Oliver Haslam on August 4, 2022, 7:14 pm

Apple’s A17 And M3 Chip Production Could Be Affected As TSMC Scales Down 3nm Chip Production Amid Intel Delays

Apple uses Taiwanese chipmaker TSMC for all of its chip needs and now a new report claims that the company is scaling back its initial plans to be able to build 3nm chips starting next year.

According to data shared by TrendForce, Intel had planned to outsource the production of its upcoming Meteor Lake tGPU chipset to TSMC, with mass production initially planned for the first half of this year.

That was then postponed with the first half of 2023 being planned. However, that timeline has once again slipped towards the end of next year.

Mass production of this product was initially planned for 2H22 but was later postponed to 1H23 due to product design and process verification issues. Recently, the product’s mass production schedule has been postponed again to the end of 2023 for some reason, nigh completely cancelling 3nm production capacity originally booked in 2023 with only a marginal amount of wafer input remaining for engineering verification.

This move will also affect Apple, with the company now set to be one of the few that will require TSMC to move to a 3nm manufacturing process. Intel’s delay has caused TSMC to scale back its development plans for the technology.

Apple will reportedly require a 3nm manufacturing process for its A17 Bionic chip, a chip that is expected to power the 2023 iPhone 15 devices. It’s also thought that the upcoming M2 Pro Mac-based chip will also be based on these same technology based on other reports.