Apple's Implications for Semiconductor
Apple's iPhone 6 alone represents at least 50K wafer starts/month plus the iPad (A8X). What could the Iphone 6S/7 & A9 mean? What about the iWatch? Apple is the technology and volume driver of the semiconductor industry so lets take a look at the broader implications.
If we do the math the A8 is 89mm2 and 8.47 X 10.5mm. Using a die calculator that means that roughly 675 die can be squeezed onto a 12 inch wafer. If we assume a 75% yield we get 500 good die per wafer (I like to use round numbers). If we take 74.5 million iPhones over three months that's about 25 million a month (or 34K an hour...but who's counting?) Divided by 500 per wafer and you get 50K wafer starts a month, give or take, depending on yield etc... That sucks up a significant chunk of a fab and doesn't leave a lot of room for other customers.
To read the full article, click here
Related Semiconductor IP
- DDR5 MRDIMM PHY and Controller
- RVA23, Multi-cluster, Hypervisor and Android
- HBM4E PHY and controller
- 64 bit RISC-V Multicore Processor with 2048-bit VLEN and AMM
- NPU IP Core for Mobile
Related Blogs
- Reducing design cycle time for semiconductor startups: The path from MVP to commercial viability
- Achronix and BigCat Wireless Collaborate for 5G/6G Wireless
- what made Apple design the A4 processor?
- Apple iPad: no LPDDR2?
Latest Blogs
- Cadence Leads the Way at PCI-SIG DevCon 2025 with Groundbreaking PCIe 7.0 Demos
- Introducing the Akeana 1000 Series Processors
- How fast a GPU do you need for your user interface?
- PCIe 6.x and 112 Gbps Ethernet: Synopsys and TeraSignal Achieve Optical Interconnect Breakthroughs
- Powering the Future of RF: Falcomm and GlobalFoundries at IMS 2025