Did TSMC lose another foundry customer?

Did TSMC lose another foundry customer?
By Semiconductor Business News
June 19, 2003 (1:23 a.m. EST)
URL: http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20030618S0036

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Did another foundry customer defect from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (TSMC)?

It remains unclear. But as expected, Analog Devices Inc. today (June 18) officially announced that its next-generation, TigerSHARC digital signal processor (DSP) line will incorporate embedded DRAM from IBM Corp.'s Microelectronics Division (see June 17 story ).

At the same time, IBM will make the device on a foundry basis for ADI--a move that possibly represents a change in direction for the DSP house.

In the past, ADI has primarily relied on TSMC for its foundry requirements. TSMC is expected to remain ADI's foundry partner, although IBM has suddenly made some inroads in the high-profile account.

Responding to the announcement, a spokesman from TSMC late Wednesday indicated that the Taiwan company remains ADI's main foundry, and denied it lost the embed ded DRAM foundry business to IBM. "We didn't compete for that business," according to the spokesman.

He said TSMC no longer offers an embedded DRAM foundry process, saying it backed away from that business two years ago. This was because the embedded DRAM foundry market is a low-volume business, the spokesman told SBN.

Still, after only one year in the foundry business, IBM is taking small bites out of TSMC's customer base. Recently, three TSMC foundry customers--Broadcom, Nvidia, and Qualcomm--have recently announced manufacturing deals with IBM.

IBM has also announced a foundry arrangement with Xilinx Corp. Previously, Taiwan's United Microelectronics Corp. was Xilinx' sole foundry. IBM also has a foundry deal with another UMC customer--Advanced Micro Devices Inc.