Samsung failed to win the contract with NVIDIA and now the next generation Pascal GPU will now be manufactured by TSMC using their 16nm FinFET process.
There wasn't any exact reason why NVIDIA chose TSMC over the South Korean tech giant. Samsung already demonstrated their 14nm FinFET with the A9 system on chip (SOC) by Apple in the recent weeks.
NVIDIA's Pascall GP100 chip is already on its way using the 16nm FinFET process from TSMC. The GPU-maker may start to launch the new chips as early as next year in Q2. What is so impressive about this new Pascal GPU?
There would be doubled transistor density in the new Pascal GPU. WCCFTech reported that it the Pascal chip would have up to 17 billion transistors, compared to the current Maxwell's 8 billion. By the numbers alone, it's an impressive improvement.
Samsung and TSMC were both competing with each other on who will manufacture NVIDIA's new GPU chips. NVIDIA chose the latter, leaving Samsung to look for another client as not to waste the massive investment the company put in the 14nm FinFET production process.
TSMC have previously gained another production contract from Apple. The upcoming A10 SoC from Apple will also be produced by TSMC, according to Hexus. Samsung just has a 50 percent share of the mass production contract for Apple's current A9 SoC. The new A10 chips are expected to be in the production lines next year in March, while the smartphones and tablets that will include the new chip may be launched at this same time period next year.
Samsung, while being a successful consumer electronics maker, may lack experience in the chip manufacturing sector. TSMC has been NVIDIA's partner for two decades now, and the GPU maker has been also widely successful in the video cards market.
NVIDIA turns over up to 6 trillion won each year, according to Business Korea. The number alone makes it a very attractive partner for other tech giants.
Samsung's failure is a big blow to the company. They might have missed the chance to produce the next-gen GPUs for NVIDIA, which is preferred by many computer graphics enthusiast.
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