IBM forms alliance around 32nm chip technology

MANILA, Philippines -- IBM has formed an alliance with semiconductor firms, including AMD and Samsung, to advance its 32-nanometer chip technology to rival that of Intel.

The alliance also includes "joint development partners" Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing Ltd., Freescale and Infineon, according to an IBM statement.

This new technology involves a material called “high-k/metal gate” in producing next- generation 32 nanometer (or 32nm) microprocessors.

IBM said chips produced using this new technique will support a range of applications -- from low power computer microchips targeted at wireless and other consumer devices to high-performance microprocessors for games and enterprise computing.

This new approach to implementing high-k/metal gate will be available to IBM alliance members in the second half of 2009.

In January, IBM and its research partners (including Sony and Toshiba) introduced the "high-k/metal gate” technique as the basis for a long-sought improvement to the transistor -- the tiny on/off switch that serves as the basic building block of virtually all microchips made today.

Using high-k/metal gate, IBM said the size of a chip has been decreased by almost half while saving 45 percent in power use and increasing performance by 30 percent, based on tests conducted at IBM semicon facilities in New York.

Intel has previously announced its own roadmap to 32nm chips by 2008.
Source: inquirer.net