Date: 26/02/2017

14nm FinFET expansion, 45nm RF SOI announced by Globalfoundries

The leading semiconductor foundry service provider Globalfoundries announced expansion of 14nm FinFET capacity by an additional 20 percent at its Fab 8 facility in New York with the new production capabilities to come online in the beginning of 2018. Globalfoundries said the development of 7nm and extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography is under progress with 7nm production planned for Q2 2018.

Globalfoundries also plans to build 22nm FD-SOI capacity at is Fab 1 facility in Dresden to meet demand for the Internet of Things (IoT), smartphone processors, automotive electronics, and other battery-powered wirelessly connected applications, growing the overall fab capacity by 40 percent by 2020. Globalfoundries is developing 12FDX technology, with customer product tape-outs expected to begin in the middle of 2018.

In the hot semiconductor market of China, Globalfoundries and the Chengdu municipality have formed a partnership to build a 300mm chip fab. The semiconductor wafer fabtwo begin production of mainstream process technologies in 2018 and also the commercially available 22FDX process technology, with volume production expected to start in 2019.

Globalfoundries increased its 40nm Singapore's fab capacity at its 300mm fab by 35 percent, while also enabling more 180nm production on its 200mm manufacturing lines. The company will also add new capabilities to produce its industry-leading RF-SOI technology.

When it comes to RF SOI. Globalfoundries has made available of its 45nm RF SOI (45RFSOI). Globalfoundries, says this is the first such 300mm RF silicon foundry solutions for millimeter-wave (mmWave) beam forming applications in future 5G base stations and smartphones.

Globalfoundries’ 45RFSOI is optimized for beam forming front-end modules (FEMs), with back-end-of-line (BEOL) features including thick copper and dielectrics that enable improved RF performance for LNAs, switches and power amplifiers. The devices made out of this process technology is used in internet broadband low earth orbit (LEO) satellites and 5G FEMs.

The RF functionalities such as integrated mmWave radio front ends, antenna phased array subsystems, and high performance radio transceivers can be designed using this process consuming less power. RF IC chips offering low latency, higher EIRP, and high resolution antenna scanning for ubiquitous coverage and continuous connectivity can be designed using 45nm RF SOI.

Globalfoundries said its 45RFSOI incorporates a substrate resistivity of greater than 40 ohm-cm that maximizes the quality factor for passive devices, reduces parasitic capacitances and minimizes disparity in phase and voltage swing. The technology supports operation in mmWave spectrum from 24GHz to 100GHz band, 5x more than 4G operating frequencies.

“Skyworks is pleased to be collaborating with GLOBALFOUNDRIES to drive innovation in millimeter wave solutions,” said Peter Gammel, chief technology officer for Skyworks Solutions, Inc. “GF’s leadership in advanced foundry technology, as exemplified by the 45RFSOI process, is enabling Skyworks to create RF solutions that will revolutionize emerging 5G markets and further advance the deployment of highly integrated RF front-ends for evolving mmWave applications.”

"5G is expected to become the dominant worldwide mobile communications standard of the next decade and will usher in a new paradigm in mobility, multi-GBps data rates, security, low latency, network availability and high quality of service (QoS),” said Bami Bastani, senior vice president of RF Business Unit at GLOBALFOUNDRIES. "Utilizing our long history of SOI leadership and high-volume manufacturing, we are excited to release our most advanced RF SOI technology that will help play a critical role in bringing 5G devices and networks to reality.”

GF’s 45RFSOI technology uses partially-depleted SOI technology and is manufactured at the GF’s 300mm production line in East Fishkill, N.Y. with enough capacity available to support the demand.

The company is made available the process design kits.