Samsung wants to beat TSMC in 3nm manufacturing, 2nm coming in 2025

Samsung is expected to announce mass production of its next-gen 3nm semiconductors next week, meaning it would beat the industry dominator (not just leader) in TSMC.

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The next-gen 3nm chips will see Samsung building them on Gate-All-Around (GAA) technology, which allows a 45% area reduction while driving 30% more performance, and lowering power composition by 50% when compared to the existing FinFET process.

Samsung showed off its new 3nm chips to US president Joe Biden last month when the Biden administration visited Samsung's Pyeongtaek complex -- which, by the way, is the world's largest semiconductor facility -- located 43 miles (70km) away from the capital of South Korea: Seoul.

Samsung said it would be making customers' first 3nm chips in the first half of 2022, which it is moving along nicely with, as 1H 2022 ends in a few days' time. TSMC on the other hand has said it would be producing 3nm chips in the second half of 2022. Both companies will have 2nm chips in front of our eyes, and inside of our devices, by 2025.

But, does it matter?

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Well, if we take a look at it from a global foundry market share perspective: TSMC has 54% of the global semiconductor foundry market share, with Samsung having just 15% according to data from Counterpoint. TSMC has some of the largest companies in the world as their customers, including AMD, Apple, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, and many others.

Samsung kicked off by prototyping a 3nm process using GAAFET (Gate-All-Around) technology back in January 2020. Regular Planar FET is 1 Gate on channel, FinFET is 3 Gates on channel, but the newer Gate-All-Around has 4 Gates on channel. Impressive to see, but how many customers will Samsung's new 3nm node have?