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Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC) has denied engaging in talks with Intel regarding any sort of investment or partnership. According to the Taipei Times, the company disputed a recent Wall Street Journal report saying that Intel solicited a joint venture with the fab. The WSJ news, based on the publications’ sources, also indicated that Intel was reaching out to Apple to explore ways in which these tech companies can collaborate. All this comes close on the heels of Nvidia buying $5 billion worth of Intel stock, alongside the announcement of a joint development of an x86 RTX SOC.
There have previously been reports of an Intel and TSMC partnership, but the latter has always denied this. The embattled Intel, whose shaky financial situation was revealed last year, has been on the hunt for partners and investors recently. Just last month, SoftBank invested $2 billion in the company, while the U.S. government released the remaining $5.7 billion it had yet to receive from its CHIPS and Science Act grant in exchange for a 10% stake.
This massive cash inflow is crucial for the company, allowing it to increase spending on investments and capital expenditure. Aside from that, Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan has been slashing costs, including reducing the company’s workforce by over 12,000 personnel — effectively gutting its personnel numbers by around 20%. He also divested some divisions, choosing to focus the company on its core competencies.
Despite all this, Intel still has a long way to go before it can get back in the green. It has long been working on its next-generation chips, but has had trouble with the yield of its 18A node. Tan also said that the company might cancel the Intel 14A and its following leading-edge nodes if it cannot win a big customer for these products. Aside from that, the company projects that its foundry business won’t break even until 2027, which will coincide with the arrival of 14A — if that ever happens.
Intel has also been facing issues on the consumer side. Analysts say that uptake of the company’s Lunar Lake processors has been slow, particularly because buyers aren’t interested in AI chips. The company is even raising prices of its last-generation Raptor Lake processors because of increased demand for the “outdated” chip.
These complications might be a big reason why TSMC does not want to entangle itself with Intel’s affairs. More than that, it likely doesn’t want to work with a chipmaker with its own foundry, which could potentially be a competitor. And unless it gets massive upside, whether in technology or geopolitics, it’s unlikely that we’ll see any sort of investment or strategic partnership between these two companies.
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