Well, that would be good news for users.

Or miners.

One of the concerns is that TSMC has to meet the enormous demand from Apple. Apple is said to have secured full 5nm production capacity last summer, and TSMC's 3nm node is also said to be predominantly intended for Apple.

It's hard for the others to compete with Apple. Apple has the most loyal customers on Earth, so Apple can easily pay more for chip production capacity and simply dump the costs directly on its own product prices. The customers will pay without asking any questions.

How about restoring own production and getting back to semiconductor business?

Hilbert Hagedoorn:

GPUs and CPUs are fairly hard to get due to shortages. The biggest foundry is of course TSMC, who increased wafer prices last month as they do have a bit of a monopolized position at the smaller fabri... AMD looking to spread chip production to Samsung

amd using samsung ? but that's the dumbest thing nvidia ever did according to YT "experts"... [youtube=tXb-8feWoOE] turns out you can't sell what you can't make. I am shocked. tsmc is having to handle too many order from every major chip maker,who could've predicted that intel will eventually be using them for cpus and gpus too,they've only been struggling for 3 years.

Kosmoz:

There is enough info by now to know that the rx 6000 series are not really good for mining, as AMD said, they made them especially for gaming and to not be very good for mining... contrary to nvidia's GPUs, this time around. A 3070 has the same mining efficiency as an rx 6800 xt, just google it.

Good to know and may this info determine miners to look elsewhere. However, scalpers are still an issue that will not go away soon. Sadly.

So...they go Nvidia road to the Samsung oven. TSMC is literally overwhelmed by demand - even auto makers have now problems because there is a a lack of chips for car computers and they stopped production of cars in some cases... I hope that 2021 will not be like 2020 with "out of stock" and obscene prices...I hope....

Having all producing their chips to one global manufacturer sounds like a single point of failure. All this TSMC customers overloading the lines could lead to a "fire" or a "flood". God forbid that this happens. One can imagine what prices one can pay in 2021.

Could also be pricing as to why they are expanding with Samsung.

Collaborating with Samsung is surely fine and such, but I am a bit concerned how this is going to affect the current CPU models when they're suddenly mixed with TSMC and Samsung. I mean like, there is going to be a Ryzen 5900X conducted by TSMC and a Ryzen 5900X from Samsung ? And how transparent will those two be separated, will owners or potential buyers be able to know whether the specific model is conducted by Samsung/TSMC ? And how are they both separated in terms of Support for like BIOS and Drivers ? And lastly how is this going to affect performance-wise in both terms of overclocking and stock-clocks ?

TalentX:

Collaborating with Samsung is surely fine and such, but I am a bit concerned how this is going to affect the current CPU models when they're suddenly mixed with TSMC and Samsung. I mean like, there is going to be a Ryzen 5900X conducted by TSMC and a Ryzen 5900X from Samsung ? And how transparent will those two be separated, will owners or potential buyers be able to know whether the specific model is conducted by Samsung/TSMC ? And how are they both separated in terms of Support for like BIOS and Drivers ? And lastly how is this going to affect performance-wise in both terms of overclocking and stock-clocks ?

All those are non issue for the market, is just some tech lover expert problem that will be able to read from the serial number what and where. I highly doubt that any chip produced in samsung will still be the 5000 serie, probably that will be for different products or segments.

Kaarme:

It's hard for the others to compete with Apple. Apple has the most loyal customers on Earth, so Apple can easily pay more for chip production capacity and simply dump the costs directly on its own product prices. The customers will pay without asking any questions.

True. And they have so much money lying around that they can simply pay whatever TSMC asks, leaving everyone else behind...

This is good news for further market penetration and healthier competition. Globalfoundries has made a mistake for opting out of 7nm game. . .

coth:

How about restoring own production and getting back to semiconductor business?

hmm how ? buying back glofo ? Samsung would not sell their foundries for sure TSMC and intel no way ....and glofo is so far behind by now even if they break threw every challenge on shrinking the lithography it is still a multi billion investment to even "try " Billions most likely amd can not afford to invest yet . Even more if they start from 0 , well that's my couch tech thoughts i am no expert or have experience on semiconductors .

Good they are diversifying their fabs and increasing production amounts, particularly as new players are rapidly entering the game https://www.theburnin.com/industry/tianshu-zhixin-debuts-gpgpu-2021-01-20/

Kaarme:

It's hard for the others to compete with Apple. Apple has the most loyal customers on Earth, so Apple can easily pay more for chip production capacity and simply dump the costs directly on its own product prices. The customers will pay without asking any questions.

Because Apple products are not really "products" - they are fashion statements! 🙄

coth:

How about restoring own production and getting back to semiconductor business?

If AMD developed their own fabs like Intel, then perhaps... but that would take time. Going to GLOFO for example is not an option. GLOFO is (as others mentioned) exceedingly well behind other fabs (they dropped the ball with 7nm first time around due to expenses, which was one of the reasons AMD tore themselves out of that contract with some fines and stipulations (which was a good decision) that they need to continue placing 'some' orders from GLOFO by a certain year... possibly late 2021 or 2022... but as far as that goes, I think the only thing AMD has at GLOFO is IO manufacturing, nothing else as of this time). GLOFO was becoming a crutch for AMD (who were literally 'chained' to them), so it was a good thing Lisa Su managed to get out of that mess. If GLOFO re-established itself somehow, maybe... unless someone else buys them and upgrades their fab facilities to handle 5nm and 3nm (for starters). Going to Samsung is not a bad decision. If TSMC is overflown with orders (which they are), then AMD going to Samsung is not a bad idea, as Samsung could potentially pick up some slack from TSMC (probably not a huge amount, but it would be enough to get things going)... and its possible AMD may find other fabs to outsource the work to... or make their own (as I mentioned) eventually.

Since GF pulled the plug on new tech research TSMC has cemented leadership. This obviously is bad news for everyone, I still can't understand how a company simply stop investment.

there is a reason this rumor is coming out of S. Korea... but not besides Samsung that is. this is drum beating for sales, period. notice this is after earnings call(s) which means this is no news at all. AMD knows full well what it costs to be first (or second... or third) in line for fab production, which includes the ES time leading up to it. whether it was their foundry or not. no-one knows Intel's heartache better than AMD who was in worse position with rotten financials (at the time). Samsung needs to show better yields than they are at 5n. TSMC is still wildly outproducing them and still is meeting all iPhone 12 and M1 production goals with nary a hiccup. so not even the Samsung sourced 5n product is hitting the US shores. and after repeated issues with the refinement of ARM licenses they've yet to be a technical leader unlike TSMC. don't get me wrong this is big science and Samsung is in far better position than third tier. it's a very solid second

I guess it makes sense, since the availability of product is nonexistent. And there aren't basically any other options besides TSMC and Samsung. However, if I'm not mistaken Samsung just has worse yields which would make the final product more expensive. So if they go with Samsung for some of their chips, it could lead to higher availability, but I don't see them dropping in price significantly. AMD could start their own production, but even if they decided to do so now it would be years until they can compete and those years would require many tens of billions in investment. Something that AMD probably doesn't have.