TSMC's N3 Node Becomes Hottest Ticket in Tech, Creating Opportunity for Intel

TSMC's N3 node has become increasingly popular among top tech companies, including Nvidia and Google. The largest AI chip designers are converging on this process simultaneously, with sales expected to soar. However, TSMC's wafer capacity for the N3 process is already tight and may remain so for multiple years.

This creates an opportunity for Intel, which is betting on its 18A and 14A processes to win over AI customers. The company has announced a €5 billion investment in upgrading existing facilities at its Leixlip campus in Ireland, which will increase capacity for its Xeon processors built on the Intel 3 process.

Nvidia's next-generation Rubin GPUs are moving from 4nm to 3nm, while Google's latest TPUs are already on N3 and expected to remain there. Meanwhile, a growing number of AI CPUs from Nvidia, Amazon, Microsoft, and Arm are converging on the same node.