TSMC's A16 Process Said to Enter Mass Production in Q4

According to media reports, TSMC has completed the development and validation of its 1.6nm (A16) process and is set to begin mass production in the fourth quarter of this year. A16 employs Super Power Rail (SPR) technology, which moves the power delivery system from the front side of the wafer to the back side, supplying power directly to the source and drain of each transistor through dedicated vertical backside contacts (VB). Compared with N2P, A16 delivers an 8%–10% improvement in computing speed at the same power consumption, and its chip integration density also increases by 8% to 10%. At the same speed, power consumption can be reduced by 15%–20%. As a result, A16 is regarded as a process well-suited for semiconductors that require complex signal routing and high power delivery, such as AI accelerators and high-performance computing (HPC).