Dive Brief:
- GlobalFoundries and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. have entered a $2 billion, multiyear manufacturing agreement to establish a U.S.-based supply of silicon interposers for TSMC's chip-on-wafer-on-substrate packaging system.
- Under the agreement, GlobalFoundries will provide TSMC with manufacturing services and fabrication capacity at GlobalFoundries’ Malta, New York, facility. Production is set to ramp there during the first half of 2028.
- According to a news release, the agreement has an initial term of five years and will support growing demand for high-performance computing and artificial intelligence systems, while also providing enough capacity to meet higher demand over time.
Dive Insight:
This is the latest in a series of deals GlobalFoundries has inked this year to take advantage of surging demand for semiconductor manufacturing and data center buildouts. The company previously reached agreements with the U.S. Department of Commerce, the Department of Energy, Renesas Electronics Corp. and others.
TSMC has also invested heavily in the U.S. semiconductor market. In July, the White House and the Commerce Department announced that TSMC plans to spend an incremental $100 billion on four additional facilities in Arizona, bringing its total U.S. investment to $265 billion across 12 sites.
GlobalFoundries will expand its Malta facility’s capacity and “establish the first U.S.-based source of silicon interposers supporting advanced packaging technologies, including embedded deep trench capacitor components,” according to its Oct. 2 news release. The added capacity will help GlobalFoundries deliver advanced packaging solutions across multiple product generations, the company said.
“Advanced packaging is becoming increasingly critical to delivering the performance, power efficiency and scale required for next-generation AI systems,” said Ed Kaste, senior vice president of GlobalFoundries’ complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor business, in a statement.
“By providing manufacturing service using GF’s trusted U.S. manufacturing footprint, we are creating a secure, scalable source of essential advanced-packaging elements that will help customers accelerate innovation and strengthen the semiconductor supply chain,” he added.
TSMC’s CoWoS advanced 2.5D packaging technology allows integration of multiple systems on a chip and high-bandwidth memory stacks, according to the company. As a result, TSMC said it provides a foundation for high-performance computing and AI products.
In August, GlobalFoundries reported $1.79 billion in second quarter revenue, up 9% sequentially. The results were driven in part by 60% year-over-year growth in the communications infrastructure and data center end market.
In July, TSMC announced Q2 revenue of $40.2 billion, a more than 33% increase year over year and up 12% from the previous quarter.
“Our business in the second quarter was supported by strong demand for our leading-edge process technologies,” TSMC Senior VP and CFO Wendell Huang said in a statement. “Moving into third quarter 2026, we expect our business to be supported by continued strong demand for our leading-edge process technologies, including the steep ramp-up of our 2-nanometer technology.”
