The past few days must have been quite challenging for Taiwan, as the nation was recently hit by an earthquake — the largest in 25 years — which also disrupted TSMC’s fab. However, despite hurdles, Apple’s major chipmaker, Taiwanese Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC), seems to be on track with 2nm process chips.
According to a report from DigiTimes, TSMC may begin trial runs of 2nm chips later this year, followed by small-scale production and ramping up to mass production by late 2025. This timing suggests that the A19 processor in the 2025 iPhone 17 Pro could be the inaugural 2nm chip, potentially followed by a 2nm M4 chip in MacBook Pro and iMac models.
More importantly, it comes hot on the heels of a previous report from the same publication that reported that TSMC offered an exclusive look at 2nm processor chips to Apple in December. The same report mentioned that Samsung and Intel don’t seem to be left far behind, too, further suggesting that Samsung could pull the price card to attract giants such as NVIDIA, it may not be able to compete with the likes of TSMC, according to a Dalton Investments analyst, mentioned in Ars Technica report.
In addition, TSMC is reported to be advancing its production process beyond 2nm to 1.4nm (internally called A14), with production of these chips expected by 2027. TSMC also secured funding from the U.S. government through the CHIPS Act, enabling the construction of three fabrication plants in Arizona.
As has been the case with Apple, the iPhone 15 Pro line was the first to feature the 3nm process chips, and the iPhone 17 Pro line could be the first to house a 2nm process chip under the hood. Of course, the bottom line is that if everything goes well, and at the time, everything seems on track.