An agreement is much better than a battle, especially at a time when the semiconductor industry is fighting to survive. Due to this last Monday Intel announced a partnership with TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.). The agreement is related to the Atom processor: TSMC engineers could have access to the chip design of this low cost processor. The Atom processor has been developed from Intel alone and it is used in the netbooks (low cost laptops) and devices like smartphones and MID (Mobile Internet Devices).

In the future graphics and Internet connectivity could be included in the Atom processor, pushing it into embedded devices and consumer electronics. As a result of the agreement, TSMC customers will get details of Atom's design and they will be able to design chips based on its core. Anyway Intel will not transfer Atom's manufacturing process technology to TSMC, so any chips resulting from the agreement will be manufactured by Intel. TSMC has connections to many consumer and lower-end products, like smartphones and embedded devices, so, thanks to the agreement, Intel will have access to this big market. In the meantime Intel is pushing the new 32-nm process technology that will allow the company to produce faster and more integrated chips.

Source: Intel and TSMC sign an agreement
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