Samsung is believed to be the manufacturing partner for Google’s TPU AI chips, specifically for its input/output (I/O) die. And now we’re hearing rumors that Samsung could be outsourcing orders for this part of the chip.
While Google is using TSMC for the TPU compute tile, the I/O portion is being manufactured by Samsung, or at least it’s Samsung’s responsibility.
These days, chips typically feature an I/O die as well as other components like compute and memory tiles. The compute and memory tiles are responsible for processing data, while the I/O portion is responsible for transferring their computations to the motherboard. Google’s next-generation TPU compute tile will be fabricated by TSMC through its 1.4nm chip technology, while Samsung is responsible for the I/O.
Samsung is interested in outsourcing the I/O, also known as the back-end design, of Google’s next TPU chip, which is being called ‘icefish’. This report is coming out of Korea, which also claims that Samsung’s foundry business is dealing with a high volume of orders right now, and that’s why they are looking to outsource this portion. Samsung is reportedly also manufacturing chips for Anthropic, a big competitor to Google. And the 2nm orders that TSMC cannot fill, are being redirected to Samsung.
Google is also using MediaTek for its new TPUs
On top of using TSMC and Samsung for manufacturing its new TPU AI chips, Google is also using MediaTek. It has been in the news a lot lately due to its packaging technology. MediaTek is apparently using Intel’s EMIIB-T technology for the TPU packaging, while analysts believe that the eventual adoption will depend on the packaging technology’s yield.
These AI chips are going to go into Google’s data centers and will run Gemini as well as other AI products. Don’t get this confused with the Tensor chip that is inside the Google Pixel smartphones, even though they share the same name.
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