Samsung Taps TSMC for NVHBM Base Die Production

Samsung is reportedly collaborating with the world's largest chip maker, TSMC, to secure a base die supply for NVIDIA's newly announced NVHBM memory standard. NVHBM integrates the controller into the 3D HBM stack, significantly enhancing performance and efficiency. Compared to standard HBM4E, NVIDIA claims up to 30% more memory bandwidth, 15% lower HBM power consumption, and up to 25% more usable compute die area on the processing unit. In simple terms, NVHBM builds on the standard HBM architecture with base die customization, but there are a few strict requirements that must be fulfilled before mass production.

Interestingly, one of the requirements is that NVIDIA's base die in the NVHBM must be manufactured on TSMC's 3 nm node. Even though Samsung has its own 3 nm production lines, NVIDIA's IP is optimized for TSMC's nodes. This forces Samsung to collaborate with TSMC and become a customer, despite having its own production capabilities. However, this arrangement is only for the base die, which integrates directly next to the compute tiles. For memory, Samsung will continue using its sixth-generation 10 nm processes, which are typical for HBM manufacturing. This means that only part of the production will be handled by TSMC. Read full story