Tape-out Cost and Wafer Price
The tape-out mask cost of 40nm is about US$800,000-900,000, and the wafer cost is about US$3,000-4,000 per piece. Including IP merge, it costs at least seven to eight million yuan.
A tape-out of the 28nm process costs US$2 million;
A tape-out of the 14nm process costs US$5 million;
A 7nm process tapeout costs US$15 million;
5nm process tape-out costs US$47.25 million per time;
Taping out the 3nm process may cost hundreds of millions of dollars;
Among the two main tape-out costs, mask and wafer, mask is the most expensive.
The more advanced the process node, the more mask layers are required; because each layer of "mask" corresponds to one application of photoresist, exposure, development, etching and other operations, involving material costs, instrument depreciation costs , these costs need to be paid by fabless customers!
The 28nm process requires about 40 layers,
The 14nm process requires 60 masks;
The 7nm process requires 80 or even hundreds of masks.
One layer of mask costs 80,000 US dollars, so the chip must be mass-produced to reduce costs!
Take the 40nm MCU process as an example: if 10 wafers are produced, the cost of each wafer is (900,000+4000*10)/10=94,000 US dollars; if 10,000 wafers are produced, the cost of each wafer is (900,000+4000* 10000)/10000=4090 US dollars. The larger the wafer quantity, the cheaper it is, and different manufacturers have different quotations.
The latest quotation given by TSMC this year: the most advanced 3nm process, US$19,865 per wafer, equivalent to about 14.2w in RMB.
