Intel pushes 18A-P into risk production to prove its manufacturing pitch

Intel said on Tuesday that the next iteration of its 18A manufacturing process, designated 18A-P, has entered risk production, the stage at which a chipmaker runs the process on real hardware to prove it works before committing to mass volumes.

The announcement is less about a single chip than about a promise Intel has spent years struggling to keep: that it can still build leading-edge silicon on schedule, on American soil, and sell that capability to other companies.

The figures Intel put on 18A-P are incremental rather than dramatic, which is what you would expect from a refined version of an existing node. Compared with the base 18A process, the company says 18A-P delivers 9% higher performance at the same power, or 18% lower power at the same speed, along with better thermals and more design flexibility.

Those are the trade-offs that matter to the customers Intel most wants, the...

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