📈⏳ The broken bargain of Moore’s Law

The physics has been slowing for years. The economics may be catching up.

This post originally appeared in Exponential View.

“The deal – the specific economic bargain that made the digital economy possible – is bending.”

A couple of weeks ago, Bloomberg reported that TSMC had no plans to use ASML’s newest chipmaking machine – High-NA EUV (EUV stands for extreme ultraviolet) – through 2029, citing cost as the issue. This may be a big deal.

Moore’s Law was always two things: a physical observation about transistor density, and an economic bargain about cost. The physics has been slowing for years.

Is TSMC’s hesitation the first sign that the economics are reversing, too?

Source: ASML