We’ve heard reports all year about the idea of Apple moving processor fabrication to TSMC from Samsung although the reports all said that’d happen in 2014 for the A8. We’re starting to hear now, however, some analysts report that the A7 chip in the iPhone 5S may actually be from TSMC, not Samsung.
The standard iPhone lineup has changed with the addition of the iPhone 5C – now a new device is just $99 on a two year contract. This means that the iPhone 5S now is a very premium handset and possibly at the cutting edge. It’ll also have lower sales than the 5C, so Apple could use TSMC for the A7 as a test to see if it could handle the production of all of Apple’s chips.
The A7 is also a completely new chip, capable of 64-bit and has over a billion transistors. If Apple moved to TSMC for the A7, it’ll have hidden the 64-bit feature from Samsung, which might’ve tried to make its latest devices 64-bit in response.
