NVIDIA and TSMC Use NVIDIA AI and CUDA-X in Semiconductor Workloads

NVIDIA said TSMC is using NVIDIA accelerated computing and AI as part of work tied to semiconductor design and manufacturing. The effort reflects a shift toward applying computation and models across stages that include lithography, process controls, and inspection as chips move to more advanced nodes.

The companies described a set of computing needs tied to moving designs from design into high-volume production, including computational lithography, transistor simulation, process control, and wafer inspection. NVIDIA said AI systems were expected to support work spanning physics, images, and other applications, with goals stated in the release including speed, energy efficiency, yield, and operational productivity.

NVIDIA said TSMC used NVIDIA CUDA-X libraries and AI models on NVIDIA GPUs. The release cited GPU-accelerated computational lithography via NVIDIA cuLitho; transistor, equipment, and process simulation via NVIDIA cuEST; advanced process control using NVIDIA cuML for analytics on NVIDIA GPUs; and fab operations optimization using CUDA-powered computation on NVIDIA H200 GPUs.

For inspection and planning, NVIDIA said TSMC used NVIDIA Metropolis and NVIDIA TAO Toolkit for vision AI to improve defect classification at nanometer scale, while reducing repeated labeling and retraining as conditions and defect types change. The release also said TSMC was exploring NVIDIA Omniverse libraries to build FabTwin, described as a virtual fab environment for evaluating process tool layouts and simulation workflows, with the intent to test scenarios digitally before physical implementation. “NVIDIA and TSMC have worked together for nearly three decades to push the limits of computing,” Jensen Huang said. “TSMC is bringing NVIDIA AI and accelerated computing into the fab itself, tackling some of the world’s most complex design and manufacturing challenges with simulation, optimization and AI to improve speed, efficiency and yield for the next generation of chips.” C.C. Wei said, “TSMC and NVIDIA have built a long-standing partnership rooted in advancing the technologies that make the next generation of computing possible,” adding that TSMC was using NVIDIA accelerated computing and AI across fab operations optimization, lithography, process control and inspection.