Intel lifted as Elon Musk says his Terafab will use its latest chipmaking tech

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

Elon Musk has said his companies will use Intel’s latest technology in their “Terafab” project, giving a boost to the US chipmaker’s manufacturing turnaround.

Intel shares rose about 3 per cent in after-hours trading on Wednesday after Musk said Tesla and SpaceX would deploy its “14A” manufacturing process in their giant semiconductor facility.

Intel has spent billions of dollars attempting to catch up to Taiwan’s TSMC to offer the most advanced chipmaking technology. But it has yet to publicly confirm it has secured any customers for its 14A technology, which is still being tested by potential Big Tech clients.

The endorsement from Musk gives Intel a much-needed vote of confidence in the new technology. Analysts say the Terafab, if completed, would eclipse the entire current global output of the chip industry.

“We plan to use Intel’s 14A process, which is state of the art and in fact not yet totally complete,” Musk told analysts on Tesla’s earnings call on Wednesday.

The technology would be “fairly mature” by the time Terafab started operating, he added, praising Intel’s team, including chief executive Lip-Bu Tan.

Intel has struggled to land external customers for its manufacturing business — including its current-generation 18A manufacturing process — since launching a vastly expensive bid to regain its status as a world-leading chipmaker.

Intel declined to comment. The US chipmaker is due to report its own earnings on Thursday.

Tan had earlier this month announced Intel was partnering with Musk on the Terafab but revealed few details.

Musk has launched the manufacturing project with the ambition to build a full suite of chips — encompassing logic, memory and packaging — for his companies, including Tesla and SpaceX. 

The memory chip market, supplied by Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron, is experiencing a particular shortage as AI infrastructure builders seek unprecedented quantities of high-bandwidth memory.

Without the Terafab, “we don’t see a path to having enough” chips for AI given “the rate at which the industry is growing”, Musk told investors on Wednesday.