SK Chairman Chey, TSMC's Wei discuss AI chip cooperation

SK Chairman Chey Taewon, left, and TSMC Chairman C.C. Wei shake hands on Thursday at the TSMC's headquarters in Taipei. [SK]

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won and TSMC Chairman and CEO C.C. Wei met to discuss and solidify their cooperation in the AI chip segment in Taipei almost two months after the announcement of SK hynix's partnership with the Taiwanese manufacturer.

The two leaders discussed Thursday the progress and details of the ongoing partnership, under which TSMC contract-manufactures SK hynix’s high bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, essential to Nvidia’s key GPUs, including its A100 and H100.

Under the agreement announced in April, the two vowed to deploy TSMC’s advanced manufacturing process in the base die of HBM4 chips, which are set to be mass-produced starting in 2025 — one year faster than the timeline that was initially revealed in February.

SK hynix has previously used proprietary technology in its base dies up to the generation known as HBM3E. It will adopt TSMC's advanced logic process for HBM4's base die, which will enable the company to produce customized HBM for clients seeking a specific performance and power efficiency.

“Let's lay the foundation for the AI era that is helpful for mankind,” Chey was quoted as saying in a statement released by SK.

SK hynix CEO Kwak Noh-jung also attended the meeting.

Chey also met Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang back in April to discuss the two firms' cooperation on HBM.

BY PARK EUN-JEE [park.eunjee@joongang.co.kr]