TECH NEWS – Nearly a decade and a half ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook was dissatisfied with what Intel was able to do, and the founder of the world’s most important chipmaker, TSMC, has told us! 

Dr. Morris Chang, founder of TSMC, told the world in his autobiography book what happened in 2011. The meeting between Cook and Chang was about TSMC becoming a supplier to Apple. Cook was unhappy with the manufacturing capacity in his contract with Intel, so he wanted to make a deal with Chang’s company. It worked: TSMC is the primary supplier for most iPhones, MacBooks, and iPads, although there was a brief period when Apple used a dual strategy for a few iPhones, but Samsung’s quality problems meant that TSMC eventually stayed with the Cupertino company. 

As a result, Apple not only controls the chip design of its smartphones, but also the design of its computers. For the latter, the company used to rely on Intel, but is now one of the first to get the latest manufacturing technologies from TSMC. The iPhone was the first device to use A-series chips (the iPad, for example, came later). Until the A8 chip (which powers the iPhone 6), Apple relied on Samsung. The 2014 A8 was built on a 22-nanometer process and manufactured by TSMC alongside Samsung, but from then on the Taiwanese company gradually took over. 

Chang also said in his book that Apple’s Chief Operating Officer Jeff Williams played a big role in arranging the meeting with Cook, who and Chang were connected through Foxconn founder Terry Gou. Gou, by the way, is a cousin of Chang’s wife. Foxconn is also one of Apple’s main suppliers for the iPhone, and it played a role in the company’s decision to move production overseas. Chang and Williams had dinner together in Taiwan after Gou introduced them. At that time, Williams told them that Apple was considering a chip manufacturing deal with Intel, which put the TSMC-Apple talks on hold for two weeks, and Chang flew to the U.S. at that time. 

Chang and Cook had dinner together at Apple’s headquarters, and here Cook assured the TSMC founder that he had nothing to fear, and while Cook did not elaborate on Intel’s costs or returns, he did note that Intel was not a good supplier… 

Source: WCCFTech