As we all know, in the end of the month Intel is going to start mass production of Pentium 4 processors from 12inch wafers (see this news story). Actually, this fact should reduce the chips cost thanks to the increase of number of chips per wafer. However, in reality everything looks much more complicated.

Firstly, 12-inch substrates cost more, and secondly, the wafer manufacturing appears more expensive. The preliminary estimates show that the cost of one 8-inch wafer made of regular substrates from silicon dioxide with 0.13micron manufacturing process costs between $1900 and $2250, while the production cost of 12-inch wafer lies between $2900 and $3300. Note that 12-inch wafer allow you to get 2.5 times more dies than an 8-inch one.

The benefits of 12-inch wafers are evident, however, we should also bear in mind that the chips yields in case of a new wafer and new production technology applied should be much lower than those provided by the well-practiced combination of 8-inch and 0.13micron. No wonder that Intel is regarding the possibility to use SOI substrates costing much more than their standard silicon dioxide brothers with a grain of skepticism.

But these are just temporary hardships. With the time, the substrates should go cheaper, the technology will be debugged and as a result the chips yields will grow up. so, Intel still has its benefits all ahead.