Apple halts production of "M2 Series" SoC chips for MacBooks

Apple has confirmed that production of the "M2 Series" of System-on-Chip (SoC) for MacBooks was completely halted in January and February.

Some production resumed in March, but was found to be half of what it was the previous year. This is the first time that Apple has stopped producing chips. M2 chips are installed and sold in Apple's MacBook Pro, Air and Mac mini series products.

According to outsourced semiconductor packaging and testing (OSAT) industry news on the 3rd, Taiwan's TSMC did not ship 5nm process M2 chip wafer processing products to OSAT in January and February. It is believed that this is due to the decline in demand for MacBook, Apple requested to stop production. M2 chips are eventually processed through the general flip chip packaging process, unlike the A series chips using fan-out wafer-level packaging (FO-WLP) packaging, TSMC called InFO (Integrated Fan Out). After TSMC completes the entire process, the processed wafers are sent to Amkor or Stats Chippack's Korean facility for packaging. The stock does not exist in January or February. Although wafers have been coming in since March, a person familiar with the matter said it is only half of what it was last year.

As a result, M2 package stock makers have also had to temporarily stop stock. solder balls for M2 are supplied by Accuracy of Taiwan. The TIM (Thermal Interface Material) material was supplied by WACKER of Germany. This material is made of a material with high thermal conductivity. It is applied on the outside of the package and is used to transfer heat to the heat sink. The underfill material was supplied by Namix of Japan. Bottom fill is a material that fills the gap between the core of a semiconductor chip and a conductive bump between the substrate. Its main purpose is to insulate and protect the connector. The package cover (lead) is supplied by Youngil Precision of Korea. The adhesive material that attaches the lid to the substrate is supplied by Henkel of Germany.

An industry source said, "It is not possible to do other packaging work on the M2 line, the so-called 'apple line' mounted on the Amcona chip package." He explained.

Apple's MacBook sales slump had been predicted. "The PC market is facing a very challenging situation," Apple CEO Tim Cook said during a conference call on Feb. 2 for the first quarter of fiscal 2023 (October to December 2022). I think we have a competitive advantage in silicon (M2 chips, etc.), but it's going to be very difficult in the near term." Apple's first quarter Mac PC business revenue was $7.7 billion. That's a 30 percent decline compared to the same period last year. Related business results are also expected to decline in the second quarter due to chip production outages in January and February.