In 2022, the US Congress passed the US CHIPS and Science Act to “revitalize domestic manufacturing, create good-paying American jobs, strengthen American supply chains, and accelerate the industries of the future,” according to the current administration. An underlying purpose was also to secure the development of intellectual property and technology supply for US National Security, also known as aerospace and defense (A&D) applications. This became apparent with the recent CHIPS Act grants to major US A&D suppliers, BAE Systems, Microchip, and GlobalFoundries. At first glance, one may wonder why GlobalFoundries was the first major semiconductor foundry awarded a US$1.5 billion grant, but comments by Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo during the award ceremony in Upstate New York highlighted the importance of a Trusted Foundry supporting A&D applications:
“This proposed investment would also allow GlobalFoundries to bring the manufacturing of its 22FDX chips to the U.S. for the first time ever. 22FDX chips are used in everything from auto safety systems to smart mobile devices, and their durability makes them especially important for satellites and other critical defense uses. By making 22FDX chips here, the Department of Defense will have access to GlobalFoundries’ advanced 22 nanometer technology, which hasn’t been possible until now. The DoD would have a steady, secure, domestic supply of these important chips coming from our shores, made by YOU in this room today.”
This also highlighted the importance and challenge of being a “Trusted Foundry,” which GlobalFoundries is currently the only commercial high-volume foundry with this designation.
The Importance of a Trusted Foundry and Secure Semiconductors
According to the accrediting Defense Microelectronics Activity (DMEA) division of the DoD, the Trusted Foundry, also referred to as Trusted Supplier, program “covers a broad range of technologies and is intended to support both new and legacy applications, both classified and unclassified.” This includes the design and manufacturing of integrated circuits aka semiconductors. The program adheres to the International Traffic in Arms and Arms Regulations (ITAR) and Export Administration Regulations (EAR) and involves the oversight and enforcement by several government agencies, including the Department of Defense (DoD), The Commerce Department, the Bureau of Industry and Security, The Department of State, and Homeland Security among others, which will likely require a doctorate in government studies to fully understand all of the agency interdependencies.
While comprehending the full scope of program might be challenging, the reason for the program is much easier to grasp. According to the DMEA, the purpose of the program is to establish “the confidence in one’s ability to secure national security systems by assessing the integrity of the people and processes used to design, generate, manufacture and distribute national security critical components.” To accomplish this “trusted sources” must (according to the DMEA):
- Provide an assured “Chain of Custody” for both classified and unclassified ICs
- Ensure that there will not be any reasonable threats related to disruption in supply
- Prevent intentional or unintentional modification or tampering of the ICs
- Protect the ICs from unauthorized attempts at reverse engineering, exposure of functionality or evaluation of their possible vulnerabilities
Many of the regulations reflect the importance to the Department of Defense and the intelligence community of ensuring the physical and intellectual security of technology critical to military, aerospace, and government applications. This includes everything from communications systems and missiles to jet engines and satellites.
The Trusted Foundry program includes a broad list of suppliers across the semiconductor ecosystem from research and design to the tools and equipment to manufacturing and assembly. Currently, there are 82 accredited Trusted Suppliers as part of the Trusted Foundry program.
Trusted Foundry Legacy
Historically, the defense community utilized dedicated classified facilities. However, this has significant technical, operational, and financial limitations. Semiconductor manufacturing fabs are very costly. Without commercial manufacturing volumes, it is difficult to justify and sustain the investment, especially as the cost of semiconductor manufacturing technology and manufacturing processes continues to increase exponentially. Although military-grade semiconductors do command a higher price due to the additional testing and processes required to support a long list of military specifications, it would still not be enough to justify the cost of a current state-of-the-art fab and the defense-only volumes are too low to sustain the economic and technical viability of the facilities. Additionally, it is difficult to achieve and maintain high quality and yields without high-volume production.
As a result, GlobalFoundries implemented a way to use its commercial fabs as Trusted Foundries through what the company refers to as security overlays that cover the people, places, and processes. Each facility is independently accredited, which includes the use of compliant IT systems, staff cleared through government background checks, both physical and electronic security of the processes and intellectual property, and strict adherence to all export controls. The industry’s first Trusted fab accreditation was issued in 2007 to GlobalFoundries Fab 9 facility located in Essex Junction, Vermont. GlobalFoundries Fab 8 facility in Malta, New York, holds the title as the Trusted fab with the most advanced technology offerings, it was accredited in 2023.
The Value of Trusted, Secure Semiconductors
GlobalFoundries has embraced the cost-effective Trusted Foundry model, which has benefits for its commercial customers, as well as its US government customers, by ensuring the security of all customers’ intellectual property. It also ensures a long-term customer in the US government and government contractors that are likely to result in further investment in future capacity. As for government customers, GlobalFoundries can offer long-term support with the widest range of processes of any Trusted semiconductor foundry, including advanced processes for logic and specialized processes like 22FDX for power, RF, optical, and even processes for quantum processors.
The U.S. Trusted Supplier accreditation can apply to companies located in Five Eyes (FVEY) nations, which are the U.S., Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. Other nations and regions in the world have or are considering requirements for regional security, and with GlobalFoundries security processes and running fabs in the U.S., EU, and Singapore, makes GlobalFoundries a top candidate for partnering with other nations for regional certifications and investments abroad.
The Importance of Process Nodes
According to Omdia Research, 93% of foundry wafer demand in the world is for technologies in node sizes manufactured by GlobalFoundries, 12nm or larger in feature size. This includes semiconductors used in national security applications, where innovations in materials, process, and features delivers the highest performance for demanding applications across land, air, sea, and space. There is much news focused on “leading edge technologies”, which refers to the smallest features sizes, e.g. 3nm. However, such technologies only “lead” in terms of smallest physical structures, which is important to a very small subset of global wafer demand for general purpose and graphics processors. These small node size technologies can only address a small subset of the world’s needs, come at a very high cost, and don’t address the vast majority of national security applications.
With GlobalFoundries competing on the process nodes most needed for national security applications, it is well positioned to satisfy U.S. government standards, including extended lifecycle support and extended temperature ranges, while rapidly achieving high quality, reliability, and yields, at lowest total cost. Additionally, since these technologies are needed for making the majority of the world’s semiconductor products for power, connectivity, embedded, amongst others, this places GlobalFoundries in the sweet spot to deliver for U.S. government applications.
The Future Points to Trusted Foundry
While the US is ahead of other countries and regions in implementing secure semiconductor manufacturing through the Trusted Foundry program, investments in semiconductor manufacturing capabilities being made by other governments are likely to drive the implementation of similar regional security programs, creating both barriers and opportunities for extensions of the Trusted security approaches to other regions in the world.
GlobalFoundries use of commercial high-volume facilities as Trusted Foundries combined with a robust support ecosystem provides a proven and cost-effective Trusted Foundry model for other foundries to follow for government customers while providing higher levels of IP security for commercial customers.
A complete list of DMEA-accredited suppliers is available at https://www.acq.osd.mil/asds/dmea/tapo/docs/tp/Accredited-Supplier-16Feb2024.pdf