The president, whose administration played a big role in completing this deal, surely loves the outcome.
A few days ago, we told you that Apple was talking with Intel and Samsung Foundry about manufacturing Apple-designed chips as a backup to the tech giant’s main foundry, TSMC. Located in Taiwan, TSMC is considered to be always at risk to an invasion by China. Samsung Foundry, known for having issues with its manufacturing yield, had previously built processors for the iPhone starting with the original model.
Apple first exclusively relied on TSMC to build iPhone processors with the iPhone 7 line in 2015
So, Apple used application processors designed and built by Samsung for the following iPhone models:
- iPhone (2007)
- iPhone 3G (2008)
- iPhone 3GS (2009)
- iPhone 4 (2010)
- iPhone 4s (2011)
- iPhone 5 (2012)
- iPhone 5s (2013)
- iPhone 5c (2013)
- iPhone 6 (2014)
- iPhone 6 Plus (2014)
The first Apple-designed chip used to power an iPhone was the A4 application processor (AP), which was manufactured by Samsung. For the A9 AP used on 2015’s iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus, Apple used dual sourcing and had the processor built by both Samsung and TSMC. Interestingly, Samsung built its version of the A9 on its 14nm process node while TSMC used its 16nm process node.
Apple and Intel have been talking about doing this deal for over a year
Apple went exclusively with TSMC to build the A10 Fusion AP for the iPhone 7 line, released in 2016, and has remained with only TSMC since. But this might change as The Wall Street Journal is reporting today that according to people familiar with the situation, Apple and Intel have signed a deal. This deal will result in Intel manufacturing some of the chips designed by Apple for its devices.
Today’s WSJ report says that Apple and Intel had been holding talks for more than a year before they were able to reach an agreement on a deal. What is not known is which Apple products Intel will build the chips for.
Intel’s shares hit an all-time high
Apple’s deal would involve the Intel Foundry unit, which builds chips using Intel’s own designs, and the designs of other companies like Apple that are considered to be “fabless.” These are companies that design their own chips but do not have a factory (or a “fab”) to build them.
Today’s news sent Intel’s stock soaring by $15.41, or 14.06%, to an all-time high of $125.03 just before Friday’s close. The U.S. government will actually benefit from this as last summer the Trump administration converted $9 billion in federal grants into Intel stock. This deal left the U.S. government with a 10% stake in Intel, which rose approximately $6.8 billion thanks to today’s rally, a good deal pulled off by the current administration.
While we have to credit the Trump administration for obtaining that 10% stake in Intel for the government in 2025, the funding for the transaction came from the CHIPS and Science Act signed by President Joe Biden in 2022. So kudos to both administrations for getting this done.
Trump administration’s deal helps the U.S. government make billions from a 10% stake in Intel
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had been talking with high-ranking tech executives looking to broker a deal with Intel. The talks, with Apple CEO Tim Cook, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, and Nvidia Chief Executive Jensen Huang, paid off as Intel signed a deal with all three firms. “As soon as we went in, Apple went in, Nvidia went in, a lot of smart people went in,” said President Donald Trump, explaining how the government’s interest in the chipmaker led Intel to sign deals with the other three tech giants.
After Apple released its last two quarterly earnings reports, CEO Tim Cook said both times that the company could have sold many more iPhone units but was hindered by a shortage of advanced chips used on the smartphone. This is an issue that continues during the current quarter.
While Apple has long received scheduling and other capacity perks giving it first crack at the latest process nodes, Nvidia is beginning to earn some leverage with TSMC thanks to the incredible demand for its GPUs used by AI data centers.
