Move will enable smaller, more powerful and energy efficient chips Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. will start making chips with transistors and other components as tiny as 45 nanometers by September, enabling smaller, more powerful and energy efficient chips.The world’s largest contract chip maker said chips made using 45nm technology will be 40 percent smaller than the slightly older 65nm size, use less power, and have 40 percent greater functionality. The move to developing smaller chip manufacturing technology is crucial to meet user demand for ever smaller devices that can do more, such as mobile phones with built-in PDA (personal digital assistant) and camera functions, and digital music players that also play videos and access the Internet wirelessly to gather new songs.The nanometer term describes the size of the smallest feature that can be manufactured on a single chip. There are about three to six atoms in a nanometer, depending on the type of atom, and there are a billion nanometers in a meter. Currently, most chips are still made using technology 90nm and larger, but the move to smaller sizes is increasing, led by high end chips such as DRAM (dynamic RAM), microprocessors, core logic chip sets, and graphics processors.By comparison, Intel, the world’s largest chip maker, will begin production of chips using a 45nm process later this year, and plans to make chips using a 32nm process in 2009, with a 23nm process in 2011.The main difference between the two companies is that Intel designs and manufactures its own chips, so it knows when it is ready to move on to more advanced production technology. TSMC works with customer companies such as graphics chip maker Nvidia and others to determine when the time is ripe to move forward on manufacturing technology. TSMC’s technology improvement has been so reliable in recent years that some major chip makers have decided to stop or slow the development of their own production technology, and instead farm out production and production R&D.NXP Semiconductors, the former semiconductor division of electronics giant Koninklijke Philips Electronics NV, in January said it planned to drop out of a chip production technology alliance and forge closer ties with TSMC, including increased outsourcing to the Taiwanese company.Last month, Texas Instruments Inc., the world’s largest maker of chips for mobile phones, said it would stop developing some chip production technologies and work more closely with contract chip makers in Asia on joint development, including TSMC and United Microelectronics Corp. Technology Industry