[1][2] On 29 December 2022, Taiwanese chip manufacturer TSMC announced that volume production using its 3 nm semiconductor node (N3) was underway with good yields.
[12] However, in real world commercial practice, 3 nm is used primarily as a marketing term by individual microchip manufacturers (foundries) to refer to a new, improved generation of silicon semiconductor chips in terms of increased transistor density (i.e. a higher degree of miniaturization), increased speed and reduced power consumption.
[19] In 2003, a research team at NEC fabricated the first MOSFETs with a channel length of 3 nm, using the PMOS and NMOS processes.
[22][23] In late 2016, TSMC announced plans to construct a 5 nm–3 nm node semiconductor fabrication plant with a co-commitment investment of around US$15.7 billion.
[24] In 2017, TSMC announced it was to begin construction of the 3 nm semiconductor fabrication plant at the Tainan Science Park in Taiwan.
[5][needs update] In October 2021, Samsung adjusted earlier plans and announced that the company is scheduled to start producing its customers' first 3 nm-based chip designs in the first half of 2022, while its second generation of 3 nm is expected in 2023.
[42][43][44] In June 2022, Samsung started "initial" production of a low-power, high-performance chip using 3 nm process technology with GAA architecture.
[46] On 25 July 2022, Samsung celebrated the first shipment of 3 nm Gate-All-Around chips to a Chinese cryptocurrency mining firm PanSemi.
After implementation of features such as single diffusion break, contact over active gate and FinFlex, there will be no more room left for improvement of FinFET-based process technologies.
[60] In July 2023, semiconductor industry research firm TechInsights said it has found that Samsung's 3 nm GAA (gate-all-around) process has been incorporated into the crypto miner ASIC (Whatsminer M56S++) from a Chinese manufacturer, MicroBT.