Of course, 18A is the final part of Intel's bold "five nodes in four years" plan (also known as 5N4Y), which kicked off with Intel 7, then went to Intel 4 as used in the Meteor Lake mobile CPU, followed by Intel 3, Intel 20A and finally Intel 18A.

Despite a long list of issues plaguing chip giant Intel (NASDAQ: INTC), the company has made meaningful progress catching up to TSMC in semiconductor manufacturing. Intel was stuck on its heavily delayed 10 nanometer (nm) process for a long time,

Intel is emphasizing that its 18A chip production will occur in North America as President Trump prepares to tariff foreign-made semiconductors.

Intel says its cutting-edge 18A process node is 'now ready' and that tape-out begins in 1H 2025, ready to compete with semiconductor leader TSMC.