GlobalFoundries bets its next chip platform on physical AI

FDX Fusion targets 7nm-class performance for robots and edge machines, with manufacturing planned in Dresden from 2028.

GlobalFoundries on October 9 unveiled FDX Fusion, a next-generation chip platform built for physical AI — robots, autonomous machines, and industrial systems — alongside the topping-out of its 1.1 billion euro SPRINT fab expansion in Dresden, Germany.

FDX Fusion extends the company's fully depleted silicon-on-insulator (FD-SOI) roadmap, targeting 7-nanometer-class digital performance combined with analog and mixed-signal functions, radio-frequency capability up to 0.5 terahertz, embedded non-volatile memory, and in-memory computing. The goal is a single energy-efficient platform for what the company calls STAC workloads — sense, think, act, communicate — putting processing, sensing, real-time control, and secure connectivity onto one chip for edge machines. The 7-nanometer comparison describes a performance target, not a conventional 7nm FinFET process.

The company plans to begin manufacturing FDX Fusion in Dresden in 2028. GlobalFoundries expects to invest roughly $1 billion in the platform over the coming years, including about $250 million for the initial capability toolset, and is targeting demonstrator silicon in early 2027 with a process design kit to follow mid-year.

The pitch is that intelligence moving into the physical world needs different silicon than data-center AI. Manfred Horstmann, senior vice president and general manager of GlobalFoundries' European fabs, argues that physical AI is a different class of problem: beyond raw compute, machines need sensors, actuators, communications, low power, and cost efficiency.

The Dresden expansion, first announced in October 2025 with support under the European Chips Act, targets more than one million wafers of annual capacity by the end of 2028. The site currently produces up to 950,000 300mm wafers a year and employs around 3,000 people; the company says it has invested more than 10 billion euros in Dresden since 2009.