TSM · Forward model · Tesla AI5 · Bear case
What has to happen in Tesla AI5
Model as of
This page changes Tesla AI5 inside the complete TSM model. Every other vertical, corporate programme and valuation assumption stays in the selected portfolio case.
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Tesla AI5
A line that does not exist yet, carried at zero across every reported quarter and starting in 2027. Tesla's AI5 is a roughly half-reticle inference die that Musk has said will be built at TSMC, two per car, against a stated ambition of two million cars a year. TSMC has never named Tesla as a customer, never mentioned AI5, and publishes no wafer price, so every number on this line is an outside estimate rather than a disclosure. It is here to make one question answerable on the page: what would a flagship automotive AI win actually be worth to a company running at $45bn a quarter? The answer, on the arithmetic below, is about half a percent of revenue - which is itself the finding.
Latest: $122M (2031Q2E)
| Period | Value |
|---|---|
| 2024Q3 | $0.00 |
| 2024Q4 | $0.00 |
| 2025Q1 | $0.00 |
| 2025Q2 | $0.00 |
| 2025Q3 | $0.00 |
| 2025Q4 | $0.00 |
| 2026Q1 | $0.00 |
| 2026Q2 | $0.00 |
| 2026Q3E | $0.00 |
| 2026Q4E | $0.00 |
| 2027Q1E | $140M |
| 2027Q2E | $138M |
| 2027Q3E | $137M |
| 2027Q4E | $136M |
| 2028Q1E | $134M |
| 2028Q2E | $133M |
| 2028Q3E | $132M |
| 2028Q4E | $131M |
| 2029Q1E | $130M |
| 2029Q2E | $129M |
| 2029Q3E | $128M |
| 2029Q4E | $127M |
| 2030Q1E | $126M |
| 2030Q2E | $125M |
| 2030Q3E | $125M |
| 2030Q4E | $124M |
| 2031Q1E | $123M |
| 2031Q2E | $122M |
Assumptions & reasoning
- Zero in every reported quarter, by construction. Tesla already buys silicon from TSMC and that revenue is inside the Automotive and HPC lines already; this vertical is the INCREMENTAL AI5 ramp above the current run rate, and reading it any other way double-counts.
- The arithmetic: two million cars a year at two dies each is four million chips, or one million a quarter. At roughly $150 of TSMC revenue per chip - about $22k a wafer over some 175 good half-reticle dies, plus packaging - that is about $150M a quarter, or $600M a year.
- The chip count grows toward 1.8 million a quarter, which is where Optimus and training clusters would take it. At $150 a chip that is $270M a quarter. A reader who wants the $250M a quarter that circulates for this programme is implicitly assuming roughly six to eight million AI5 dies a year, which is cars plus everything else, not cars alone.
- At its peak this line is about half a percent of TSMC revenue and moves fair value by cents. That is the point of carrying it: a flagship automotive design win at a company this size is a rounding error, and the model says so explicitly rather than leaving it to intuition.