IBM has created working versions of computer chips that have around four times the capacity of the most powerful chips that exist at present.

The development, reported by the New York Times, means that the new chips are the smallest and most powerful in the world.

Breaking with tradition, the company has moved away from using pure silicon in the important areas of the chip. Instead it has used silicon-germanium, which has allowed the chip to continue to shrink in size.

The company, which has beaten Intel in announcing any new chip development, said that its new chips were working with seven-nanometer transistors, which is much below the current industry standard of 14 nanometer (nm) transistors.

Across the chip industry there has been a push to get processors shrunk to 10nm.

At present Intel describes its current 14nm chips as ones that “improve performance and reduce leakage power” and goes on to say they “will be used to manufacture a wide range” of products. The company says they can be used in low-power products to devices connected to the Internet of Things.

Despite the boasting about the 14nm chips, it has been reported that the company is struggling to produce 10nm chips.

While it will be a fair while until IBM’s new chips are on the market – they’re still in the research phase and no timescale has been released for their commercial use – the breakthrough means that it will be possible to build microprocessors with more than 20 billion transistors.

The latest development lies roughly inline with Moore’s Law, an observation made by one of the co-founders of Intel.

Back in 1965, Gordon Moore said that the number of transistors that can be placed in a circuit will double every two years. But as chips have become faster and smaller it has become harder for researchers to continue to push the boundaries.

Featured image courtesy of Darryl Bautista / IBM.