Ivy Bridge is the codename for Intel's 22 nm die shrink of the Sandy Bridge microarchitecture based on tri-gate ("3D") transistors. Ivy Bridge processors will be backwards-compatible with the Sandy Bridge platform, but might require a firmware update (vendor specific). Intel has released new 7-series Panther Point chipsets with integrated USB 3.0 to complement Ivy Bridge.Intel announced that volume production of Ivy Bridge chips began in the third quarter of 2011. Quad-core and dual-core-mobile models launched on April 29, 2012 and May 31, 2012 respectively. Meanwhile, Core i3 desktop processors are said to arrive in the third quarter of 2012.