C.C. Wei, CEO of TSMC, the world's largest contract chip manufacturer, made an implicit jab at rival Samsung in a statement this week. Wei underscored his company's leadership confidence by mocking the long-repeated claim, "We will catch up to TSMC within 10 years."
"Our Rivals Are Dreaming"
Speaking during a Q&A session with shareholders, Wei stated that he does not expect Taiwan's semiconductor manufacturing dominance to be shaken in the short term. When asked if Samsung could surpass TSMC to become the leader in the foundry sector in the future, Wei replied, "Our rivals are actually dreaming."
"Twenty years ago, our competitor said they would catch up to TSMC within 10 years. Ten years ago, they said they would catch up within 10 years again. Recently, they once again said they would catch up within 10 years," Wei remarked, implying that their rivals have been repeating the same goal for years.
The statements come at a time when AI-driven chip demand is reshaping the semiconductor industry. While both TSMC and Samsung are investing billions of dollars in 2-nanometer production technologies, the gap between the two companies still appears to be quite significant.
TSMC Controls 70% of the Foundry Market
According to industry data, TSMC controls approximately 70% of the global pure-play foundry market. Samsung's share, on the other hand, stands at around 7%. Despite significant investments in recent years, the South Korean giant continues to lag behind TSMC in terms of advanced manufacturing technologies and production capacity.
One of TSMC's advantages is its strong position in the AI ecosystem. Customers like NVIDIA, in particular, rely on TSMC not only for advanced manufacturing processes but also for advanced packaging technologies such as CoWoS. In AI accelerators, packaging technologies now play a role as critical as transistor density.
On the other hand, Samsung also has important strengths. The company is considered one of the industry leaders in High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), which is critical for AI servers. Wei acknowledged Samsung's strength in this area in his statements.
Nevertheless, according to experts, the main differentiating factor in the foundry market is the stability of production processes. Thanks to high yield rates, long-standing customer relationships, and a robust manufacturing ecosystem, TSMC holds a position that its rivals find difficult to reach.
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