Samsung + TSMC: Foundry

choi

(1) Apple the Driving Force Behind Samsung’s Foundry Sales Surge—Again!  The two fierce competitors in electronic systems endure 'marriage of convenience' for ICs. IC INsights, Aug 20, 2012.
http://www.icinsights.com/news/b ... y-Sales-SurgeAgain/

Quote:

"For the second year in a row, Samsung is expected to be ranked as the fourth largest IC foundry.  However, IC Insights believes that the company will challenge UMC for the number three spot in the ranking in 2013.

"As was shown in Figure 1, after surging by 82% in 2011, Samsung’s IC foundry sales are forecast to jump by another 54% in 2012, which would make it the fastest growing top-12 IC foundry last year and this year.  Moreover, Apple’s 2012 share of Samsung’s total foundry sales is expected to be 85%.  However, as Apple begins to engage other foundries (e.g., TSMC) to produce its custom processors, Samsung will need to make up for these lost sales by signing up additional large-scale customers.

My comment:
(a) A notation of the figure identifies Taiwan's Win as "GaAs foundry."
(i) Gallium Arsenide
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium_arsenide
(GaAs, a compound of the elements gallium and arsenic; section 2 Comparison with silicon)
(ii) Win Semiconductors Corp  穩懋半導體股份有限公司 (founded in 1988, based in Taoyuan, Taiwan)
(iii) Mark LaPedus, Consolidation Hits GaAs Foundry Market. Sept 7, 2005.
http://www.eetimes.com/electroni ... GaAs-foundry-market

(b) IDM stands for Integrated device manufacturer. See foundry model
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundry_model
(Although many companies continue to both design and manufacture integrated circuits (achieving efficiency through vertical integration), these Integrated Device Manufacturers (IDMs) are not alone in the marketplace)

The top two tables (rankings for 2011 and 2010, respectively) shows how quickly Samsung foundry has advanced in the past two years, judged by revenues: In 2010, Samsung was No 10 (revenue $390m); in 2011 it cataqpulted to No 4 ($1,975m), displacing SMIC (in 2011: No 5, revenue $1,315m).

(2) Ken Liu, TSMC Triples 28nm Process Capacity in Q3. Taiwan Economic News, Aug 21, 2012.
http://news.cens.com/cens/html/en/news/news_inner_41054.html
("According to capital-equipment suppliers, TSMC’s yield rate of 28nm process production has reached over 80% after six months of adjustments, making the company’s 28nm production yield rate the highest of all first-tier chipmakers in the world. So far this quarter, the company has increased 28nm capacity to around 100,000 300mm wafers a month, three times the 25,000 wafers recorded in the second quarter")

(3) Maranda Hsu and Frances Huang, TSMC Spending Plan Needed to Keep Lead Over Samsung: Analyst. CNA, Aug 15, 2012
http://focustaiwan.tw/ShowNews/W ... amp;ID=201208150019
("It is expected that TSMC will unveil chips on the 20 nm process next year." Grand Cathay Securities analyst Meissen Chang also said Intel Corp commands a lead over the Taiwanese firm by 9-12 months in the 20 nm process)

My comment: There is no need to read the rest.

(4) Ken Liu, TSMC Builds Up 3D IC Assembling Capability to Vie for Lucrative Business. Taiwan Economic News, Aug 14, 2012.
http://news.cens.com/cens/html/en/news/news_inner_40986.html

choi

Taiwan Semiconductor still appealing after price rise. NASDAQ, Aug 22, 2012
http://community.nasdaq.com/News ... ter-price-rise.aspx
(TSMC "has a very healthy profit margin of 30.83%. The profit margin for Intel by contrast, is 22.73% -- which is still admirable")

Note: share repurchase
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Share_repurchase
(section 1 Purpose)