Samsung targets AI/HPC to upend TSMC’s semiconductor edge

Samsung is focusing on expanding its market in AI and high-performance computing (HPC) semiconductors. The company is following a different approach to compete with Foundry leader TSMC, which controls 62% of the market.

TSMC continued to lead the global foundry market in the second quarter. The company’s gap with its closest opponent, Samsung, was 49%. It indicates how the competition became significantly challenging for TSMC’s rivals.

Samsung is the second biggest foundry vendor that had 13% market share in the previous quarter. The huge gap with TSMC highlights the challenges Samsung faces in its ambitious quest to become the global semiconductor foundry leader by 2030.

As AI is on the rise, the global foundry revenue grew by 9% QoQ and 23% YoY. The market growth pushed TSMC’s revenue further as it holds leading fabless companies like Apple, Nvidia, Qualcomm, and MediaTek.

During the Q2 earnings briefing, Samsung executive Song Tae-jung stated, “We plan to continue expanding orders for AI/HPC applications, aiming to increase the number of AI/HPC application customers by four times and sales by more than nine times by 2028 compared to 2023.”

The official specifically spotlighted Samsung’s efforts to improve the maturity of the 2nm process and enhance additional competitiveness to meet the high-performance, low-power, and high-bandwidth requirements of advanced processes.

The Korean tech giant unveiled its foundry strategy in June this year. It focuses on the “2.4nm process roadmap expansion and turnkey service.” The company targets global fabless companies directly by advancing processes below 2nm.

[Via]