Foundry model
The foundry model is a microelectronics engineering and manufacturing business model consisting of a semiconductor fabrication plant, or foundry, and an integrated circuit design operation, each belonging to separate companies or subsidiaries.[1][2][3][4]
Integrated circuit production facilities are expensive to build and maintain. Unless they can be kept at nearly full use, they will become a drain on the
History
Companies that both designed and produced the devices were originally responsible for manufacturing microelectronic devices. These manufacturers were involved in both the
The first pure play semiconductor company is the
An absolute separation into fabless and foundry companies is not necessary. Some companies continue to exist that perform both operations and benefit from the close coupling of their skills. Some companies manufacture some of their own designs and contract out to have others manufactured or designed, in cases where they see value or seek special skills. The foundry model is a business vision that seeks to optimize productivity.
MOSIS
The very first merchant foundries were part of the MOSIS service. The MOSIS service gave limited production access to designers with limited means, such as students, university researchers, and engineers at small startups.[7] The designer submitted designs, and these submissions were manufactured with the commercial company's extra capacity. Manufacturers could insert some wafers for a MOSIS design into a collection of their own wafers when a processing step was compatible with both operations. The commercial company (serving as foundry) was already running the process, so they were effectively being paid by MOSIS for something they were already doing. A factory with excess capacity during slow periods could also run MOSIS designs to avoid having expensive capital equipment stand idle.
Under-use of an expensive manufacturing plant could lead to the financial ruin of the owner, so selling surplus wafer capacity was a way to maximize the fab's use. Hence, economic factors created a climate where fab operators wanted to sell surplus wafer-manufacturing capacity and designers wanted to purchase manufacturing capacity rather than try to build it.
Although MOSIS opened the doors to some fabless customers, earning additional
Dedicated foundry
In 1987, the world's first dedicated merchant foundry opened its doors: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC).[8] The distinction of 'dedicated' is in reference to the typical merchant foundry of the era, whose primary business activity was building and selling of its own IC-products. The dedicated foundry offers several key advantages to its customers: first, it does not sell finished IC-products into the supply channel; thus a dedicated foundry will never compete directly with its fabless customers (obviating a common concern of fabless companies). Second, the dedicated foundry can scale production capacity to a customer's needs, offering low-quantity shuttle services in addition to full-scale production lines. Finally, the dedicated foundry offers a "COT-flow" (customer owned tooling) based on industry-standard EDA systems, whereas many IDM merchants required its customers to use proprietary (non-portable) development tools. The COT advantage gave the customer complete control over the design process, from concept to final design.
Foundry sales leaders by year
- Pure-play semiconductor foundry is a company that does not offer a significant amount of IC products of its own design, but instead operates semiconductor fabrication plants focused on producing ICs for other companies.[9]
- Integrated device manufacturer (IDM) semiconductor foundry is where companies such as Texas Instruments, IBM, and Samsung join in to provide foundry services as long as there is no conflict of interest between relevant parties.
2023
Rank | Company | Foundry type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
2023 | Q4 2023 | Q3 2023 | |||
1 | TSMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 19,660 | 17,249 |
2 | Samsung Semiconductor | IDM | Korea | 3,619 | 3,690 |
3 | GlobalFoundries | Pure-play | United States | 1,854 | 1,852 |
4 | UMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 1,727 | 1,801 |
5 | SMIC | Pure-play | China | 1,678 | 1,620 |
6 | Hua Hong Semiconductor | Pure-play | China | 657 | 766 |
7 | Tower Semiconductor | Pure-play | Israel | 352 | 358 |
8 | PowerChip
|
IDM | Taiwan | 330 | 305 |
9 | Nexchip | Pure-play | China | 308 | 283 |
10 | Vanguard (VIS) | Pure-play | Taiwan | 304 | 333 |
2017
Rank | Company | Foundry type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
2017 | 2017 | 2016 | |||
1 | TSMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 32,040 | 29,437 |
2 | GlobalFoundries | Pure-play | United States | 5,407 | 4,999 |
3 | UMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 4,898 | 4,587 |
4 | Samsung Semiconductor | IDM | Korea | 7,398 | 4,284 |
5 | SMIC | Pure-play | China | 3,099 | 2,914 |
6 | TowerJazz
|
Pure-play | Israel | 1,388 | 1,249 |
7 | PowerChip
|
IDM | Taiwan | 1,035 | 870 |
8 | Vanguard (VIS) | Pure-play | Taiwan | 817 | 801 |
9 | Hua Hong Semiconductor | Pure-play | China | 807 | 721 |
10 | Dongbu HiTek | Pure-play | Korea | 676 | 666 |
2016–2014
Rank | Company | Foundry type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2016 | 2015 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | |||
1 | 1 | TSMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 29,488 | 25,574 | 25,138 |
2 | 2 | GlobalFoundries | Pure-play | United States | 5,545 | 5,019 | 4,355 |
3 | 3 | UMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 4,582 | 4,464 | 4,331 |
4 | 4 | SMIC | Pure-play | China | 2,921 | 2,236 | 1,970 |
5 | 5 | PowerChip
|
Pure-play | Taiwan | 1,275 | 1,268 | 1,291 |
6 | 6 | TowerJazz
|
Pure-play | Israel | 1,249 | 961 | 828 |
7 | 7 | Ruselectronics[14][15] | Pure-play | Russia | 971 | 774 | 800 |
8 | 8 | Vanguard (VIS) | Pure-play | Taiwan | 800 | 736 | 790 |
9 | 9 | Hua Hong Semi | Pure-play | China | 712 | 650 | 665 |
10 | 10 | Dongbu HiTek | Pure-play | Korea | 672 | 593 | 541 |
11 | 12 | X-Fab | Pure-play | Germany | 510 | 331 | 330 |
12 | 13 | Crocus Nano Electronics (CNE) | Pure-play | Russia | – | – | – |
Others | Pure-play | 2,251 | 2,405 | 2,280 |
2013
2013 Rank | 2012 Rank | Company | Foundry Type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million $USD) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 1 | TSMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 19,850 |
2 | 2 | GlobalFoundries | Pure-play | United States | 4,261 |
3 | 3 | UMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 3,959 |
4 | 4 | Samsung Semiconductor | IDM | Korea | 3,950 |
5 | 5 | SMIC | Pure-play | China | 1,973 |
6 | – | Ruselectronics[17] | Pure-play | Russia | 1,200 |
7 | 8 | PowerChip
|
Pure-play | Taiwan | 1,175 |
8 | 9 | Vanguard (VIS) | Pure-play | Taiwan | 713 |
9 | 6 | Huahong Grace | Pure-play | China | 710 |
10 | 10 | Dongbu | Pure-play | Korea | 570 |
11 | 7 | TowerJazz
|
Pure-play | Israel | 509 |
12 | 11 | IBM | IDM | United States | 485 |
13 | 12 | MagnaChip | IDM | Korea | 411 |
14 | 13 | Win Semiconductors | Pure-play | Taiwan | 354 |
15 | 14 | Crocus Nano Electronics (CNE) | Pure-play | Russia | – |
2011
Rank | Company | Foundry type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | TSMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 14,600 |
2 | UMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 3,760 |
3 | GlobalFoundries | Pure-play | United States | 3,580 |
4 | Samsung Semiconductor | IDM | Korea | 1,975 |
5 | SMIC | Pure-play | China | 1,315 |
6 | TowerJazz
|
Pure-play | Israel | 610 |
7 | Vanguard (VIS) | Pure-play | Taiwan | 519 |
8 | Dongbu HiTek
|
Pure-play | Korea | 500 |
9 | IBM | IDM | United States | 445 |
10 | MagnaChip | IDM | Korea | 350 |
11 | SSMC | Pure-play | Singapore | 345 |
12 | Hua Hong NEC | Pure-play | China | 335 |
13 | Win Semiconductors | Pure-play | Taiwan | 300 |
14 | X-Fab | Pure-play | Germany | 285 |
2010
Rank | Company | Foundry Type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | TSMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 13,332 |
2 | UMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 3,824 |
3 | GlobalFoundries | Pure-play | United States | 3,520 |
4 | SMIC | Pure-play | China | 1,554 |
5 | Dongbu HiTek
|
Pure-play | Korea | 512 |
6 | TowerJazz | Pure-play | Israel | 509 |
7 | Vanguard (VIS) | Pure-play | Taiwan | 505 |
8 | IBM | IDM | United States | 500 |
9 | MagnaChip | IDM | Korea | 410 |
10 | Samsung Semiconductor | IDM | Korea | 390 |
2009–2007
As of 2009, the top 17 semiconductor foundries were:[20]
Rank | Company | Foundry type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2009 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | |||
1 | TSMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 8,989 | 10,556 | 9,813 |
2 | UMC | Pure-play | Taiwan | 2,815 | 3,070 | 3,430 |
3 | Chartered(1) | Pure-play | Singapore | 1,540 | 1,743 | 1,458 |
4 | GlobalFoundries | Pure-play | USA | 1,101 | 0 | 0 |
5 | SMIC | Pure-play | China | 1,075 | 1,353 | 1,550 |
6 | Dongbu | Pure-play | South Korea | 395 | 490 | 510 |
7 | Vanguard | Pure-play | Taiwan | 382 | 511 | 486 |
8 | IBM | IDM | USA | 335 | 400 | 570 |
9 | Samsung | IDM | South Korea | 325 | 370 | 355 |
10 | Grace | Pure-play | China | 310 | 335 | 310 |
11 | HeJian | Pure-play | China | 305 | 345 | 330 |
12 | Tower Semiconductor | Pure-play | Israel | 292 | 252 | 231 |
13 | HHNEC | Pure-play | China | 290 | 350 | 335 |
14 | SSMC | Pure-play | Singapore | 280 | 340 | 359 |
15 | Texas Instruments | IDM | USA | 250 | 315 | 450 |
16 | X-Fab | Pure-play | Germany | 223 | 368 | 410 |
17 | MagnaChip | IDM | South Korea | 220 | 290 | 322 |
(1) Now acquired by GlobalFoundries
2008–2006
As of 2008, the top 18 pure-play semiconductor foundries were:[21]
Rank | Company | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
2008 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | ||
1 | TSMC | Taiwan | 10,556 | 9,813 | 9,748 |
2 | UMC | Taiwan | 3,400 | 3,755 | 3,670 |
3 | Chartered | Singapore | 1,743 | 1,458 | 1,527 |
4 | SMIC | China | 1,354 | 1,550 | 1,465 |
5 | Vanguard | Taiwan | 511 | 486 | 398 |
6 | Dongbu | South Korea | 490 | 510 | 456 |
7 | X-Fab | Germany | 400 | 410 | 290 |
8 | HHNEC | China | 350 | 335 | 315 |
9 | HeJian | China | 345 | 330 | 290 |
10 | SSMC | Singapore | 340 | 350 | 325 |
11 | Grace | China | 335 | 310 | 227 |
12 | Tower Semiconductor | Israel | 252 | 231 | 187 |
13 | Jazz Semiconductor | United States | 190 | 182 | 213 |
14 | Silterra | Malaysia | 175 | 180 | 155 |
15 | ASMC | China | 149 | 155 | 170 |
16 | Polar Semiconductor | Japan | 110 | 105 | 95 |
17 | Mosel-Vitelic | Taiwan | 100 | 105 | 155 |
18 | CR Micro (1) | China | - | 143 | 114 |
Others | 140 | 167 | 180 | ||
Total | 20,980 | 20,575 | 19,940 |
(1) Merged with CR Logic in 2008, reclassified as an IDM foundry
2007–2005
As of 2007, the top 14 semiconductor foundries include:[22]
Rank | Company | Foundry type | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2007 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | |||
1 | TSMC | Pure-Play | Taiwan | 9,813 | 9,748 | 8,217 |
2 | UMC | Pure-Play | Taiwan | 3,755 | 3,670 | 3,259 |
3 | SMIC | Pure-Play | China | 1,550 | 1,465 | 1,171 |
4 | Chartered | Pure-Play | Singapore | 1,458 | 1,527 | 1,132 |
5 | Texas Instruments | IDM | United States | 610 | 585 | 540 |
6 | IBM | IDM | United States | 570 | 600 | 665 |
7 | Dongbu | Pure-Play | South Korea | 510 | 456 | 347 |
8 | Vanguard | Pure-Play | Taiwan | 486 | 398 | 353 |
9 | X-Fab | Pure-Play | Germany | 410 | 290 | 202 |
10 | Samsung | IDM | South Korea | 385 | 75 | - |
11 | SSMC | Pure-Play | Singapore | 350 | 325 | 280 |
12 | HHNEC | Pure-Play | China | 335 | 315 | 313 |
13 | HeJian | Pure-Play | China | 330 | 290 | 250 |
14 | MagnaChip | IDM | South Korea | 322 | 342 | 345 |
For ranking in worldwide:[23]
Rank | Company | Country/Territory of origin | Revenue (million USD) | 2006/2005 changes | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2006 | 2005 | 2006 | 2005 | |||
6 | 7 | TSMC | Taiwan | 9,748 | 8,217 | +19% |
21 | 22 | UMC | Taiwan | 3,670 | 3,259 | +13% |
2004
As of 2004, the top 10 pure-play semiconductor foundries were: [citation needed]
Rank 2004 | Company | Country/Territory of origin |
---|---|---|
1 | TSMC | Taiwan |
2 | UMC | Taiwan |
3 | Chartered | Singapore |
4 | SMIC | China |
5 | Dongbu/Anam | South Korea |
6 | SSMC | Singapore |
7 | HHNEC | China |
8 | Jazz Semiconductor | United States |
9 | Silterra | Malaysia |
10 | X-Fab | Germany |
Financial and IP issues
Like all industries, the semiconductor industry faces upcoming challenges and obstacles.
The cost to stay on the leading edge has steadily increased with each generation of chips. The financial strain is being felt by both large merchant foundries and their fabless customers. The cost of a new foundry exceeds $1 billion. These costs must be passed on to customers. Many merchant foundries have entered into joint ventures with their competitors in an effort to split research and design expenditures and fab-maintenance expenses.
Chip design companies sometimes avoid other companies' patents simply by purchasing the products from a licensed foundry with broad cross-license agreements with the patent owner.[24]
Stolen design data is also a concern; data is rarely directly copied, because blatant copies are easily identified by distinctive features in the chip,[25] placed there either for this purpose or as a byproduct of the design process. However, the data including any procedure, process system, method of operation or concept may be sold to a competitor, who may save months or years of tedious reverse engineering.
See also
- Fabless manufacturing
- Contract manufacturer
- Integrated device manufacturer
- Semiconductor fabrication
- Original design manufacturer
- Original equipment manufacturer
- Semiconductor fabless sales leaders by year
- Semiconductor equipment sales leaders by year
References
- .
- S2CID 7329163.
- S2CID 40610229.
- S2CID 173181521.
- ^ "Company Profile". TSMC. Retrieved 6 December 2020.
- ISBN 9780262516822.
- ISBN 978-1-317-46970-4.
- ISBN 978-0-415-63945-3.
- ^ "Pure-Play Foundry Market On Pace For Strongest Growth Since 2014". EPS News. 22 September 2020. Retrieved 6 January 2021.
- ^ Chung, Eden. "Press Center - Global Top 10 Foundries Q4 Revenue Up 7.9%, Annual Total Hits US$111.54 Billion in 2023, Says TrendForce | TrendForce - Market research, price trend of DRAM, NAND Flash, LEDs, TFT-LCD and green energy, PV". TrendForce. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
- ^ "Press Center – TrendForce Reports Top 10 Ranking of Global Semiconductor Foundries of 2017, TSMC Ranks First with Market Share of 55.9% | TrendForce – Market research, price trend of DRAM, NAND Flash, LEDs, TFT-LCD and green energy, PV". TrendForce. Retrieved 1 July 2020.
- ^ McGrath, Dylan (23 January 2017). "X-Fab is Fastest Growing Foundry". EE Times. Archived from the original on 29 January 2017. Retrieved 10 May 2017.
- ^ Clarke, Peter (16 January 2017). "SMIC, Tower, X-Fab are strongest growing pure-play foundries". eeNews Analog. Retrieved 29 January 2021.
- ^ "RBK Data base of companies". rbc.ru. Retrieved 20 February 2018.
- ^ "United States dollar (USD) and Russian ruble (RUB) Year 2014 Exchange Rate History". Retrieved 20 February 2018.
- ^ IC Insights: Top 13 Foundries Account for 91% of Total Foundry Sales in 2013
- ^ "Ruselectronics to triple revenues by 2020".
- ^ semimd.com: 2011 Major IC Foundries Archived 26 May 2013 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ dongbuhitek.com: 2010 Foundry Ranking (citing Gartner) (PDF).
- ^ IC Insights, "2009 Major IC Foundries" March 2009.
- ^ IC Insights, "Leading Pure-Play Foundry Companies" March 2009 Archived 19 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ IC Insights, "2007 Major IC Foundries".
- ^ IC Insights, "Worldwide 2006 Top 25 Semiconductor Sales Leaders".
- ^
R. H. Abramson (28 February – 4 March 1994). "When the chickens come home to roost: The licensed foundry defense in patent cases". Proceedings of COMPCON '94. pp. 348–354. S2CID 2957002.
- ^ Carol Marsh and Tom Kean. "A Security Tagging Scheme for ASIC Designs and Intellectual Property Cores". Design & Reuse.