Is There Really a Foundry “Big Two”? TSMC at 72.5%, Samsung at 5.9% in a Shock Scorecard

The global foundry market saw total revenue rise amid intensifying competition in advanced processes, driven by a surge in AI semiconductor demand and broader AI semiconductor demand growth. According to TrendForce data cited by the semiconductor industry on the 11th, combined revenue of the global foundry industry's top 10 companies in the second quarter of 2026 reached USD 53.488 billion, or about KRW 72.213 trillion, up 11.5% from the previous quarter and a quarterly record.

Even in this environment, the gap between Samsung Electronics and TSMC in the global foundry market persisted. In the second quarter of 2026, TSMC's market share was 72.5%, while Samsung Foundry's was only 5.9%. Over the same period, TSMC's revenue was about USD 40.2 billion, or about KRW 54.2732 trillion, and Samsung's revenue was about USD 3.3 billion, or about KRW 4.4554 trillion, meaning TSMC's revenue was more than 12 times Samsung's. The industry's attention is focused on whether Samsung Foundry can narrow the gap with TSMC by leveraging demand growth in the second half of the year.

TSMC ranked first among foundry companies in second-quarter foundry revenue. TSMC's second-quarter revenue was about USD 40.2 billion, or about KRW 54.2732 trillion, up 12.1% from the previous quarter. Its market share also expanded to 72.5%.

TSMC's revenue growth was attributed to the continued increase in demand for AI semiconductors. AI semiconductor demand continued in the GPU and xPU segments. In addition, TSMC's 5-, 4-, and 3-nm processes continued to run at full capacity, which also had an impact.

Products using 2-nm processes, expected to be adopted in the next iPhone, also contributed to TSMC's revenue increase. As a result, TSMC's revenue and market share both increased.

Samsung Foundry held on to second place. Samsung Foundry's second-quarter revenue was about USD 3.3 billion, or about KRW 4.4554 trillion, up 1.8% from the previous quarter. The revenue increase was affected by higher prices for advanced processes at 5-nm and below. However, Samsung Foundry's market share fell from 6.5% in the previous quarter to 5.9% in the second quarter. This was interpreted as a result of faster growth among competitors.

SMIC, the third-place foundry company, posted second-quarter revenue of USD 3 billion, or about KRW 4.0504 trillion, with revenue up 20.0% from the previous quarter and its market share expanding to 5.4%. SMIC's performance was driven by increased pre-buy demand related to PCs, higher demand for ICs around AI servers, and higher demand for network products.

In addition, rising NAND demand and rising NOR demand also acted as positive factors in SMIC's performance. As SMIC showed growth in both revenue and market share, UMC and GF also posted double-digit growth, while China's HuaHong also showed an increase.

UMC, ranked fourth, posted second-quarter revenue of about USD 2.2 billion, or about KRW 2.97 trillion, up 12.7% from the previous quarter. UMC's market share was 3.9%, unchanged from the previous quarter. UMC's performance was led by strong demand for semiconductors for PCs and consumer electronics, as well as increased sales of server products including FPGA, while higher utilization at its 8-inch production lines also contributed to the improvement.

GlobalFoundries (GF), ranked fifth, posted revenue of about USD 1.8 billion, up 9.3% from the previous quarter, while its market share slipped slightly to 3.2%. GF's revenue increase came from the resumption of procurement for consumer products and rising demand tied to AI servers. The company said increasing demand for power semiconductors, transimpedance amplifiers (TIA), and drivers for AI servers supported revenue growth.

The HuaHong group of China, ranked sixth, saw improved group performance thanks to strong NOR demand, strong demand for PMICs for AI, higher wafer prices, and the phased ramp-up of new production capacity at its subsidiary HHGrace. As a result, HuaHong posted second-quarter revenue of about USD 1.3 billion, up 3.5% from the previous quarter. Its market share was 2.3%.

Tower, based in Israel and ranked seventh, was driven by rising demand for TIA and driver ICs for AI optical transceiver modules and increased demand for photonic ICs. As a result, revenue reached USD 460 million, up 11.2% from the previous quarter.

Vanguard International Semiconductor (VIS), ranked eighth, grew on higher orders for AI peripheral ICs, higher orders for mobile PMICs, higher orders for mobile power products, and rising average selling prices (ASP). VIS posted revenue of USD 451 million, up 13.8% from the previous quarter. The growth lifted VIS from ninth place in the previous quarter to eighth.

Nexchip ranked ninth. Nexchip's revenue was USD 447 million, up 6.4% from the previous quarter. This was interpreted as being driven by a recovery in DDIC orders and a rebound in demand for consumer products. However, Nexchip fell one spot, from eighth place in the previous quarter to ninth this time.

Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing (PSMC) took 10th place. PSMC's revenue was USD 432 million, up 11.9% from the previous quarter. Shipments of previously price-hiked memory and logic wafers increased, and performance improved as shipment volumes rose.

Samsung Foundry, meanwhile, posted a slight increase in second-quarter revenue but saw its market share decline. As a result, Samsung Foundry struggled to narrow the gap with TSMC.

However, possibilities have been raised that Samsung Foundry's operating conditions could improve, based on recent expansion in demand for advanced processes, recent price increases, and the securing of major clients. Accordingly, attention is being paid to improving profitability in the second half.

In its second-quarter 2026 earnings release, Samsung Electronics presented an outlook for improved profitability in its foundry business. The basis for the improvement included rising customer demand, better utilization, improved yields, and higher prices. However, Samsung Electronics did not mention specific operating conditions.

Regarding the second-half outlook, Samsung Electronics pointed to increased revenue from major U.S. and Chinese customers and higher demand for base dies for HBM. Accordingly, it forecast that foundry revenue in the second half would post double-digit growth from a year earlier.

In line with this trend, it has been reported that Samsung Foundry raised prices for some advanced-process products in response to growing demand for AI semiconductors. Reuters reported that new order prices for Samsung Electronics' 4-, 5-, and 8-nm processes rose by as much as 15%, and that the 4-nm process at the Pyeongtaek production line is running at full capacity. Samsung Electronics has announced a semiconductor production contract with Broadcom and is pursuing semiconductor manufacturing cooperation with Tesla and Apple. Samsung Foundry has also been mentioned as a possible option for producing Nvidia's next-generation AI inference processor.

Whether the changes mentioned above will translate directly into improved results remains uncertain. Samsung Foundry still faces challenges in strengthening competitiveness in advanced processes, improving production yields, and raising utilization.

The key variables for future performance improvement are expected to be whether increased orders for AI and HPC semiconductors actually lead to higher shipment volumes and whether they result in revenue growth.

TrendForce expects the foundry market to keep growing in the third quarter of 2026. In consumer ICs, constraints on mature-node production capacity are likely to persist and wafer prices may rise, but consumer IC production is expected to remain at a stable level.

In addition, seasonal production expansion of flagship smartphones and production expansion of next-generation AI and high-performance computing (HPC) platforms are expected. TrendForce said the expansion in flagship smartphone production and next-generation AI and HPC platform production will further drive foundry companies' revenue.

A semiconductor industry expert said the global foundry market is expected to maintain its growth as demand for leading-edge processes centered on AI semiconductors emerges while consumer market recovery proceeds at the same time. In this flow, the expert said it is worth paying attention to the possibility that Samsung Foundry's performance improvement will begin in earnest in the second half, as demand for advanced processes is expected and customer revenue growth is also anticipated.

Source: TECHWORLD · Park Gyu-chan
Original: https://www.epnc.co.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=406816

References

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