TSMC is the semiconductor manufacturer headquartered in Hsinchu that makes chips designed by companies such as Apple and Nvidia.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, commonly called TSMC, is the world’s largest dedicated semiconductor foundry. A foundry manufactures chips for customers that design processors but generally do not operate their own leading-edge fabrication plants. This model lets firms such as Apple, Nvidia, AMD, and Qualcomm focus on chip architecture and product development.
TSMC was founded in Taiwan in 1987 by Morris Chang. Its headquarters and major manufacturing base are in Hsinchu, a city known for Taiwan’s technology industry. The company has also expanded manufacturing and construction activities outside Taiwan, including in Arizona, Japan, and Germany.
TSMC is central to the market for advanced processors used in smartphones, data centers, artificial intelligence systems, and high-performance computing. It is often confused with Nvidia, which designs many processors, or Intel, which both designs chips and operates manufacturing facilities.