Which Taiwanese chipmaker is commonly abbreviated TSMC and ranks among the world's largest companies by market cap?

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, commonly abbreviated TSMC, ranks among the world’s largest companies by market capitalization.

TSMC was founded in Taiwan in 1987 by Morris Chang. Its major innovation was specializing in contract chip manufacturing: customers design semiconductor products, while TSMC manufactures them in advanced fabrication plants. This model helped create the modern “fabless” semiconductor industry.

The company manufactures chips for many leading technology firms, including processors and accelerators used in smartphones, computers, data centers, and artificial-intelligence systems. Its market value has benefited from the strategic importance of advanced chips and the difficulty of reproducing leading-edge manufacturing capacity.

TSMC is not the same as a chip designer such as Nvidia or AMD. Those companies create chip architectures and products, while TSMC primarily operates the manufacturing infrastructure. TSMC also has major facilities outside Taiwan, including plants in the United States and Japan.