The 3Q Foundry Market Grew by 12%... TSMC-Samsung Gap Slightly Widened

[Asia Economy Reporter Jeong Hyunjin] In the third quarter of this year, the global semiconductor foundry market grew by about 12% compared to the previous quarter, with the gap in market share between industry leader Taiwan's TSMC and Samsung Electronics slightly widening.

According to Taiwan market research firm TrendForce on the 3rd, the top 10 companies, which account for 97% of total foundry market sales, recorded sales of $27.277 billion (approximately 32.0641 trillion KRW) in the third quarter of this year, an 11.8% increase from the previous quarter. Total foundry sales have set a new record for nine consecutive quarters since the third quarter of 2019.

In terms of market share, TSMC ranked first with 53.1% in the third quarter, followed by Samsung Electronics with 17.1%. While TSMC's market share increased by 0.2 percentage points compared to the second quarter, Samsung Electronics' share decreased by 0.2 percentage points during the same period, widening the gap between the two companies from 35.6 percentage points in the second quarter to 36.0 percentage points in the third quarter.

During the third quarter, TSMC's sales increased by 11.9% quarter-on-quarter, influenced by the launch of new iPhone models, whereas Samsung Electronics' sales growth was 11.0%, lower than TSMC's, which appears to have affected its market share. TrendForce explained that Samsung Electronics saw increased foundry demand for mobile system-on-chips (SoC) and display driver ICs (DDI) due to new smartphone model launches in the second half of the year, and sales rose thanks to the normalization of the Austin fab in the U.S., which had production disruptions due to a cold wave earlier this year, as well as the operation of the Pyeongtaek S5 line.

Additionally, Taiwan's UMC ranked third with a 7.3% market share, U.S.-based GlobalFoundries was fourth with 6.1%, and China's SMIC was fifth with 5.0%. DB HiTek maintained its 10th place with a 1.0% market share.