A semiconductor manufacturer that makes chips for other companies. Foundries make most of the chips in the world for hundreds of "fabless" companies that design the circuits but do not manufacture the chips, including some of the most well-known tech leaders such as Qualcomm, NVIDIA and Apple. However, a large chip maker that designs and makes its own chips may sell excess manufacturing capacity and function as a foundry from time to time (see
IDM). See
fab.
It Takes Manufacturing Expertise
Founded by Morris Chang in 1987, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC) was the first "pure-play" foundry, which was created to make chips only for other companies. There is a huge difference in expertise required to design the circuits on a chip versus actually making a wafer full of chips. See
TSMC,
process technology,
chip and
chip manufacturing.