Key Takeaways
1. Global foundry earnings reached a record $41.7 billion in Q2 2025, a 14.6% increase quarter-on-quarter.
2. TSMC led the market with $30.24 billion in revenue, capturing a 70.2% market share, the highest ever for the company.
3. Demand growth was driven by China’s consumer subsidies and upcoming product launches in smartphones, PCs, and servers.
4. Tier-2 foundries also grew, with HuaHong Group earning $1.06 billion and other smaller foundries seeing significant increases.
5. Challenges remain for advanced node production, particularly for SMIC, which faced a 1.7% revenue decline due to shipment delays.
Global foundry earnings reached an all-time high of $41.7 billion in the second quarter of 2025, marking an increase of 14.6 percent quarter-on-quarter, as reported by TrendForce. TSMC topped the list with an impressive revenue of $30.24 billion, capturing a 70.2 percent share, which is the highest it has ever achieved. Samsung claimed the second spot with $3.16 billion and a 7.3 percent market share, while China’s SMIC secured third place, earning $2.21 billion and holding a market share of 5.1 percent.
Demand Surge
The rise in demand was fueled by China’s consumer subsidy initiative and the anticipation of product launches in the latter half of the year for smartphones, notebooks/PCs, and servers. TrendForce predicts that seasonal product trends will continue to drive orders in Q3: advanced nodes are set to gain from flagship chip sales, while mature nodes will benefit from demand for peripheral ICs, with growth expected to slow down from the rapid increase seen in Q2.
TSMC’s Dominance
TSMC’s strong position is attributed to its advanced nodes and the scale of its packaging capabilities. Currently, around three-quarters of its revenue is generated from 7nm technology and smaller nodes, with about a quarter coming from 3nm, which is largely driven by Nvidia’s Blackwell GPUs, AMD’s Zen 5 CPUs, and Apple’s M-series Macs. The ramp-up in high-performance chip production and mobile device manufacturing, along with the capacity for advanced packaging, has kept both shipments and average selling prices on the rise.
Samsung’s foundry revenue increased by 9.2 percent quarter-on-quarter to $3.16 billion, still placing it far behind TSMC. In contrast, SMIC experienced a decline of 1.7 percent due to challenges in advanced node production, as shipment delays affected average selling prices. UMC’s revenue grew by 8.2 percent to $1.9 billion, capturing a 4.4 percent share, while GlobalFoundries saw a 6.5 percent increase to $1.69 billion, holding a 3.9 percent share. Despite substantial investments, Intel Foundry’s revenue continues to be significantly lower.
Growth Among Tier-2 Foundries
Tier-2 foundries also saw growth thanks to orders for peripheral ICs: HuaHong Group reached approximately $1.06 billion, accounting for 2.5 percent of the market, Vanguard earned $379 million, Tower made $372 million, Nexchip reached $363 million, and PSMC garnered $345 million. While supply is anticipated to improve this year, costs are expected to stay high. The TSMC 2nm node is likely to come with a higher price tag, as GPU manufacturers are already raising prices to counterbalance wafer costs.
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