At present, the global semiconductor foundry industry is experiencing the double impact of technological upgrading and industrial pattern adjustment. From the breakthrough of the 2nm process to the strategic restructuring of enterprises, from the geopolitical game to the trend of green computing, the core logic of the development of the industry is undergoing profound changes.
Ⅰ The technological arms race is heating up, and 2nm has become a new battlefield
The fierce competition between TSMC, Samsung, Rapidus and other companies in the 2nm process reflects the industrial reality that Moore's law has not yet expired. Behind the parameters of 15% performance improvement and 30% energy efficiency optimization is the thirst for advanced manufacturing processes due to the explosion of AI computing power. In particular, it is worth noting that Japan's Rapidus entered the game as a "dark horse" in an attempt to break the TSMC-Samsung duopoly pattern, which not only means a breakthrough in the technical threshold, but also suggests that geopolitical factors are reshaping the semiconductor supply chain. TSMC's behavior of advancing the mass production schedule highlights the business strategy of leading companies to consolidate their monopoly position through the technology generation gap.
Ⅱ The undercurrent of industrial restructuring is surging, and the relationship between competition and cooperation is complicated
Rumors of a merger between GlobalFoundries and UMC, as well as a potential joint venture between Intel and TSMC, reveal the existential anxieties of latecomers on the road to catch-up. When the cost of technology research and development climbs to the order of 10 billion US dollars, the independent living space of small and medium-sized foundries is sharply compressed, and the industry may move towards the era of "super alliance". This paradox of competition and cooperation—not only to fight in cutting-edge fields, but also to hold together at mature nodes—embodies the unique "cooperative competition" ecology of the semiconductor industry.
Ⅲ HBM technology has become a key hub for the integration of memory and logic chips
Samsung's move to relocate talent from the foundry department to HBM's R&D is strategic. As the importance of 3D stacking and advanced packaging technologies goes beyond simple process scaling, the competition for HBM4 has escalated from the storage field to a contest of system-level innovation. This cross-departmental resource integration implies that the breakthrough of chip performance in the future will rely more on architecture innovation and heterogeneous integration, rather than on the technological breakthrough of a single link, and the dimension of industrial competition is moving from flat to three-dimensional.
Figure: The global foundry market may be restructured (Source: Trendforce)
Ⅳ The deep entanglement of geopolitics and business logic
Rapidus made a high-profile mention of its contact with GAFAM (Google, Apple, etc.), and the Japanese government's support for it, revealing the national strategic nature of the semiconductor industry. When the technology roadmap is tied to the supply chain security, the market behavior of enterprises inevitably becomes an extension of the great power game. The complexity of this political economy makes it difficult for technological progress alone to fully dominate the direction of the industry.
Ⅴ The co-evolution of green computing and business interests
In recent years, industry players have been emphasizing the energy efficiency improvement of the 2nm process, reflecting that the semiconductor industry is actively integrating into the global carbon reduction narrative. This practice of transforming technological advantages into ESG discourse is not only a response to regulatory pressure, but also opens up new value growth points. When "performance per watt" replaces "absolute performance" as the core metric, the direction of technology evolution may be subtly adjusted.
Overall, the semiconductor industry is undergoing a paradigm shift from "technology-driven" to "eco-driven". In this transformation, the success or defeat of enterprises is no longer only determined by breakthroughs in the laboratory, but also by their ability to integrate the industrial chain, the wisdom of balancing geopolitical risks, and the imagination to transform physical challenges into business opportunities. The future industry map may be redrawn by those companies that can dance in the three dimensions of technological innovation, political mediation, and ecological construction at the same time.
