TSMC’s share price broke a record, and the “trace” of protecting the country has once again become the focus of market discussion. According to expert analysis, TSMC relies on 3 tricks to create a barrier to competition, including focusing on foundry, huge capital expenditures and accompany customers to practice skills, successfully distanced itself from Samsung and succumbed to Apple's orders, becoming the world's largest semiconductor foundry leader.

According to Liu Peizhen, a researcher and industrial consultant at the Taiwan Economic Research Institute, TSMC has achieved the ultimate in OEM. Unlike the “three to four gross” of notebook OEMs, TSMC’s gross profit margin can be as high as 50% to meet customer diversity and customization. The demand for globalization, "TSMC has 258 manufacturing processes, 480 customers, and 9,920 products, which is difficult for ordinary companies to imagine."

Turning to historical observations, in the early years, Intel mastered the most advanced technology in the global semiconductor industry. In the heyday of personal computers 20 years ago, Intel’s microprocessors (CPU) dominated the world. Even the well-known Moore's law in the semiconductor industry was proposed by Gordon Moore, the co-founder of Intel, and is regarded as an important reference standard by the industry.

In 2012, TSMC’s manufacturing and R&D capabilities lag behind Intel and Samsung. Zhang Zhongmou described these two most formidable competitors as very powerful, just like "700-pound gorillas."

However, 8 years later, Intel handed over the foundry orders to TSMC, which indirectly affirmed TSMC’s capabilities.

In addition to focusing on the foundry industry, TSMC maintains an annual capital expenditure scale of more than 10 billion US dollars. This year’s law will explain that the original planned total scale of 15-16 billion US dollars has been increased to 16-17 billion US dollars, and advanced purchases through huge capital expenditures Process equipment to widen the gap with competitors.

Later, as smart phones became more popular and mobile phone functions changed with each passing day, customers' requirements for chips became higher and higher. According to Yang Ruilin, research director of the International Institute of Obstetrics, ITRI, TSMC’s key growth technology breakthroughs in the past 7 to 10 years, especially in the 4G era, are driven by smartphone chip customers, including Apple, Qualcomm, and MediaTek. Improve technology, "practice" with customers, and unknowingly also greatly enhance their combat power.

In contrast, Intel did not invest heavily in smartphone-related applications. Later, Intel wanted to transform into mobile communications from the personal computer business, but it was not smooth, and the process began to take longer and unable to keep up.

According to industry analysis, this is also related to the business model of the two companies' organizational culture and manufacturing process. TSMC is a pure foundry, like opening an independent restaurant that sells outside customers; Intel is an integrated device manufacturer, which is more like a family restaurant, and the main thing is to make the family feel delicious. "But when the restaurant gets better and bigger, it will also drive more good food suppliers to want to do business with the restaurant."

According to Liu Peizhen’s analysis, TSMC’s beachhead was to grab an order from the major Apple. In 2015, although Samsung had developed 14nm earlier and shocked the industry, the performance and yield of TSMC’s 16nm processor in the A9 processor made Apple very satisfied. It also prompted TSMC to take all orders from Apple's A10 to A14 processors.

Liu Peizhen pointed out that Intel originally announced mass production of 10 nanometers in the fourth quarter of next year, and recently said it would postpone it by one year. This also announced that TSMC has substantially surpassed Intel in its technical blueprint and is undoubtedly the most influential company in the global semiconductor industry.