C.C. Wei, CEO of TSMC, and Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, work together on stage throughout TSMC’s annual sports activities day in Hsinchu, Taiwan, Nov. 8, 2025.
Ann Wang | Reuters
When Jensen Huang first met Morris Chang a long time in the past, he informed the founding father of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Firm that at some point Nvidia could be the chip foundry’s largest buyer.
That is a narrative Huang, Nvidia’s CEO, was requested about on a latest podcast, and it is a promise that’s on monitor to be realized this 12 months.
Nvidia will grow to be TSMC’s largest buyer this 12 months, in response to analyst estimates and Huang himself. Apple is believed to at the moment be TSMC’s largest buyer, principally to fabricate A-series chips for iPhones and M-series chips for PCs and servers.
The positional swap will mark a basic shift within the semiconductor business, reflecting Nvidia’s rising significance amid the AI infrastructure buildout.
On the podcast printed this month, Huang mentioned that swap has already occurred.
“Morris shall be glad to know Nvidia is TSMC’s largest buyer now,” mentioned Huang, including that he was personally very glad in regards to the milestone.
Inventive Methods chief analyst Ben Bajarin mentioned he tasks Nvidia to generate $33 billion in TSMC income this 12 months, or about 22% of the chip foundry’s complete. Apple, by comparability, is projected to generate about $27 billion, or about 18% of TSMC’s income.
“The dimensions of this drastically modified,” Bajarin mentioned. “A pair years in the past, you may simply see how far more capability Nvidia was demanding from TSMC.”
Nvidia and TSMC declined to remark. Apple did not reply to a request for remark.
Apple experiences first-quarter earnings on Thursday, and the corporate is forecasting as a lot as 12% income development within the quarter.
TSMC would not talk about the rating of its 522 prospects, though it mentioned in March that its high 10 prospects made up 76% of the corporate’s web income, including that its largest buyer on the time accounted for 22% of its web income. The second-largest buyer accounted for 12% of web income.
Nvidia’s influence is obvious within the chip foundry’s financials.
TSMC’s HPC gross sales, which embrace Nvidia’s AI chips, made up 55% of web income in fourth-quarter earnings that had been reported earlier this month. That was up from 40% in 2022, the 12 months the AI increase kicked off with the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. AI accelerators, that are at the moment dominated by Nvidia, made up “high-teens” of TSMC’s complete 2025 gross sales.
Nvidia’s gross sales are rising rapidly and outpacing Apple’s development. In February, Nvidia is anticipated to report 66% development to $213 billion in gross sales in its fiscal 2026, which ends this month. Apple’s development in its fiscal 2025, resulted in September, was 6.4%.
Moreover, Nvidia’s AI chips are greater and extra difficult to supply than what Apple manufactures, which implies they value extra.
The shift additionally highlights TSMC’s position as the biggest contract provide foundry on the planet, offering chip manufacturing and associated providers to just about each processor maker, together with Superior Micro Units, Intel, Broadcom and Qualcomm.
TSMC has an estimated 70% of the whole marketplace for chip manufacturing income, in response to market researcher TrendForce. Though rival Intel has mentioned it desires to make main node chips within the U.S., it has but to announce an anchor buyer, and on Thursday, the corporate noticed its inventory plunge 13% after reporting tender first-quarter steerage and manufacturing considerations.
A TSMC emblem is displayed on a wall in Hsinchu, Taiwan April 15, 2025.
Ann Wang | Reuters
Huang understands the significance of TSMC’s provide to Nvidia.
He visited Taiwan 5 occasions final 12 months. In November, he attended the foundry’s annual sports activities day whereas carrying the identical purple shirt as TSMC workers. On that journey, he additionally reportedly visited TSMC’s fab outfitted with the three nanometer expertise used to supply Nvidia’s Rubin chip, which is in full manufacturing and anticipated to ship later this 12 months.
TSMC’s newest quarterly outcomes confirmed how the corporate’s enterprise is being remodeled by the demand for AI chips. Firm executives mentioned they had been weighing elevated funding into extra factories, however had been performing cautiously.
For the December quarter, TSMC reported $33.73 billion in web income, up 21% on an annual foundation, and projected 30% development in gross sales this 12 months. The sturdy forecast is pushed by TSMC’s success in AI chips, which the corporate expects to develop at a “mid-to-high-fifties” compound development price via 2029.
“Our prospects’ buyer, who’re primarily the cloud service suppliers, are additionally offering sturdy alerts and reaching out on to request the capability to help their enterprise,” TSMC CEO C.C. Wei mentioned, in response to an organization transcript. “Thus, our conviction within the multi-year AI mega-trend stays sturdy.”
TSMC mentioned it deliberate to spend as a lot as $56 billion on capital expenditures this 12 months and expects to extend that to seize AI demand, including that investments made this 12 months would come on-line in 2028. Nonetheless, the corporate stays conservative about long-term projections that may span 5 years into the longer term.
“I am additionally very nervous about it, you wager,” Wei mentioned when requested about an AI bubble, in response to the transcript. “As a result of we’ve got to speculate about $52 billion to $56 billion for the CapEx, proper?”
Tim Prepare dinner, chief govt officer of Apple Inc., left, shares a toast with Morris Chang, founding father of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), throughout a “First Device-In” ceremony on the TSMC facility underneath building in Phoenix, Arizona, US, on Tuesday, Dec. 6, 2022.
Caitlin O’Hara | Bloomberg | Getty Photos
TSMC and Apple have had an in depth relationship due to the amount of iPhone chips, that are smaller than AI GPUs and due to this fact cheaper per unit. The steadiness of that relationship allowed TSMC to aggressively put money into new capability for cutting-edge applied sciences, that are referred to as the “main nodes.”
Apple needed the most recent manufacturing nodes as a result of the extra superior the manufacturing course of, the extra power-efficient the chip will be, bettering machine battery life. However energy effectivity on the most recent nodes can also be vital to Nvidia. That is as a result of power is an enter into the return on funding on its AI techniques.
“It simply modifications the dynamic the place what was the driving power for TSMC — Apple — now shifts to Nvidia, and to a point AMD, which is kind of the guarantee-scale buyer that helps you justify the rise in CapEx to every new node,” Bajarin mentioned.
Apple will nonetheless want numerous chips from TSMC, however on the Taiwanese firm’s earnings name earlier this month, the one buyer whose product names had been talked about was Nvidia.
“My prospects, their product enhancements proceed to extend,” Wei mentioned. “It is well-known from Hopper to Blackwell to Rubin — that just about doubles, triples their efficiency.”
Wei added that, from his perspective, the bottleneck within the AI business stays “TSMC’s wafer provide.”
