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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Chipmaker TSMC had a mixed final calendar quarter of 2023, with profit falling less than expected and revenue growth “essentially flat,” in another sign that the global semiconductor downturn is over.

Chief executive CC Wei said of the quarter: “Our business has bottomed out on a year-over-year basis, and we expect 2024 to be a healthy growth year for TSMC, supported by continued strong ramp of our industry-leading 3nm technologies, strong demand for the 5nm technologies and robust AI-related demand.”

[...] Looking at TSMC’s production of wafer shipments during the quarter, 5nm was the largest single process node by revenue, at 35 percent. 7nm accounted for another 17 percent, while the current most advanced 3nm nodes accounted for 15 percent of revenue.

The latter figure shows that 3nm uptake is indeed increasing, as it made up just 6 percent of TSMC’s wafer revenue in the previous quarter. Older nodes such as 16nm still accounted for 8 percent, with 28nm at 7 percent, but advanced nodes, which TSMC now defines as 7nm or better, accounted for 67 percent of wafer revenue for this quarter.

[...] “2023 was a challenging year for the global semiconductor industry, but our technology leadership enabled TSMC to outperform the foundry industry,” Huang commented.

He also struck an optimistic note looking ahead, telling investors that: “Despite a challenging 2023, our revenue remains well on track to grow between 15 and 20 percent CAGR over the next several years in US dollar terms, which is the target we communicated back in the January 2022 investor conference,” Huang commented.

Chief exec Wei added he expected the overall semiconductor market, excluding memory, to increase by more than 10 percent during 2024. Analyst Gartner recently estimated that global semiconductor revenues will rise 16.8 percent this year, following a contraction in sales during 2023.

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