Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) named to TIME100 Most Influential Companies 2025

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is the world’s largest chip manufacturer, providing the brains behind everything from smartphones to data centers. Surging demand for its cutting-edge AI chips, which are optimized for tasks like machine learning and neural networks, helped TSMC beat analyst estimates in the first quarter of 2025.

But those chips place TSMC in the center of the trade war between the U.S. and China, making it a focal point of geopolitical tension over AI’s future. (TSMC partners with Synopsys and Foxconn in the U.S. and T-Head [Alibaba] and Sanechips in China.) Even as Washington tightens regulations to reduce China’s access to advanced chips, TSMC has admitted it has limited ability to keep business partners from diverting shipments to avoid the sanctions.

Facing pressure from the White House, TSMC committed to spending $100 billion on U.S. chip manufacturing facilities in March, bringing its total American investment to $165 billion. Overall, TSMC aims to build nine global facilities in 2025 in countries like Germany and Japan as it ramps up capacity to historic levels.