⚠ Dominance This Complete Draws Scrutiny and RivalsModerate threat

A 90%-plus share of leading-edge manufacturing is a commercial triumph and a political target. Governments around the world have recognized how dangerous it is to depend¹ on a single company on a single island for the chips their economies and militaries need, and they are pouring subsidies into building alternatives — the US CHIPS Act funding domestic fabs, Europe and Japan doing likewise, and backing Intel's and others' foundry ambitions. TSMC's very dominance is the motivation for a well-funded, state-supported effort to reduce the world's reliance on it.

The near-term reality is that subsidies do not buy a process lead, and TSMC's competitors remain years behind despite the money; a 90%-plus leading-edge share is not seriously threatened today. But over a long horizon, a concerted, government-backed push to build credible alternatives — Intel Foundry, Samsung, subsidized fabs in the US and Europe — is the kind of patient, deep-pocketed competition that could, eventually, chip away at the extremes of TSMC's dominance, especially as customers and their governments actively seek a second source for strategic reasons. The dominance is real and durable, but its very completeness guarantees that the most powerful forces in the world are working to erode it, and TSMC must keep out-executing not just commercial rivals but the treasuries backing them.