TSMC’s HPC share rises as sales decline

TSMC’s 20 April results show first-quarter revenue of US$16.72 billion, down 4.8% year-on-year. In Taiwan dollars, revenue rose 3.6% to NT$508.63 billion.

Photo: Briáxis F. Mendes (孟必思), “TSMC logo on Taichung factory building” (2020). CC BY-SA 4.0. Responsive crops under the same licence.

The management report exposes another distinction: high-performance computing rose from 42% to 44% of revenue, yet its sales fell 14% quarter-on-quarter in Taiwan-dollar terms. Smartphone sales fell 27%.

HPC gained share of a shrinking total. That isn’t evidence of an HPC sales recovery, and the platform category doesn’t isolate AI demand.

Following its January warning of weaker demand, TSMC forecasts second-quarter revenue of US$15.2–16.0 billion, below the first quarter. CFO Wendell Huang says customers are still adjusting inventories.