Before the semiconductor foundry model, Integrated Device Manufacturers (IDMs), do both design and manufacturing integrated circuits. Differentiation and economic efficiency drives the industry towards foundry model. With foundry model, thus exists fabless companies (specialised in design, no need to invest in equipment to manufacture) and semiconductor foundry (specialised in manufacturing technology, invest in equipments and technology, pooling orders from pool of fabless companies for economy of scales, no need to design).

Examples of some pure-play top semiconductor foundries.

Semiconductor foundry produces integrated circuits in the form of wafer.
This website shows some typical processes in semiconductor foundry.

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