Fabless manufacturing
Rank Company Headquarters Revenue ( million US $ )
1 Qualcomm USA 17,200
2 Broadcom USA 8,200
3 AMD USA 5,300
4 MediaTek Taiwan 4,600
5 Nvidia USA 3,900
Sales leaders
The top 5 sales leaders for fabless companies in 2017 were : [ 6 ] Rank Company Headquarters Revenue ( million US $ ) 1 Qualcomm USA 17,078 2 Broadcom USA 16,065 3 Nvidia USA 9,228 4 MediaTek Taiwan 7,875 5 Apple USA 6,660 The top 5 sales leaders for fabless companies in 2013 were : [ 7 ]
Fabless manufacturing is the design and sale of hardware devices and semiconductor chips and outsourcing their fabrication (or fab) to a specialized manufacturer called a semiconductor foundry. Foundries are typically, but not exclusively, located in mainland China and Taiwan. Fabless companies can benefit from lower capital costs while concentrating their research and development resources on the end market. Some fabless companies and pure play foundries (like TSMC) may offer microchip/integrated circuit design services to third parties.