fabless
/ˈfæbləs/
describing a chip company that designs semiconductors but outsources all manufacturing to a foundry
fabless in a sentence
“Qualcomm and NVIDIA are fabless companies that rely on TSMC to manufacture their chips.”
Origin of fabless
fab (fabrication) + -less; coined in the 1990s as the business model emerged
Related Words
Moore's Law
the observation that the number of transistors on a chip doubles approximately every two years, driving decades of computing progress
SoC
System on a Chip; an integrated circuit that combines all components of a computer—CPU, GPU, memory controller, and I/O—onto a single die
chiplet
a modular, small die designed to connect with other chiplets in a single package, enabling flexible chip assembly
EUV
Extreme Ultraviolet lithography; a technology using 13.5nm wavelength light to print the finest circuit patterns, essential for advanced nodes
FinFET
a transistor architecture where the channel rises vertically like a fin, enabling better current control at small scales
IP core
a reusable, pre-designed circuit block licensed from a third party and integrated into a custom chip