Whether they compete on cutting edge nodes is irrelevant to whether they compete. My comment was explicitly in response to the idea of a TSMC foundry monopoly.

Whether they compete on cutting edge nodes is irrelevant to whether they compete. My comment was explicitly in response to the idea of a TSMC foundry monopoly. It's certainly valuable to understand the specific nature of their competition, but such conversation tautologically defines TSMC as not-monopoly. Ninja-edit: And even if you want to restrict the definition of competition in chip manufacturing to only those foundries with cutting edge nodes, then Samsung's existence is sufficient argument against the claim of monopoly on that front.