Semi Conductor Companies

Intel Corporation

Revenue: US$ 55 billion

Number of employees: 95,000

Intel Corporation is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is one of the worlds largest and highest valued semiconductor chip makers based on revenue. and is the inventor of the x86 series of microprocessors, the processors found in most personal computers (PCs). Intel supplies processors for computer system manufacturers such as Apple Inc., Lenovo, HP and Dell. Intel also manufactures motherboard chipsets, network interface controllers and integrated circuits, flash memory, graphics chips, embedded processors and other devices related to communications and computing.

Intel Corporation was founded on July 18, 1968 by semiconductor pioneers Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore, and widely associated with the executive leadership and vision of Andrew Grove. The company's name was conceived as portmanteau of the words integrated and electronics. The fact that "intel" is the term for intelligence information also made the name appropriate. Intel was an early developer of SRAM and DRAM memory chips, which represented the majority of its business until 1981.

Although Intel created the world's first commercial microprocessor chip in 1971, it was not until the success of the personal computer (PC) that this became its primary business. During the 1990s, Intel invested heavily in new microprocessor designs fostering the rapid growth of the computer industry. During this period Intel became the dominant supplier of microprocessors for PCs, and was known for aggressive and anti-competitive tactics in defense of its market position, particularly against Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), as well as a struggle with Microsoft for control over the direction of the PC industry.

Intel was placed at #56 on the 2015 rankings of the world's most valuable brands published by Millward Brown Optimor. The Open Source Technology Center at Intel hosts PowerTOP and LatencyTOP, and supports other open-source projects such as Wayland, Intel Array Building Blocks, Threading Building.

Samsung Electronics

Revenue: US$180billion (2015)

Number of employees: 392,300

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is a South Korean multinational electronics company headquartered in Suwon, South Korea. Through extremely complicated ownership structure with some circular ownership it is the flagship division of the Samsung Group, accounting for 70% of the group's revenue in 2012. It is the world's second largest information technology company by revenue, after Apple. Samsung Electronics has assembly plants and sales networks in 80 countries and employs around 370,000 people. Since 2012, Kwon Oh-hyun has served as the company's CEO.

Samsung has long been a major manufacturer of electronic components such as lithium-ion batteries, semiconductors, chips, flash memory and hard drive devices for clients such as Apple, Sony, HTC and Nokia.

In recent years, the company has diversified into consumer electronics. It is the world's largest manufacturer of mobile phones and smartphones fueled by the popularity of its Samsung Galaxy line of devices. The company is also a major vendor of tablet computers, particularly its Android-powered Samsung Galaxy Tab collection, and is generally regarded as pioneering the phablet market through the Samsung Galaxy Note family of devices.

Samsung has been the world's largest television manufacturer since 2006, and world's largest manufacturer of mobile phones since 2011. Samsung Electronics displaced Apple Inc. as the world's largest technology company in 2011 and is a major part of the South Korean economy. In June 2014, Samsung published the Tizen OS with the new Samsung Z.

Qualcomm

Revenue: $25.3billion (2015)

Number of employees: 27,000

Qualcomm Inc. is an American multinational semiconductor and telecommunications equipment company that designs and markets wireless telecom products and services. It derives most of its revenue from chipmaking and the bulk of its profit from patent licensing businesses. The company headquarters are located in San Diego, California, United States, and has 224 worldwide locations. The parent company is Qualcomm Incorporated (Qualcomm), which includes the Qualcomm Technology Licensing Division (QTL). Qualcomm's wholly owned subsidiary, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. (QTI), operates substantially all of Qualcomm's R&D activities, as well as its product and services businesses, including its semiconductor business, Qualcomm CDMA Technologies.

Qualcomm's first products and services included the OmniTRACS satellite locating and messaging service, used by long-haul trucking companies, developed from a product called Omninet owned by Parviz Nazarian and Neil Kadisha, and specialized integrated circuits for digital radio communications such as a Viterbi decoder and now it is one of the leading processor makers for smartphone companies.

In 1990, Qualcomm began the design of the first CDMA-based cellular base station, based upon calculations derived from the CDMA-based OmniTRACS satellite system. This work began as a study contract from AirTouch which was facing a shortage of cellular capacity in Los Angeles. Two years later Qualcomm began to manufacture CDMA cell phones, base stations and chips. The initial base stations were not reliable and the technology was licensed wholly to Nortel in return for their work in improving the base station switching. The first CDMA technology was standardized as IS-95. Qualcomm has since helped to establish the CDMA2000, WCDMA and LTE cellular standards.