The reality, at the moment, is that Intel may well be the only company that can push the industry forward.<p>Each time you introduce a new processor node, the cost of the fab goes up dramatically, and now we&#x27;re talking about $14 billion for the next Samsung fab. (This is Rock&#x27;s Law.)<p>If you go back a few years, there were a couple of dozen chip manufacturers around the leading edge, including Toshiba, Siemens, Sony, Fujitsu, NEC and Philips.<p>With each new step, one or two of these companies can&#x27;t find or justify the money to build a very expensive fab for the next process, so they drop out.<p>Today, we&#x27;re down to four or five: Intel, TSMC, Global Foundries (ex AMD+IBM), Samsung and maybe Europe&#x27;s STM. So Toshiba, Siemens, Sony, Fujitsu, NEC, Philips and several others have all dropped out.<p>Which of the four or five leading companies have got both the money and the need to keep pushing on?<p>Looks to me like Intel and Samsung.<p>The only other option I can see is Apple putting a ton of money into TSMC, which current makes most of its money fabricating chips for mid-market companies like Mediatek. That&#x27;s a possibility because it would stop Apple from being too reliant on Samsung.<p>Rock&#x27;s law 
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