Marvell Is Winning Custom AI Business. TSMC May Be the Safer Way to Play It

Marvell Is Winning Custom AI Business. TSMC May Be the Safer Way to Play It

Habib Ur Rehman

Sat, September 12, 2026 at 2:04 AM GMT+3 2 min read

Marvell Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MRVL) is betting heavily on custom AI accelerators and networking. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (NYSE:TSM) occupies a particularly powerful position in that strategy.

Marvell's latest regulatory filing says TSM is currently the sole wafer supplier for its advanced-node products, including its 3nm products. That makes the relationship unusually direct. Marvell itself warns that a disruption at TSM could materially affect revenue, net income and cash flow because moving advanced products to another foundry would be difficult.

TSM's latest numbers show why access to its manufacturing capacity is valuable. August revenue rose 53.3% year over year to a record NT$514.81 billion.

Marvell Needs the Custom-AI Programs to Convert

Marvell Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MRVL) has a bull case built around hyperscalers increasingly wanting purpose-built silicon for AI workloads. The company has custom ASIC expertise, high-speed SerDes, networking silicon and advanced packaging capabilities that make it a credible partner for customers that do not want to build every semiconductor capability internally.

The bear case is that these programs can be highly concentrated and lumpy. Marvell also has less negotiating leverage over advanced manufacturing than TSM itself. If foundry pricing rises, part of Marvell's custom-silicon upside could migrate upstream.

Photo from Marvell website

TSM Collects the Manufacturing Toll

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (NYSE:TSM) has almost the mirror-image bull case. It can manufacture Marvell's custom accelerators while also serving competing architectures. The growth of custom silicon therefore expands TSM's opportunity even if it reduces the share of AI spending going to traditional GPUs.

The downside remains familiar: huge capital requirements, geopolitical exposure and dependence on a concentrated group of giant customers.

Hedge funds became considerably more bullish on both names in Q2. Marvell ownership increased to 96 funds from 79, while TSM rose to 249 from 234. Marvell short interest was about 3.3% of its float as of August 14, down sharply from the previous report, while TSM's was only about 0.6%.

That declining short interest is notable because Marvell still carries meaningful execution risk. Investors appear increasingly willing to underwrite its custom-AI ramp. If custom AI silicon succeeds, Marvell can grow rapidly. If a competing architecture wins instead, TSM may still manufacture the winner. That asymmetry gives the foundry the cleaner risk-reward.

While we acknowledge the potential of MRVL and TSM as investments, we believe certain other AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you're looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock.

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