Microelectronics Corporation (UMC), GlobalFoundries and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC). In 2013 the cost of building the next generation wafer fab was over $10 billion. WFE market Referred to respectively as the wafer fab equipment or wafer front end (equipment) market, both using the acronym WFE, the market is that of the manufacturers of the machines which in turn manufacture semiconductors. The apexresearch link in 2020 identified Applied Materials, ASML, KLA-Tencor, Lam Research, TEL and Dainippon Screen Manufacturing as market participants while the 2019 electronicsweekly.com report, citing The Information Network’s president Robert Castellano, focused on the respective market shares commanded by the two leaders, Applied Materials and ASML. References Semiconductor device fabrication