Silicon Valley

American  

noun

1. the area in northern California, southwest of San Francisco in the Santa Clara valley region, where many of the high-technology design and manufacturing companies in the semiconductor industry are concentrated.

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Silicon Valley British  

noun

1. an industrial strip in W California, extending S of San Francisco, in which the US information technology industry is concentrated

2. any area in which industries associated with information technology are concentrated

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Silicon Valley Cultural  

1. A region on the San Francisco Peninsula in California where the miniaturized electronics industry is centered, so called because most of the devices built there are made of semiconductors such as silicon.

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The term is often used as a catchword to describe the development of high-tech industry (see also high-tech): “If we can attract this corporation to our town, we could become another Silicon Valley.”

Etymology

Origin of Silicon Valley

So called from the silicon wafers employed in semiconductor devices

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Silicon Valley

Dubbed the PayPal mafia, the company’s founders and early employees, such as Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, would go on to invest in or build successful Silicon Valley companies.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 29, 2026

It was because of money from tech billionaire investor Peter Thiel and other Silicon Valley types who seem to equate being rich with being learned.

From Salon ● Jul. 29, 2026

Some founders and startup executives said Anthropic’s release of Claude Design was a wake-up call across Silicon Valley.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 29, 2026

As debate escalates over the implications of open-weight artificial intelligence in both Washington and Silicon Valley, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang made his position clear on Friday.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 24, 2026

South of that were little beach towns, and then Silicon Valley and Stanford.

From "We Are Okay" by Nina LaCour