Samsung Electronics Chairman Jae-Yong Lee's recent acquittal in a merger and accounting fraud trial marks the end of the company's decade-long "judicial crisis," according to South Korean media. Industry observers expect Lee to revive his "speedy management" style to tackle crucial challenges in decision-making and semiconductor competitiveness

China's cloud service providers (CSPs) have been engaged in fierce price competition since 2024, deploying aggressive cost-cutting strategies to expand market share. This battle is set to intensify in 2025 as major CSPs integrate the low-cost DeepSeek AI model, which blends artificial intelligence (AI) with open-source frameworks on cloud computing platforms. The ongoing price war is expected to drive service fees even lower

Amid intensifying competition in advanced semiconductor packaging, Samsung Electronics is reportedly taking direct control of glass substrate supply chain development, a critical enabler for next-generation AI chips and high-performance computing. Industry analysts suggest this strategic move aims to strengthen Samsung Foundry's competitiveness by offering integrated solutions combining cutting-edge packaging, high-bandwidth memory (HBM), and novel substrate technologies

SK Hynix's memory business in China faces numerous uncertainties due to the ongoing US-China conflict. Chief Production Officer (CPO) Young-Sik Kim will reportedly lead the Wuxi fab in response to tariffs and sanctions following the inauguration of Trump's new administration

Industry observers from Taiwan's supply chain are speculating about Nissan's future direction as its potential merger with Honda appears increasingly likely to fail

Toyota has unveiled plans to accelerate its electrification initiatives in the US and China, according to its latest financial report. The Japanese automaker will begin producing batteries for hybrid electric vehicles (HEV), plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV), and battery electric vehicles (BEV) at its new North Carolina plant in April 2025

Alibaba Group (Alibaba) has announced that its upgraded Qwen 2.5 Max model has achieved superior performance over the V3 model from Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) startup DeepSeek in several third-party benchmark tests. The achievement marks a significant milestone as Qwen 2.5 Max has emerged as the top-ranked non-reasoning model from China in prominent benchmarking and ranking platforms

Renesas Electronics Corp., a leading Japanese semiconductor manufacturer, reported significant declines in revenue and profit for the fiscal year 2024 (January–December), primarily due to weaker earnings from its industrial chip segment

With the growing buzz surrounding DeepSeek, its website and application have seen a massive surge in traffic. The influx of new users has led to repeated "server busy" delays, raising concerns that despite DeepSeek's advantage of low-cost models, it may face bottlenecks due to overwhelming demand for computational power

The advent of DeepSeek is expected to promote China's goal of achieving self-sufficiency in semiconductor development, according to sources at semiconductor equipment companies

In a recent episode of In Good Company—hosted by Nicolai Tangen, CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management—Christophe Fouquet, President and CEO of ASML, delivered a pointed analysis of the semiconductor industry's future amid escalating geopolitical tensions

Apple Inc., which counts China as its biggest manufacturing hub and the US as its largest market, is now at the center of an escalating geopolitical fight that threatens to span tariffs and regulatory probes

Artificial intelligence (AI) and data center demand are emerging as key performance drivers for Japanese electronic component makers such as Murata Manufacturing, while performance in areas such as automotive and smartphones remains mixed

Chinese AI startup DeepSeek, founded by Wenfeng Liang, has developed a generative AI (GenAI) service that claims to surpass large language models (LLMs) in the US, such as OpenAI's, with a low-cost, open-source approach that does not rely on advanced GPUs or HBM. With a reported development cost of under US$6 million, DeepSeek developed its V3 model in just two months, positioning itself as one of the most significant disruptors in AI for 2025

Arm China announced on February 6th, 2025 that it has appointed Feng Chen as its new CEO, following the departure of co-CEOs Renchen Liu and Eric Chen. Before this appointment, Feng Chen held key positions at SMIC (Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation), where he served as the Director of the Design Services Department and Head of the Department