CONNECT WITH US
Thursday 16 July 2026
AI hardware boom lifts Taiwan's rail and CCL suppliers; optical module tells messier story
Taiwan's technology supply chain delivered another month of strong year-over-year revenue growth in June 2026, led by suppliers tied directly to AI server infrastructure, even as the optical module segment showed the sharpest slowdown of any sector tracked and revealed a widening gap between winners and laggards within its own ranks.
Thursday 16 July 2026
DeepSeek eyes US$70 billion valuation and Shanghai IPO as Apple Intelligence enters China

DeepSeek is preparing a new fundraising round and a possible Shanghai listing as surging computing costs force one of China's best-known artificial intelligence startups to rethink its long-standing resistance to outside capital.

Thursday 16 July 2026
Apple Intelligence edges closer to China with Alibaba Qwen integration
Apple Intelligence has passed a key regulatory milestone in China, bringing the iPhone maker closer to launching generative AI features for mainland users after a prolonged delay.
Thursday 16 July 2026
Groups urge EU interim measures against Broadcom amid VMware antitrust case

A European industry group, the Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe (CISPE), has joined four other trade organizations in calling for the European Commission to impose interim measures while it processes an antitrust case against Broadcom. The case concerns recent licensing changes made by the chip designer on the virtualization platform VMware.

Thursday 16 July 2026
Apple lawsuit targets OpenAI's AI hardware ambitions
Apple has sued OpenAI for allegedly stealing trade secrets, but the real fight is over who controls the entry points of AI. As LLM technology converges, the case shows that competition is shifting back to a fundamental question: on what device, and in what way, will users use AI?
Thursday 16 July 2026
Commentary: Xi Jinping elevates Sovereign AI, diplomacy, ecosystems into China's next AI strategy

The 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) opens in Shanghai on July 17, with Chinese President Xi Jinping set to attend and deliver a keynote speech.

Thursday 16 July 2026
AWS showcases Trainium, Inferentia and Graviton in Taiwan, home to over 90% of advanced chip production

Amazon Web Services opened its 2026 AWS Summit Taipei on July 15, placing AI agents, custom chips and enterprise AI adoption at the center of its annual cloud and AI conference.

Thursday 16 July 2026
Nvidia expands Japan AI partnerships with Kawasaki, Toyota, and industrial leaders

Nvidia unveiled a series of new partnerships in Japan on July 16, 2026, highlighting the growing adoption of AI across manufacturing, robotics, automotive, healthcare and data center infrastructure. The announcements coincided with CEO Jensen Huang's visit to Japan, where the company showcased its latest physical AI technologies and deepened collaborations with several of the country's leading industrial groups.

Thursday 16 July 2026
Jensen refutes Vera Rubin's delay, continuing Nvidia's running rebuttal of the rumor mill

Nvidia co-founder and chief executive Jensen Huang used a developer event in Tokyo on July 15 to reject reports that manufacturing problems could delay its next-generation AI accelerator systems, telling reporters the claims were "not true" and that "Vera Rubin is already in production. Giant amounts of production incoming."

Thursday 16 July 2026
Apple reportedly explores AI chip acquisitions as it races to strengthen its infrastructure
Apple is exploring acquisitions of semiconductor companies to accelerate development of AI server chips, reflecting mounting pressure to improve the computing infrastructure behind its AI ambitions, according to The Information.
Thursday 16 July 2026
Nvidia doubles down on the land of the rising GPU, wiring Blackwell into Japan's science, banks, factories and cars

Nvidia has laid out a sweeping expansion of its Japanese footprint. The company is moving beyond one-off supercomputer wins to embed its Blackwell-generation chips and software across the country's research labs, banks, hospitals, factories, and automakers. The breadth signals that Japan is being positioned as a full "AI ecosystem" for Nvidia, not a single-sector customer. It's a hedge that spreads the company's growth across sovereign science, industrial automation, and physical AI, even as questions mount over chip pricing and supply.

Thursday 16 July 2026
Japan's enterprises and startups adopt Nvidia open models for specialized AI

Japan's companies and research institutions are turning to Nvidia's Nemotron open models to build AI tailored to local language, industry, and public-sector needs. The move highlights how open, customizable systems may shape national AI strategies far beyond Japan, affecting productivity, service delivery, and data control worldwide.

Thursday 16 July 2026
Nvidia's Huang says AI agents are tools, not humanlike beings
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said AI agents should be treated as tools, not as humanlike beings, in a recent conversation with LangChain founder Harrison Chase. He said the latest wave of agentic AI has been driven by better models, open ecosystems and stronger engineering around safeguards and system design.
Thursday 16 July 2026
Acer Gadget posts record second-quarter revenue on AI PC and e-commerce demand
Acer Gadget, the Acer Group subsidiary, reported record second-quarter self-reported revenue and said its two core businesses kept shipments moving in June and the first half of 2026. The company said demand in the second half should support further growth as it expands its AI PC peripheral lineup and broadens its global channel strategy.
Thursday 16 July 2026
Anthropic eyes autumn IPO to beat OpenAI and DeepSeek to public markets
Anthropic PBC is lining up investor meetings ahead of a potential mega-IPO that could value the Claude maker at US$1 trillion or more, a move that would let it beat both OpenAI and China's DeepSeek to public markets and, in the process, set the first widely watched price for a pure-play frontier AI lab.
Thursday 16 July 2026
China's top seller of AI compute has emerged without owning the GPUs

Beijing Approach AI Technology Co., or Approaching.AI, raised more than CNY1 billion within six months by selling AI tokens generated largely on computing infrastructure it does not own.

Thursday 16 July 2026
AI, ICT projects, and 5G upgrades power Taiwan telecom trio's strong June results
Taiwan's three major telecom operators delivered stronger June 2026 results than a year earlier, supported by robust demand for ICT services, continued 5G migration and expanding digital-service ecosystems. Chunghwa Telecom posted record June revenue and EBITDA, Taiwan Mobile led the industry in monthly earnings per share (EPS) for a second consecutive month, and Far EasTone Telecommunications achieved its strongest June on record across revenue, EBITDA, net profit, and EPS.
Thursday 16 July 2026
Column: From K-Semiconductor to AI superpower —How South Korea is taking its next chip leap

South Korean President Lee Jae-myung unveiled the country's Three Mega Projects for AI and Semiconductors in late June 2026, an ambitious national strategy designed to strengthen South Korea's global leadership in artificial intelligence and semiconductors. The initiative centers on three pillars—semiconductors, physical AI, and AI data centers—and aims to double the nation's DRAM output within five years while expanding capabilities in high-bandwidth memory (HBM), advanced packaging, AI processors, and next-generation memory technologies. It also seeks to extend South Korea's semiconductor footprint beyond the Seoul metropolitan region.

Thursday 16 July 2026
Chip inflation drives phone prices higher, clouds 2027 demand
Rising chip costs are adding pressure to consumer electronics, with memory prices expected to stay elevated through at least 2027 and weighing heavily on downstream manufacturers and brands. Industry players say the wave of smartphone price increases in the first quarter of 2026 has already hurt sales momentum, and another round of memory-driven hikes in the second half of this year or in 2027 would make it extremely difficult to keep phone prices where they are.
Wednesday 15 July 2026
JCET forecasts higher first-half profit on AI-driven chip demand
China's JCET expects stronger first-half earnings as global demand tied to artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure lifts semiconductor activity. The outlook signals continued momentum in chip packaging and testing, a sector closely watched by investors because it reflects broader technology spending trends that affect supply chains across Asia, the US, and Europe.
Wednesday 15 July 2026
AI server tracker: Power and thermal suppliers lead June revenue growth

Taiwan's AI server component suppliers generally maintained healthy revenue momentum in June, with power supply, thermal solution and baseboard management controller (BMC) vendors continuing to benefit from strong AI infrastructure demand. Optical module suppliers, meanwhile, delivered a more mixed performance, with several companies posting triple-digit or strong double-digit annual growth while others remained under pressure.

Wednesday 15 July 2026
LimX Dynamics raises US$200B in fundraising round as it prepares for public listing
LimX Dynamics Technology, a general-purpose humanoid robot and embodied AI company, has announced the completion of its pre-IPO round of financing, raising nearly US$200 million. The company may soon see a public listing at a time when China's robotics market has grown to include hundreds of companies.
Wednesday 15 July 2026
US licenses widen Nvidia H200 access in China, but shipments remain minimal

Nvidia H200 exports to China are expanding to a broader group of licensed buyers, though actual deliveries remain negligible under continued scrutiny in Washington and Beijing.

Wednesday 15 July 2026
AI drives memory shortage through 2027, PSMC lifts 2Q26 margin to 28%
AI-driven demand for memory, power management chips, and advanced packaging has continued to tighten supply and demand in the foundry market. Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing (PSMC) reported second quarter 2026 revenue of NT$17.291 billion (approx. US$537.8 million), up 27% quarter-over-quarter and 53% year-over-year, while gross margin jumped to 28%, up 18pp from the first quarter; operating margin reached 21%, turning positive from the same period in 2025, and net profit after tax came to NT$3.291 billion, an EPS of NT$0.76.
Wednesday 15 July 2026
Jensen Huang's Akihabara visit honors partners behind Nvidia's 33-year rise
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is scheduled to attend an event in Tokyo's Akihabara district on July 15, marking the 30th anniversary of the partnership between Nvidia GeForce Japan and gaming company Sega. The appearance drawing the most attention will be Huang's reunion with former Sega president Shoichiro Irimajiri, turning the brief visit into what many have described as a journey of gratitude.