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Monday 29 June 2026
China makes AI power a national priority in new five-year energy plan

Generative AI is driving a sharp rise in electricity demand from data centers and AI computing infrastructure, prompting China to release its 15th Five-Year Plan for the Construction of a New Energy System (2026–2030). The plan incorporates AI power demand into China's national energy strategy for the first time, calling for closer coordination between electricity supply and computing capacity to support AI, advanced manufacturing, and other strategic industries.

Monday 29 June 2026
Weekly news roundup: South Korea takes physical AI push from policy to practice; Europe aggressively pursues non-red supply chains
Below are the most-read DIGITIMES Asia stories from the week of June 22-28, 2026:
Monday 29 June 2026
Foxlink appoints Freddy Kuo president, targets AI factory transformation
Cheng Uei Precision Industry (Foxlink) announced on June 24 that its board of directors has approved the appointment of Freddy Kuo as company president. Speaking publicly for the first time in his new capacity on June 26, Kuo outlined the group's artificial intelligence (AI) transformation strategy, saying the company will evolve from a traditional electronics manufacturing services (EMS) provider into an "AI factory," using smart manufacturing to redefine its global competitive position.
Monday 29 June 2026
US AI restrictions face scrutiny as Chinese models gain ground

Chinese artificial intelligence developer Zhipu AI, also known as Z.ai, is narrowing the performance gap with leading US AI companies in cybersecurity-focused models, underscoring intensifying technological competition as Washington tightens oversight of advanced AI systems.

Monday 29 June 2026
Physical AI's next hurdle is not walking, but grasping

As Physical AI moves closer to commercial reality, its global impact may depend less on humanoid robots that can run or dance and more on their ability to safely grasp, lift, and manipulate objects. A Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor said the central challenge is touch, force, and real-world control, not simply bigger models or faster computing.

Monday 29 June 2026
Onsemi's Synaptics acquisition intensifies competition for physical AI leadership
Onsemi's acquisition of Synaptics underscores how global chipmakers are racing to build broader edge AI platforms, with implications that could ripple through data centers, industrial systems, and connected devices. The deal signals a push toward integrated hardware stacks amid intensifying worldwide competition across the AI supply chain.
Monday 29 June 2026
Goertek's 12-inch AR wafer fab could double waveguide output, cut AI glasses costs
Goertek has begun mass production at China's first 12-inch AR optical wafer fab, a milestone that could cut waveguide costs, strengthen the domestic AI smart glasses supply chain and speed up mass-market adoption.
Monday 29 June 2026
Taiwan electronics sector stays upbeat as AI demand lifts exports
Taiwan's electronics-machinery sector is heading into the second half of 2026 with cautious optimism, as global demand for AI infrastructure, high-end semiconductors, and cloud services continues to support trade. The latest survey suggests the benefits are spreading through supply chains, with implications for manufacturers and consumers worldwide.
Monday 29 June 2026
AIC sees double-digit growth as AI infrastructure shifts to rack-level systems
AIC said the global shift from single-server AI computing to rack- and system-level integration is driving coordinated storage, compute, and networking design as a key trend in AI infrastructure worldwide. The server rack maker said it will continue deepening technology and global customer ties, while expecting full-year 2026 revenue to keep growing by double digits.
Monday 29 June 2026
LG expands data-center liquid cooling push, eyes Taiwan server partnerships amid AI infrastructure boom
As AI infrastructure pushes server power consumption to unprecedented levels, liquid cooling is rapidly moving from an alternative technology to a data-center necessity. Amid fragmented industry standards, LG Electronics is expanding its liquid-cooling portfolio while leveraging broader group resources and exploring partnerships with Taiwanese server makers to strengthen its position in the fast-growing market.
Monday 29 June 2026
India roundup: Global tech giants deepen India investments
India is attracting fresh technology investment as global companies expand AI, cloud and semiconductor commitments, reinforcing the country's growing role as a strategic manufacturing and digital infrastructure hub.
Monday 29 June 2026
Qualcomm stirs AI data center competition with CPUs, ASICs, and accelerators
Qualcomm officially unveiled its Dragonfly data center platform at this week's annual investor day, laying out a four-pronged push into cloud AI that spans SerDes, PAM4 DSP, and other connectivity technologies gained through its Alphawave acquisition; ASICs; AI accelerators; and CPUs. The company also said its Modular acquisition added key assets for an AI software stack.
Monday 29 June 2026
LinkCom leans into AI networking and high-power power modules to drive growth
LinkCom Manufacturing held its 2026 annual general meeting and said rapid AI adoption is driving demand for its magnetic components in high-speed networking, AI data-center power, silicon photonics power systems and LEO satellite ground receivers, and that the firm will pursue AI-related opportunities. The meeting outlined a medium- to long-term strategy focused on AI applications, high-power power modules and smart module solutions to convert technology into revenue growth.
Monday 29 June 2026
Commentary: Jack Ma's rice-field message and Alibaba's new AI confidence
Jack Ma recently made a rare public appearance with senior executives from Alibaba and Ant Group at a rice-planting event outside Hangzhou. Although Alibaba chairman Joseph Tsai was absent, CEO Eddie Wu, chief scientist Jingren Zhou and Ant Group chairman Eric Jing were photographed planting rice seedlings alongside the company's founder.
Sunday 28 June 2026
Sunrise builds integrated energy platform as AI data center demand rises
Sino-American Silicon (SAS) Products' Sunrise is expanding its integrated smart energy business as artificial intelligence (AI) and data center demand for high-performance computing drives higher electricity demand worldwide. The company said its combined offering could help global firms secure greener, more resilient power supplies while meeting net-zero, RE100, and supply-chain carbon goals.
Sunday 28 June 2026
AI attacks scale up as annual security checks lag
AI is reshaping cyber offense and defense at an unprecedented pace, shrinking attack preparation that once took hackers weeks or months and making threats easier to scale. As a result, companies are facing a more complex and less predictable threat environment, while annual cybersecurity verification is increasingly unable to keep up.
Saturday 27 June 2026
Zettabyte urges new standard for quality AI compute as demand surges over two years
AI infrastructure firm Zettabyte said AI token generation exploded more than 330-fold over two years and urged that compute be measured by delivered useful work rather than raw hardware specs or hourly price. According to Alphabet's Google, monthly AI token generation grew from about 9.7 trillion to more than 3.2 quadrillion, and Zettabyte presented its quality-compute framework at a seminar hosted by Taiwan's Industrial Technology Research Institute.
Friday 26 June 2026
Qualcomm HBC takes aim at HBM costs in AI data centers

Qualcomm has unveiled its latest AI data center platform, Dragonfly, at its annual investor day, highlighting a new technology it calls High Bandwidth Compute, or HBC, as a key weapon in its challenge to Nvidia, AMD and AI chip startups.

Friday 26 June 2026
Agility Robotics IPO strengthens Foxconn's long-term robotics ambitions

Humanoid robotics and physical AI pioneer Agility Robotics has announced plans to pursue a public listing, drawing significant attention from global capital markets and the technology industry. Behind the IPO, however, lies a notable Taiwanese supply-chain presence that adds broader strategic significance to the company's public market debut.

Friday 26 June 2026
Z.ai's HK$1tn rally tests China AI boom: model leap or market mirage?
Chinese AI startup Z.ai, also known as Zhipu AI, has turned GLM-5.2 into the clearest test yet of China's frontier AI gap with Anthropic and OpenAI. Its stock surge is now raising a second question: whether investors are pricing a real technology shift or a thin-float capital-market fever.
Friday 26 June 2026
AuthenX targets AI data center interconnects with plug-and-play FAU for CPO
AI-driven hyperscale data center expansion is pushing the global AI race beyond raw GPU computing power into a broader contest over high-speed interconnects and electro-optical integration. As Nvidia's next-generation AI factory moves toward petabyte (PB)-scale data transfers, co-packaged optics (CPO) is heading toward commercialization, lifting the importance of key components such as fiber array units (FAU) and external laser sources (ELS).
Friday 26 June 2026
OpenAI to release GPT 5.6 model on staggered basis in face of US regulatory uncertainty
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told staff that its latest model, GPT 5.6, would be released on a staggered basis, with a small group of entities first gaining preview access to it after approval by the US government. The case highlights the regulatory uncertainty many local AI developers are facing after US President Donald Trump announced a voluntary review system before the release of frontier models, with the industry remaining concerned that it is not so voluntary after all.
Friday 26 June 2026
OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google turn to deployment engineers as AI focus shifts to enterprise use
AI companies are racing to hire forward deployed engineers, or FDEs, as the industry shifts from model-building to implementation. For global readers, the trend signals that the next wave of AI competition may hinge less on smarter systems and more on whether businesses can actually use them effectively at scale.
Friday 26 June 2026
How big tech is nudging cloud emissions on customers

In a corporate interview, Alexis Bateman, Head of Sustainability at Amazon Web Services (AWS), promoted the tech giant's latest environmental milestones and tools built to track data center carbon metrics. This includes the AWS Sustainability Console, a tracking hub launched to build on the Customer Carbon Footprint Tool (CCFT).

Friday 26 June 2026
Japan puts JPY101.6 trillion AI chip push at heart of JPY370 trillion growth roadmap
Japan is moving to anchor its long-term growth strategy around AI, semiconductors, and strategic infrastructure, as Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi seeks to use state-backed investment as a strategic push to lift private-sector spending and rebuild the country's industrial base.