At the Asia Photonics Expo (APE 2026) in Singapore, DIGITIMES interviewed MetaOptics, the first planar lens company listed on the Singapore Exchange's Catalist board. Aloysius Chua, the company's deputy CEO, outlined MetaOptics' latest technological advances and global footprint, with a particular focus on its progress in co-packaged optics (CPO).
Ibiden plans to invest JPY500 billion (about US$3.3 billion) over three years starting in fiscal 2026 to expand production of its core IC package substrates. By fiscal 2028, capacity allocated to generative AI servers and high-performance server products is expected to reach around 2.5 times current levels based on product area.
Samsung Electro-Mechanics (Semco) has secured its first supply role with Nvidia, the world's leading GPU manufacturer, to provide high-end flip chip ball grid array (FC-BGA) substrates for NVSwitch systems. According to South Korea's Seoul Economic Daily, the agreement marks the company's first engagement as a supplier of these specific components to Nvidia.
Norelsys (Tianjin) Co., Ltd. has begun IPO counseling after filing registration for listing guidance with the Tianjin branch of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, according to regulatory disclosures.
China is pushing ahead with its semiconductor materials strategy. Shanghai, one of the country's leading cities, has included brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) and fourth-generation semiconductors among its priority future industries, signaling early preparation for a new materials era beyond third-generation semiconductors.
AI server architectures are rapidly shifting toward ultra-high-density designs, keeping advanced CoWoS packaging capacity persistently tight. The primary bottleneck stems from continuously expanding chip sizes, which introduce warpage and thermal stress challenges while driving ABF substrate demand to multiply, creating structural supply pressure and underpinning a recovery in 2025 operations for Taiwan's three leading IC substrate makers.
