Ultra large-sized LCD panel shipments are expected to surge in 2024, driven by China-based suppliers, which may lead to a price war in the market, threatening LG Display, the sole LCD panel major based in South Korea.
Samsung Electronics is caught in the history of the first collective strike crisis in South Korea amidst intensifying global semiconductor competition. Samsung's five labor unions, should they eventually choose to go on strike, will become Samsung's first largest collective action in the 55 years since its founding.
Taiwan's Ministry of Finance (MOF) released preliminary import and export trade statistics for March 2024 and found that under the strong global demand for AI servers, Taiwan's overall exports showed significant growth despite the decline in IC exports.
In a landmark bilateral summit, the United States and Japan have solidified a groundbreaking partnership to spearhead the global transition towards clean energy. As reported by Nikkei, Reuters, and Bloomberg Magazine, the high-level meeting, held on April 10, 2024, in Washington, marks a pivotal moment in international efforts to combat climate change and ensure energy security.
HippStor Technology, a Chinese memory and storage startup, plans to mass-produce DDR5 RDIMMs in the second quarter of 2024 in response to data center upgrade requests.
SK Siltron, a silicon carbide (SiC) wafer manufacturer in the United States, is set to receive a US$77 million subsidy from the state of Michigan, following a US$544 million loan from the US government in February 2024. This is expected to expedite the construction of its factory.
A solid-state battery research project supported by the South Korean government has discovered methods to enhance the stability of solid-state batteries. The discoveries will reportedly promote the development of safer battery systems and the team's results have been published in the online edition of the academic journal ACS Energy Letters.
Advanced chip manufacturing and advanced packaging have now become the focus of attention in China. SMIC already confirmed that it had adopted deep ultraviolet (DUV) lithography machines to produce N+1 process (similar to 7nm process) chips in limited quantities at the end of 2020.
Volkswagen committed to a new investment in China. The carmaker said on April 11 that it will invest EUR2.5 billion (US$2.67 billion) in its Hefei site to facilitate innovation and the production of two EVs it is developing with Xpeng.
Tokyo Electron plans to ramp up its R&D spending over five years. This move comes as cutting-edge chip manufacturing tools become increasingly vital for the development of next-generation semiconductors and as competitors strive to close the gap in the industry.
As the US seeks to increase its share of production capacity, inviting Asian companies to invest and expand in the US, shifting new wafer fab projects from the Asian continent to the American continent is crucial for boosting US production capacity.
SK Hynix reportedly is slated to start mass production of the sixth-generation 10nm 1c DRAM in the third quarter of 2024, ahead of Samsung's schedule, drawing significant attention from the industry.
