Support from Taiwan's supply chain was behind US memory IDM Micron's successful mass production of its latest-generation high bandwidth memory (HBM) product – HBM3E – ahead of other competitors, to supply Nvidia's H200 GPU in 2024.

Ranovus, a Canadian silicon photonics scaleup company specializing in high-speed optical interconnect chips, announced on March 20, 2024, a groundbreaking partnership with MediaTek Inc., Taiwan's leading fabless semiconductor firm, to deliver the industry's first 6.4Tbps Co-Packaged Optics (CPO) solution with integrated lasers aimed at AI data centers.

Apple Inc.'s recent decision to give up a Micro LED smartphone collaboration with ams OSRAM forced the latter to sell its new factory in Malaysia to deal with the strategic change. Reza Chaji, CEO of VueReal, a Micro LED startup company based in Ontario, Canada, gave his insight on the challenges of the Micro LED industry during an exclusive interview with DIGITIMES.

In the face of an impending climate crisis, the global carbon compliance and voluntary credit market are projected to soar to unprecedented heights, reaching a staggering US$2.68 trillion by 2028, with a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.2%. At the forefront of this transformative shift stands FiO, a US-SG-based Web 3.0 startup poised to offer a fresh perspective on the carbon credit market.

Founded in 2007, UBI Research has become South Korea's most renowned research institution regarding the panel industry by establishing a diverse OLED database through its extensive research on LCD and OLED panel technologies and long-term observations of IT market trends.

In recent years, Synaptics, a leading US-based IC design firm, has undergone a transformation, refocusing its efforts on IoT applications. This strategic shift included divesting its mobile Touch with Display Driver (TDDI) business and reallocating resources to the automotive electronics sector. Despite maintaining a robust presence in traditional areas like PC touchpads and fingerprint recognition chips, Synaptics has strategically expanded its IoT product line through acquisitions and in-house research and development.

NearLink (also known as SparkLink), China's homegrown wireless communication technology, entered commercialization in 2023 after being led by Huawei and supported by more than 400 Chinese companies. NearLink aims to reduce China's reliance on international standards, such as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, dominated by the US.

As one-sixth of new car buyers worldwide purchased EVs in 2023, the vehicle has gradually become part of people's daily lives. In September last year, Taiwan-based Chander Electronics released the island's first charging robot, E-Hero, to disrupt the market.

The tech industry's resurgence and restructuring driven by the AI wave have led to a reshuffling of market value rankings among major players like Microsoft, Apple, Nvidia, and Google, sparking interest in how business models evolve.

Geopolitical pressures and changes in industrial structure are driving strategic collaborations among semiconductor companies, with various countries or regions incentivized for partnerships, particularly Taiwan and Japan. However, support from Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea is essential to establish ICT supply chains in emerging countries such as South Asia and Southeast Asia.

Canada is following in the footsteps of various countries to participate in the ongoing reshoring recalibrations for the semiconductor supply chains and develop its competitiveness in semiconductors.

Asia Pacific (Japan, Korea, Taiwan, China, and Singapore) accounts for 84% of global chip exports and is home to 10 of the 16 semiconductor exporters and the top six suppliers, which includes Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC). The leading pure-play foundry will celebrate the inauguration of its first fab in Kumamoto, Japan, on February 24, 2024.

We are seeing the most standardized specifications of AI hardware with the launch of AI PCs, and the operating system and the apps will be key to defining the "AI" on the PCs as a genie or a white elephant, said DIGITIMES Research analyst Joyce Chen, who just recently released a report regarding AI PC.

With the government's support, Chinese companies have scaled the silicon carbide (SiC) segment and secured partnerships with some international IDMs. In the second part of an interview with DIGITIMES, Doris Hsu, chairperson of the Sino-American Silicon Products (SAS) Group, talked about the opportunities SiC devices would bring to Taiwan's semiconductor industry.

China-based companies are expected to march into the compound semiconductor segment in 2024 as they solve the bottleneck of SiC crystal growth and are recognized by global companies like Bosch, Infineon, and STM.