The whole world is watching closely 5G network development, expecting it to fuel future economic growth and drive advances in big data analytics and information economy. With 5G services kicking off in major cities, governments around the world are stepping up network infrastructure roll-out. Even in Taiwan, where 5G spectrum auction is lagging behind, multiple telecom operators have been offering 5G services in parts of the country starting second-quarter 2020.According to Chenbro, as a key player in the global mechatronics industry, 5G communication featuring high bandwidth, low latency and massive connectivity will give a boost to the performance of IoV (Internet of Vehicles) and a slew of other smart services while spurring a wave of data center build-up by cloud service operators.Eric Hui, vice president of global sales at Chenbro, commented that smart services that have been on the market for some time fail to deliver the benefits consumers expect as they are hindered by 4G transmission speeds. This is why the market has yet to see explosive demand for smart services.5G communication may be the answer. For instance, after 5G mobile services become available, China is seeing flourishing developments of Internet services, such as new generations of telematics systems and geographic information systems aimed to facilitate driving experiences.The increase in connected end devices will definitely put pressure on data centers that support the operation of smart services. In response, cloud service operators will purchase servers, AI servers, storage, switches and other infrastructure equipment to build next-generation data centers and support AI-based analytics and edge computing needs. To accommodate wide-ranging industry requirements, Chenbro is working with multiple customers on development projects and will be launching new products throughout 2021. The aim is to maintain its competitive edge as it ushers in the 5G era.Most consumers today have grown used to communicating via instant messaging apps such as Line and Facebook with their increasing popularity. This has led to a plunge in traditional phone usage, leaving most telecom operators worldwide unable to recoup their 4G investments. Nonetheless, 5G is poised to become the standard in the future. Telecom operators have no choice but to keep bidding for 5G spectrums and frequency bands to avoid being driven out by the competition.In the process of building 5G infrastructure, telecom operators face the challenges of having to renew their outdated server room equipment as well as deploy miniature base stations that cover small geographical areas. This is when Chenbro comes into play. Capable of providing original equipment manufacturing (OEM), original design manufacturing (ODM) and joint design manufacturing (JDM) services, Chenbro is the top-choice partner that many telecom operators go to.Hui noted, "In Europe, a great number of telecom operators struggle with the challenges in updating their data centers that have been in use for many years while doing so within limited office building space. Chenbro has a wealth of design experience and technological strength. With comprehensive design, sales and technical support teams stationed across Taiwan, the US and Europe, Chenbro is able to precisely grasp customer needs and deliver tailor-made services. A wide range of development projects that are suited to different telecom operators' needs are ongoing to help renew their equipment in their existing space."Furthermore, different from 3G and 4G networks, 5G supports Open Virtualized Radio Access Network (Open vRAN), which allows telecom operators to use white-box telecommunication servers to build 5G infrastructure. In view of this, Chenbro is collaborating with network communication equipment suppliers to develop white-box equipment and help telecom operators capture 5G opportunities.As IoT technologies mature and their costs become reasonable, many governments are making full efforts toward smart transportation projects to address the issue of overcrowding resulting from urbanization. They look to make use of IoV advances to address traffic congestions and improve road safety for both pedestrians and motorists. 5G communication featuring high bandwidth, low latency and massive connectivity can effectively connect network-capable vehicles and traffic signs, allowing traffic authorities to monitor traffic flows via cloud-based platforms and thereby reduce the occurrence of accidents.3GPP, in charge of developing mobile telecommunication protocols, announced 5G Release 16 on July 3, 2020 and plans to establish more complete standards targeting different industries including autonomous driving that is growingly mature. This is expected to expand the application scope of IoV. According to TrendForce, the number of connected cars sold in the new car market is projected to reach about 74 million units in 2025, an 80% penetration rate. The enormous market opportunities should not be taken lightly."As opposed to our earlier products designed for indoor use with no need to consider exposure to wind, sunlight and rain, IoV equipment operates outdoors so the casing must be corrosion proof. This is a challenge to the design team's ability in material selection and usage. We are confident with our ability to address such a challenge and work with partners to come up with solutions in line with market expectation," said Hui.Product demo center at Chenbro headquarters

Taiwan's PC monitor shipments are expected to fall 8.2% sequentially in the first quarter of 2021, after registering a 3.7% sequential increase in the prior quarter, according to Digitimes Research.Taiwanese makers together delivered 25.69 million PC monitors in the fourth quarter of 2020. The makers, out of concern about component shortages, expanded their component inventory and shipments in the fourth quarter.Although the volumes will slip more than 8% sequentially in the first quarter of 2021 because of seasonal factors, the volume will represent a 27.4% on-year increase, thanks to a low comparison base in the same quarter a year ago, Digitimes Research's figures show.Taiwan-based makers' shipments continue to lean toward large-size models with the 23.x-inch and 27-inch and above segments witnessing increasing shipment proportions. The combined shipment share of 22-inch and above monitor products reached more than 75% in the fourth quarter of 2020.Among Taiwanese makers, Wistron had the highest sequential shipment growth in the fourth quarter of 2020, up 24.1%, thanks to increased orders from Dell and Lenovo. Foxconn enjoyed the second highest sequential increase also because of order ramp-ups by Dell and Lenovo.For the first quarter of 2021, Wistron's shipments are expected to dip slightly from a quarter ago or remain flat, while other Taiwanese makers will all suffer from a between 8-10% sequential drop.

A strong focus at the Mobile World Congress Shanghai 2021 (MWCS 2021) was on how the telecom industry will transform and how communication technologies can be upgraded to meet the needs of 5G vertical applications, Digitimes Research has observed.Vertical commercial applications will bring real benefits to China's 5G network deployments, given the number of the country's 5G service users has surpassed 200 million, and it has already installed 718,000 5G base stations.Huawei reiterated its "5.5G" definition for the 5G technology. In addition to three traits of 5G applications - eMBB (enhanced mobile broadband), mMTC (massive machine type communications) and URLLC (ultra reliable low latency communication) - the Chinese vendor believes that 5G can be improved by adding other features, such as uplink centric broadband communication (UCBC), real-time broadband communications (RTBC) and harmonized communication and sensing (HCS).MWCS 2021 also highlighted the 5G vertical application market, focusing on C-V2X, industrial IoT (IIoT), unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems and mmWave applications.China has promoted its national C-V2X standards since 2017 and has also established 16 national demonstration fields for C-V2X applications. It plans to roll out at least nine C-V2X-capable vehicles in 2020-2022. Meanwhile, China Mobile has begun to deploy integrated 5G+C-V2X RSU (roadside unit) base stations.For IIoT development, there is greater demand for improved 5G connectivity for AMR (autonomous mobile robot)/AGR (automated guided vehicle) applications. Meanwhile, ZTE showcased an ATG (air to ground) designated network for high-speed, large-broadband width transmission utilizing both 5G sub-6GHz and mmWave technologies.

5G achieves a 20Gbps downlink peak data rate (20 times faster than 4G), a latency as low as 1ms (one tenth of 4G) and a connection density of one million devices per square kilometer (10 times that of 4G) with enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB), ultra-reliable and low latency communications (URLLC) and massive machine type communications (mMTC). On top of that, it supports network slicing, which allows different levels of services to be provided based on user requirements. These advantages make 5G an enabler of cloud computing, IoT, big data analytics, AI, IoV/autonomous driving, AR/VR and a diversity of other innovative technologies or applications.Changes in the radio access network (RAN) are a major item among what make the 4G to 5G transition different from the 3G to 4G transition, which only brought faster data transfer speeds. 5G communication has refined and separated multiple network functions to enable a more flexible network structure so that different levels of services or functions can be provided and network virtualization and slicing can be effectively implemented. Moreover, a baseband unit (BBU) is split into a centralized unit (CU) and a distributed unit (DU), which drives the miniaturization of base stations and allows the use of white-box equipment, helping telecom operators reduce capital expenditure.Multi-access edge computing (MEC) will play an instrumental role maximizing all the above-mentioned 5G benefits. In view of this, ADLINK, with long-standing leadership in edge computing, industrial PC, data acquisition (DAQ), machine vision and motion control technologies and long-term devotion into vertical OT solutions including smart factory equipment, is actively developing MEC platforms while engaging in partnerships with AI, autonomous mobile robots (AMR), autonomous driving, automated optical inspection (AOI) and smart healthcare solution providers to jointly form a complete 5G ecosystem and expedite advances of 5G-enabled smart applications across vertical industries.Qianqian Shao, product marketing manager of ADLINK's networking, communication and public business unit, emphasized that MEC is a critical element of 5G communication. It ensures that latency-sensitive applications such as industrial robots and self-driving vehicles can operate efficiently by performing instant data processing and analysis close to the source to allow decision-making in real time. It is no longer required to upload data to the cloud platform or data center so as to prevent risks resulting from data transmission latency and largely save network bandwidth.Joining forces with 5G ecosystem partners to accelerate private network applications in diverse use scenariosFeaturing small footprint and wide operating temperature range, ADLINK's MEC platform is capable of supporting core computing needs within the 5G network architecture while enabling GPU and FPGA hardware acceleration. It also implements the IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol to support high-efficiency AI inferencing and clock synchronization throughout IP networks. System integrators can build applications/services to address all kinds of critical tasks on top of ADLINK's MEC platform.Shao added that ADLINK collaborates with ecosystem partners targeting a variety of application fields by providing hardware equipment and middleware. They have jointly built multiple application-ready platforms to help enterprises bring their private network applications to reality. For example, the Robot Operating System (ROS) running on optimized MEC platforms coupled with edge AI inference and low latency 5G communication accelerates AMR development and deployment and even achieves swarm autonomy. The AMR can carry out smart logistics tasks in factories, warehouses, hospitals, retail stores, restaurants and a slew of other application scenarios.Furthermore, leveraging its strength in edge computing and AI accelerators, ADLINK engages in close collaborations with multiple autonomous driving solution providers including autonomous driving software developer Tier IV and intelligent vehicle platform AutoCore to make use of 5G communication's low latency and massive connectivity features to develop high-performance and high-reliability autonomous driving applications.Making use of 5G communication's high-bandwidth, low latency and massive connectivity features, ADLINK's MEC edge computing platform will also expedite the advent of fully automated and unmanned factories as it helps connect diverse processes and workstations in the factory including AI-enabled AOI, AI-based process monitoring (operator behavior detection and analysis as well as object recognition), production equipment monitoring and diagnostics as well as material transportation by AMR.Apart from being used on 5G private networks, ADLINK's MEC platform can also be connected to public networks as MEC is needed on both types of networks but only with differences in how the platform is set up. For private networks, ADLINK's MEC platform serves as a DU to support communication access while acting as an application-ready platform. ADLINK and partners have worked together to help customers quickly build applications for specific use scenarios. For example, multiple smart factory proof-of-concept (PoC) projects in collaboration with several solution providers have been completed. For public networks, ADLINK's MEC platform also functions as a high-performance DU and provide edge computing capability. More than that, it fully supports data acquisition, transmission and processing under the premise that information security is guaranteed. ADLINK's MEC platform will accelerate the development of smart applications, bringing the futuristic scenes in sci-fi films to real life.More information on ADLINK's MEC platform: https://www.adlinktech.com/en/Edge_ServerQianqian Shao, product marketing manager of ADLINK's networking, communication and public business unit

Semiconductor manufacturing capacity has been tight, sending some major IC design houses in Taiwan seeking support from Chinese backend firms for packaging lower-end chips. Notebook vendors and ODMs currently do not have a clear outlook for second-half 2021 amid uncertainty arising from the development of the pandemic and component shortages. But they generally believe notebook demand in first-half 2021 will remain stable. Meanwhile, startups in Canada are keen to seek partnerships from Taiwanese manufacturers, according to Jordan Reeves, executive director of Canadian Trade Office in Taipei.MediaTek may seek capacity support from China OSATs for lower-end chips: Taiwan's first-tier IC designers including MediaTek, now facing increasingly tight capacity support from domestic backend houses, are expected to release some orders to Chinese OSATs JCET, Tongfu Microelectronics and Tianshui Huatian Technology in second-half 2021, according to industry sources.Notebook demand to remain robust in 1H21: Notebook brands and their ODM partners believe that demand for notebooks will remain stable in the first half of 2021 though at the moment they do not have a clear picture of the second half of the year due to low order visibility, according to industry sources.Connecting Canada startups with Taiwan: Q&A with Jordan Reeves, executive director of Canadian Trade Office in Taipei: The Canadian Trade Office in Taipei is endeavoring to accelerate collaboration between Canadian startups and Taiwanese companies. Canada's AI strength and car-manufacturing prowess and Taiwan's competitiveness in ICT hardware manufacturing are complementary and have great potential to create synergies.

The Canadian Trade Office in Taipei is endeavoring to accelerate collaboration between Canadian startups and Taiwanese companies. Canada's AI strength and car-manufacturing prowess and Taiwan's competitiveness in ICT hardware manufacturing are complementary and have great potential to create synergies.Jordan Reeves, executive director of the Canadian Trade Office in Taipei, explained in a recent interview by Digitimes how his office is forging ties to benefit both Canda and Taiwan.Q: We learned that the Canadian Trade Office in Taipei has a new project to introduce Canada's startups to Taiwanese companies. Could you share the purpose of the project and explain why Taiwan has suddenly become important for Canadian companies?A: We launched a Canadian Technology Accelerator in Taiwan at the end of 2018. This is the largest single commercial project that my ministry - Global Affairs Canada - has ever funded in Taiwan. We have accelerator programs in Silicon Valley and Boston and have had lots of success there for many years. We wanted to bring this success to Asia. We were considering four locations (of which Taiwan was one) for this accelerator program. It was part of our economic diversification strategy. We wanted to see increased trade and investment with Asia.In recognition of Taiwan's important place in ICT value chains, and to build on a very successful foundation of science and technology collaboration between Canada's National Research Council and Taiwan's Ministry of Science and Technology over the past 24 years, we made the decision to launch an accelerator here in Taiwan.Our focus is on several areas, such as artificial intelligence (AI) applications, Internet of Things (IoT), or AIoT. We have also looked at several sectors which have potential for new business. ICT is one, health-tech is another. Many Canadian startups went to Silicon Valley, looking for financing. Taiwan was a little bit different. Their purpose here in Taiwan is to develop prototypes, commercialize prototypes, or for some, to find partners to scale up production. Others are looking for ways to reduce their research and development costs. We have a network in Taiwan now of 200 mentors, partners, and industry contacts. We have space at Taipei Tech Arena and have a partnership with Epoch Foundation and Garage+. I can tell you that, so far in 2021, a total of 150 Canadian startups have applied to come to Taiwan through our program.In addition, this is the year of Canadian-Taiwanese Innovators. We officially launched it in Tainan back in September 2020. It was a joint decision with Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua. The idea was to combine Canadian software capabilities and Taiwan's hardware engineering prowess, and to forge new innovation partnerships.Q: How many startups are included in this project? Are all the 150 companies that have expressed interest or approached you able to attend?A: No, we have a rigorous selection process as we work with our mentors and the CTOs of many companies in Taiwan. At the end of the day, we want to maximize the chances of success for these startup firms. This way, we know right off the bat that there are going to be deep business discussions when they come to Taiwan.Q: What are the benefits and opportunities that a collaboration between Canada and Taiwan firms can bring to both sides? Can you share some examples of companies interested in collaborating with Taiwanese companies? What results would they want to achieve?For our broader vision, there are some really exciting opportunities right now. There will be interesting innovations in areas such as electrical vehicles (EV). Many expect value of electronics and chips in EVs will be double what it is now in traditional cars. So it's very important for Taiwanese electronics companies to establish partnerships within this emerging sector with companies from other countries. Canada is the fourth-largest automobile exporting country in the world. Ford, GM and Fiat Chrysler have recently made large investments in EVs in Canada. So, we feel that, in this particular area, there are many opportunities. We need to work more closely with Taiwanese electronics and ICT firms.Q: In which areas or verticals can Taiwan and Canada complement each other? What can be done to foster a deeper connection between both sides?A: We have quite a number of leading-edge tech firms in the automotive supply chain, producing all kinds of things, including sensors and imaging technology for autonomous vehicles. Immervision from Montreal, for example, with their 360 degree image-processing algorithm, can be applied to any type of camera. In seeing what we can do to bring tech firms like that to the EV and AV value chain and introduce them to Taiwanese initiatives such as Foxconn's MIH platform, for example.I would say digital health is another very important area. Many of the current IoT-enabled health solutions definitely rely on hardware for industrial computing and so on. That's another possible area for a lot of complementary businesses. And then there are areas such as smart manufacturing. Taiwan has a long history of manufacturing, whether it's bicycles, machinery and so on, and many of those companies are looking to apply AI solutions. Canada has real strength in AI. The Toronto area, for example, has the highest concentration of AI firms in the world by some estimates, with nearly 600 AI-focused companies.Let's take two examples to answer your questions. One is the Spartan Cube, a DNA analyzer, the size of a coffee cup. Samples are collected with a non-invasive swap, inserted in a single-use DNA cartridge. It is basically a PCR test. It was just approved by Health Canada on January 23. It is a portable testing kit, making it very easy to use. And within minutes it can produce very accurate test results for COVID-19.It is, in fact, a collaboration between Wistron, which manufactures its shell, and Spartan Bioscience in Canada. This is a perfect example of the sort of potential we see for collaborations between Taiwanese and Canadian companies. Software or intellectual property (IP) developed in Canada coming together with the right engineering partner in Taiwan.Wistron is also working with Canadian company B-Temia. That product has received Taiwan FDA and US FDA approval. Their product, Keeogo Exoskeleton, is a walking assistance device which is used to help people regain mobility after serious injury. It is selling quite well in Taiwan.Taiwan has been such a great partner for Canada. We are very excited about the possibilities going forward.Q: The trade wars and the pandemic have changed the world in a significant way. What trend have you spotted in the supply chain of Canadian companies worldwide?A: We all know that rising labor costs in China, US-China trade frictions, the development of new technologies, such as AI, EV, autonomous vehicles, the impact of the pandemic recently, and the concern of some governments to maintain domestic production of critical goods - all of these factors are contributing to changes in global supply chains.We see a real urgency and an opportunity for Canadian and Taiwanese firms to work together. Taiwanese companies are moving some of their current production and future production from mainland China back to Taiwan or to other markets. At the same time, the Canadian government has been encouraging Canadian companies to diversify their trade and investment toward and across the Asian region.We have real opportunities right now we did not have before. From a policy perspective, I should say that, in Canada, our policy approach continues to promote free trade, keeping borders open for trade and investment. Canada currently has trade agreements covering two-thirds of the world's GDP. In relative terms, Canada continues to be very open towards people through our immigration policy. For example, Canada is taking between 300,000-400,000 of immigrants every year. We haven't stopped, despite the rise of protectionism in other countries in the last few years. At the same time, Canada attracts tens of thousands of foreign students. We see it as a great benefit for the country.On the business side, we've made it simpler for Canadian companies and foreign companies to apply to bring in the engineers they need. Under the Global Skills Strategy program, the government of Canada responds in two weeks or less to applications to bring in highly skilled or specialized workers. Close to 90% of applications are approved. Canada remains an open place when it comes to investment, trade, and talent. This is an advantage for Taiwanese companies that make Canada a partner.Jordan Reeves, executive director of Canadian Trade Office in TaipeiPhoto: Michael Lee, Digitimes, March 2021

The foundry sector has seen tight supply across all segments, with 6-inch fab capacity almost fully booked for third-quarter 2021 thanks to strong demand for a wide range of applications, such as analog chips and discrete power devices. And short suply in the memory sector is also expected to drive up DRAM and NOR flash prices through second-half 2021. In Poland, startup IS-Wireless is aiming to break the vendor lock-in imposed by big players in the mobile telecom industry. IS-Wireless CEO Slawomir Pietrzyk recently told Digitimes how his company does it.Six-inch fab capacity almost fully booked for 3Q21: Six-inch foundries have seen their fab capacity for the third quarter almost fully booked, driven by a ramp-up in demand for analog chips, such as power management ICs, and discrete power devices including diodes and MOSFETs, according to industry sources in Taiwan.DRAM, NOR flash prices to rise through 2H21: DRAM and NOR flash memory prices are expected to rise through the second half of 2021, as growth on the supply side fails to catch up, according to industry sources.Liberalizing 5G: Q&A with Polish startup IS-Wireless CEO Slawomir Pietrzyk: Window of opportunity has opened up for Polish startup IS-Wireless, which was nominated for DigitalEurope's Future Unicorn Award 2021, having won several other awards in Europe with its innovative 5G mobile communications technologies. They have joined the Garage+ accelerator of the Epoch Foundation in Taiwan, hoping to find hardware partners from Taiwan to deliver their new model of 5G communications at lower cost and better performance.

Window of opportunity has opened up for Polish startup IS-Wireless, which was nominated for DigitalEurope's Future Unicorn Award 2021, having won several other awards in Europe with its innovative 5G mobile communications technologies. They have joined the Garage+ accelerator of the Epoch Foundation in Taiwan, hoping to find hardware partners from Taiwan to deliver their new model of 5G communications at lower cost and better performance.IS-Wireless CEO Slawomir Pietrzyk recently talked to Digitimes about his visions.Q: Could you give a brief introduction to your core team and the company's value proposition?A: I received my PhD in wireless communications at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, and two of our colleagues did their PhD studies at National Chiao Tung University in Hsiunchu. The team consists of 50 highly skilled telecom professionals who have experience in building telecommunication networks, starting from 2G and 3G trough 4G and now 5G. We have also a research part of the company which is already focused on 6G. We are a company providing mobile networks of the future. We try to challenge the status quo, which is dominated by the big providers, such as Nokia, Ericsson, Huawei, etc. We are building the gears, including hardware and software for rollouts of the networks. This technology domain is getting to a point of saturation, as the big players each are trying to cover the whole value chain. This situation is called "vendor lock-in," very similar to the computer industry 30 years ago, where single vendors sold software and peripherals products incompatible with other companies. The same thing is happening in the mobile industry and reaching the point of saturation would mean the end of possibilities in this industry.In order to release creativity and move forward, and help lower the prices at the same time, we need to do the same thing which happened 30 years ago in the computer industry, which also involved Taiwanese companies, which is modulization of PCs. Instead of using those incompatible computers, people standardized computer hardware 30 years ago, which allowed consumers to insert cards in computers made by many different suppliers, provided they complied with those standards. The software was totally different. You could install whatever operating system, and on top of that you can build different applications. Each of those elements came from independent suppliers, because the value chain was open. This is happening in the mobile industry. We are one of the few players in the world that is following this trend.We focus on the radio access part, which is the most technologically demanding. Our value is in functionality definition and in implementation of software responsible for those functionality. Taiwanese firms are great in developing hardware, so we look forward to establishing relations with companies which develop computing hardware, such as servers, and the remote radio heads.Q: In the Garage+ brochure, you pointed out that IS-Wireless is participating in the Open-RAN revolution and expects significant changes in how networks are built and deployed in the future. Can you elaborate that vision?A: The things that I have been describing so far was more on the side of the providers, the functionalities and the network gears. They are installed in the mobile networks of telecom service operators, such as Orange, Verizon, etc. Traditionally, mobile service operators tend, so far, to cover all the value chain. From building the networks, running the networks, offering services, etc. But it is a very silo-based thinking, which definitely will have to change.Let me give you an example. Building and running the sites is the least welcoming business of the network operators. Site acquisition, network maintenance, are all costly. Right now companies tend to sell those part of business to external partners. What I believe is that in the near future, especially the locations where the network gear, the base stations, and especially the radio units will have to be co-located with other type of infrastructure. Lamp posts is one example, but there are much more. We will face a massive distribution of those radio units, tiny base stations, in order to cover small area to densify the network. You need small and low-power units, like WiFi kind of access points. They can even be installed before being used by the same token as the Ethernet cables in the offices. This is the only way to provide significant capacity improvement.The change of gravity is huge. It normally takes 15 months for European telecom operators to build huge sites, which includes acquiring site, and actual build-up of the base station. That is like the stone age for providing the services. Now with our solution, if the operator has already acquired the tiny radio gears, and the owner of kiosks or the city municipality permits the use of lamp posts and bus stops, then those non-telecom infrastructures will serve as access points of the radio gears. The time required for installation can be significantly shorten with this new business model.The single unit of the radio gears is cheap, but you need to produce a huge number of them, in order to get the optimal network performance.Q: It is a brilliant idea for smart city models. Are you already in talks with cities or governments in Europe for this deployment?A: We are at the stage of getting it out of the labs. We have demonstrated the operability of our solution in the labs, and right now we are conducting proof-of-concept trials, including small-site rollouts. This is the step before commercial roll-outs in the cities. Smart city application is only one of the applications. We are also targeting industrial applications and we plan to have rollouts to address the needs for operators providing private networks, which are favored by many companies. This is especially visible in Germany, which auctioned 5G bandwidth for private operators. In addition to auctioning large chunks of bandwidth for the whole country, they allowed localizing licensing of bandwidth per square kilometer, at the price of about single thousand euros, not millions of euros as country-wide auction options. You can imagine how many more business cases can carry such affordable costs. It is seeing explosive demand in Germany and we hope to see similar situation in Poland, which is scheduled to auction frequencies for 5G in 2021. Taiwan also had a private 5G bandwidth auction, a trend we have been very much interested in.Q: Security is a key issue for 5G, not only the geopolitical issues raised by the US in the case of Huawei. In the age of Internet of Things (IoT), networks are vulnerable to hacking. Do you have any solution for protecting security?A: Certainly. Security is at the heart of our solution; we put great emphasis to this. At the geopolitical level, we are building our infrastructure locally. For this part of the world which is in collaboration with NATO and the US, we can be the supplier that is accountable not just for our homeland deployment, but also for the whole European Union, and/or allies of NATO and the US.At the system level, our system is developed with the open model, all the interfaces can be checked by the community. You have much more people to challenge this, compared to the single, silo-based block model of the traditional vendors. Everything is hidden in the traditional model, and the customers over-pay for security which they have no idea what kind of protection they are getting.Our system also has superiority in flexibility. For that open system, which also is equipped up-to-date security counter-measures for threats, you can use the open-system counter-measures tailored for the risks you are facing, because you can take it as a module from an independent security provider. This is very important, you can have the functionality of one vendor, while the security of that vendor can be locally verified in any country.And we also put a lot of emphasis on certification of security. We have just initiated a project with the Polish National Telecommunications Institute, on safeguarding security between the network security functions and aligned computing resources. This is because we allow our software to run on dedicated hardware, such as servers, and shared resources, such as Amazon, Google or Microsoft Azure. That poses different kind of challenges, but we are addressing them as well.Q: Are you seeing competitors which are also startups that are offering similar solutions?A: There are three or four such companies globally. They are already engaged and working for rollouts. They are also providing solutions with the open radio-networking philosophy. They are on wave one, but we are considered as wave two. We believe we have better technology. In most of their cases, the software they offer is decoupled from hardware. Our software is not only decoupled but partitionable from the very beginning. Another difference is they typically start from the upgrade of 4G implementation, while we started from 5G at the very beginning. We are confident to say, after the rollout, we will deliver deployments at a much better level of quality and flexibility.Besides, the competitors are pushing for large-sites with customers who focus on their current needs. I would say that is a technological trap, because the large-site rollout that they focus on will soon get saturated.Q: What is your business model? Do you license IP? How do you generate revenues?A: Very good questions. We want to address two types of customers. One is technologically savvy operators, which understand the technology and can control the whole value chain themselves. Rakuten Mobile of Japan is a good example of such kind of customer. For this kind of customer, we are willing to simply license our software and make sure it matches the hardware it controls. The second group of customers are more likely to get the low-hanging fruits faster. They are not that technologically savvy because they are from different industries. Let's imagine we are working with a railway company or with an airport. They are not telecom companies, but they have the potential of either running their private networks or deploy networks that they would rent or license to someone else. With that, we will provide total solution, including both software and hardware. We will not be producing hardware but would like to work as a partner with hardware manufacturers to offer total solution. We also provide installation and integration service to whatever is needed.Very often we can think of running system integration with non-telecom companies such as Amazon who have access to customers. We can also work as a supplier of the network gears to provide network functionality and able to install the elements needed for localization.Q: IS-Wireless is also preparing for the emergence of 6G technology? Will your 5G technology be obsolete when 6G takes over?A: No, it won't happen that way. I am old enough to observe 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G, with 3G and 4G the center of my professional career. We expect that 6G will be a continuation of 5G concepts. The 5G services currently provided by large operators is not too different from 4G, regarding the technical concept. The novelty of 5G is the possibility of opening up the value chains. You can have the elements of the wireless gears, decoupled from the software. In the past, they are inseparable. 5G brings slicing of services. What will 6G be? It will be an evolution. The leapfrogging technology we are working on right now is exactly a 6G strategy. We are very confident that the future lies with the trend of software decoupling from hardware, and a bottom-up approach of building massive numbers of low-power sites versus the top-down approach of traditional 3G/4G rollouts. That is because you would not have the luxury of building a totally new network, and the limit of the wave length requires density of the network. In the future, 6G gears will have to be co-located with other infrastructures, and you need to share those bandwidths with multiple users.Q: Is the purpose of IS-Wireless to join the community of Garage+ accelerator to get access to potential manufacturing partners in Taiwan?A: That is one of the reasons, but there are more. The first thing is to find partners with hardware manufacturing capabilities. We already have some relationships that we would like to deepen, in the direction of computing and radio units. During my visit in 2019, I learned that there are interests from Taiwanese companies to invest in technological startups. If we can establish a collaboration with Taiwanese companies which are strong in hardware manufacturing, it would be complementary and would benefit both sides, because our strength is in software. And Taiwan is also the perfect place to propagate to the entire region of Asia. We also share similar values. Poles and Taiwanese are both good at abstract thinking and creative way of solving problems. I believe we are better than our western European colleagues as a partner for Taiwanese companies.Q: Do you have any expansion plan or fund-raising plan this year or next?A: We are now a company of around 50 people, which is like a teenager in the life of a human being. We are growing rapidly and learning rapidly. To build a team to support the early rollouts and trials that I mentioned earlier, maintaining customer relationships, and finishing technical work for optimizing, adding or improving our product, we are looking for investments of around US$10 million this year as a bridge-financing to get us to the point of implementing larger rollouts.Right now we are looking for early adopters who are customers that are willing to work with us, a very agile and fast-responding company. In their domain, we can be a very strong differentiator.IS-Wireless CEO Slawomir PietrzykPhoto: Company

DRAM supply has already fallen short of demand with the chip shortages worsening. DRAM contract prices are expected to continue rising in second-quarter 2021. The coronavirus pandemic has decimated many industries, but the semiconductor sector has thrived against all odds, HPC, 5G, AI, and automotive applications will be driving the global semiconductor market growth in 2021 and beyond, according to SEMI. But components shortage remains a headache in the meantime. Acer expects global demand for notebooks and other PCs to remain strong due to the pandemic-induced stay-home needs, but supply will be constrained by component shortages until thid-quaerter 2021.DRAM contract prices set to continue growing in 2Q21: DRAM contract prices are set to continue rising in the second quarter of 2021, according to Nanya Technology, which has reported sequential and on-year increases in February revenue.SEMI upbeat about semiconductor market outlook: The emerging 5G, HPC, AI and automotive applications will be driving the global semiconductor market growth in 2021 and over the next several years, according to Clark Tseng, director of Industry Research and Statistics at SEMI.PC supply to remain constrained until 3Q21, says Acer chairman: The global supply of notebooks and other PCs will remain constrained all the way to the third quarter of this year as components continue to be in tight supply, according to Acer chairman and CEO Jason Chen.

Taiwan's New Media Entertainment Association (NMEA) has launched a project to unite small content creators vertically and horizontally, calling for the establishment of a holding company to help domestic media companies support and cooperate with each other.Under its Project X, NMEA suggests the government inject an initial fund of NT$1 billion (US$35.71 million) for the holding company that will create 10 new pieces of Taiwanese IP per year, so as to achieve four major development goals of capitalization, digitalization, globalization and localization for Taiwan's contents creation industry, according to NMEA chairman Homme Tsai.Tsai said in a statement that the arrival of "the age of streaming" threatens to wipe out Taiwanese content creators who compete individually against international giants such as Netflix.NMEA now has more than 200 individual and corporate members, engaged in the fields of gaming, music, digital advertising, publishing, anime and manga, fashion, new media and filmmaking, the statement said.