Nvidia has recently revealed that its next-generation GPU will be manufactured by Samsung on 7nm EUV process. The revelation should not have come as a big surprise, as Nvidia probably made the switch from TSMC to Samsung due to pricing and supply concerns. For TSMC, losing some of Nvidia's orders should not be a big problem, as long as orders from its biggest clients - Apple, Huawei and Qualcomm - remain stable. Meanwhile, Qualcomm is aggressively expanding its work force in Taiwan.What is behind Nvidia switch from TSMC to Samsung?: Nvidia has decided to choose Samsung Electronics over TSMC for producing next-generation GPUs in 2020 on 7nm EUV (extreme ultraviolet) node despite Samsung's yield rates for the process remaining uncertain, sparking speculation about the reasons behind the switch.Qualcomm, MediaTek competing over R&D talent in Taiwan: Qualcomm and MediaTek have both been expanding their R&D deployments in Taiwan and are recruiting local IC design talent keenly with higher-than-average salaries.

Government-sponsored Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) has disclosed its Mechanical and Mechatronics Research Laboratories (MMRL) will develop and establish a bogie running tester for Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC).Both sides have signed an agreement for the project, ITRI said.Bogies are assembly of chassis and wheel axles of train carriages, including motors, shock absorbers, brakes and various sensors, ITRI said. Bogies bear the weight of trains, reduce vibration and help for trains' turning, and are therefore important to safety and stability of running trains and passengers' comfort, ITRI noted.THSRC has 34 12-car trains, with each car equipped with two bogies. THSRC has bogies of each train under regular overhaul-based maintenance every time after the train has run for 600,000km. After such maintenance, bogies together with trains have to be tested on tracks and the testing should be undertaken in the time intervals not interfering with running of regular trains. Thus, such on-track testing is quite inconvenient.The tester to be built allows bogies to be tested after maintenance at THSRC's depot in southern Taiwan, with stationary wheels running at speed of up to 320km/hour, rather than running on actual tracks, ITRI noted.By adopting Industry 4.0-based prognosis technology and AI-based big data analysis, the tester can record vibration, hikes in temperature and other operating conditions of components of bogies, forming a database to detect abnormal operating conditions of such components for preventive maintenance, ITRI indicated.MMRL will complete developing and set up the bogie running tester by year-end 2020, collect testing data in 2021 and put the tester into operation beginning January 2022, ITRI said.A total of about NT$20 billion (US$644 million) a year is spent on maintaining high-speed, conventional and subway trains in Taiwan, and local contribution was only NT$8.6 billion in 2018, and the economics ministry hopes to gradually hike the share by local industries to NT$11.7 billion in 2026.A physical model of a bogie running tester to be developed by ITRIPhoto: Yihan Li, Digitimes, July 2019

In the post-Terry Gou era, Foxconn has elected a new chairman, Young Liu, who has been leading the semiconductor business subgroup of the electronics manufacturing giant. Liu's rise to the leadership post highlights Foxconn's semiconductor drive to raise self-sufficiency. Meanwhile, the trade war with the US must have fueled China's desire to improve its semiconductor self-sufficiency, but the easing of the tensions between the two superpowers after the recent G20 summit has been positive news for many in the supply chain, with MOSFET and other chip demand for PCs, notebooks and consumer electronics devices expected to pick up in the second half of 2019.Foxconn set to build 12-inch wafer fab in 2020 as IDM: Foxconn Technology Group is likely to kick off construction of a 12-inch wafer fab in 2020 in Zhuhai, southern China in cooperation with the city government there, and will operate the plant as an IDM to satisfy the group's own demand for 8K, 5G and AI chip solutions, according to industry sources.Taiwan MOSFET firms see sales pick up: Taiwan-based MOSFET chip specialists, which ship mainly for PC and notebook applications, may have seen their sales hit bottom for 2019 in April and May. Sales have started picking up, and are expected to grow through the second half of the year, according to industry sources.

Taiwan will form a blockchain alliance on July 12, looking to create an environment to help companies and developer enter the blockchain industry, a government minister has announced.National Development Council minister Mei-ling Chen made the announcement on Jluy 2 at the opening day of the two-day the Asia Blockchain Summit 2019 held in Taipei.Chen said that in addition to providing funds to blockchain developers, the government has also been making efforts to accelerate overall industry transformation, and FinTech development.The alliance will serve as a communication platform among industries, governments and academies, allowing experts in different fields to exchange ideas, and integrate resources and information. The alliance will also focus on nurturing talent, forming cooperation with blockchain players worldwide, and pushing and adjusting related policiesDuring the summit, ACE Exchange has pointed out that it has cooperated with Asia Blockchain Accelerator (ABA), Asia Blockchain Media (ABM) and ACE Blockchain Fund (ABF) to establish two cryptocurrency exchange centers in Taiwan.ACE Exchange, citing Gartner's figures, pointed out that worldwide blockchain business opportunity is expected to reach US$170 billion by 2025.ACE Exchange president and ABA CEO David Pan pointed out that ACE Exchange serves the entire Asia. The company self-imposes strict regulations, and receives supervision from KPMG, Pan said, adding it is the only blockchain accelerator in Taiwan that has a strategic partnership with Binance Chain. It has also collaborated with Taiwan Blockchain Academia formed by 15 universities in Taiwan, to jointly incubate blockchain talent.Asia Blockchain Summit 2019 in TaipeiPhoto: Shihmin Fu, Digitimes, July 2019

The IC industry in Taiwan has breathed a sigh of relief after the US and China agreed to restart trade talks. But most of them remain cautious, as so much remains to be seen. TSMC is scheduled to hold its quarterly investors meeting on July 18, with the pure-play foundry's performance being regarded as an indicator for the overall chip industry. Huawei has reportedly told supply chain partners that it hopes to resume normal purchasing as soon as possible. Others in the 5G supply chain are even more upbeat about the second half of the year.Chipmakers likely to post disappointing 2H19 results: Most of Taiwan-based chipmakers will likely experience a particularly weak second half of 2019, due to macro headwinds facing the chipmaking sector, according to industry observers.TDDI IC supply chain turns optimistic about 2H19 on Huawei ban easing: Taiwan's handset TDDI IC supply chain for Huawei, including designers, backend COF service providers and substrate suppliers, have turned guardedly optimistic about their business prospects for the second half of 2019 as US trade ban on the China vendor shows signs of thawing following the recent G20 summit, according to industry sources.Huawei order visibility for 5G chips, IC backend services to extend to year-end 2019: Taiwan's chips and IC backend service suppliers have felt a sense of relief after the US government softened its stance against Huawei, and expect their order visibility from Huawei, particularly for 5G base station chips and logic IC backend services, to extend to the end of the year, according to industry sources.

Demand for collaborative robots is fast growing because they are safer to human workers than conventional industrial robots. But the priority given to safety, which is restricting collaborative robots' speed and efficiency, is deterring some makers from adopting them, according to Wang Liang-kuo, Epson Taiwan's general manager in charge of robotic arms.Most collaborative robots have payload of below 10kg and their moving speeds are relatively low to ensure safety to human workers, Wang said.Robotic arms recognize force larger than 150N (newton) as collision that makes them shut down automatically for safety, Wang noted, adding ISO/TS 15066 specifies the maximum force tolerable for 29 most vulnerable parts of a human body, with 110N enough to cause feling of pains for some parts, Wang indicated.Some manufacturers hike sensitivity to collision by lowering the maximum force to better protect collaborative workers, but the high sensitivity may result in frequent automatic stoppage of the robotic arms' operation, Wang explained.If manufacturers want to hike collaborative robots' working speed, they may have to separate them from collaborative workers due to safety concerns, which is the same as conventional industrial robots and would defeat the purposes of adopting such robots, Wang noted. Therefore, collaborative robots are mostly used in highly repetitive wok, such feeding/cutting materials/components and delivering finished products to warehouses currently, Wang said.Denmark-based Universal Robots and Taiwan-based Techman Robot are two globally leading collaborative robot suppliers currently, and Japan-based industrial robot makers Fanuc, Yaskawa Electric, Mitsubishi Electric and Seiko Epson have extended production to collaborative robots.Wang Liang-kuo, Epson Taiwan's general manager in charge of robotic armsPhoto: Company

The battle for dominace in the gaphics card maket is heating up as AMD and Nvidia are set to release their latest products in early July. They may stimulate some demand in the second half of 2019, but the lack of AAA games, plus othe factors, may deter demand for hardware replacement in the gaming market.AMD, Nvidia to fire up graphics card competition in early July: The competition between AMD and Nvidia in the graphics card market is expected to heat up in early July as AMD is set to release its new 7nm Navi series products on July 7, while Nvidia will counter with its latest RTX 20 Super series on July 9, according to sources from graphics card players.Gaming market to see weak results in 2H19: The gaming market may see weak sales in the second half of 2019 as the hardware replacement cycle has been extended due to limited improvement from new-generation hardware, and competitions among vendors have grown fiercer, according to sources from the upstream supply chain.

It is believed that Samsung smartphones will gain some ground in the market, thanks to the US ban on Huawei. But the Korean giant is looking to gain more as in the mobile chip market as Chinese vendors seek to reduce reliance on US suppliers, including Qualcomm. But Qualcomm has begun construction on a new R&D facilities in Taiwan to better serve its customers in Asia Pacific.Samsung vying for 5G chip orders from China handset vendors: Samsung Electronics has delivered multiple samples of its 5G chipset solutions to a number of China-based handset vendors including Oppo and Vivo for testing and verification, according to industry sources.Qualcomm breaks ground for new complex in Taiwan: Qualcomm has broken ground for construction of a complex in Hsinchu, Taiwan that will house its first overseas center for operations, manufacturing engineering and testing (COMET), according to a company statement.

Everduit Technology, a startup company engaged in software development, has introduced DaaS (drone as a service), sharing drones for short-term services, among operators of suburban hotels, scenic spots, outdoor recreational facilities and leisure farms and ranches, according to company CEO CJ Lai.Everduit was established by Taiwanese entrepreneurs, with headquarters in Silicon Valley and an R&D office in Taipei.While most customers are reluctant to buy drones that they do not use frequently or find it technical difficult to operate them, Eversuit is motivated to promote DaaS, Lai said. Everduit uses in-house-developed Virtual Private Drone, a patented software system based on cloud computing, edge computing, AI and IoT to implement DaaS, Lai noted.Everduit, specifically for boosting DaaS, has developed Go Drone, a software solution to enable business operators to provide DaaS for their visitors or customers: they can use Everduit's app, which supports Android and iOS, to request drones, and drones will then fly to take photos or record video fo 3-5 minutes in the designated areas with geo-fencing already set by Go Drone, Lai noted. Through hardware and software settings in advance, drones can automatically come, fly and return, Lai explained.Competition is increasingly intense among consumer drone makers, as there is little hadware differentiation and therefore they have to appeal by price, Lai indicated. But there is a market niche for drones for specific purposes such as agriculture, factory or infrastructure inspection, and security patrols, Lai noted.Everduit Technology CEO CJ LaiPhoto: Shihmin Fu, Digitimes, June 2019

ARPlanet Digital Technology, founded in 2010 as an AR startup, provides a full range of virtual and physical realities integration solutions. The company is now one of few startups in Taiwan able to export its AR PaaS (Platform as a Service) solutions.In a recent interview conducted by Digitimes, the firm's founder and CEO Jennifer Pai said AR is the friendliest and most intuitive interface for humans to access global information. She expressed optimism that AR will become a pivotal next-generation technology capable of integrating virtual and real worlds.Q: You used to be a Chinese-language magazine editor and were also responsible for marketing in gaming, financial and retail service sectors. How did these job experiences help you set up an AR startup?A: I majored in Chinese literature at university, but I was then quite interested in learning new tech products in addition to taking courses in journalism, psychology and economics. After graduation, my first job was to do copyediting at a Chinese-language computer magazine, and at the time new technologies were fast changing work patterns.Just three months after joining the magazine, computerized typesetting desktop systems quickly emerged and prevailed, prompting art editors to quickly learn and master such systems, with many manual typesetting service houses forced to shut down. From this, I got to know that any new trend would appear extremely fast and wait for nobody.Later I migrated to do marketing for diverse business sectors, witnessing the evolution of the Internet from web 1.0 and 2.0 to the Internet of Things (IoT) as well as the impacts of digital technology on various industries. When I first learned of AR more than 10 years ago, I deeply felt that "vision" would be the next trend and AR would play a crucial role in the trend.The outlook is bright for AR because AR is an all-match, able to be paired with diverse business models and suitable for cross-domain applications such as transportation, tourism, smart city, smart manufacturing, 5G, IoT, medical care, and long-term care. While smartphones are indispensable devices in the daily lives, I think AR will be not only a technology in the future, but also an interface for us to access the world in our daily lives.AR can be used to explore many things that are invisible to the naked eye and present them via computer vision. All the knowledge and data now stored in hard disks and in the cloud have to be presented externally through computer vision in the future, so that virtual and physical realities can be combined to demonstrate the true value of AR.Q: Besides the core AR solutions, your company also provides VR services. How do you define the market positions for AR and VR?A: In terms of software, VR is actually a carrier and device, and AR is a kind of user interface (UI) and user experience (UX), enabling us to access information.Both AR and VR are experience technology, but only through the integration of virtual and physical realities can the true value be generated. VR is purely a virtual concept and can help you enter the virtualized world after wearing a VR carrier, but physical reality cannot be totally replaced by VR.The reason AR is so fascinating is that it does not separate you from the real world, and can instead combine the real life to create new business models by leveraging technology. AR is not a world formed with pieces put together, but a new user-oriented application based on the development of humanity.For instance, if AR is applied to serve as a shopping guide for you, it can create a special shopping atmosphere allowing you to purchase the exact products you want to buy without quitting the real environment. With AR, consumers will no longer have to make online price comparisons or search for product items via written text, and can complete shopping simply by scanning products with their handsets. Accordingly, AR enables consumers to enjoy a slight sense of entertainment in the shopping process.For commodities vendors, AR-based shopping guide will generate high-accuracy one-to-one shopping pattern and help enhance brand loyalty by consumers.Q: How can VR achieve a booming development?A: Content will play a key role in determining the development of the VR industry. Currently, only a few people have their own VR carriers, and most others still have to go to specific dens to experience VR. Accordingly, the VR industry still focuses on vertical market applications such as education and video games, allowing users to watch immersive images or images invisible to the naked eye. VR cannot enter an actual popularity period until after VR carriers become highly affordable pricewise so that most consumers are willing to buy them before mature edge and cloud computing technologies are available to support diverse VR applications.At the moment, the average VR carrier unit price is still over NT$30,000 (US$966.40), which is still too high for consumers to accept. VR industry players still have little idea about the aceptable price levels of VR hardware in the market, but they can take current market prices of Nintendo Switch or Sony PlayStation consoles for reference, which may be the price range acceptable to users.But what counts most for the development of the VR industry is still content or user experience. Sony owns massive gaming content and users, and can therefore develop VR technologies in its gaming ecosystem. Without content and users, it would be a highly difficult job to build VR ecosystems.Q: What changes will AR and VR bring to Taiwan's 5G industry? And what government policy is needed to help spur the development of the AR industry?A: The two major advantages of high efficiency and low latency of 5G cannot be fully appreciated without the stimulus of AR, VR and even 8K, which are therefore badly needed to persuade consumers to upgrade to 5G from 4G, which currently does not have any problem accessing the Internet.AR, VR and 8K are crucial for promoting 5G because 5G is best suitable for vertical applications carried out at places shared by many people, such as a sports stadium, where AR, VR and 8K are mainstream applications. AR and VR enable high real-time interactivity, and current 4G smartphones cannot support 8K image transmission.Accordingly, while enforcing 5G development policies, the government must also spur the development of AR and VR content in addition to hardware equipment and technologies, in order for consumers to enjoy real 5G experience.In the wake of "Pokemon Go" becoming a popular AR application, many hardware makers have come to us for cooperation. Nevertheless, related Taiwan businesses usually lack software and hardware integration capability, and the government can serve as the best third party to bridge and integrate the strong ICT hardware industry and the fledgling software industry in Taiwan to facilitate the country's AR industry development.ARPlanet Digital Technology founder and CEO Jennifer PaiPhoto: Company