Thanks to his 20 years of work in Silicon Valley, Gary Wang, a professor of the Creativity & Entrepreneurship Program at National Taiwan University (NTU), co-founder and chairman of Pergolas Medical Technology and ex-senior executive at 3Com (the creator company of Ethernet that was acquired later by Hewlett-Packard (HP) in 2010) has a rich experience as an entrepreneur and investor.During his career at 3Com, he started a total of three internal entrepreneurships including H3C Technologies, a joint venture between 3Com and Huawei. In addition to network communication technologies, he also has a PhD in biotechnology. He has been observing Taiwan's entrepreneurial market for many years and is currently giving lectures to Taiwan's students at NTU about innovation development and entrepreneurship.Taiwan's entrepreneurship"The main problem that Taiwan is currently facing is that there are not many good projects that can help enhance Taiwan's competitive edge. If the situation continues, Taiwan's worldwide competitiveness will only be weakened," pointed out Wang, noting this has been the biggest concern for him regarding the future of Taiwan's innovation development.He noted that there are three factors behind the difficulties of Taiwan's current entrepreneurial market.First of all, Taiwan's innovation development has not had any major progress for nearly 20 years since 1998. Wang said that 20 years ago, the top-3 enterprises worldwide were Intel, Cisco and Hewlett-Packard (HP) - all hardware manufacturers. But these top-tier companies' revenues today are not much higher than those recorded 20 years ago. Similarly, Taiwan's hardware manufacturers have been doing their best to enhance their production technologies in the past few years, but are also seeing limited revenue growth as the hardware industry has already hit maturity.On the contrary, the software industry has been breaking its record in terms of revenues, and companies including Airbnb, Uber and Dropbox have been included by CNBC in its list of Worldwide Top-50 Disrupter.Since 1998, Taiwan's mainstream industry has always been hardware OEM/ODM services and because of their major success in the business, these first-tier manufacturing service providers have not been aggressive about business transformation. Although some Taiwan-based panel or IT manufacturers have begun crossing into the manufacturing and sales of medical care equipment and products such as contact lens, such a move is merely eyeing the product lines' high margins instead of an investment in innovation development.Second, Taiwan is seriously behind in the development of the latest technologies. "No matter what industry Taiwan wants to push into, without big data's support, there is no game for Taiwan," Wang said.A foreign medical care product provider had already collected data as much as 10 bytes to the18th power times 160 by 2013 and in 2011 worldwide web dataflow was only 500 times 10 bytes to the 18th power, showing how international first-tier companies have been aggressively preparing for innovation development.At the same time, Taiwan's development of the latest technologies also lag far behind that of the companies in Silicon Valley.There have been many new areas of development that companies in Silicon Valley have been investing in. Artificial intelligence (AI) has been one of the key technologies that Taiwan IT companies have been planning to cross into; however, not many of them are aware of the bias-free AI development.AI is basically trained through human behavior, and data that trainers feed the system with could potentially contain some bias from the content providers, which may relatively give out unjustified results. Creating a bias-free AI system has been a key development direction for several Silicon Valley AI developers.An encryption that is uncrackable even by quantum computing is a new area that some Silicon Valley startups have already begun developing. The technology is a new encryption standard that is designed to be uncrackable even when quantum computing becomes standardized.The combination of Internet of Things (IoT) device with the blockchain technology is a project that a Silicon Valley-based company has been developing currently. The company is looking to come up with an IoT device featuring only the size of a grain of salt and its integrated blockchain technology will be able to provide services to the users of the device that weighs much less.For biotechnology, companies in the US are also not lagging behind. 23andMe, a startup that focuses on DNA technologies, is developing a new solution called Crispr-Cas9, which is able to eliminate or correct the DNA of living organisms. If a user is found to have a DNA that could potentially cause cancer, the technology is able fix the DNA to prevent the disease from happening.Companies such as IBM and Google are gearing up development of quantum bit (qubit) technology for quantum computing-related applications. Once they resolve the technology's high error rates, quantum computing will be able to process tasks that traditional computers were not able to accomplish. For startups in Silicon Valley, researching programming languages of quantum computing is a major trend.Third, Taiwanese have little confidence in their capability of starting a business, seriously lacking the spirt of entrepreneurship. According to Global Entrepreneurship Monitor's (GEM) observation on worldwide entrepreneurship 2017/2018, although 71% of Taiwanese aged 18-64 years agreed that entrepreneurship provides good value to the society, when asked whether they had the capabilities of entrepreneurs, Taiwan ranked second from the bottom and was fifth from the bottom in terms of entrepreneurship spirit based on Taiwan's current entrepreneurial activities.For the millennials, which are currently the key working forces of Taiwan, the figures showed how they lack confidence in running entrepreneurships.Demand from the baby boom generation is a business opportunity for TaiwanAnother issue Taiwan is facing now is the succession problem of Taiwan's small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs), Wang pointed out. SMEs currently account for 97% of Taiwan's overall number of enterprises and most of those thta have operated for over 10 years are already earning profits stably. Of the SMEs, about 30% of the operators are baby boomers that are almost at their retirement age, but only less than 15% of them are able to find a successor to pass down their duties smoothly.This problem will worsen in the next 15 years and this may dramatically influence Taiwan's economy. As to the solution to the problem, in addition to traditional entrepreneurship, Wang suggests that Taiwan's younger generation should enter enterprises to work for a few years and then start an internal entrepreneurship, as adding new ideas to existing businesses is also a method of innovation development.Wang also believes Taiwan's National Health Insurance is a killer of Taiwan's innovation development. Because of its convenience, around 90% of the insurance's expenses are used on acute care, such as surgeries and outpatient services, and only a limited amount of the resources are invested in preventive or follow-up care.Such a division of resources has greatly limited the development of Taiwan's related medical care equipment industries as most users would not consider purchasing the equipment without subsidies from the insurance.Wang noted that when Taiwan's younger generation is planning to start an entrepreneurship, it is not necessary to target a business opportunity that can cover worldwide markets to begin with. The aging population has grown to become a problem for Taiwan, but it is also an opportunity. Resolving the many issues facing the aging population actually is a billion dollar business. An ability to satisfy demand from the retired baby boom generation means controlling the market formed by one of the largest consumer groups.(Editor's note: This is part of a series of interviews focusing on the problems and opportunities that Taiwan-based startups face. The interviewees are venture capitalists and angel investors from Silicon Valley and Taiwan.)Gary Wang, Creativity & Entrepreneurship Program professor at NTU and chairman of Pergolas Medical TechnologyPhoto: Joseph Tsai, Digitimes, June 2018

Taiwan's edge AI solutions provider Kneron has recently completed its series A1 financing of US$18 million led by Horizons Ventures, a venture capital firm founded by Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-shing, making it the first Taiwan semiconductor firm to have ever received investment from the business magnate.Kneron founder and CEO Albert Liu said that his company is confident of becoming the next company to lead the industry in innovation.He stressed that Kneron's vision is to apply AI technologies to improve human life, which complies with Horizons Ventures' goals of bettering people's daily life by investing in many disruptive companies including Skype, Facebook, Siri and DeepMind. Over the past 10 years, the venture capital firm has invested in over 80 tech startups, mostly in the US and Israel.Liu said that with this new round of funding, Kneron will accelerate its product development and collaboration with strategic partners to carry out vertical industrial applications, focusing on smart home, smart surveillance and smartphones. He added that a breakthrough 3D AI solution will be launched in the second half of 2018.Liu indicated that Kneron, founded in 2015, provides edge AI solutions, including AI processor NPU (neural processing unit) and visual recognition software, to help customers develop products more quickly. He furthered that the AI NPU provides high computing performance with low power consumption.Liu stressed that Kneron offers innovative edge AI solutions by moving part of the AI computing power from the cloud to edge devices to perform real-time AI recognition, inference and analysis without connecting to the cloud, so as to better safeguard the confidentiality of related data for users.Kneron CEO Albert LiuPhoto: Vega Chiu, Digitimes, June 2018

Virtual reality (VR) immerses users in a simulated world while augmented reality (AR) adds digital enhancements to a real image so users can see beyond the real world around them. The industry is beginning to envision more AR growth potential than VR. This has prompted LUCI Group to foray into AR/MR, targeting not only industrial applications but also consumer markets.According to Cori Shieh, secretary general, Taiwan Association for Virtual and Augmented Reality (TAVAR), VR enables a fully enclosed immersive experience. It is not likely that a user will wear a VR headset for extended periods of time, not to mention walking around with a VR headset on. On the other hand, AR, which combines virtuality and reality, fits closer to real life.According to SuperData, investors are more interested in growing mobile AR and MR solutions, which are expected to pull in US$1.4 billion of the US$1.9 billion invested in immersive technologies including both VR and AR in 2018. AR and MR revenues will amount to US$3.2 billion in 2018.Eyeing AR growth potential, Taiwan-based startup LUCI Group has been focusing efforts on AR and IoT technology developments since its establishment. Combining AR, building information modeling (BIM) and geographic information system (GIS) technologies, LUCI has introduced an ARIoT industrial application for use in manufacturing and construction. The application has been put to use by government agencies and private enterprises.Aside from entertainment and gaming, how can the manufacturing sector make use of AR? LUCI gave an example. Underground piping may become inconsistent with the original layout plan due to environmental changes over time because these changes are not reflected on the layout plan.In view of engineering design needs, LUCI uses AR technologies to deliver a three-dimensional (3D) model of the intricate piping system buried deep under the city so that users can have a simulated view of the water pipes on a mobile device. Users are able to visualize the pipes through building walls and precisely track their locations in and outside the walls.Further to industrial applications, LUCI also applies AR to automobile sales. Its solution can instantly simulate views of different car colors, interior decorations or components such as wheel frames, enabling a realistic feel and optimal user experiences to promote sales. LUCI has engaged in collaboration talks with Gaius Auto to put the solution to use.LUCI also presented its TAGTAG solution, a communication application with MR technologies, among the InnoVEX exhibits at Computex 2018. The solution allows users to engage in remote conference calls in a real space and add annotations in the space.LUCI has been working on industrial applications and now expands from industrial management solutions to business and home-use markets by launching TAGTAG. Sometimes, verbal or text communication is not enough for people to clearly convey what they want to express. For example, when there is a leak or plumbing problem in the house, verbal or text communication may fail to precisely present the problem to a technician who cannot come to the scene in time for an assessment.Under the circumstances, the homeowner can use a mobile device and TAGTAG to remotely connect with the technician who can show the homeowner the steps to follow and mark the locations of the switches to turn on/off. The homeowner can then take immediate actions to fix the problem and minimize potential damage.According to LUCI, spatial annotation has vast applications including industrial management, automobile maintenance and repair, remote healthcare, distance learning, and customer service for home appliances. Especially now with cross-sector efforts to reduce labor costs and improve efficiency, not only can spatial annotation minimize potential damage as in the example above but it also enables communication beyond time and space barriers.LUCI has also revealed its plan to extend MR applications to experiential marketing, targeting the food service sector. In the future, customers ordering meals at a restaurant will have more options than listening to the server describe menu items or flipping through menu pages themselves. They will be able to see menu information presented in 3D virtual images using a tablet or smartphone.MR-enhanced menus will have diverse looks as to how information such as prices, specials, recommendations, ingredients, and calories can be presented. They can also work in combination with POS systems to remotely notify the kitchen to prepare the order. Adding an electronic payment system, restaurants can go fully digital.Restaurant operators can save a tremendous amount of labor costs while enhancing customer experiences. Many of them are keen to introduce AR or MR applications to their businesses despite higher development costs.LUCI Group enables a 3D view of an intricate underground piping system using AR technologiesPhoto: Company

When a doctor puts a stethoscope on a patient's chest, he or she usually asks the patient to breathe in deeply and breathe out slowly. This is quite common when a patient has a cold or serious cough: the doctor listens to the patient's heart and lungs to check for respiratory infection.Going to the doctor for a cold does not seem much of a hassle in Taiwan where the size and density of population is enough to support widespread neighborhood clinics and medical institutions. Healthcare is generally readily available to people in Taiwan. However, it is not the same for people living in countries with vast territories or people having difficulty making trips to see a doctor.In view of this, Shanghai Tuoxiao Intelligent Technology has developed an intelligent heart and lung auscultation system and service that combines a digital stethoscope, AI-based algorithm and big data analytics platform for heart and lung sounds.According to Tuoxiao CFO Hsueh Yang, the system automatically analyzes whether there is anything abnormal with the user's heart or lung sounds using the AI-based algorithm to help a doctor make diagnosis. Its cloud-based platform not only analyzes and stores biophysical data but also sends the data to hospitals. Furthermore, its digital stethoscope also records the user's heart and lung sounds, which can be played back to healthcare professionals when the user later makes a hospital visit.Yang points out that the system makes remote auscultation and remote diagnosis a reality. It provides a home care tool to warn patients of potential heart or lung problems and to monitor health conditions during recuperation. In other words, Tuoxiao's intelligent heart and lung auscultation system can integrate with hierarchical medical services and remote health centers to accelerate the availability of remote healthcare.According to the company, its intelligent heart and lung auscultation system has accumulated more than 20,000 heart and lung sound recordings. Tuoxiao is also working with Shanghai Children's Hospital and Affiliated Hospital of Liaoning College of Traditional Chinese Medicine and has begun trial operation at Wuhu City Community Hospital of Anhui Province.Hsueh Yang, CFO, Shanghai Tuoxiao Intelligent TechnologyPhoto: Vega Chiu, Digitimes, June 2018

Taiwan Semiconductor Industry Association (TSIA) recently hosted a banquet to bid farewell to Morris Chang following his retirement. The guests there - including leaders in the tech industries and government officials - were all eager to hear the "commander in chief" (that's the nickname of the former TSMC chairman) share his years of experiences in the semiconductor industry.Chang said the first transistor was invented in 1947, which was an early form of semiconductor device. In 1952, Texas Instrument (TI) and Motorola acquired the patent from Bell Labs for several hundred thousand dollars, marking the start of the world's semiconductor industry.It has been six decades since Chang entered the semiconductor business in 1955. He had the chance of meeting many high-tech pioneers, such as Gordon Moore. Chang witnessed the rise of the global semiconductor industry and he was a champion of Taiwan's semiconductor industry.Taiwan's semiconductor business kicked off with the RCA project in 1975. However, early-stage developments only included government-sponsored small-scale trial or experimental projects until the establishment of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company in 1987, the first major investment deal. By that time, Samsung, under the leadership of Kun-Hee Lee, had already stepped up the development of Korea's semiconductor industry in 1983 with full support from government.Lee invited Chang, Acer founder Stan Shih and others to visit Samsung's semiconductor foundry in 1989, showing off the fact that his company had already established itself as a leading provider of memory chips at that time.The guests from Taiwan were not frustrated and went on to help create a golden era for Taiwan's semiconductor industry. The industry leaders of Chang's generation helped Taiwan expand into worldwide markets, and overtake countries such as Japan, Germany, France and Britain in many aspects.I wasn't involved in building Taiwan's the semiconductor industry, but had the chance of being a witness to the end of an era at the banquet.I got to know Chang in 1995 when I was at Market Intelligence & Consulting Institute, a division of Institute for Information Industry (III). At the time, TSMC had been around for only seven to eight years and Chang often attended seminars we organized - always sitting in the front rowA few years later I founded Digitimes, and Chang was among its major investors - which also included Stan Shih, Matthew Miau, and Ken Tai. Chang also on Digitimes' board of directors for the first two terms. It was Chang's personal investment made with the goal to establish an independent and professional data service provider.Already well known around the globe at that time, TSMC consistently advised that investments associated with integrated device manufacturers (IDM) would be too risky and IC design startups should stay focused and invest their capital on core technology research. It was also a critical time when TSMC's foundry service was taking shape.Business executives must be both modest and confidentIt is critical for a business to have influence in the industry. TSMC has always been able to stay on top of industry dynamics and lead a business model centered on itself at a global scale. This is made possible through the vision and confidence of the company's leaders and a great inspiration to many business operators.At the farewell dinner, I was seated at the same table with TSMC CFO Lora Ho. Ho revealed that In the 19 years she had worked alongside Chang, Chang had reiterated on several occasions that business executives should be modest and confident - modest when listening to people's opinions and confident when making decisions. He believes all characteristics can be developed but only when you have a soul can you make profound influence.Chang is a man with dreams and beliefs, a creative leader refusing to go with the flow and a professional executive upholding core values and ethics. At the first Digitimes board meeting, he said, "If you can't do something different. I'm not willing to give you any of my money." He was actually asking for a valid reason to invest in Digitimes as Taiwan already had a great number of media services.He always demonstrated his commitment to advancing the interests of Taiwan. I think this may be his way of showing gratitude for Kwoh-Ting Li - architect of Taiwan's economic transformation who invited Chang to bring his know-how and vision back home.Rational, professional, focused and goal-orientedRational, professional, focused and goal-oriented are the words I would use to describe Chang in view of his accomplishments in the three decades of career and the role he has played in history.Chang is not a sentimental person but a rational business executive. In a meeting, he would not hesitate to ask those who have nothing to do with the issue at hand to leave. Sparing someone's feelings is never his concern when he interacts with people professionally.In his 30 years with TSMC, his leadership has helped the company achieve great success with a US$200 billion market capitalization, in the same class as Intel. I remember when Texas Instrument Taiwan celebrated its 20th anniversary, Chang was invited to give a speech. He said, "Intel is the world's No. 1 semiconductor company, followed by TI and TSMC. The latter two combined cannot compare to Intel. Can we ever beat Intel?"TSMC achieved that goal in 2017. Sharp-minded Chang has the courage to invest in cutting-edge technologies. He exhibits extraordinary confidence, not aggressiveness, in his business decisions. He leads the trend rather than follow it.Chang has stayed focused on his core business for all his life. He has never misused his power to invest in upstream or downstream businesses. Since he returned to Taiwan, his only focus has always been foundry service and the success he is able to achieve has wowed the world.TSMC has always aimed high. It is able to grab a 56% market share as it competes with heavyweights in the semiconductor manufacturing sector. TSMC has taken Taiwan to a new height. The company accounts for 3.5% of Taiwan's GDP, pays high salaries to a staff of 48,000 employees, enjoys a 50% gross profit margin, takes a more than 50% market share, allocates US$10 billion in annual capital expenditure and records a market capitalization exceeding US$200 billion. Each one of these represents an admirable achievement.TSMC has allocated US$10.8 billion out of its US$32.1 billion annual revenue for capital expenditure. There are very few companies in the world able to maintain long-term success with such a high ratio of capital expenditure. The key is that TSMC's investments can keep generating returns in the long run. TSMC divides its business into three focus areas - advanced technologies, main growth drivers and mature technologies.It competes for orders from world-leading customers with advanced technologies including 16/14nm and 7nm processes, for example, Apple's application processors, Qualcomm's communication chips and crypto mining machines with low energy consumption. For older process nodes, TSMC maintains dominant market leadership that is not to be underestimated amid an IoT era with diverse opportunities.What kind of leader do we need?When the world is keen on pushing process technologies toward 7nm and 5nm nodes, TSMC also provides all-inclusive services. According to Chang, as long as Moore's Law continues to apply, Taiwan can stay 6-7 years ahead of China. The commander in chief's insight and vision wraps up this period in semiconductor development and encourages Taiwan to keep pressing forward.TSMC's new CEO and TSIA chairman CC Wei, in bidding farewell, said humorously that Chang was still reviewing work as usual days before his retirement and he still had to report to Chang in trepidation as always.As Chang bows out, we will usher in a new era - the IoT era, extending from the times of PC and handsets. In the past, Taiwan competed with capitalist countries Japan and Korea; but going forward, Taiwan faces a new rival that speaks the same language and shares a common cultural root – a new China, looking to disrupt the global business model with its state capitalism.Chang remarked, "I open the window and I don't see any red tide" - a reference to China. Chang sees the world as an arena where players compete for chances to excel. The battleground is not the narrow strip of water between Taiwan and China but the vast Pacific Ocean. The semiconductor industry where world-class players abound leaves no chance for opportunists with no soul but offers plenty of opportunities for leaders insisting on core values.Chang could very well have said nothing about the gap between Taiwan and China. However, with six decades of expertise, he chose to offer advice as to how Taiwan can maintain its leading edge. For this, we are forever grateful. Good-bye Morris!(Editor's note: Colley Hwang is president of Digitimes.)TSMC founder Morris ChangPhoto: Digitimes file photo

While Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) and Samsung are entering the 7nm process era, the latest cobalt-based process solutions rolled out by Applied Materials following over 10 years of development will be the best helper for 7nm foundry node, as they can help increase, by 5-15%, the performance of AI and high-performance computing (HPC) chips fabricated on 7nm node, according to Jonathan Bakke, global product manager for Contact and Middle of Line Products in the Metal Deposition Products Business Unit at the US-based leader in semiconductor materials engineering solutions.Bakke told Digitimes in a recent interview that Applied Materials' cobalt-based solutions represent a major breakthrough in materials engineering to accelerate the chip performance in the big data and AI era, adding that the company has started delivering the solutions to major customers.Q: Why do you adopt the cobalt metal in material engineering solutions and how will it influence the semiconductor industry?A: In fact, the appearance of the cobalt material is quite an exciting thing. Since IBM replaced aluminum with copper in 1997, the materials application field has seen little change, and therefore adopting cobalt has become a new major metal change to transistor contact and interconnect in 20 years.We can see semiconductor applications roughly divided into three major stages: first for PC and internet application, then for mobile devices and social networks, and now for AI, big data, and automation. Industry players are all focusing on the third stage, but the Moore's Law has reached its physical limits, so Applied Materials has managed to adjust materials to extend the Moore's Law and better meet the PPAC requirements of chips.Q: What are the chip's PPAC requirements ?A: The PPAC requirements entail that chips can be volume produced using x-nm process nodes to achieve higher 'Performance', lower 'Power' consumption, smaller 'Area' and lower 'Cost'. With the advent of the AI and big data era, such requirements are casting challenges for the traditional Moore's Law.Let us briefly review the evolutions of mobile devices in the past 30 years. In terms of performance, mobile devices have seen exponential growth, in that they can function as not only phones, but also web access and gaming devices. In power consumption, many other needs than phone calls have to be covered. Meanwhile, IC scaling has kept improving. Apple's smartphone processors, for instance, have become tinnier and tinnier when evolving from A5 to A11, with the performance increasing 10-folds when progressing from A8 to A11 alone. Cost-wise, a mobile phone was sold for around US$4,000 in early years, but the price has fallen sharply to about US$600. In bracing for the arrival of the AI and big data era, the introduction of new materials and material engineering solutions is increasingly crucial for the PPAC requirements of chips to be fulfilled.Q: What about the evolutions in wafer fabrication equipment in the three main semiconductor application stages mentioned earlier?A: In the PC era, planar transistor structure was the mainstay, and chips' PPAC requirements could be easily met without materials integration or lithography adoption. And our customers started to incorporate self-aligned double patterning (SADP) and self-aligned quadruple pattering (SAQP) technologies in the mobile device era, and now even have moved to adopt EUV (extreme ultraviolet) lithography technology. Of course, transistor structures must be adjusted along with the advancement of fabrication process nodes to achieve the PPAC effects of chips, with FinFET, for instance, able to enhance chip performance.Intel started using tri-gate FinFET devices at the 22nm in 2011, and now the gate-all-round (GAA) FET process is also available. The FinFET and GAA FET process technologies alone, however, are not sufficient enough to upgrade the performance of chips, but material engineering breakthroughs will play a crucial role in meeting PPAC requirements of chips needed in the AI era.Q: How do you see the advantages of cobalt adopted as a conducting material in the AI era?A: More and more HPC chips will be needed in the AI era, and so will be new materials. Today, materials such as tungsten and copper are no longer scalable beyond the 10nm foundry node because their electrical performance has reached physical limits for transistor contacts and local interconnects. This has created a major bottleneck in achieving the full performance potential of FinFET transistors. Cobalt can remove this bottleneck but also requires a change in process system strategy. As the industry scales structure to extreme dimensions, the materials behave differently and must be systematically engineered at the atomic scale, often under vacuum.After figuring out some parameters, we have found cobalt outperforming tungsten, aluminum and copper in the critical dimensions of under 20nm, showing lower resistance and variability, better gap-fill capability and higher reliability. Of the three traditional materials, only copper still performs well in the critical dimensions of over 30nm process.Q: How do you assess the competitive advantages of Applied Materials in the cobalt-based material engineering solutions? What about the material cost of cobalt?A: Applied Materials has been pursuing integrated material engineering solutions to best serve customer needs. To enable the use of cobalt as a new conducting material in the transistor contact and interconnect, our company has offered end-to-end product portfolios by combining several materials engineering steps - pre-clean, PVD, ALD, and CVD - on the Endura platform. Moreover, our company has also defined an integrated cobalt suite that includes anneal on the Producer platform, planarization on the Reflexion LK Prime CMP platform, and e-beam inspection on the Provision platform. Customers can use this proven Integrated Materials Solution to speed time-to-market and increase chip performance at the 7nm foundry node and beyond.Cobalt as a conducting material is especially suitable for advanced 7nm process and beyond, and we believe that as long as foundry houses enter the 7nm process, they will surely need the cobalt material to break the bottleneck in transistor contact and interconnect.As far as pure material cost is concerned, cobalt is three times more expensive than tungsten, but it remains inconvenient for us to comment on the actual cost that also involves the cost of collaborative R&D with customers.In fact, Applied Materials is the only semiconductor equipment supplier with most comprehensive technological capabilities to explore the broadest portfolio of solutions, and we are sure that volume production of chips fabricated with our latest cobalt-based solutions may be seen probably in September 2018.Jonathan Bakke, Applied Materials executivePhoto: Julian Ho, Digitimes, June 2018

Consumers in Taiwan are probably quite familiar with the logo featuring the black characters "Yale" on a yellow background but they may not know the company behind the classic Yale brand - ASSA ABLOY. In fact, ASSA ABLOY is the largest worldwide leading company of door opening and security solutions. One out of ten locks or security devices in the world is an ASSA ABLOY product.In response to booming IoT developments, ASSA ABLOY is gearing up R&D efforts combining a wide range of high-tech innovations to deliver new-generation smart door opening solutions for homes and businesses and reshaping the traditional lock industry. During a recent interview, Aravind Karthigesu, managing director, ASSA ABLOY ASEAN, and Irene Yip, general manager, ASSA ABLOY Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan talked about smart applications and their views on Taiwan market expansions.Karthigesu first noted that ASSA ABLOY was formed in 1994 through the merger of ASSA in Sweden and ABLOY in Finland. Since then, the company has engaged in more than 200 merger and acquisition deals and is now an international group with 47,500 employees and annual sales of SEK76 billion (NT$265 billion). ASSA ABLOY's workforce in Asia Pacific comprises 11,800 employees and the region contributes SEK9 billion (NT$30 billion) to the company's annual revenue with the Taiwan market being an important segment.Focusing on R&D and innovation, ASSA ABLOY enables seamless access controlIn addition to Yale, ASSA ABLOY Group's comprehensive brand portfolio include Gateman, TESA, ABLOY, TRAKA, Mul-T-Lock, supplying a complete range of mechanical, electromechanical , digital and smart door opening solutions and security devices for both residential and commercial markets.Irene Yip added that many of ASSA ABLOY's brands have been long standing, particularly with Yale celebrating its 175th anniversary this year. Yale Joined the ASSA ABLOY family in 2000 and many customers only got to know ASSA ABLOY because of Yale. With digital locks becoming the trend, ASSA ABLOY's ongoing innovative efforts have been infusing new energy into Yale by introducing new high-tech electronic door opening solutions to keep the brand on the leading edge.Commenting on developments in Asia Pacific markets, Karthigesu pointed out the region has a population of 4.1 billion people, among which two billion have access to Internet, 3.9 billion use mobile devices and half are the millennial generation under the age of 30 who grew up surrounded by technologies.In view of the trend, ASSA ABLOY gears its Asia Pacific strategies from digital locks toward smart locks in an attempt to capture IoT opportunities. It is working to enable higher security and more convenience through strengthened integrations of smart locks, Internet and mobile apps.Extending from electronic locks to smart home applications, the famous Yale brand under the ASSA ABLOY Group highlights family values, especially for Asian markets. For example, when a user is worried about an elderly family member or a child but cannot go home to check on them, he or she can use a smart device to send a one-time-use electronic key, which is in the form of a password, or turn a smart device into a key using Wi-Fi or Bluetooth communication to allow a neighbor or friend to unlock the door and help check on family members during a specified period of time.Karthigesu said ASSA ABLOY brings innovative application built on adding value to people's lives. As a result of urbanization, most people live in apartment complexes or communities with common areas and personal spaces. For growingly popular home delivery services, ASSA ABLOY's solutions can allow a delivery person to pass through community gates and lifts on a one-time basis and bring packages to a customer's door with no security concerns.If we expand the scope to smart building and smart city applications, just think how many doors people pass through every day as they move around the city.ASSA ABLOY is becoming the 'meastro' in the background orchestrating the products, technologies and seamless customer experience to securely and reliably access the doors to where you live, work and play. We look to build seamless access control with no need for keys. The door can recognize your face and automatically open for you while denying unauthorized access. This will bring more convenience and security to people's lives. To achieve such a goal, we will combine multiple technologies, including early-day mechanical locks, present-day password, card and fingerprint solutions and face recognition or other cutting-edge technologies in the future. ASSA ABLOY will keep abreast of the times and introduce the latest high-tech advancements to reshape the lock industry that seems to be in keeping with the tradition." Says Karthigesu.Smart home and smart city applications spur growth opportunitiesASSA ABLOY will continue to actively promote smart lock products to the Taiwan market where high-tech products enjoy a high penetration rate. As part of its efforts to expand into smart home services, ASSA ABLOY has joined forces with Secom to include its electronic locks and apps in Secom solutions. According to Yip, every household in Europe, North America, Taiwan, Japan and Korea will be equipped with electronic lock systems within the next 10 to 15 years, representing a significant change to the way people use locks. In view of this, ASSA ABLOY will strengthen collaborations with smart home service providers and system vendors to expedite market expansion.In addition, ASSA ABLOY is the first vendor in Taiwan to open a concept store featuring door locks with six Yale stores already up and running and a total of ten stores by year-end. These stores provide consumers easy access to ASSA ABLOY's innovations and raise market awareness on smart locks.ASSA ABLOY has enjoyed multiplying growth each year since 2010 in the home-use market in Taiwan, including uses in renovation projects and new constructions. This is very impressive growth and also a confirmation on the trend ASSA ABLOY has envisioned, so the company is very optimistic in its outlook for the Taiwan market.Aside from home-use, there are also tremendous opportunities in commercial buildings, government institutions and public infrastructures. The Taiwan government is aggressively rolling out smart city applications and has selected ASSA ABLOY's electronic locks for use in public housing projects and new Taipei MRT subway lines under construction. With government agencies leading the way, Taiwan citizens will increasingly embrace these high-tech innovations as well.According to Karthigesu, seamless access control also has wide-ranging applications throughout different scenarios such as hospitals, factories and power plants. For example, a patient that is delivered to the emergency room in an ambulance passes through multiple access control points before he is sent to the operation room. Any delay, even just seconds, may be life-threatening. ASSA ABLOY has received requests from hospitals to study the use scenario and develop solutions for them.In closing, Karthigesu emphasized ASSA ABLOY's product portfolio includes not only door locks but also smart windows and smart safes. The goal is to build a secure and convenient life for users. ASSA ABLOY is able to lead smart lock developments thanks to its devotion of immense R&D resources and its task force of more than 2,000 R&D professionals who continue to transform innovative concepts to actual implementations, thereby creating greater opportunities.Irene Yip, general manager, ASSA ABLOY Hong Kong (left) and Aravind Karthigesu, managing director, ASSA ABLOY ASEAN (right).

If applied to the healthcare industry, 5G technologies should start with outside-the-body applications rather than invasive ones, as accreditations for invasive medical applications are much harder to obtain and involve time-consuming procedures, according to Robert Topol, Intel's general manager of advanced 5G technologies.Topol said Intel is optimistic that 5G technologies will first usher in a new period of transformation in non-invasive medical treatments for patients, thus bringing substantial business opportunities.Such medical segments as telehealth, teleconsultation, telesurgery demonstration, and other non-invasion applications will be among the first application scenarios following the commercialization of 5G technologies, according to Topol.He stressed that the low-latency transmission and wide network coverage of 5G will help turn telemedicine into a reality, enable robots to do regular rounds, allow elderly patients to receive medical treatments without having to go outdoors, and upgrade the healthcare quality in remote areas.In addition, 5G will also drastically change the scenarios of many sectors including consumer practices, banking, retail, energy, transportation, industrial production, and government infrastructures, among others.Robot Topol, Intel's general manager of 5G advanced technologiesPhoto: Vega Chiu, Digitimes, June 2018

The 2018 Infinity Ventures Summit (IVS), hosted by Japan's Infinity Ventures (IVP) as an annual gathering for global tech startups, has recently wrapped up its three-day run in Taipei, with Taiwan-based startup team ReCactus winning the championship at the IVS LaunchPad contest.This is the first time that the IVS has been held in Taipei since its inception in 2007 in Japan, attracting the participation of some 1,000 experts, CEOs, angel investors and startup players from Taiwan, Japan, China, Southeast Asia, the USA and Europe, according to IVP.IVP said that this year, many experts were invited to deliver keynote speeches on latest developments in angel investment, cryptocurrencies, taxation challenges, startup development advantages in Taiwan, and the latest tech trends in Japan. Among the speakers were SEA chief strategy officer Alan Hellawell, iQIYI co-president Xu Weifeng, and Ctrip.com chief technology officer Eric Ye.Championship winner ReCactus is a reaction video social platform, allowing users to make, watch, connect and share reaction videos on YouTube, Facebook or Istagram. Since the app was launched in October 2017, it has become popular with users around the world while also having attracted investors from the US and Southeast Asia.This year, 14 out of a total of 150 startups registering their presence in the contest had the chance to pitch at the LaunchPad stage, but only five winners were selected. Besides ReCactus, three of the other top four winners are also based in Taiwan, namely TWO, Xpression and SkyRec, with the fifth place taken by ORII from Hong Kong.IVP said that IVS LaunchPad has been one of the most closely watched startup contest in Japan, as contestants can compete for the attention from media and angel investors by winning a slot to pitch at the activity. Over the past 10 years, around 300 startup teams have got on the IVS LaunchPad stage, having solicited combined investments of over US$600 million. In addition, 11 of them have launched IPO and another 16 startups have been acquired by large-size businesses.

At the recent 2018 SNEC International Photovoltaic Power Generation and Smart Energy Exhibition & Conference in Shanghai, Dr. Weiming Zhang, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Heraeus Photovoltaics, announced the company's new Hecaro - a revolutionary electrically conductive adhesive (ECA) that contains <50% silver but delivers performance equivalent to high silver ECAs.As a global leading provider of metallization pastes, Heraeus Photovoltaics endeavors to expand its presence across the photovoltaics (PV) value chain through technology innovations and strategic transformation.The launch of Hecaro not only is the result of Heraeus Photovoltaics' efforts to transform to a supplier of "Beyond Paste" solutions but also represents its commitment to strengthening R&D capabilities and enhancing product quality for the PV industry.During an interview, Dr. Zhang said in earnest only through continuing R&D efforts can Heraeus Photovoltaics keep pushing the efficiency of clean PV energy. Heraeus Photovoltaics will strive to make utmost contributions to sustainable developments of the industry and future generations until one day when photovoltaic panels become standard household systems and the clean energy ecosystem shows significant improvement. The following is a highlight of the interview.Q: Could you highlight the new Heraeus Photovoltaics products and services making a grand debut at SNEC 2018? Why is Heraeus Photovoltaics introducing these new offerings? What are their characteristics and main features?A: This year we are launching at full blast an advanced electrically conductive adhesive (ECA) named Hecaro with a less than 50% silver content, the lowest on the market. It delivers performance on par with high silver content ECA at a superior cost structure. Customer responses have been very positive. Solar shingle suppliers will enjoy cost savings and enhanced reliability.Aside from savings on total costs, Hecaro is designed with optimizations for screen-printing to offer fast curing and long-term reliability. We think screen-printing will become the mainstream technology for solar shingles, which will give rise to Hecaro's widespread adoption as the interconnection material for advanced solar cells [e.g. shingles, heterojunction technology (HJT) modules and interdigitated back contact (IBC) solar cells].To keep up with market trends, many vendors in the PV industry are seeking a partner that can provide them comprehensive products, solutions and technical support to help them simplify and streamline their process. In view of this, Heraeus Photovoltaics offers new Cell Optimization Service (COS) to further boost PV cell efficiency, analog property and manufacturing process optimizations by engaging in close collaborations with world-leading research institutions in Germany and Singapore to help customers break through technological bottlenecks through forecasts based on big data analytics on past success stories.Q: The launch of these new solutions indicates Heraeus Photovoltaics is undergoing a strategic transformation. In general, businesses under market pressure have difficulty making long-term strategies. What is Heraeus Photovoltaics' main idea in this respect?A: Having already established itself as a global leading provider of metallization pastes, Heraeus Photovoltaics will expand the range of applications for its innovations and thereby benefit the PV value chain by engaging in strategic transformation. I also recently spoke at the CTO forum that Heraeus Photovoltaics is keen to form strategic alliances with customers and work together in the long run to continuingly lower the total cost per-watt for the PV industry. To achieve this goal, Heraeus Photovoltaics devotes tremendous resources to research, expands its professional work force and tailors its services to suit customer needs.Heraeus Photovoltaics continues to help the PV industry set new world records of PERC cell efficiency with its technology innovations, which is a solid contribution to clean energy development and environmental protection, allowing the PV industry to maintain healthy and sustainable development and future generations to have a clean and safe environment.Q: According to IHS Markit, global solar photovoltaic demand is forecast to reach 108GW in 2018, propelled by strong demand in China. This marks a major milestone as China, the largest PV market in the world, is transitioning toward "smart manufacturing." What is Heraeus Photovoltaics' plan to boost its presence in China for the next three to five years? How much growth do you expect in your China business?A: Global PV installations totaled 100GW in 2017, among which 50GW was installed in China, surprisingly topping market expectations. The China market accounts for half of worldwide investments in energy storage technologies. Chinese battery makers produce a capacity three times the amount generated by the rest of the world. The country's investments are beginning to create results. The average price of a battery pack continues on a downward trend, decreasing to US$209/kWh in 2017, down 24%.Aside from China, Africa, the Middle East, South America and India are also exhibiting growth potential. It is forecast that 14 to 15 countries/regions will install more than 1GW. The industry is showing healthy growth.The China market enjoyed a whopping 230% increase in distributed PV grid-connected power generation just in the first quarter of this year. We expect this to drive future growth in China in the years to come. Operating in small areas, distributed PV power generation requires solar cells to have higher conversion efficiency, cost effectiveness and product reliability, particularly the polysilicon material. Vendors with the capability to guarantee premium quality will have competitive advantage. As local governments in China, especially the Jiangsu province and the Yangtze Delta region, actively enforce their solar energy policies, we think the domestic demand will grow even stronger when PV components become more cost-effective and affordable by 2020.Dr. Weiming Zhang, executive vice president and chief technology officer, Heraeus PhotovoltaicsPhoto: Digitimes, June 2018