South Korean President Lee Jae-myung has begun a fresh round of talks with the country's leading business figures, starting with a private dinner with SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won, at a time when semiconductor investment, artificial intelligence and US demands for more local manufacturing are becoming increasingly intertwined.
The global memory market is entering a sharp upcycle as cloud providers boost capital spending and demand for AI infrastructure lifts DRAM, NAND, and HBM prices. According to DIGITIMES, the three largest upstream memory chip makers are headed for a more than threefold jump in combined DRAM and NAND revenue in 2026, with supply constraints likely to keep pricing firm until new capacity arrives in 2027.
Bosch Rexroth, the industrial technology subsidiary of Bosch, showcased advanced semiconductor and smart manufacturing solutions at the 2026 Taipei International Industrial Automation Exhibition, held from August 19 to 22.
Xiaomi is preparing to take its in-house smartphone silicon further upmarket, with founder and chairman Lei Jun confirming that a new generation of its Xring chip is on the way. Supply-chain sources say the chip has already returned from fabrication, completed initial power-on testing and moved into the device integration stage.
JCET Group reported record first-half revenue for 2026, with demand from artificial intelligence infrastructure and high-performance computing lifting capacity utilization and accelerating the shift toward higher-value advanced packaging.
SK hynix is considering a large-scale memory semiconductor investment in Japan, with Miyagi Prefecture emerging as a potential site, although the company has stressed that no decision has been finalized.
Rising demand for AI computing power is increasing chip package sizes, bringing fan-out panel-level packaging (FOPLP) into sharper focus as a next-generation packaging technology that converts traditional round wafer formats into rectangular panels, offering potential gains in both production efficiency and cost.
The AI industry is watching the rise of co-packaged optics (CPO) as faster AI systems now depend on more efficient links between chips and data centers. At DIGITIMES Tech Forum 2026 in Taipei, analyst Jerry Zheng said the technology is moving toward mainstream adoption as bandwidth demand outpaces computing gains.
SK hynix has published a technical roadmap for co-packaged optics (CPO) in the journal Nature Electronics, positioning the world's largest supplier of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) to compete not just on individual chip performance but on how memory, processors, and networking are designed together as AI computing systems scale.
Micron's new US research hub could influence how future AI systems are built, stored, and scaled, with implications that extend well beyond America. The planned US$10 billion effort targets breakthroughs in memory, advanced packaging, and new compute architectures that may shape global technology supply chains, energy use, and access to smarter devices.
Foundry leader Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) grew 37% year to date — and still lost four percentage points of the sub-sector's revenue share, because the other 26 manufacturers grew more than twice as fast.
More coverage
