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Wednesday 20 May 2026

Alibaba's T-Head doubles down on AI infrastructure with Zhenwu M890

Alibaba Cloud has unveiled the Zhenwu M890, a new proprietary AI training and inference chip developed by its semiconductor subsidiary T-Head Semiconductor, as the Chinese cloud group accelerates its push into full-stack AI infrastructure for the agentic AI era.

Wednesday 20 May 2026

Amazon's AI chip push gains ground as Nvidia remains central to AWS

Amazon's yearslong push to build a credible alternative to Nvidia's AI chips is beginning to gain traction, as software improvements, tight GPU supply, and cost pressure prompt more developers to test the company's Trainium processors, according to The Information.

Wednesday 20 May 2026

Former Samsung semiconductor head warns that memory prices and demand could fall sharply after 2028

The global semiconductor industry has been focused on a memory supercycle, with some forecasts suggesting the upturn could last until 2030. However, Kye-hyun Kyung, former head of Samsung Electronics' Device Solutions (DS) division and currently a standing advisor to Samsung, has cautioned against overly optimistic sentiment in the memory market.

Wednesday 20 May 2026

Google and Blackstone could lift ASIC demand with TPU leasing joint venture

Recent media reports say Google is set to team up with Blackstone to form a new cloud computing leasing company, with Blackstone as the main shareholder. The new venture aims to build about 500 MW of computing capacity by 2027, most of it using Google's Tensor Processing Units (TPUs), a move industry watchers say supports Google ASIC partners such as MediaTek, Broadcom, and TSMC.

Wednesday 20 May 2026

South Korea sounds alarm on manufacturing hollow-out as AI server boom lifts Taiwan

As artificial intelligence reshapes the global economy, demand for data centers is rapidly redrawing the export map of nations.

Wednesday 20 May 2026

Phison taps overseas bond market for US$800 million storage push

Phison Electronics has completed pricing for its first overseas unsecured convertible bond sale, raising US$800 million as the NAND controller supplier moves to support expanding demand for AI storage and related solutions.

Wednesday 20 May 2026

Commentary: Musk, Huang, and H200—Nvidia's last chip in China

US President Donald Trump's trip to China with 17 business leaders thrust Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang back into the spotlight — as Beijing's position on Nvidia's H200 chips and China's broader AI supply chain continue to reshape the market narrative.

Wednesday 20 May 2026

Intel prioritizes high-end CPUs as AI demand tightens global supply

Intel is urging notebook and PC customers to adopt its most advanced chip manufacturing technology as surging demand for artificial intelligence computing continues to strain global CPU supply, according to industry sources.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

Foundry, test costs push PMIC price hikes toward 12-inch wafers

Rising manufacturing costs at upstream foundries and back-end packaging and testing are pushing power management IC (PMIC) makers toward price increases, with global implications for device makers and automotive and data-center operators as firms weigh whether to accept higher PMIC prices or shift strategies amid ongoing worldwide capacity constraints and node migration pressures.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

ITE Tech awaits PC, NB visibility as price hikes begin in 2H26

ITE Tech's stable first-quarter results and planned price increases from the second half of 2026 signal potential cost pass-through across global PC, notebook, and embedded markets, affecting device makers and buyers worldwide as memory and component costs climb and inventory strategies shift in response to anticipated further price rises.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

XPeng introduces mass-produced Robotaxi built on in-house AI chips

XPeng unveiled its first mass-produced robotaxi on Tuesday, marking a major milestone in China's rapidly accelerating race to commercialize Level 4 autonomous driving.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

Analog Devices reportedly closes in on US$1.5 billion cash bid for Empower Semiconductor

Analog Devices Inc. is in advanced talks to acquire Empower Semiconductor for about US$1.5 billion in cash, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter. A formal announcement could come as soon as Tuesday. The deal has not been finalized and could still fall through.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

AMD gains Beijing spotlight: China courts Lisa Su for AI chip ties

Shortly after Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang left China following a delegation led by US President Donald Trump, Beijing officials swiftly announced a meeting with Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) CEO Lisa Su, drawing market attention to a possible shift in the atmosphere surrounding US-China AI chip cooperation.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

Chipmakers rejoice as Googlebook entry heats up AI PC race

Google's announcement for the upcoming Googlebook, which tightly integrates Gemini features, signals that it is no longer limiting its PC strategy to the Chromebook line and is pushing into a higher-end product tier in the AI PC era. Chipmakers, including Intel on the x86 side and Qualcomm and MediaTek on the Arm side, are also joining the race, further intensifying competition in the AI PC market.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

Satellite communications boom drives Winsemi, AWSC into W band

SpaceX's IPO preparations are accelerating the commercialization of low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites, renewing global attention on satellite communications. The LEO sector's sharp growth in 2025 and expected expansion in 2026 could reshape connectivity worldwide, as rising demand for inter-satellite, satellite-to-gateway, and satellite-to-mobile links drives higher frequencies and services.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

Google and Blackstone reportedly plan AI cloud venture to expand TPU business

Alphabet's Google and Blackstone are planning to launch a new artificial intelligence cloud company that would use Google's proprietary AI chips to compete in the fast-growing AI infrastructure market, according to reports from Bloomberg, Reuters, and The Wall Street Journal.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

Arm faces US antitrust probe after announcing plan to design its own chips

Arm was notified by the US Federal Trade Commission in early 2026 that it was the subject of an antitrust investigation after the chip designer said it would begin engineering its own processors, according to Bloomberg. The FTC is examining whether Arm used its dominant position in chip licensing to deny or downgrade the quality of CPU blueprints it licenses to others in order to disadvantage rivals. The regulator asked Arm to cooperate and preserve related documents.

Tuesday 19 May 2026

Commentary: Sanctions reshaped China's foundry sector — just not in the way markets expected

China's foundry sector is charting a different course as the global semiconductor market remains focused on AI GPUs, the 2nm process node, and advanced packaging. Led by Semiconductor Manufacturing International (SMIC) and Hua Hong Semiconductor, domestic Chinese foundries have not stalled under US sanctions; instead, they are accelerating efforts to build a China-specific foundry ecosystem amid the AI boom, recovering demand for mature nodes, and a push for supply-chain self-reliance.

Monday 18 May 2026

TSMC's Japan fab signals a turning point for overseas manufacturing

TSMC's semiconductor venture in Japan has posted its first quarterly profit since entering mass production, marking an important milestone in the company's overseas expansion strategy.

Monday 18 May 2026

Apple's chip recycling strategy deepens reliance on TSMC and pressures PC rivals

Apple has increasingly relied on "binned" chips — processors with disabled or defective cores — to expand into lower-priced devices, according to a recent report by The Wall Street Journal. The strategy allows the company to reuse chips that would otherwise be discarded, lowering costs while broadening its product lineup.

Monday 18 May 2026

South Korean court bars factory occupations and orders safety work during planned Samsung strike

A South Korean court granted Samsung Electronics an injunction on May 18, 2026, limiting union dispute actions and ordering that safety protection systems and wafer anti-deterioration operations remain fully staffed and operational during any strike, according to Seoul Economic Daily. The Suwon District Court issued the decision three days before a planned general strike on May 21, 2026, and the ruling is expected to constrain the scale and methods of any walkout.

Monday 18 May 2026

As AI redraws chip industry, TSMC faces its first real rivals

The global map of semiconductor manufacturing is beginning to shift. For years, the market for advanced chip production was dominated almost entirely by TSMC. But the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), intensifying geopolitical tensions, and mounting pressure from Washington to secure critical supply chains are beginning to loosen that grip.

Monday 18 May 2026

Samsung and union enter new round of talks ahead of planned strike

Samsung Electronics and its labor union in South Korea began a new round of negotiations on May 18, days before a planned strike that could bring its chip plants to a halt. The talks are being mediated by the government, which has signaled concern about the labor action's impact on the South Korean economy, in which Samsung contributes more than 20% of its exports.

Monday 18 May 2026

DIGITIMES Insight: Intel and AMD diverge as TSMC prepares price hikes

Global server markets may shift as DIGITIMES analyst Luke Lin says Intel's revenue gains stem largely from price rises while AMD posts stronger shipment-led growth. TSMC plans another price increase as customers prioritize capacity over cost, developments that could affect cloud providers, vendors, and data center economics worldwide.

Monday 18 May 2026

Weekly news roundup: TSMC faces AI supply strain as Samsung, Intel, and Apple test foundry alternatives

Below are the most-read DIGITIMES Asia stories from the week of May 11-17, 2026:

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