The Trump administration has authorized exports of Nvidia's H200 artificial intelligence processors to China, a decision that analysts view as a partial concession allowing restricted chip sales while still blocking Chinese access to Nvidia's upcoming Blackwell line.

Planet Technology reported solid profitability through the first three quarters of 2025, maintaining a gross margin above 46% despite currency pressure. Chairman Jack Chen said recent memory price increases are expected to have little impact on the company because memory accounts for a small portion of its overall cost structure.

SK Hynix is considering listing its treasury shares on the US market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) but has not made a final decision, the company said. This statement follows Korean media reports suggesting a US listing for about 2.4% of its treasury shares.

As 2025 nears its end, negotiations over the US Section 232 tariffs closely tied to Taiwan's semiconductor and ICT exports remain unresolved. The US government's expectation of a "50-50 chip split" has yet to receive a commitment from Taiwan. However, Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te recently sent a positive message in an interview with US media, stating that Taiwan is willing to assist the US in chip production, and that if the US provides policy support, achieving the "50-50 chip split" goal is possible. This marks a significant shift in the government's stance toward US expectations based on mutual benefits.

A major memory shortage is hitting the industry as the supply-demand gap widens. Some upstream memory manufacturers are prioritizing server shipments, while other companies have been aggressively stockpiling due to shortages. Among US-based CSPs, Google and Microsoft have moved the fastest and come out on top. The four major US CSPs have recently begun product validation with Nanya Technology, intending to diversify DDR4 DIMM module supply beyond Korean memory suppliers.

YMTC filed a lawsuit on December 5, 2025, in the US District Court in Washington, challenging the US Department of Defense's decision to label it as linked to the Chinese military, asking the court to block enforcement of the listing and overturn the designation.

Samsung Electronics, fresh off completing sixth-generation HBM4 development, is reportedly accelerating DRAM capacity expansion in a renewed effort to reclaim leadership in AI memory.

Rumors have risen that SK Hynix is accelerating the expansion of its 10nm-class sixth-generation 1c DRAM capacity. Previously, to concentrate on producing high-bandwidth memory (HBM), SK Hynix had successively notified major customers that it would reduce general-purpose DRAM supply. However, now that general-purpose DRAM prices have risen sharply, the company's strategy also appears to be undergoing adjustments.

The Indo-Pacific region has become the world's most critical theater for both technology manufacturing and geopolitical competition. As military tensions escalate across East Asia, executives are increasingly questioning whether their supply chains can withstand potential disruptions.

Samsung Electronics, with its sixth-generation high-bandwidth memory (HBM4), uses base dies produced by Samsung Foundry. As Samsung's HBM4 competitiveness rises, the market expects the performance of Samsung Foundry to improve in tandem. Increased HBM4 sales not only boost the memory business but also drive foundry revenue, demonstrating Samsung's advantage as an integrated device manufacturer (IDM).

South Korean memory giant SK Hynix is fast-tracking the development of its next-generation 300-layer V10 NAND flash memory, according to reports in Korean media outlets Hankyung and Nate. The company plans to implement hybrid bonding technology for the first time to compete more effectively with rivals such as Samsung Electronics, China's YMTC, and Japan's Kioxia. Industry sources cited by Hankyung indicate that the company aims to complete development of a pilot line in 2026, before commencing mass production in early 2027.

SK Hynix and battery subsidiaries within SK Group received approval for 68 core patents in China in November 2025. Many of these patents relate to highly integrated memory designs and solid-state battery stability technologies, which are expected to accelerate the development of next-generation AI chips and electric vehicle batteries, enhancing competitiveness in the Chinese market.

Chassis maker Catcher Technology stated that as the calendar moves into the year-end shopping season of 2025, promotional campaigns and a rebound in end-market demand are expected to support its business momentum.

SK Hynix announced a comprehensive organizational restructuring to expand its global research network and reinforce its leadership in the high-bandwidth memory sector. The strategic shift comes as a ZDNet Korea report indicates the South Korean chipmaker may postpone mass production of its next-generation HBM4 chips due to timeline changes for Nvidia's Rubin AI accelerators.

Samsung Electronics is reportedly gaining momentum across its foundry and memory operations as higher yields on its 4nm process and a broad recovery in DRAM demand position the company for a strong finish to 2025. South Korean analysts expect operating profit to reach as much as KRW19 trillion (US$13 billion) in the fourth quarter of 2025, significantly above market expectations.

SK Hynix has reportedly postponed the mass production timeline for its sixth-generation high bandwidth memory (HBM4) from the end of the second quarter of 2026 to the third quarter of 2026, coinciding with Nvidia Corporation's planned 2026 launch of its "Rubin" AI accelerator that will use HBM4. The delay appears to be a strategic adjustment influenced by ongoing market demand and supply negotiations.

These are the most-read DIGITIMES Asia stories in the week of December 1 to December 7, 2025.

Samsung Electronics has shifted its internal strategy in response to intensified HBM market competition**,** reallocating capacity toward DDR5 RDIMM modules and freeing up around 80,000 DRAM wafers monthly to yield stronger profits.

China's storage industry is at a critical juncture. Surging AI workloads have fuelled a global shortage of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and pushed storage to the forefront of the semiconductor market. Yet while overseas suppliers have filled HBM capacity through 2027, many Chinese vendors remain trapped in margin-draining price competition that limits innovation.

Tight memory supply has lifted prices across product lines, allowing Elite Semiconductor Microelectronics Technology (ESMT) to break a two-quarter losing streak in the third quarter of 2025. With wafer cycles running four to six months and contract pricing lagging by a quarter, the real pricing uplift is expected to appear from the fourth quarter of 2025. ESMT is on track to return to core profitability, with gross margin set to rise materially from third-quarter levels.

Update: Samsung has since reached out to DIGITIMES and denied this report. The company also declined to provide more details.

Micron announced it will phase out its Crucial brand's consumer memory and SSD products by February 2026, marking its exit from the nearly 30-year-old consumer market. This move reflects the industry's pivot toward high-margin DDR5 and HBM for AI applications, driven by surging GPU and AI chip demands.

Samsung Electronics' latest-generation GDDR7 has received the 2025 Korea Technology Awards Presidential Award, and its importance is growing as Nvidia adopts the memory for AI inference GPUs.

Taiwan's dedicated chip backend house Lingsen Precision Industries is stepping up capacity expansion and price adjustments as AI-fueled demand for memory chip testing accelerates. President Tse-sung Tsai noted that unresolved global tariff policies could present risks into 2026, but said long-term growth momentum for memory testing remains strong as AI adoption widens.