Demand for AI chips is expected to remain strong in 2026, keeping the spotlight firmly on persistent shortages of high-end glass fiber cloth—an essential material in advanced circuit boards and chip packaging.

As the race to embed artificial intelligence into consumer devices heats up, Apple has formally confirmed a strategic partnership with Google to integrate the Gemini model into the next generation of Siri and Apple Intelligence. The tie-up between the two tech heavyweights is expected to sharpen Siri's capabilities and could also lift demand for Apple's future hardware.

Demand for high-performance compute and storage for AI training and inference continues to climb. Phison has partnered with AI infrastructure management software provider Infinitix to integrate its aiDAPTIV+ intelligent storage technology with Infinitix's AI-Stack platform, delivering an enterprise-grade AI training and inference solution that unifies hardware and software.

Quanta Computer Executive Vice President and Quanta Cloud Technology President Mike Yang said on January 15 that the company's AI business is expected to deliver at least triple-digit percentage growth in 2026. He added that capital spending is likely to be revised higher, with most of the additional investment planned for the US and a portion allocated to Thailand.

The global memory industry is confronting a growing capacity crunch, one that is increasingly rippling upstream to a shortage of glass fiber cloth, an obscure but indispensable material in advanced semiconductor packaging.