DIGITIMES Semiconductors: IC design, distribution news

Home Tech Semiconductors IC design, distribution

Tuesday 17 March 2026

GTC 2026: Nvidia unveils NemoClaw to accelerate autonomous agent deployment on OpenClaw

Nvidia today announced the Nvidia NemoClaw stack, a specialized software suite designed for the OpenClaw agent platform that enables users to deploy autonomous AI agents with a single command.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

MetaX GPU push delivers growth, not profit, as losses hit US$560 million

MetaX, one of China's most closely watched domestic GPU developers, remains loss-making despite rapid revenue growth. According to Sina, 2025 revenue reached CNY1.64 billion (US$230 million), up 121.26% year-over-year, while net loss narrowed to CNY781 million. First-quarter 2026 revenue is expected to be CNY400-600 million, with losses of CNY90.8 million to CNY182 million.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Nvidia GTC 2026: Jensen Huang projects US$1 trillion inference market, LPU chip to be made by Samsung

As generative AI advances into the inference and agentic AI stages, global demand for AI computing power is entering a new surge. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang outlined during his keynote at GTC 2026 that AI development has officially shifted from early model training to an era centered on inference and autonomous agents. He significantly raised Nvidia's forecast for the AI infrastructure market size, estimating that related demand will double and surpass US$1 trillion between 2025 and 2027.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Meta and Nebius reach US$27B deal for AI infrastructure capacity as data center computing demand soars

Nebius, a Dutch data center firm, announced a US$27 billion deal with Meta on March 16, 2026, to supply AI infrastructure capacity to the tech giant. The agreement comes as soaring demand for data center computing pushes Meta to source extra capacity externally.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Samsung Electronics reports shifts in raw material costs and production output in fiscal 2025

Samsung Electronics has released comprehensive operational data for fiscal 2025, revealing a complex picture of shifting raw material costs and high production efficiency. Despite rising prices for essential smartphone components, the company maintained full capacity across its semiconductor and display divisions to meet global demand.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

How Nvidia and Taiwan's co-engineering pact is fueling a US$1 trillion token economy

The air inside the SAP Center carried more than just Silicon Valley anticipation. There was a distinct sense of historical gravity as Jensen Huang took the stage for GTC 2026.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Intel joins GTC, eyes debut of co-developed x86 CPU with Nvidia

Intel has confirmed its participation in Nvidia's GTC conference starting on March 16, signaling a deepening collaboration between the two chip giants to co-develop custom x86 CPUs aimed at easing current AI workload bottlenecks.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Nvidia signals trillion dollar infrastructure shift at GTC 2026 keynote

During the GTC 2026 keynote, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang detailed a massive shift toward agentic AI and specialized token factories. Huang projected at least a trillion dollars in infrastructure demand through 2027, driven by the rapid evolution of reasoning models and a global transition to accelerated, vertically integrated computing.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Nvidia GTC 2026: The agentic AI era arrives via full-stack infrastructure, open models, and simulation blueprints

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang declared the arrival of the "agentic AI inflection point" at the company's GTC 2026 conference, unveiling a vast ecosystem of hardware, software, and industrial partnerships.

Monday 16 March 2026

ASML layoffs stall, leaving workers in limbo

Dutch semiconductor equipment maker ASML announced in late January 2026 plans to cut 1,700 management positions — about 4% of its global workforce — primarily affecting technical and IT departments. However, seven weeks on, affected employees still have not received clear information about their job status, stoking internal anxiety.

Monday 16 March 2026

Sony CIS yield issue raises Apple supply risks, opens door for Samsung

Sony's core semiconductor business, CMOS image sensors (CIS), has reportedly encountered yield challenges in recent production. Industry sources say the issue could introduce uncertainty into Apple's supply chain, while potentially creating indirect opportunities for Samsung Electronics' non-memory businesses, including its System LSI and foundry divisions, as the world's second-largest CIS supplier.

Monday 16 March 2026

Taiwan IC design emerges as top choice amid US-China tensions, key lifeline for Europe

At Embedded World 2026, most Taiwanese IC design houses reported unprecedentedly active engagement with European customers. Over the past year, visits by European downstream customers to Taiwan for supply chain discussions have far exceeded previous averages, driving a strong Taiwanese presence at this year's event.

Monday 16 March 2026

IC design houses push 12-inch chips as 8-inch process price hikes loom

The chip market is facing a wave of price increases, with IDM companies issuing hike notices and foundries preparing to raise prices for the 8-inch wafer process amid current supply-demand dynamics. Many IC design houses see this as an opportunity to push customers to adopt the relatively advanced 12-inch process, highlighting its overall cost-effectiveness compared to 8-inch under today's cost environment.

Monday 16 March 2026

US withdraws draft for rule requiring approval for AI chip exports anywhere in the world

The US revoked a draft rule on March 13 that would have required the country's approval to export US-made AI chips anywhere in the world. The withdrawal marks a reversal of one of the Trump administration's most significant chip export strategies after ending a regulation inherited from the previous Biden administration last year.

Monday 16 March 2026

AWS and Cerebras collaborate on faster AI inference for Amazon Bedrock

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and AI chip startup Cerebras Systems said they are working together to bring a high-speed AI inference architecture to Amazon Bedrock, a managed service for building generative AI applications. The companies said the system, expected to launch in AWS data centers in the coming months, will combine AWS's in-house AI chips with Cerebras hardware to accelerate the execution of large language models (LLMs).

Monday 16 March 2026

Commentary: Nvidia CEO outlines new AI infrastructure vision ahead of GTC 2026

On March 10, 2026, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang published an in-depth personal article systematically explaining the development logic behind the AI industry. He argued that AI should not be seen as a single model or application but rather as an emerging infrastructure system undergoing a technological revolution comparable to the industrial era.

Monday 16 March 2026

AI server tracker: AI infrastructure demand lifts Taiwan foundry and ODM/EMS revenues despite seasonal dip

Taiwan's major semiconductor and server supply chain companies posted mixed February 2026 revenue results, with continued strength in artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure demand supporting year-over-year growth across most firms despite seasonal month-to-month declines.

Monday 16 March 2026

HyperLight, UMC, and Wavetek form foundry partnership for high-volume TFLN chiplet production

HyperLight Corporation, United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC), and Wavetek Microelectronics Corporation, a wholly owned UMC subsidiary, have announced a strategic manufacturing partnership to deliver high-volume foundry production of HyperLight's thin-film lithium niobate (TFLN) chiplet platform on both 6-inch and 8-inch wafers. The companies said the collaboration is intended to provide the manufacturing capacity needed to deploy AI and cloud infrastructure at scale.

Monday 16 March 2026

Himax showcases palm vein authentication and WiseEye at Embedded World 2026

Taiwan-based Himax Technologies is exhibiting at Embedded World 2026, presenting its touch and display products alongside its WiseEye image sensing solutions, which the company says support rapid deployment across smart home, security surveillance, access control, and smart glasses while meeting power and performance requirements.

Sunday 15 March 2026

SiliconAuto's MCU debut could reshape compute allocation in vehicle platforms

SiliconAuto introduced its XMotiv M3 series microcontroller units at Embedded World 2026, signaling a push to expand collaborations in Europe, CEO Gene Liu said. The company has spent recent years developing its automotive MCU products with customers and partners and is now ready to showcase them in Europe.

Saturday 14 March 2026

AI server boom lifts WPG Holdings to record February revenue

Driven by surging AI computing and server demand, IC distributor WPG Holdings reported February 2026 revenue of NT$79.68 billion (approx. US$2.49 billion), a record for the same period. Despite fewer working days due to the Lunar New Year holiday, revenue still rose 9.4% year-over-year. Revenue for the first two months of 2026 reached NT$174.85 billion, up 26.1% from a year earlier.

Saturday 14 March 2026

M31's 2025 results show revenue lift but profit still weigh down by EDA costs and currency losses

M31 Technology posted a record consolidated revenue of NT$1.78 billion (US$55.94 million) for 2025, up 20.3% year on year, with the fourth quarter of 2025 delivering a new quarterly revenue high and a recovery in operating margin to 17.4%.

Friday 13 March 2026

Hygon revenue jumps 57% as AI compute boom lifts China's x86 chip contender

Generative AI is rapidly reshaping the global computing industry, driving demand for advanced processors and accelerating China's push for domestic AI chips. Among the emerging players, Hygon Information Technology has become one of the most closely watched, combining rapid revenue growth with a key role in China's effort to build an independent AI computing infrastructure.

Friday 13 March 2026

Tesla AI chip delay pushes South Korean NPU startup DeepX back six months

Tesla's next-generation AI processor schedule change has disrupted Samsung Electronics' foundry timelines, delaying mass-production plans for South Korean startup DeepX's next AI accelerator by roughly six months.

Friday 13 March 2026

ByteDance's overseas chip play puts Washington in a bind

ByteDance, the Chinese technology company best known as the owner of TikTok, is seeking to secure large amounts of advanced artificial intelligence computing power outside China, underscoring the growing geopolitical tensions surrounding the global AI chip supply chain.

More IC design, distribution coverage