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Thursday 19 March 2026

Nvidia hosts Taiwan night at GTC 2026, Huang vows to defend Taiwan

Nvidia's GTC 2026 is well underway, with the event reaching a record scale as among the major annual events in the AI landscape. Despite a packed schedule, CEO Jensen Huang attended the conference's "Taiwan Night" on March 18 (local time) to engage with Taiwanese partners and express his appreciation for their work.

Thursday 19 March 2026

Nvidia positions Groq 3 LPUs alongside Vera Rubin for an inference-first era

The 2026 Nvidia GTC keynote signaled a clear industry shift toward inference. CEO Jensen Huang declared that "training is just the beginning — inference is the core battleground for AI commercialization." Attendees expected AI agents to dominate the event's agenda.

Thursday 19 March 2026

Groq anchors Nvidia's inference strategy; CPU redefines architecture for AI agents

As AI evolves from generating information to executing tasks, inference scenarios characterized by coding agents and requiring low latency and high throughput are ushering in the next phase of AI infrastructure commercialization. However, even powerful systems like Vera Rubin face challenges when confronted with extreme generation demands. While Nvidia remains the undisputed leader in throughput, traditional GPU architectures appear too heavy for ultra-low-latency token generation. This is why Jensen Huang moved quickly to secure IP licensing and talent from Groq ahead of Christmas 2025.

Thursday 19 March 2026

Chip price surge in 2Q26 shifts cost pressure to end markets

As more European and American chipmakers and IDM giants publicly announce price hikes effective April 1 of this year, mature process foundries in Taiwan and China have also nearly finalized plans to raise prices. The semiconductor industry is clearly entering a broad wave of chip price increases that will likely push costs onto end markets.

Thursday 19 March 2026

Samsung, AMD expand AI memory and compute partnership with MOU to align HBM4 supply and DDR5 support

Samsung Electronics announced it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with AMD to expand its strategic collaboration on next-generation AI memory and computing technologies.

Thursday 19 March 2026

AMD deepens ties with Naver in bid to expand AI infrastructure

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) is set to deepen its collaboration with Naver Corporation after CEO Lisa Su visits South Korea, with the companies signing an MOU to jointly develop GPU and infrastructure technologies for large-scale AI models.

Thursday 19 March 2026

Nvidia adopts Groq to tackle AI inference and expand global reach

At its annual GTC conference in San Jose, Nvidia unveiled a major shift in its AI hardware strategy: integrating technology from AI chip startup Groq to address growing demand in AI inference, while simultaneously preparing new products for global markets, including China.

Thursday 19 March 2026

How Hwaseong became South Korea's semiconductor supply-chain capital

The global race to onshore semiconductor production has a new focal point: Hwaseong. Nestled in South Korea's Gyeonggi-do province, the city is quietly emerging as the spine of the country's domestic chip supply chain — and a testbed for AI-driven manufacturing.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Nvidia partners with chipmakers to advance industrial robotics

At Nvidia's GTC 2026 conference, major chipmakers — including Texas Instruments (TI), Infineon Technologies AG, NXP Semiconductors, Analog Devices (ADI), and Synopsys — announced new collaborations centered on robotics built around Nvidia's platform. Robotics is now the defining focus for IDM firms and the broader industrial control chip ecosystem.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Nvidia reportedly preparing Groq AI chips for the Chinese market

Nvidia is preparing Groq AI chips for sale in the Chinese market, according to Reuters. The move signals the company's intent to remain competitive in the global inference chip market, particularly as Chinese chip firms move to fill the void left by US chips following export restrictions.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

The signature on the wafer: Samsung, Nvidia, and Groq close loop on AI inference

The most telling moment of Nvidia's GTC 2026 did not unfold on the main stage of the SAP Center, but inside a glass display case at Booth 1207.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Russia reportedly turns to Loongson to escape x86 sanctions

Amid sustained Western sanctions, Russia is reportedly advancing an alternative CPU pathway through cooperation between local IC firm Tramplin Electronics and China's Loongson. The company is said to be developing its Irtysh processor series based on the LoongArch instruction set, with initial engineering samples released and a production target of 30,000 units.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Nvidia secures approvals and orders for H200 in China, restarts supply chain production

During the GTC 2026 conference, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told global media that the company has made new progress in the China market.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Apple adopts MediaTek Wi-Fi chip for MacBook Neo to save costs, say sources

Apple's recently launched affordable MacBook Neo has been found to use MediaTek's Wi-Fi and Bluetooth chips instead of Broadcom or Apple's own N1 chip, according to teardown reports. Industry insiders assess that Apple likely made this decision to reduce costs while buying time to improve its in-house N-series chip specifications.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Analysis: Is Nvidia's Groq deal the endgame for AI chip startups?

At its 2026 GTC conference, Nvidia not only unveiled its Vera CPU but also officially launched the Groq 3 LPU chip, developed through a prior technology licensing arrangement with Groq and brought into its own ecosystem. Alongside it, Nvidia introduced the Groq 3 LPX platform — a server rack composed of 128 Groq 3 LPUs that can be directly integrated with the Vera Rubin solution. The move signals that Nvidia has successfully absorbed Groq's technology into its fold. For AI chip startups, the most viable path forward may ultimately be: "if you can't beat them, join them."

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Dreame rollout plan for five chips: chips for robots today, AI data centers in orbit tomorrow

At an industry forum in Shanghai this month, a young Chinese semiconductor startup laid out a sweeping vision: designing chips not only for smartphones and self-driving cars, but also for robots, personal AI supercomputers — and eventually, computing centers in orbit.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

AI boom lifts Changs Ascending as data centers seek reliable power

As AI and advanced semiconductor manufacturing drive unprecedented demand for computing power, the reliability of the electricity supply has become a critical concern for both data centers and chip fabrication plants.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Meta accelerates AI ASIC roll-out as Broadcom secures four-generation chip design deal

Meta recently announced plans to launch four generations of ASIC product lines over the next two years, including the already mass-produced MTIA 300 and upcoming MTIA 400, 450, and 500 chips. These ASICs will primarily target AI inference workloads, while AI training tasks will continue relying on Nvidia solutions.

Wednesday 18 March 2026

Taiwan on track to outpace China's growth again in 2026

Driven by US President Donald Trump's push for American reindustrialization and efforts to shift industries away from China through high tariffs, Taiwan's economy is set to outpace China's growth for the second consecutive year in 2026.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Hon Precision raises AI chip test capacity plan by 40% amid surging demand

Driven by rapid growth in AI and high-performance computing (HPC) markets, semiconductor IC test equipment leader Hon Precision has upgraded its production expansion plan for 2026 from an annual increase of 30% to over 40%. The company also revealed that AI chip-related orders have far exceeded current capacity, signaling a new wave of global demand for AI chip testing.

Tuesday 17 March 2026

Nvidia 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.

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