A record number of exhibitors will this year attend Semicon Taiwan, an annual international trade fair in the semiconductor technology sector, when it opens on Wednesday next week in Taipei, organizer SEMI Taiwan said yesterday.
The annual event will feature more than 3,600 booths from over 1,100 exhibitors from home and abroad, the highest number since it was first held in 1996, according to SEMI Taiwan, an organization located in Hsinchu County that connects about 3,000 member companies and 1.5 million professionals worldwide to advance the technology and business of electronics design and manufacturing.
Ray Yang (楊瑞臨), an international strategy development consulting director at the government-sponsored Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) and a committee member at SEMI Taiwan, said this year’s event has a theme of "Empowering AI Without Limits," and highlights the significance of silicon photonics and fan-out panel level packaging (FOPLP).
Photo: CNA
A forum focusing on silicon photonics will be held during the event, featuring experts from organizations and companies, including Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), Inter-university Microelectronic Centre, and Marvell Technology Group Ltd, for discussions regarding the opportunities and challenges facing silicon photonics, Yang added.
Silicon photonics — known for its high bandwidth, low power consumption, long-distance transmission and cost-saving features — has become a hot topic in the semiconductor industry. It is estimated that the global silicon photonics market could reach US$7.86 billion by 2030.
In addition, a forum on FOPLP will also be held, with experts including those from Applied Materials Inc, Manz AG and Advanced Semiconductor Engineering Inc discussing and exploring related technological developments.
Driven by demand for 5G, artificial intelligence of things, automotive, high-performance computing and consumer products, FOPLP shows significant growth potential. According to research firm Yole Group, the market is expected to reach US$221 million by 2028, with a compound annual growth rate of 32.5 percent from last year to 2028.
Meanwhile, several TSMC senior managers, including executive vice president and co-chief operating officer YJ Mii (米玉傑), vice president of Pathfinding and Corporate Research Min Cao (曹敏), vice president of Advanced Packaging Technology and Service Jun He (何軍) and director of Advanced Packaging Business Development Jerry Tsou (鄒覺倫), will deliver speech at different forums during the event, Yang said.
He added that there will be 13 country sections at this year’s exhibition, with France, Malaysia and the Philippines new additions to the list.
Semicon Taiwan will take place from Wednesday to Friday at the Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center.
PRICE HIKES: The war in the Middle East would not significantly disrupt supply in the short term, but semiconductor companies are facing price surges for materials Taiwan’s semiconductor companies are not facing imminent supply disruptions of essential chemicals or raw materials due to the war in the Middle East, but surges in material costs loom large, industry association SEMI Taiwan said yesterday. The association’s comments came amid growing concerns that supplies of helium and other key raw materials used in semiconductor production could become a choke point after Qatar shut down its liquefied natural gas (LNG) production and helium output earlier this month due to the conflict. Qatar is the second-largest LNG supplier in the world and accounts for about 33 percent of global helium output. Helium is
DOMESTIC COMPONENT: Huang identified several Taiwanese partners to be a key part of Nvidia’s Vera Rubin supply chain, including Asustek, Hon Hai and Wistron Nvidia Corp chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), addressing crowds at the company’s biggest annual event, unveiled a variety of new products while predicting that its flagship artificial intelligence (AI) processors would help generate US$1 trillion in sales through next year. During a two-and-a-half-hour keynote address, Huang announced plans to push deeper into central processing units (CPUs) — Intel Corp’s home turf — and introduced semiconductors made with technology acquired from start-up Groq Inc. The company even said it was developing chips for data centers in outer space. At the heart of Huang’s speech was the message that demand for computing power
OPTIMISTIC: Inflation still has a chance of remaining below the central bank’s 2 percent alert level, as Taiwan’s economy is resilient with healthy exports, the NDC minister said Taiwan’s inflation could exceed 2 percent this year if oil prices continue to surge amid escalating tensions in the Middle East, prompting the government to reassess its economic outlook, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. DGBAS Minister Chen Shu-tzu (陳淑姿) told lawmakers at a meeting of the legislature’s Finance Committee that the agency’s earlier growth forecast of 1.68 percent in the consumer price index (CPI) and 7.71 percent for GDP this year did not account for the ongoing Middle East conflict and would need revision, if tensions persist. The previous forecast assumed an average international crude price of
ELECTRIC DREAMS: Smart cities would use ‘virtual power plants,’ which integrate idle electricity use from households, businesses and factories, Asustek said Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) yesterday showcased key components of its artificial intelligence (AI)-driven smart city initiatives at a trade show in Taipei, eyeing new business opportunities as cities develop sovereign AI infrastructure. Advances in generative, multimodal and physical AI are driving cities toward a new phase of “sovereign AI,” Asustek cochief executive officer Samson Hu (胡書賓) told reporters on the sidelines of the Smart City Summit and Expo at Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center’s Hall 2. The company showcased its “AI City” framework, which comprises three layers — computing infrastructure centered on AI servers, AI models and a platform layer for data processing