Semicon Briefing

TSMC and Amkor have signed a decade-long supply contract for Advanced Packaging and Testing at Arizona's US fab – a fully domestic supply path is emerging. The SOX Index jumped 6.4% following the announcement, as packaging is considered a central AI infrastructure bottleneck.

TSMC, ASML and imec presented a scalable 300mm integration technology for 2D-material transistors with 50nm Contacted Poly Pitch at the IEEE/JSAP Symposium 2026 – a potential successor to silicon CMOS technology. This partnership could define the roadmap beyond 1nm and fundamentally shifts the technology leadership landscape.

According to reports, Google is simultaneously working with TSMC and Intel on Advanced Packaging solutions, while AMD is in talks with Samsung about CPU manufacturing starting in 2028. The hyperscalers' diversification strategy puts margin pressure on TSMC and structurally strengthens Intel's foundry ambitions.

Coherent signed a LOI for up to $50M USD in CHIPS Act funding to expand its Indium Phosphide fab in Sherman, Texas – combined with NVIDIA's $2B strategic investment, wafer capacity triples. This is a new aspect compared to the groundbreaking ceremony alone: the officially confirmed CHIPS funding logistics and capital transfer structure.

China's export restrictions on tungsten create a critical bottleneck in tungsten hexafluoride (WF6), which is indispensable in chip CVD manufacturing – a previously barely discussed raw material flank of the chip war. Manufacturing lines worldwide are affected, including TSMC and Samsung, with no immediate Western substitution source.

IonQ has completed its acquisition phase with the purchase of semiconductor manufacturer Skywater Technology (SKYT), securing its own manufacturing capacity for quantum chips. This vertical integration step is strategically significant as it makes IonQ more independent from external foundries and redefines competition in the quantum computing segment.