Semicon Briefing

Samsung Electronics has signed a 5-year agreement with Broadcom worth over 200 billion dollars, bundling 2nm foundry, HBM4 memory, and advanced packaging – Samsung Foundry's largest single order to date. The deal is a direct attack on TSMC's foundry dominance and SK Hynix's HBM market leadership, signaling that Broadcom is betting on Samsung as a serious TSMC alternative supplier for AI chips.

IonQ received FTC approval and closed the $1.8 billion acquisition of semiconductor foundry SkyWater Technology – an unusual move in which a quantum computing company is taking over classical chip manufacturing capacity. The deal marks the growing convergence of quantum computing and classical semiconductor manufacturing and gives IonQ access to a US foundry for its own chip production.

Infineon Technologies has fully completed the acquisition of ams OSRAM's non-optical analog/mixed-signal sensor portfolio for 570 million euros; the business is expected to contribute approximately 230 million euros in revenue in 2026 and is immediately EPS-accretive. The transaction significantly strengthens Infineon's position in the automotive sensor market, while ams OSRAM focuses on digital photonics.

Under a new CHIPS Act agreement, the US government will acquire a 1 percent equity stake in GlobalFoundries and allocate 300 million dollars for CPO/silicon photonics R&D – an unprecedented step of direct government participation in a semiconductor manufacturer. This signals a new level of US industrial policy that goes beyond mere subsidies and seeks strategic control over critical manufacturing capacity.

ASML confirmed on July 15, 2026, that Intel Foundry is using High-NA EUV technology for the Intel 18A process node – the first commercial application of this next-generation lithography ever. This is strategically significant as Intel seeks to technologically close the gap with TSMC and Samsung, and ASML cements its technology lead in the high-end segment despite Chinese DUV advances.

Applied Materials has signed a 10-year advanced AI packaging contract with TSMC and simultaneously acquired company NEXX, significantly deepening its revenue dependence on TSMC's AI foundry roadmap. The deal binds Applied Materials long-term to the AI chip ecosystem and could fundamentally strengthen the bull case for AMAT despite the current semiconductor selloff.