DIGITIMES: News and Insight of the Global Supply Chain

Samsung Electronics' board has approved a 2026 shareholder return plan estimated at KRW90 trillion to KRW110 trillion (approx. US$64-79 billion), which the company says is the largest ever by a Korean firm.

Super Micro Computer (NASDAQ: SMCI) said Thursday that an internal investigation run by its independent directors found no evidence that any current senior manager knew of an alleged scheme to divert export-controlled products — the conduct at the center of a March federal indictment of two Supermicro employees and a contractor.

As AI develops rapidly, data centers are driving equally rapid growth in electricity demand. The stability of future energy supplies will directly determine whether AI computing capacity can continue to expand.

As AI chips continue to grow in size, the shift in advanced packaging from 300 mm wafers to square panels is becoming clearer, driving parallel development of new packaging technologies including FOPLP, CoPoS, and Glass Core. Manz Asia general manager Robert Lin said yield will determine whether Glass Core can move into mass production.

Taiwanese automation integrator DS Technology is shifting more of its highly customized robotic automation work toward standardized, modular systems as it seeks to make its technology easier to sell and deploy overseas, with prospective partners in Brazil and Mexico among its latest expansion targets.

Piotech Inc. reported a sharp rise in first-half 2026 earnings, helped by stronger demand for semiconductor deposition equipment, wider adoption of new process tools and improving economies of scale.

Broadcom is in talks with asset managers to raise more than US$60 billion in debt financing, with the potential package reaching as much as US$100 billion, as the chipmaker moves to expand its role in the rapidly growing AI infrastructure market, according to Bloomberg .

Taiwan industrial computer supplier Vecow is stepping up its push into robotics and edge AI, with North America and Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) together accounting for 65% of its business, Executive Vice President Joseph Huang said at Automation Taipei 2026 on August 21.

As the first publicly listed humanoid robot company, Ubtech Robotics is often referred to in China as the sector's "first humanoid robot stock." At the 2026 World Robot Conference (WRC) in Beijing, the company found itself sharing the spotlight with recently listed Unitree Robotics, as both showcased their latest humanoid platforms.

Major global cloud service providers (CSPs) continue to scale up investments in AI infrastructure. According to the latest DIGITIMES research report, combined capital expenditures from Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet, and Meta are projected to reach a record high of US$745 billion in 2026.

Hiwin Technologies Chairman Eric Y. T. Chuo stated that the company has supplied samples of miniature ball screws and single-axis robots to co-packaged optics (CPO) vendors across Taiwan and China for validation. Meanwhile, the timeline for its dual-arm logistics robot, originally scheduled for small-batch shipment in 2026, has been adjusted due to customer requirement changes. Hiwin expects to s…

Cambricon Technologies chairman and president Chen Tian-shi said the company's sixth-generation AI processor and instruction set remain under development, with the next-generation platform targeting large-model training and inference while improving programmability, ease of use, performance, power efficiency and chip area.

China Huaneng Group said on August 20 that chairman Wen Shugang and president Zhong Guodong recently visited Huawei in Shenzhen, where they met Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei to discuss potential cooperation in artificial intelligence, computing power and "compute-power coordination."

SK Group Chairman Tae-Won Chey said in a recent interview with CNBC that memory demand is surging explosively and that the most severe "memory shortage" will hit in 2027. He also apologized to the market for the pace of memory chip price increases, saying the rapid rise is fueling chip inflation across the industry.

South Korean President Lee Jae-myung has begun a fresh round of talks with the country's leading business figures, starting with a private dinner with SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won, at a time when semiconductor investment, artificial intelligence and US demands for more local manufacturing are becoming increasingly intertwined.

The global memory market is entering a sharp upcycle as cloud providers boost capital spending and demand for AI infrastructure lifts DRAM, NAND, and HBM prices. According to DIGITIMES, the three largest upstream memory chip makers are headed for a more than threefold jump in combined DRAM and NAND revenue in 2026, with supply constraints likely to keep pricing firm until new capacity arrives in …

Bosch Rexroth, the industrial technology subsidiary of Bosch, showcased advanced semiconductor and smart manufacturing solutions at the 2026 Taipei International Industrial Automation Exhibition, held from August 19 to 22.