During its November 20 earnings call, AMPACS has forecasted a year-on-year revenue decline in 2025 due to continued softness in global consumer electronics demand. Despite this, the company anticipates gross margin performance to exceed 2024 levels, driven by fully ramped production capacity in Vietnam and a more competitive cost structure.

Foxconn is accelerating its push into electric vehicles and energy storage batteries, launching its Foxtron plant in Kaohsiung and investing in talent, automation, and supply chain development as it works to build Taiwan's first gigafactory-level battery industry and expand its global footprint.

Amid the global RE100 movement and intensifying net-zero transition, electricity has shifted from a basic utility to a strategic resource shaping national competitiveness and geopolitical positioning. Yet Taiwan's domestic solar industry is being pushed toward collapse by internal regulatory constraints that function as self-imposed roadblocks.

The 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium opened in Taipei on November 17, with experts highlighting that Taiwan's future economic growth faces challenges from extreme climate events, geopolitical conflicts, US tariff uncertainties, and constraints on critical material supplies. Among these, extreme drought poses the most severe threat to Taiwan's industries, especially the water-intensive semiconductor sector.

Taiwan's solar industry is facing a severe setback due to amendments to three key laws: the Environmental Impact Assessment Act, the Act for the Development of Tourism, and the Geology Act. Large-scale solar projects will be comprehensively impacted, possibly causing green energy supply to stall and forcing Taiwan's semiconductor sector, critical to national security, into unprecedented strategic dilemmas under RE100 commitments.

South Korea is seeking to expand renewable energy capacity to 100GW by 2030 as part of its accelerated decarbonization plans, with solar power positioned as a central pillar. Yet solar deployment has slowed in recent years, and industry estimates suggest the country will add only around 3GW of new capacity annually through 2028, half the level required to stay on track for 2030 targets. The gap reflects longstanding structural challenges, including limited land availability, grid bottlenecks, and persistent local resistance.

China's AI boom is entering a new phase as investors shift from high-valuation chip and pure-AI stocks to the infrastructure that keeps AI running, namely power, metals, cooling, storage, and grid-scale hardware. The move reflects concern over inflated tech valuations and recognition that data-center growth is driving lasting demand for electricity and materials.

Electric power equates to national strength. This principle now drives geopolitical dynamics as the global energy transition evolves into a silent market strategy battle.

Despite surging global demand for solar energy, South Korean manufacturers are seeing export volumes contract as China deepens its dominance over upstream silicon wafer and module production. Industry experts caution that rising domestic consumption alone will not revive local manufacturing unless supported by protective measures and mandatory local-sourcing requirements.

Microsoft has activated its data center in Atlanta, Georgia, connecting it with another Fairwater project data center in Wisconsin. This will support OpenAI and its own LLM training, using two-story buildings and liquid cooling to improve energy efficiency.

With the global race toward net-zero intensifying, Taiwan's energy strategy now stands at a critical crossroads. An amendment to the Environmental Impact Assessment Act, currently under review in the Legislative Yuan, is drawing fierce concern from industry groups, who argue the proposal could create a self-inflicted "legislative barrier" that jeopardizes Taiwan's energy security, semiconductor supply chain, and the livelihoods of millions.