US officials have approved license applications worth hundreds of millions of dollars for China's blacklisted telecom company Huawei to buy chips for its growing auto component business, two people familiar with the matter said.

Jay Y. Lee's get-out-of-jail-free card prepares the next chapter for Samsung Electronics. The early release of the conglomerate's de facto boss from prison ramps up pressure on him to use its huge cash pile to make splashy investments. Samsung's heft will force some creative dealmaking. It's a tricky combination to manage well.

The planned 瞿29bn purchase of UK chip designer Arm by US firm Nvidia raises "serious" competition concerns, the UK's competition watchdog has said.

Applied Materials, the biggest maker of machinery used to manufacture semiconductors, topped earnings estimates and gave a rosy forecast in the latest sign that the chip boom is going strong.

Intel Chief Executive Pat Gelsinger is committed to buying other chip-makers as the industry consolidates, despite a leading acquisition candidate's plan to go public.

GlobalFoundries has filed confidentially with US regulators for an initial public offering (IPO) in New York that could value the chipmaker at around US$25 billion, people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.

Chinese tech giant Baidu said on Wednesday it had begun mass-producing second-generation Kunlun artificial intelligence (AI) chips, as it races to become a key player in the chip industry which Beijing is trying to strengthen.

Asia's renewed surge in Covid-19 infections is compounding supply-chain blockages across the world's biggest source of manufactured goods.

SoftBank is holding back on new investments in China while it sees how Beijing's move to tame its technology sector plays out.

The Chinese government has unveiled a five-year plan outlining tighter regulation of much of its economy. It says new rules will be introduced covering areas including national security, technology and monopolies.

Toshiba said on Thursday it swung back to profit in the first quarter, as sales of automotive chips and hard disk drives recover from a pandemic-driven slump in demand.

SK Hynix plans to turn Intel's NAND memory and storage business into a stand-alone US company that will be owned by the South Korean chipmaker.

Google did not disclose who will manufacture the Tensor chip for Pixel, but sources familiar with the matter told Nikkei Asia that Samsung will handle production using its advanced 5-nanometer process technology.

The UK is considering blocking a takeover of Arm by Nvidia due to potential risks to national security, according to people familiar with the discussions.

Infineon chief executive Reinhard Ploss on Tuesday supported the idea of Taiwan Semiconductor (TSMC) building a chip fabrication plant in Germany, expressing a clear preference for its technology over that of Intel.

Samsung is increasing foundry prices to support more investment in 5nm EUV process technology.

Chinese automobile-chip maker stocks tumbled after the government launched a probe into possible price manipulation, putting a brake on share surges buoyed by a global semiconductor shortage that's approaching the 12-month mark.

The photo removed showcases some new information about next-generation Thunderbolt technology.

TSMC is finalizing a decision to put its first chip plant in Japan into operation as early as 2023, Nikkei has learned.

Texas Instruments gave a revenue forecast for the current period that disappointed some investors, raising concerns that a jump in chip demand caused by the pandemic will be short-lived. The stock fell in extended trading.

Tsinghua Unigroup has been forced into restructuring under China's bankruptcy law, kicking off a process that could pave the way for the introduction of strategic investors like Alibaba.

Globalfoundries is sticking with its plan for an initial public offering next year, according to company CEO Tom Caulfield. Reports that Globalfoundries is the subject of a takeover bid by Intel are speculation, he said.

Any talks don't appear to include Globalfoundries executives, as a spokeswoman for the company said it isn't in discussions with Intel.

Both Conservative and Labour MPs have raised national security concerns because Nexperia is a Chinese-backed firm.

Alibaba Group and Chinese state-backed firms are weighing bids for a stake in Unisplendour, a cloud computing infrastructure firm, that could fetch as much as $7.7 billion, people familiar with the matter said.

Strains in the semiconductor supply chain have worsened in some areas as trends such as remote working combine with an industrial recovery from last year's pandemic slump to drive chip demand, the head of Germany's Infineon said.

Intel has said investment in its planned new European $20bn semiconductor factory could be spread across several EU member states, as it lobbies to win the bloc's financial and political support for the project.

Taiwan's Foxconn and TSMC said on Monday they had reached deals to buy 10 million doses of Germany's BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine, putting the total cost of the highly politicised deal at around $350 million.

The UK's largest chip maker based in Newport has been bought by Nexperia, which is wholly-owned by Chinese tech firm Wingtech for 瞿65m.

NXP Semiconductors has announced a major industry milestone for 5G energy efficiency with the integration of gallium nitride (GaN) technology to its multi-chip module platform. The new 5G multi-chip modules will sample in the third quarter, with production starting later this year.

Huawei's chip design arm has struck a deal aimed at building up its domestic supply chain, a local partner said on Tuesday, in a first public move against a US clampdown aimed at cutting its access to vital technology.

Qualcomm's new CEO, Cristiano Amon, says the company will have no problem producing laptop chips to compete directly with Apple's M1 - mainly because Qualcomm now employs some of the key minds behind Apple's highly publicized breakthrough.

The UK's largest chip producer, Newport Wafer Fab, is set to be acquired by Chinese-owned semiconductor company Nexperia for around US$87 million.

Japan's Kioxia Holdings, the world's second largest maker of flash memory chips and formerly known as Toshiba Memory, plans an initial public offering as early as September, weekly financial magazine Diamond reported on Thursday.

Broadcom has come out in support of Nvidia's $40 billion acquisition of chip designer Arm after other firms raised concerns about the deal.

Bitmain, China's biggest maker of cryptocurrency mining machines, said it had suspended sales of its products in the spot market to help ease selling pressure following Beijing's ban on bitcoin mining.

A global shortage of semiconductors is continuing to put the brakes on Japan's car-manufacturing industry.

China has expanded its clampdown on cryptocurrencies, telling banks and payments platforms to stop supporting digital currency transactions.

Taiwan will allow Terry Gou, the billionaire founder of Taiwan's Foxconn, and TSMC to negotiate on the government's behalf for COVID-19 vaccines, a spokesman said on Friday, but warned he couldn't guarantee success.

SiFive, a startup that designs semiconductors, has received takeover interest from investor Intel, according to people familiar with the matter.