The used mobile phone recycling market in China has recently heated up, with even non-functional old phones being collected at significantly higher prices than before. This surge is driven by a severe global shortage of consumer-grade memory chips.
Airoha announced on March 30, 2026, that it has expanded the adoption of open-source systems in networking communications, becoming the world's first fiber broadband chip platform vendor to integrate three major open-source systems—OpenWrt, RDK-B, and prplOS—into its own network chips.
By late March, Taiwan's equity market is offering a more nuanced read of the AI infrastructure boom. While accumulated revenue and year-over-year growth through February continue to point to strong structural demand, recent share price movements suggest that the market has begun to recalibrate expectations. The result is a growing divergence between backward-looking financial data and forward-looking capital market signals.
Global memory chip shortages have shifted industry focus from price competition to securing supply, driven by explosive demand for AI servers. Advanced production capacity is being prioritized for AI memory products, squeezing mature process output and pushing inventory levels below safety thresholds.
South Korea has approved a KRW250 billion (approx. US$166 million) investment in local artificial intelligence (AI) chip startup Rebellions, as part of a government push to build a globally competitive AI chipmaker.
Huawei has recruited a leading scientist from a German research institute, raising concerns among the German government and academic circles. According to Nikkei Asia, Martin Schell, formerly director of Germany's Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz Institute (HHI), announced his departure and moved to the UK in March to become research director at Huawei's Bragg Research Center.
Samsung Electronics is embroiled in a deepening labor dispute after intensive negotiations between management and workers — which began on March 26, 2026 — broke down without an agreement on employee treatment across its business units. Talks were suspended on March 27, stoking growing concerns over a potential full-scale strike in May involving up to 17,700 employees.
The recent surge in display driver IC (DDI) price hikes has spread from China to Taiwan, with reports indicating that Taiwanese DDI design firms will begin raising prices starting in the second quarter of 2026 to reflect escalating supply chain costs. Besides DDIs, related chip products such as T-Con, touch ICs, and power management ICs (PMICs) may also see price adjustments depending on negotiations with individual customers. Reported increases range from 5-15%, with some cases reaching up to 20%.
Generative AI is moving from concept to commercial deployment, reshaping the global technology supply chain. It is shifting from a productivity tool to a core enterprise infrastructure. At the same time, layoffs are accelerating across Silicon Valley tech firms, Wall Street institutions, semiconductor companies, and Taiwan IC design houses.
On a recent podcast, DIGITIMES analyst Luke Lin spotlighted Elon Musk's Terafab as a retro IDM bet with major funding questions, while arguing CPUs are resurging in the AI era as inference demand tightens supply and reshapes semiconductor priorities.
Amid ongoing conflict in the Middle East, Taiwan's Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) convened an electricity price review committee on March 27. Taking into account the need to stabilize consumer prices, the committee decided not to adjust electricity rates, keeping the average price at NT$3.78 (approx. US$0.12) per kilowatt-hour (kWh).
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