The UN has designated 2025 as the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology, recognizing significant breakthroughs in quantum hardware, quantum error correction, and practical quantum applications throughout the year. Research firm QURECA reports that worldwide investment in quantum technologies has exceeded US$55.7 billion, reflecting growing global interest.

Apple announced that John Giannandrea, its senior vice president of Machine Learning and AI Strategy, will officially retire in spring 2026. He will serve as an advisor during the transition period.

India has ordered smartphone makers to pre-install a state-owned cybersecurity app on all new devices and push it to existing phones via software updates. The move is already drawing industry pushback over privacy implications.

OpenAI's decision to take an ownership stake in Thrive Holdings has reignited debate over whether the arrangement constitutes another circular deal. While analysts warn the structure obscures true performance, OpenAI and Thrive insist it is a mutually reinforcing partnership rather than an artificial value loop.

Although Taiwan possesses core upstream technologies in the robotics supply chain, downstream applications are only just getting started. To fill the gap, companies have formed the Robotics Innovation Alliance (RIA), emphasizing that future efforts will begin from actual industry needs to connect the supply and demand sides and push applications toward successful commercialization.

Taiwan is experiencing the highest weekly average of cyberattacks in the Asia-Pacific region, distinguished by a notably large share of attacks targeting the "impact" phase, according to Fortinet's latest threat intelligence data. Derek Manky, Fortinet's global threat intelligence vice president, shared insights with DIGITIMES, revealing Taiwan's cybersecurity landscape deviates significantly from global patterns observed in the first three quarters of 2025.

South Korea's Solvit System is rolling out new search-and-rescue technologies designed to locate missing people in areas with no mobile coverage. The company introduced two systems honored with CES Innovation Awards that aim to sharply reduce search zones and speed up rescue missions in radio shadow regions where phones cannot connect.

As global supply chains realign and tariff barriers rise, Taiwan's manufacturing sector—at the heart of this storm—feels the uncertainty acutely. At the Fortinet Cybersecurity Carnival 2025 held on November 26, 2025, in Taipei, IDC senior research analyst Yvette Lin stressed that amid geopolitical tensions and rising operating costs, manufacturers must treat cybersecurity not as a simple cost of protection but as a core competitive advantage that ensures uninterrupted production and reinforces operational resilience.

As mainstream automakers accelerate their push toward electrification and digitalization, an "invisible siege" from the digital world is rapidly closing in. Hackers are no longer just stealing data; they are exploiting vulnerabilities exposed during costly upgrades to automotive electronic/electrical (E/E) architectures, complicating the industry's already high-stakes transformation.

At Hon Hai Tech Day 2025 (HHTD25), Foxconn clearly showcased its ambition to transition from hardware manufacturing to platform solutions. For the first time in the smart city exhibition area, Foxconn acted as a system integrator, leveraging its self-developed CityGPT platform to integrate technologies from global leaders such as NVIDIA and Microsoft. Supported by Taiwan's Ministry of Economic Affairs' (MOEA's) Asia New Bay 2.0 project, Foxconn is partnering with trusted technology service provider Gogolook to jointly build city-level AI solutions with cybersecurity resilience.

The Pentagon has concluded that Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., Baidu Inc., and BYD Co. should be added to its Section 1260H list of companies that aid the Chinese military, according to a letter sent to Congress on October 7, according to Bloomberg, Reuters, and Cryptopolitan.

Foxconn Industrial Internet (FII) plans to double its revenue in Vietnam to US$20 billion in 2026, driven largely by surging demand for AI server systems and components purchased by cloud giants, including Amazon, Google, and Oracle.

Alibaba reported strong cloud revenue growth for the quarter ending September 30, 2025, with CNY39.8 billion (approx. US$5.6 billion) in sales, up 34% year-over-year, and external customer revenue rising 29%. The company highlighted robust demand for AI services that currently outpaces supply, signaling potential increases in capital expenditure to meet customer needs.

Apple has demonstrated that large language models (LLMs) can accurately identify user activities by integrating textual audio and motion data without accessing raw audio. This multimodal approach opens new possibilities for health monitoring and smart fitness applications.

Taiwan's cloud software provider PenPower Technology reported strong momentum for its flagship product Asteroom during an investor briefing on November 25, 2025, revealing that the 3D appraisal and inspection data collection platform now holds an estimated 30% to 50% share of the US new appraisal segment.

Google has been on a streak of breakthroughs in AI. Gemini 3 has been outperforming major AI models, while it has also received strong engineering feedback on Antigravity. Its already fast-rising TPU business is now seeing another major development: Google is reportedly in discussions with Meta about potentially deploying TPUs in Meta's data centers. This is fundamentally different from Google providing TPU computing services to Apple or Anthropic in the past.

Cybersecurity provider SailPoint released its annual Horizons of Identity Security report on November 20, which noted that identity security now offers the highest return on investment (ROI) among all cybersecurity domains. However, 63% of enterprises are still in the early stages of transition and remain largely dependent on manual audits and fragmented account management, which limits their ability to tackle increasingly complex cyber threats.

At Samsung Technology Conference (STC 2025), the latest research findings in AI agents, communications, healthcare, and cybersecurity were showcased. Security, intelligent software, robotics, and open-source ecosystems were identified as four key fields that will guide AI transformation.

Cybersecurity solutions provider SailPoint recently released a report, "The Horizons of Identity Security, 2025-2026," revealing the current state of identity security among global enterprises. The Asia-Pacific (APAC) region shows a polarized development pattern: over half of the surveyed companies are still in early stages while the proportion of highly mature firms surpasses Europe and matches North America.

India's efforts to build large language models (LLMs) for its diverse linguistic landscape are accelerating, driven by community-led data collection, academic research, and government-backed AI initiatives. With more than 1,600 languages and dialects spoken across the country, developers say the lack of high-quality digital data — especially for low-resource languages — is one of the biggest obstacles to creating AI systems that work for Indian users.

Qualcomm announced the winners of the 7th Qualcomm Innovate in Taiwan Challenge (QITC) on November 21. First place went to MoBagel, which provides high-efficiency, energy-saving, enterprise-level artificial intelligence (AI) agent solutions. Second place was awarded to Moovo, noted for its performance in smart city applications and global electric bike (e-bike) rental services. Third place went to Paia Technology, which focuses on AI education.

Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and Alphabet Inc. have sharply increased capex on artificial intelligence (AI) in recent years, leading to depleted cash reserves and rising debt levels, according to The Wall Street Journal. This trend is shifting their financial models toward those typical of capital-intensive industries like semiconductor manufacturing.

The European Commission (EC) has introduced the Digital Omnibus package, a set of proposals intended to harmonize and update key digital laws across the EU. According to Bloomberg, Reuters, and Deutsche Welle (DW), the initiative postpones the enforcement deadline for high-risk artificial intelligence (AI) rules under the AI Act from August 2026 to December 2027, affecting multiple sectors, including biometric identification, healthcare, and law enforcement.

Google officially opened a new office in Taipei's Shilin District on November 20, marking its largest AI infrastructure, hardware research, and development center outside its headquarters in the US. According to Google Cloud Platford R&D General Manager Greg Moore, the company aims to leverage Taiwan's comprehensive supply chain and manufacturing capabilities to accelerate project development cycles by up to 40%.