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Friday 9 January 2026
CES 2026: Wearable startups present new applications

Startups at CES 2026 are broadening the scope of wearable technology, shifting focus beyond fitness and health tracking toward workplace productivity and personal media applications, as early-stage companies look to stand out in a crowded hardware market.

Friday 9 January 2026
Lenovo launches hybrid AI platform Qira for cross-device personal AI

On the opening day of CES 2026, Lenovo followed Nvidia and AMD by bringing its annual flagship event, Lenovo Tech World, to CES for the first time. Held at the iconic Sphere venue in Las Vegas, the event marked the largest Lenovo Tech World to date.

Friday 9 January 2026
Google and Samsung bet again on smart glasses, this time with Android XR
Multiple indicators suggest Google will re-enter the smart glasses market in 2026, more than a decade after exiting the category. The company is expected to partner with Samsung to launch a new generation of smart glasses built on the Android XR platform, signaling a renewed push into augmented reality and wearable computing.
Friday 9 January 2026
Largan faces challenges as memory price impacts spread
Optical lens maker Largan Precision held an earnings briefing on January 8, 2026, during which chairman Adam Lin expressed a wary smartphone industry outlook. Surging memory prices are squeezing smartphone bills of materials (BOM), making customers more hesitant to pursue lens specification upgrades. Visibility for the full year of 2026 remains unclear, with only the first quarter confirmed to be affected by the traditional off-season, during which capacity utilization will be lower than in previous years.
Friday 9 January 2026
Largan Technology highlights challenges and prospects of variable aperture for 2026 flagship smartphones
Largan Technology drew significant attention at its investor conference on January 8, 2026, revealing that US flagship smartphones are expected to adopt variable-aperture camera modules in the second half of 2026. Despite the promising timeline, several technical and manufacturing challenges remain unresolved, raising questions about the widespread adoption of this technology.
Friday 9 January 2026
Tight memory supply to push smartphone prices higher in early 2026
Smartphone brands face mounting challenges as memory prices are expected to surge over 50% in the first half of 2026, according to channel operators. The rise in memory costs threatens to impact operations and sales, particularly for mid- to low-end smartphones.
Tuesday 6 January 2026
Samsung leverages Gemini models as global AI device race heats up
The global artificial intelligence (AI) competition is rapidly moving beyond large language model (LLM) development, as leading technology companies race to embed AI into hardware, devices, and applications across consumer and enterprise markets. Samsung, OpenAI, and Meta are all pursuing strategies that go beyond cloud-based AI, signaling a shift toward vertical integration and ecosystem dominance.
Tuesday 6 January 2026
Why China smartphone brands are turning to ByteDance's Doubao to break Apple-Huawei's hold on premium phones
Several Chinese smartphone brands are moving closer to Doubao, ByteDance's LLM platform, accelerating partnerships tied to AI smartphones. The shift reflects mounting pressure from falling mobile phone shipments and a premium market long locked up by Apple and Huawei, where smaller brands struggle to gain traction. AI applications and services have thus emerged as one of the few remaining levers for differentiation.
Monday 5 January 2026
iPhone 17 sales surge lifts Apple past 20% share in China

Apple's iPhone 17 series has driven a notable recovery in China, pushing the company's market share back above 20% and lifting monthly shipments beyond 6 million units in November 2025, according to industry estimates. The rebound marks Apple's strongest performance in the market in recent years after a period of declining share amid intense competition from domestic smartphone brands.

Monday 5 January 2026
Weekly news roundup: TSMC widens 2 nm edge as South Korea boosts chip spending; Huawei eyes memory bottlenecks
These are the most-read DIGITIMES Asia stories in the week of Dec 29 - Jan 4.
Monday 5 January 2026
Asus pulls back from smartphone market after two decades of losses
Asus announced on January 2, 2026, that it will not release any new smartphones this year, effectively suspending a mobile business the Taiwanese hardware giant has sustained for more than 20 years without ever achieving profitability.
Saturday 3 January 2026
Asus halts 2026 smartphone plans, eyes entry into drone and AI glass markets
Asustek Computer has confirmed it will not launch any new smartphones in 2026, effectively scaling back its mobile device business. At the same time, the company emphasized that after-sales support, maintenance, software updates, and warranty services will continue as normal. The move comes amid intensifying global competition and supply chain challenges, with the company redirecting efforts toward emerging products like drones and smart glasses.
Friday 2 January 2026
Asus to pause new smartphone launches in 2026, maintain mobile operations
Smartphone distributors in Taiwan have recently said they are no longer able to obtain Asus handsets through local agents and claimed they had received information indicating that Asus's smartphone unit would operate only through December 31, 2025, after which the company would stop launching new smartphone products.
Friday 2 January 2026
Twoway chair indicted in Taiwan for alleged attempted breach of trust
Twoway Group announced on December 31, 2025, that its chairperson, Bi-shuang Chen, along with other business personnel, has been indicted by the Taoyuan District Prosecutors' Office in Taiwan on charges of attempted breach of trust under the Criminal Code. The case is currently awaiting court review, and the company emphasized that its financial status and business operations remain unaffected.
Friday 2 January 2026
Smartphones and notebook prices could increase as memory lead times extend
Demand for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) is crowding out production capacity for consumer memory. Despite capacity expansions by major memory makers, including Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix, the supply of HBM for AI servers remains tight, and the demand from large chipmakers is difficult to satisfy immediately. IC distributors report that lead times from memory manufacturers have now extended to 52 weeks. With priority allocation given to large clients, almost no stock is available. Both distributors and customers must now pay upfront and wait in line for delivery.
Friday 2 January 2026
Galaxy S26 mirror predecessor specs, sparking Samsung's cost-cutting strategy debate
Samsung Electronics' 2026 spring flagship smartphones, the Galaxy S26/S26 Plus, are rumored to feature specifications similar to those of the previous generation. Analysts have revealed that this is related to the management style of TM Roh, head of Samsung's Mobile eXperience (MX) business, who has emphasized cost reduction. However, this strategy has not been received well by consumers.
Wednesday 31 December 2025
Taiwan smartphone market steady in 2025 despite challenges, AI phones drive growth
Taiwan's smartphone market shipped around 5 million units in 2025, remaining stable despite factors like high market penetration, longer replacement cycles, and inflation, according to Senao International. Leading brands Apple, Samsung, Oppo, and Vivo each reported operational gains amid evolving consumer preferences.
Wednesday 31 December 2025
Foxconn's FIH Mobile may start new smartphone product development in Vietnam by 2026
Under ongoing geopolitical risks and rising tariff barriers, Foxconn Technology Group's smartphone assembler FIH Mobile plans to shift part of its new product introduction (NPI) operations from China to Vietnam starting in 2026, sources say. This move marks a significant step as the industry adapts to heightened supply chain resilience demands amid US-China tech tensions.
Wednesday 31 December 2025
Top tech topics in 2025 (2): turbulent year for end-device and downstream applications
2025 proved turbulent for downstream applications and end-user devices. Tariffs and geopolitical tensions dominated the first half, while AI gained momentum later in the year. Global market unpredictability pushed many brands—particularly in China, the epicenter of geopolitical tensions—toward domestic markets and self-sufficiency.
Wednesday 31 December 2025
Samsung faces scrutiny over Taiwan probe, denies memory market ties
Samsung Electronics has expanded an internal investigation into alleged employee misconduct at its Taiwan subsidiary, a move the company characterizes as an isolated matter despite its timing amid a global tightening of memory chip supplies. The probe, which stems from a routine internal audit, focuses on suspected kickbacks involving a limited number of staff and predates the current first quarter of the 2025 fiscal year, according to reporting from DIGITIMES and industry sources in South Korea.
Tuesday 30 December 2025
Samsung Galaxy Z TriFold sees strong global sales, but high costs keep production tight
Samsung Electronics recently launched its tri-fold smartphone, the Galaxy Z TriFold. Despite its high price point, the device continues to sell strongly worldwide. However, Samsung reportedly remains cautious about increasing production due to the device's extremely high costs, which leave the company with little to no profit margin.
Monday 29 December 2025
Smartphone market 2026: Can AI, smart glasses, and foldables revive demand?
Tariffs, inflation, and geopolitical risk continue to cloud the global economy, while the smartphone industry faces fresh pressure from higher upstream material costs and component shortages. As 2026 approaches, several structural issues are set to define the market's direction.
Monday 29 December 2025
ByteDance's speed-first approach exposes a split with Apple's ecosystem control
The development paths for artificial intelligence (AI) integration in smartphones are diverging as ByteDance extends its collaborations with multiple brands, while technology giants Apple Inc. and Alphabet maintain a standardized application programming interface (API) strategy. Following the December 2025 launch of the Doubao phone M153 in partnership with ZTE Corporation's Nubia, recent reports indicate that ByteDance is broadening its AI smartphone alliances to include Vivo, Lenovo Group, and Transsion.
Saturday 27 December 2025
Apple develops DarkDiff AI to enhance low-light photography with generative diffusion models
Apple Inc. has unveiled an AI imaging technology called DarkDiff, designed to improve photo clarity in low-light conditions by integrating generative diffusion models into the camera's image signal processor (ISP). While effective in reducing blur and enhancing detail, the technology's high computational demands currently limit its deployment on consumer devices.
Friday 26 December 2025
Taiwan smartphone market growth to stall in 2026 amid rising prices and memory squeeze
Taiwan's smartphone market is expected to face another challenging year in 2026, as rising device prices, extended replacement cycles, and persistent memory supply constraints limit shipment growth, even as higher average selling prices support revenue expansion.