June 4, 2025

Supply-chain guardrails tighten while AI datacenters get a 3 nm upgrade

Round-up

Highlights

  1. Broadcom starts shipping its 3 nm “Tomahawk 6” Ethernet switch, doubling port speed to 1.6 Tbit/s and promising to cut AI-cluster switch counts by half12.
  2. The White House plans to waive key Defense Production Act hurdles to fast-track domestic critical-mineral projects—an echo of CHIPS, but for the raw materials behind it3.
  3. Nvidia’s market cap leap-frogs Microsoft at $3.45 trillion after a fresh Blackwell margin boost, even as it quietly works on a “China-compliant” AI GPU45.

Other developments

  • Barclays downgrades ASML, warning 2026 growth hinges on just three High-NA EUV shipments6.
  • GlobalFoundries commits €1.1 billion (~$1.19 billion) to expand its Dresden fab, chasing European automotive and IoT demand7.
  • Samsung hires former Intel/TSMC veteran Margaret Han to run its U.S. foundry push8.
  • Capitol Hill briefing today sees SIA press lawmakers for faster CHIPS outlays and workforce visas9.
  • Nuveen trims its ASML stake by 1.4 million shares ahead of the downgrade10.
  • Infineon debuts 80 / 100 V OptiMOS & MOTIX parts for UAV motor drives11.
  • Tower Semi to unveil a pSemi co-designed RF switch at IMS 2025, aiming at 5G handsets12.

Did you know? A single 1.6 Tbit/s Tomahawk 6 chip can move 230 GB of data every second—the equivalent of copying a full Blu-ray disc about 46 times in that blink2.


In-depth

1. Government & Corporate Policy

  • DPA waiver for critical minerals

    • Administration will sidestep the $50 million congressional review threshold to speed new graphite and gallium projects3.
    • Move aims to blunt China’s latest hold-back on rare-earth export licences highlighted in yesterday’s FT scoop13.
  • Samsung’s U.S. leadership shuffle

    • Margaret Han takes charge of North-America foundry sales and procurement after stints at Intel IDM 2.0 and TSMC supply-chain teams8.
    • Signals Samsung is doubling down on Austin-based 2 nm risk production slated for 2H 2026.
  • SIA “America’s Chip Resurgence” Hill briefing

    • Industry lobby urges quicker CHIPS grants and H-1B visa cap relief; staffers floated a “CHIPS-for-Skills” rider for FY-26 appropriations9.
  • Rare-earth spat heats up

    • Beijing delays export licences, while President Trump calls Xi “hard to make a deal with,” reviving tariff overhang fears13.

2. Economics, Finance & Business Outlook

  • ASML downgrade checks equipment rally

    • Barclays cuts target from €770 to €650, citing Intel and Samsung cap-ex pauses and tepid High-NA uptake—an interesting reversal after yesterday’s newsletter noted fund rotation into wafer-tool names6.
  • GlobalFoundries’ Dresden upgrade

    • New clean-room adds 12K wafer starts/week for 22 FDX and SiGe lines, with Saxony state covering 20% of costs7.
  • Nvidia tops U.S. market cap table

    • Stock closes at $141.40 (+2.9%), buoyed by Jefferies’ “top pick” call and 70–80% projected GM on Blackwell4.
  • Institutional flows

    • Nuveen sheds ~$600 million of ASML shares, while smaller funds pile into Applied Materials and Lam, underscoring mixed sentiment on the equipment cycle10.

3. Technology & R&D

  • Broadcom Tomahawk 6 lands

    • First 3 nm switch ASIC uses chiplets and on-package bridge interconnect; supports up to 256 × 800 G ports and adaptive congestion control12.
    • Designed for Ethernet-based GPU pods scaling to 1 million accelerators, challenging Nvidia’s InfiniBand lock-in.
  • Infineon OptiMOS/MOTIX for UAVs

    • 80 / 100 V devices hit 97% efficiency in Reflex Drive quad-rotor tests; integrates programmable gate driver to slash BOM by 20%11.
  • Tower Semi + pSemi RF switch

    • IMS 2025 paper touts sub-0.15 dB insertion loss at 6 GHz using SOI-based MEMS actuation; sampling to handset OEMs this quarter12.
  • Next-gen materials & compute

    • Researchers demo self-healing stretchable transistors patterned at wafer scale—key for neural implants14.
    • Overlapping moiré lattices in stacked 2D semiconductors yield tunable flat-band quantum states, hinting at programmable qubits15.
    • Germany’s Q.ANT will run the first public hands-on with its photonic NPS co-processor at ISC 2025, claiming 10× energy gains over GPUs for CFD workloads16.

Footnotes


  1. https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/broadcom-ships-latest-networking-chip-speed-ai-2025-06-03/ ↩︎ ↩︎

  2. https://www.cxodigitalpulse.com/broadcom-begins-shipping-high-speed-tomahawk-6-chip-to-power-ai-data-centers/ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎

  3. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-expected-waive-defense-production-act-requirements-boost-critical-minerals-2025-06-03/ ↩︎ ↩︎

  4. https://www.barrons.com/articles/nvidia-stock-buy-top-pick-916e5ed8 ↩︎ ↩︎

  5. https://www.moneycontrol.com/technology/nvidia-is-building-a-new-ai-chip-for-china-that-follows-us-rules-article-13095042.html ↩︎

  6. https://www.barrons.com/articles/asml-stock-price-euv-intel-tsmc-ca4bdd47 ↩︎ ↩︎

  7. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/globalfoundries-invest-1-1-billion-110456549.html ↩︎ ↩︎

  8. https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/former-intel-and-tsmc-exec-to-lead-samsungs-us-foundry-business/ ↩︎ ↩︎

  9. https://www.semiconductors.org/hill-briefing-americas-chip-resurgence-state-of-the-u-s-semiconductor-industry-june-4-2025/ ↩︎ ↩︎

  10. https://www.marketbeat.com/instant-alerts/filing-asml-holding-nasdaqasml-shares-sold-by-nuveen-asset-management-llc-2025-06-04/ ↩︎ ↩︎

  11. https://www.infineon.com/cms/en/about-infineon/press/market-news/2025/INFPSS202506-112.html ↩︎ ↩︎

  12. https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2025/06/03/3092538/0/en/Tower-Semiconductor-to-Present-at-IMS-2025-Highlighting-Recent-Innovations-in-RF-Foundry-Technology.html ↩︎ ↩︎

  13. https://www.ft.com/content/4c90feeb-75cf-40fc-af13-addca27746f7 ↩︎ ↩︎

  14. https://techxplore.com/news/2025-06-scalable-method-stretchable-transistors-circuits.html ↩︎

  15. https://phys.org/news/2025-06-overlapping-moir-lattices-2d-materials.html ↩︎

  16. https://thequantuminsider.com/2025/06/04/q-ant-to-debut-first-interactive-live-demonstration-and-at-isc-2025/ ↩︎