Round-up
- TSMC posted a 40 % YoY revenue jump for May, showing that AI-server demand is still outrunning a broader electronics slowdown1.
- Day-2 London talks between Washington and Beijing edged toward narrowly easing export controls—but the U.S. refused to lift the ban on Nvidia’s H20 GPUs, keeping China’s premium-AI bottleneck in place23.
- At the VLSI Symposium, SK hynix outlined a 4F-Vertical-Gate + 3-D DRAM roadmap that pushes sub-10 nm scaling for next-gen HBM and LPDDR, promising denser, cooler memory stacks for AI accelerators4.
Other developments
- Huawei’s Ren Zhengfei admitted Ascend chips trail U.S. rivals by “about one generation,” but touted cluster computing and compound-chip designs as work-arounds5.
- China began case-by-case reviews of rare-earth export licences, underscoring its 70 % share of global output and raising supply-chain anxiety6.
- Radar start-up aiRadar tapped Sivers Semiconductors for a 28 GHz beam-forming antenna module based on the TRX BF02 RFIC789.
- Japanese researchers demonstrated an ultra-compact 150 GHz phased-array transceiver module—a building block for 6 G back-haul and chip-to-chip radio links10.
- Apple confirmed macOS 26 “Tahoe” will be the last major release for Intel Macs, completing the transition to Apple Silicon1112.
- Taipei Times data show TSMC widened its foundry share to 67.6 % in Q1 even as smartphone orders softened13.
- Barron’s notes Qualcomm’s Alphawave buy is lifting the buyer’s share price as investors digest integration upside14.
Did you know? SK hynix’s new 4F² vertical‑gate DRAM architecture slashes cell area by ~30% and cuts reliance on costly EUV lithography—reducing EUV-related expenses by nearly 50%.
In-depth
1. Government & Corporate Policy
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London export-control talks
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H20 GPU ban stands
- U.S. negotiators rejected China’s request to unblock Nvidia’s H20; TrendForce says license approvals remain at “effectively zero” since April3.
- Chinese hyperscalers are pivoting to domestic Ascend clusters and rescheduled AI deployments.
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China’s rare-earth licence review
- MOFCOM began case-by-case approvals on 7 June; TrendForce counts ten exporters now cleared, well short of industry demand6.
- EU and U.S. downstream suppliers warn of mid-July inventory gaps for NdFeB magnets.
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Huawei’s strategic candor
- Ren Zhengfei pegged Huawei’s chips “one generation behind,” yet claimed $25 billion annual R&D spend and interest in heterogeneous compound devices5.
- He framed cluster computing and non-Moore scaling as paths around U.S. lithography restrictions.
2. Economics, Finance & Business Outlook
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TSMC’s May blow-out
- Sales jumped to NT$236.2 bn (~US $7.4 bn), driven by stocking of 5-nm and 3-nm AI parts for Nvidia, Apple and AMD1.
- Management flagged “visibility through Q3” despite PC and handset softness.
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Foundry league-table shuffle
- TrendForce’s Q1 scorecard shows TSMC at 67.6 % share; Samsung dropped to 7.7 % on consumer weakness, while SMIC eked out growth on subsidy-fuelled mature nodes13.
- Analysts see pricing pressure on Samsung unless its 2-nm GAA ramp regains momentum.
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DRAM revenue picture
- SK hynix’s HBM3e surge let it edge past Samsung to top spot in Q1 revenue (US $9.72 bn vs. Samsung’s US $9.1 bn)4.
- TrendForce expects server DDR4 contract prices to rise another 18-23 % QoQ as suppliers wind down legacy lines.
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Qualcomm-Alphawave ripple effects
- Barron’s reports QCOM shares up 3.4 % on deal optimism; analysts say Alphawave’s 2-nm UCIe IP will slot into Qualcomm’s next-gen AI CPU road-map14.
3. Technology & R&D
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SK hynix 4F VG & 3-D DRAM
- CTO Cha Seon-Yong detailed vertical-gate cells and wafer-bonded 3-D DRAM to break density limits below 10 nm4.
- The company targets mass production “early 2027” with a claimed 30 % energy cut versus today’s 1-alpha node.
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Ultra-compact 150 GHz radio module
- A Science Tokyo/NICT team integrated an 8-element phased array and bi-active sub-harmonic mixer in a 20 mm × 8.4 mm AiP, slashing LO power via injection-locked tripling10.
- Potential uses span 6 G fixed-wireless back-haul and chip-to-chip terabit links.
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Sivers 28 GHz antenna-in-module
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Apple’s Intel sunset
Footnotes
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https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-06-10/tsmc-s-may-sales-surge-39-6-on-resilient-ai-demand ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.reuters.com/world/china/us-china-trade-talks-resume-second-day-2025-06-10/ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.trendforce.com/news/2025/06/10/news-h20-ai-chip-ban-reportedly-holds-as-china-u-s-talks-heat-up-whats-next-for-both-sides/ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.trendforce.com/news/2025/06/10/news-sk-hynix-charts-dram-roadmap-highlighting-4f-vg-and-3d-dram-adoption-for-sub-10nm-era/ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/us-exaggerating-huaweis-ai-chip-achievements-china-state-media-quotes-ceo-saying-2025-06-10/ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.trendforce.com/news/2025/06/10/news-china-controls-70-of-global-rare-earth-output-meet-the-top-10-suppliers-behind-it/ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/SIVERS-SEMICONDUCTORS-AB-61747388/news/Sivers-Semiconductors-wins-development-contract-for-antenna-module-50196805/ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://bisinfotech.com/sivers-secures-airadar-deal-for-28ghz-module/ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://techxplore.com/news/2025-06-ultra-compact-phased-array-transceiver.html ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.trendforce.com/news/2025/06/10/news-apple-ends-intel-mac-support-with-macos-26-tahoe-finalizing-move-to-apple-silicon/ ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.engadget.com/apple-will-drop-intel-mac-support-with-macos-26-tahoe-090002105.html ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2025/06/10/2003838326 ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.barrons.com/articles/qualcomm-stock-alphawave-deal-599e71ac ↩︎ ↩︎
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https://www.tradingview.com/news/reuters.com%2C2025%3Anewsml_TUC4RWGWH%3A0-sivers-semiconductors-wins-contract-from-airadar/ ↩︎