Financial
• AI demand has continued to drive up revenues for the top global foundries, with records reached in Q4 2025. This is largely due to AI server GPUs and Google TPUs. The top 10 foundries accumulated around $169,5 billion in revenue in 2025, a 26,3% YoY increase. TSMC saw slightly lower overall wafer shipments, but had increased demand for its 3 nm process caused by the release of the iPhone 17. The resulting increase in ASPs lifted quarterly revenue 2% QoQ to $33,7 billion, which allowed TSMC to maintain its leading position with a 70,4% market share. Samsung Foundry recorded 6,7% QoQ revenue growth to reach $3,4 billion in Q4 2025.
• The top five enterprise SSD vendors posted a more than 50% QoQ revenue growth in the last quarter 2025, with SK Hynix topping the leaderboard. This is largely attributed to the widespread adoption of AI inference workloads, which significantly raised the requirements for large-scale data storage systems. Shortages in HDD supply also contributed to the increased demand for new SSD installations and upgrades.
• Benefitting from the surge in AI data centres, the top five global NAND Flash manufacturers in the industry have posted a combined 23,8% QoQ rise in revenue to $21,17 billion. The forecast is for NAND Flash products to continue this trend into 2026 with the ASP set to rise by up to 90% in the first quarter.
• Samsung has retained its number one position in DRAM market share. Total DRAM industry revenue increased to $53,58 billion in Q4 2025, up 29,4% QoQ, with prices expected to increase during Q1 2026 by as much as 80% [something this editor can attest to].
• According to Berg Insight, shipments of smart labels in logistics, based on either cellular, SigFox, or LoRaWAN technology, reached close to one million units in 2025. Growing at a CAGR of 101%, annual shipments of smart labels are projected to reach 29,2 million units by 2030. Leading companies in this sector include Sensos, Reelables, Giesecke+Devrient, VISEMO, AT&T, and Trackonomy Systems.
Companies
• Same Sky has announced it has signed a global distribution agreement with Farnell, one of the world’s premier distributors of electronic components. As a part of the agreement, Farnell will distribute and market Same Sky’s extensive product portfolio, including audio, interconnect, thermal management, and more. Farnell will be offering Same Sky product support throughout the EMEA region.
• Würth Elektronik and embedded systems developer Grinn have announced their collaboration at embedded world 2026. The first product of this collaboration is the Grinn GenioBoard - Edge AI SBC single-board computer. This board for edge AI in the IoT is now available from Würth Elektronik. With this offering, Würth Elektronik is positioning itself as a competent partner for product development in the field of edge AI that includes matching products, design tools, and consulting on topics such as EMC, temperature management, sensors, wireless communication, power supply, and cybersecurity.
• IQD, part of the Würth Elektronik eiSos Group, announced that it has achieved Gold medal status from EcoVadis. IQD scored 82% placing the company in the top 3% of companies evaluated worldwide in the last 12 months.
Technologies
NVIDIA’s next-generation AI computer rack architecture suggests that future GPU designs will increasingly use greater chip-to-chip interconnect density and faster data transmission. This paves the way for the company to transition to high-speed optical interconnects in future designs due to the physical limitations placed on electrical transmission. TrandForce has forecast that penetration of optical transmission technologies into AI data centres will reach 35% by 2030. NVIDIA’s NVLink 6 protocol defines 400G SerDes per lane as the peak transmission rate with a bandwidth ceiling of 3,6 TB/s per GPU. At this speed, electrical transmission has a limit of less than one metre.
• TSMC’s N2 process technology, the company’s 2 nm manufacturing tech, officially entered volume production in late 2025. The company is now aggressively increasing their N2 manufacturing capacity amid reports that its existing capacity is sold out through the whole of 2026 by their major customers like Apple, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, and AMD. N2 technology provides up to 15% performance gains with substantial power reductions over previous nodes.
• Intel’s 18A node is part of its post-Intel 7 roadmap and is roughly classed in the same generational tier as 2 nm class processes. However, while 18A yields have improved as of mid-2025, they are generally considered behind TSMC’s N2 yields and Intel’s own foundry ecosystem is still small relative to TSMC’s global customer base. Samsung has also entered the 2 nm fray but has faced challenges around its yield stability and customer adoption. While it offers very competitive pricing, the combination of yield issues and weak customer mindshare means that Samsung is not a viable alternative to TSMC for high-volume 2 nm orders.
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