By Bolaji Ojo

What’s at stake: Electronics makers have so far succeeded in convincing President Donald Trump to spare them as he wages a war on America’s trading partners using the threats of tariffs on exports to the United States. With the chip market being such an integral part of the global economy, the tariffs will eventually impact the industry. Chipmakers concerned about the uncertainties resulting from the tariffs and tariff threats wonder if there is a permanent exit ramp for them.

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Donald Trump’s return to aggressive tariffs on other countries’ exports to America has reignited debate in the technology market with semiconductor executives wondering if or when the sector will be at the receiving end of punitive measures. Some say uncertainties trail their operations as they engage in hit-or-miss dodgeball maneuvers with America’s president.

Capital expenditure planning is taking a hit, according to industry observers. Although most chipmakers are focused on daily operational activities, decisions on long-term investments are being impacted by the cloudy outlook injected into the business by the tariff threats as well as growing unease about the geopolitical squabbles that have intensified in recent years.

With a new round of tariffs targeting semiconductors and related electronics, industry leaders, investors, and policymakers are asking: Will semiconductor suppliers find ways to dodge these tariffs, or is the global chip supply chain about to face a seismic shock?

Read More »Chipmakers May Evade Tariffs but Not the Full Effects

By Bolaji Ojo

What’s at stake: At stake in the memory market is control over the core technology powering AI, data centers, and next-gen devices, a segment worth nearly $200 billion this year. With soaring demand, rising Chinese competition, and geopolitical risks threatening the electronics supply chain, whoever leads in memory manufacturing will shape the future of tech innovation and global economic power.

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In the high-stakes world of technology, semiconductor memory has become the ultimate prize, with the industry’s titans and ambitious challengers vying for dominance in a market reshaped by AI, geopolitical maneuvering, and relentless innovation.

As the digital era’s backbone, memory chips are not just components but also strategic assets that have elevated their makers into the new role of power brokers of the global economy. We ask: How much power do they wield and how will this be used as demand from AI continues to skyrocket? Also, will these companies be able to avoid the reckless investments they’ve in the past done with disastrous impact on their operations?

Read More »AI Fuels the Memory Boom but Who’s Leading the Charge?

By Peter Clarke

What’s at stake: AI and RISC-V as drivers of commercial semiconductor activity have each been around for a dozen years or so. A lot of startups were formed to address these opportunities in the early years. However, it is often the established player that wins the market and venture capital does not have infinite patience. A reframing of the opportunities is triggering startup closures and more are likely to follow.

Business activity ebbs and flows in cycles while technology comes in waves.

The two are not unrelated. The mix of human herd-mentality, commerce and external factors such as politics, tend to modulate a repeated business cycle of about three to five years duration.

Meanwhile, academic progress based on previous technical achievements can produce a groundswell of activity often in the form of startups. These startups – or established players backing the same technology – can move the frontier forward, which in turns sets the context for consolidation and fresh academic investigations.

With that as a background, I sense we are at a turning point and that a broad shake out is about to happen in processor-based startups. This includes AI, RISC-V and more general processor activity. This is related, in part, to the maturity of the AI and RISC-V paradigms.

Read More »Startup Maturity Crash is Picking Up Speed

By Bolaji Ojo

What’s at stake: Renesas has thrown its weight fully behind gallium nitride and will be adding investments to the product line, while hitting pause on silicon carbide. Does this represent a trend rather than the decision of a single company to focus on a segment where it believes it has an edge? Renesas’ move favors the company, because it allows it to concentrate resources and product development efforts on GaN. The latest move raises the question of when and whether Renesas will reconsider SiC anytime soon.

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Renesas Electronics has sent a strong signal to the power semiconductor industry, announcing a major expansion of its gallium nitride (GaN) business only weeks after pausing its silicon carbide (SiC) operations.

The move underscores a rapidly shifting landscape in power electronics, where the rivalry between GaN and SiC is intensifying as both technologies vie for dominance in high-growth sectors like AI data centers, electric vehicles, and renewable energy.

Read More »Renesas’ Power IC Strategy Shift Puts the Spotlight on GaN

By Bolaji Ojo

What’s at stake: Perhaps out of fears of being displaced, despite recognizing the limitations and challenges of the technology, engineers and executives at EDA companies, semiconductor suppliers and hyperscalers, have swiftly tried to adopt and integrate artificial intelligence into their workflow. The result is a massive reshaping of the design and production systems with such an intensity that engineers are re-examining the values they bring to the system amidst the realization that skills and knowledge must be upgraded to avoid being relegated to the bottom of the totem pole.  

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Artificial intelligence (AI) is doing more than just improving chip production. It is completely changing the industry’s fundamental principles.

In the most sophisticated semiconductor fabrication plants, algorithms now make decisions that previously took months or even years of meticulous human effort. From Nvidia Corp.’s state-of-the-art GPU designs to Intel’s hybrid CPU models, AI is accelerating the entire semiconductor ecosystem while confronting unprecedented challenges that redefine competitive landscapes.

The semiconductor industry has always embraced complexity, but today’s demands are extraordinary. As transistors approach atomic scales and chips grow increasingly specialized, conventional design and manufacturing methods have hit critical barriers. Where engineers once combined intuition and incremental improvements to advance Moore’s Law, modern processors, particularly CPUs and GPUs, demand radical innovation. AI has swiftly transitioned from experimental tools to indispensable backbone for industry leaders like NVIDIA, Intel, AMD, TSMC, and EDA pioneers Cadence and Synopsys.

Read More »Chipmakers Race to Keep Up As AI Reshapes IC Design

By Bolaji Ojo

What’s at stake: Sanjay Mehrotra, chairman, president, and CEO, of Micron Technology, is 66 years old, well passed the retirement age at the semiconductor memory supplier. We ask: Who will succeed Mehrotra whenever he retires, which can be anytime from now? The list is short for such an important question, considering Mehrotra’s successor will inherit plans that include spending up to $200 billion on new fabs in a market notorious for irregular cycles. 

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At 66 years old, Sanjay Mehrotra is the oldest chief executive Micron Technology has had since it was founded 47 years ago. Prior to Mehrotra, the company’s leaders either retired or died in office before they were 60.

Mehrotra and Micron have not indicated who is being prepped to succeed the long-term semiconductor executive, but that question cannot be far from the minds of the management, board of directors, and investors. Micron occupies a unique position in the global semiconductor business, being one of the top 5 memory IC vendors, and a key vendor to the rapidly growing artificial intelligence sector.

Whoever takes over at Micron from Mehrotra will inherit a series of mega tasks. The new CEO will have to figure out how to finance the company’s huge spending plan, meet stringent American conditions for CHIPS Act-related grants and loan guarantees, beat, or at least match, stiff and growing competition from the likes of Kioxia, Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Western Digital, and plan for the industry’s next numbing downcycle.

Read More »Who Will Succeed Mehrotra as CEO at Micron?

By Peter Clarke

What’s at stake: As a semiconductor manufacturing process industrialized in Europe, FDSOI is partially a badge of honor that has served European needs while showing the world that Europe has what it takes in R&D and engineering creativity. But it is a badge that is becoming tarnished and out of date.

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Fully depleted silicon-on-insulator (FDSOI) is a style of semiconductor manufacturing that has offered an alternative to planar CMOS and FinFET for many years.

Now, the FDSOI manufacturing process technology is being pushed with European taxpayers’ money, with the goal to get the process down to 10nm and 7nm nominal nodes. FDSOI test chips are expected at 10nm in 2027 with further work happening in 2028 towards achieving the 7nm milestone.

Read More »FDSOI’s Path to 7nm is Blighted by More Push and Little Pull