AI supports the world s 10% of the investment in conductor factories increased for the first time in 3 years

With the support of AI demand, the investment amount of most of the world's 10 conductive factory equipment such as Taiwan and Taiwan Electric will increase for the first time in three years.

According to the news on the 5th, AI demand has promoted global semiconductor investment. After integrating equipment investment plans for most 10 semi-conductor factories in the world, including the United States, Europe, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, China, etc., it was learned that the investment amount in 2025 is expected to increase by 7% year-on-year to US$135 billion, which will show growth for the first time in three years. In terms of enterprises, whether it has a large number of AI-related products and customers has become the key to failure. Among them, six manufacturers including Taiwan Electric Power, South Korea SK Hynix, US Micron, China's crystalline foundry Longtou SMIC, and Japanese Kioxia have increased their investment, while equipment investment in Intel and South Korea's Samsung Electronics has been sluggish.

The report pointed out that Taiwan Electric will have nine factories in operation/investment in 2025, with an estimated investment of US$38 billion to US$42 billion, an increase of about 30% per year; Micron will expand its investment and investment in AI use "HBM" (high-frequency wide memory) estimates that it will soar 70% to around US$14 billion; HBM dragon head factory SK Hynix will also increase its investment in Korean factories. In addition, Intel's equipment investment, which has been in trouble for six quarters, will be reduced by 30%. Samsung Electronics is affected by the sluggish memory market, suppressing investment in South Korea.

The power semiconductors used in electric vehicles (EVs) are oversupply due to the reduction of EV subsidies in Europe and weak sales in North America, and the investment in Swiss STMicroelectronics and German Infineon equipment will shrink. SMIC's international equipment investment will reach US$7.5 billion, and SEMI pointed out that China will invest more than US$100 billion in manufacturing equipment in the next three years.

Reported that in the next few years, AI is expected to continue to grow in the semiconductor market, and the US Ultramicro (AMD) estimates that the AI semiconductor market size will reach US$500 billion in 2030, which will be more than three times the level in 2025.

Extended reading: AI Wang WSTS reviews global semiconductor sales estimates and has a high historical record