Managing Director, Zero One, Zero One

Vincent Fernando, CFA

Managing Director, Zero One

Zero One

Founded in 2015, Zero One produces independent investment research and provides corporate finance advisory services with a focus on both listed and private technology companies. Founder Vincent Fernando has over 20 years of experience in US and Asia capital markets.

Independent Investment Research

Equity Bottom-Up

Taiwan Semiconductor (TSMC) - ADR / Equity Bottom-Up

<ul>
<li>Taiwan Tech and Nvidia Rally Ahead of Nvidia Earnings Next Week; Microsoft Build Conference Could Showcase Edge AI Copilot</li>
<li>Hon Hai: Traditional Server Market Now Adding to AI Growth; Expects Market Share Gains in 2024E </li>
<li>Asustek: Margin Beat, Guides More Upside; Qualcomm for AI PCs; Why Asus Confident in AI PC Up-Cycle </li>
</ul>


Taiwan Tech and Nvidia Rally Ahead of Nvidia Earnings Next Week; Microsoft Build Conference Could Showcase Edge AI Copilot
Hon Hai: Traditional Server Market Now Adding to AI Growth; Expects Market Share Gains in 2024E 
Asustek: Margin Beat, Guides More Upside; Qualcomm for AI PCs; Why Asus Confident in AI PC Up-Cycle 


Taiwan Tech Weekly: All Eyes on Nvidia Results Next Week; Microsoft Copilot Edge AI To Be Showcased?

Asia and Global Semiconductor and Tech Research

Andrew Lu

Taiwan Semiconductor (TSMC) / Equity Bottom-Up

<ul>
<li>TSMC reiterates 2024 sales y/y growth of 20-25% but revises down 2024 global semiconductor y/y sales from over 10% to 10% and global foundry sales growth from 20% to 15-19%.</li>
<li>
<strong>No more Moore's Law</strong>: After 3 years ramp up gap between N5-N3, TSMC confirms 10-11 quarters of ramp up gap between N3 and N2 due to longer production cycle.</li>
<li>Driven by stronger digital consumer (33% q/q), HPC (3% q/q), IoT (5% q/q) sales but weaker smartphone IC (-16% q/q), TSMC reports 1Q24 sales decline of only 5% q/q.</li>
</ul>


TSMC reiterates 2024 sales y/y growth of 20-25% but revises down 2024 global semiconductor y/y sales from over 10% to 10% and global foundry sales growth from 20% to 15-19%.

No more Moore's Law: After 3 years ramp up gap between N5-N3, TSMC confirms 10-11 quarters of ramp up gap between N3 and N2 due to longer production cycle.
Driven by stronger digital consumer (33% q/q), HPC (3% q/q), IoT (5% q/q) sales but weaker smartphone IC (-16% q/q), TSMC reports 1Q24 sales decline of only 5% q/q.


What Is TSMC Telling Us About Semi Supply Chain Stories at Its Investor Conference?

Equity Long-Short, Semiconductors, Fabricated Knowledge

Douglas O'Laughlin

Equity Long-Short, Semiconductors

Fabricated Knowledge

Learn more about the world's most important manufactured product. Meaningful insight, timely analysis, and an occasional investment idea.

<ul>
<li>"It is so much cheaper to do simulations than real experiments, so much more flexible in testing...we can even do things which cannot be done in any lab… So it’s inevitable this trend will continue for some time." - Richard Hamming, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Art-Doing-Science-Engineering-Learning/dp/1732265178" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Art of Doing Science and Engineering</a>.</li>
<li>Richard Hamming said this to the President of Bell Labs in the 1950s. And I think this insight rings more accurate than ever. Simulations of reality are much more flexible and cheaper than observing and interacting with reality.</li>
<li>I will assert that LLMs and “AI” are effectively the logical conclusion of this trend. A large language model is trained on the largest amount of data possible, often the entire crawlable Internet<a href="https://kili-technology.com/large-language-models-llms/9-open-sourced-datasets-for-training-large-language-models" target="_blank" rel="noopener">, all the books ever written, and so much more</a>.</li>
</ul>


"It is so much cheaper to do simulations than real experiments, so much more flexible in testing...we can even do things which cannot be done in any lab… So it’s inevitable this trend will continue for some time." - Richard Hamming, The Art of Doing Science and Engineering.
Richard Hamming said this to the President of Bell Labs in the 1950s. And I think this insight rings more accurate than ever. Simulations of reality are much more flexible and cheaper than observing and interacting with reality.
I will assert that LLMs and “AI” are effectively the logical conclusion of this trend. A large language model is trained on the largest amount of data possible, often the entire crawlable Internet, all the books ever written, and so much more.


<ul>
<li>We see early signs of recovery in PC and smartphone markets, stable server market (strengths in AI server, stable in non-AI server market), but weaknesses in automotive and industrial.</li>
<li>We expect the PC semi market recovery of more than 10% y/y in 2024/2025, driven by inventory rebuild and silicon contents increase by adding AI into PC.</li>
<li>We expect the smartphone semi market recovery of 7-8% y/y in 2024/2025, driven by inventory rebuild and adopting 3nE foundry node. But, Huawei/HiSilicon will take some of the growth.</li>
</ul>


We see early signs of recovery in PC and smartphone markets, stable server market (strengths in AI server, stable in non-AI server market), but weaknesses in automotive and industrial.
We expect the PC semi market recovery of more than 10% y/y in 2024/2025, driven by inventory rebuild and silicon contents increase by adding AI into PC.
We expect the smartphone semi market recovery of 7-8% y/y in 2024/2025, driven by inventory rebuild and adopting 3nE foundry node. But, Huawei/HiSilicon will take some of the growth.


First Run of Global Semis' Guidances to Tell Early Signs of Recovery

Equity Long-Short Analyst

Pyari Menon

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

<ul>
<li>
<a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/sunny-optical-tech" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:13363:1" rel="noopener">Sunny Optical (2382 HK)</a>  and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/largan-precision-co-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:9126:1" rel="noopener">Largan Precision (3008 TT)</a> dominate the compact lens module market, but analysis of data from technical publications suggests very different strategies.</li>
<li>After lagging Largan significantly till 2016, Sunny Optical now leads in number of innovations, though the impact and quality of the innovations still materially lags Largan</li>
<li>Besides overcapacity the primary risk for the industry is whether at some some stage the benefits of "next-gen" lens modules fall below the "Noticeable Difference" threshold.</li>
</ul>



Sunny Optical (2382 HK)  and Largan Precision (3008 TT) dominate the compact lens module market, but analysis of data from technical publications suggests very different strategies.
After lagging Largan significantly till 2016, Sunny Optical now leads in number of innovations, though the impact and quality of the innovations still materially lags Largan
Besides overcapacity the primary risk for the industry is whether at some some stage the benefits of "next-gen" lens modules fall below the "Noticeable Difference" threshold.


Sunny Optical & Largan - Innovation Quantity Versus Quality

United States

Apple Inc. designs, manufactures, and markets smartphones, personal computers, tablets, wearables and accessories, and sells a variety of related accessories. The Company also offers payment, digital content, cloud and advertising services. Apple Inc.'s customers are primarily in consumer, small & mid-sized business, education, enterprise and government markets worldwide.

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Apple (AAPL US)

Taiwan Tech Weekly: All Eyes on Nvidia Results Next Week; Microsoft Copilot Edge AI To Be Showcased?

Taiwan's earnings season is wrapping up but one of the most important companies for the market, Nvidia, is set to release results next week.

Vincent Fernando, CFA

What Is TSMC Telling Us About Semi Supply Chain Stories at Its Investor Conference?

What Is TSMC Telling Us About Semi Supply Chain Stories at Its Investor Conference? TSMC revises down 2024 global semi y/y sales from over 10% to...

Andrew Lu

Jensen's World: Compressing Reality

Nvidia is pursuing a strategy of broadening its software distribution on one of the largest installed bases in the world.

Fabricated Knowledge

First Run of Global Semis' Guidances to Tell Early Signs of Recovery

After the first Run of global semis' guidance, it tells early signs of recovery in PC and smartphone but weaknesses in automotive and industrial,...

Andrew Lu

Sunny Optical & Largan - Innovation Quantity Versus Quality

Since 2016 Sunny Optical has ramped up innovations in compact lens modules at an exhilarating pace, but in terms of impact the innovations lag that...

Pyari Menon

Price Gauge

52-week Range

Market Cap (USDm)

P/E

Dividend (Yield)

Taiwan Tech Weekly: All Eyes on Nvidia Results Next Week; Microsoft Copilot Edge AI To Be Showcased?

​Taiwan's earnings season is wrapping up but one of the most important companies for the market, Nvidia, is set to release results next week.

Vincent Fernando, CFA

What Is TSMC Telling Us About Semi Supply Chain Stories at Its Investor Conference?

What Is TSMC Telling Us About Semi Supply Chain Stories at Its Investor Conference? TSMC revises down 2024 global semi y/y sales from over 10% to...

Andrew Lu

Jensen's World: Compressing Reality

Nvidia is pursuing a strategy of broadening its software distribution on one of the largest installed bases in the world.

Fabricated Knowledge

First Run of Global Semis' Guidances to Tell Early Signs of Recovery

After the first Run of global semis' guidance, it tells early signs of recovery in PC and smartphone but weaknesses in automotive and industrial,...

Andrew Lu

Sunny Optical & Largan - Innovation Quantity Versus Quality

Since 2016 Sunny Optical has ramped up innovations in compact lens modules at an exhilarating pace, but in terms of impact the innovations lag that...

Pyari Menon

Taiwan's earnings season is wrapping up but one of the most important companies for the market, Nvidia, is set to release results next week.