Weekly Top Ten Tech Hardware and Semiconductor – Sep 21, 2025

1. Intel CFO @ Citi’s 2025 Global TMT Conference: “We Will Use TSMC Forever”

By William Keating, Ingenuity

• We will be putting products on TSMC you know, forever, really. TSMC is a great partner for us. Obviously everyone understands that their support and technology are great. 
• 18A is actually a good node for us. We want to milk that node  We won’t get peak volume on 18A until the 2030 timeframe.
• Kevork Kechichian joined Intel as head of the Data Center Group. He will lead Intel’s data center business across cloud and enterprise, including the Intel Xeon processor family

2. Synopsys Crashes On “Major Foundry Challenges”. Intel, What Have You Done?

By William Keating, Ingenuity

• Last week, Synopsys reported Q325 results and guidance both well below expectations causing the share price to collapse over 34% in the immediate aftermath.
• The company revised down full year revenue targets, noting that “challenges at a major foundry customer are also having a sizeable impact on the year”
• That “major foundry customer” is likely Intel. Who’s next in line to face similar revenue impact from Intel’s challenges? 

3. MediaTek: Satellite Connectivity the Next Strategic Battleground for Mobile SoCs (Structural Long)

By Vincent Fernando, CFA, Zero One

• Starlink’s Direct-to-Phone Semiconductor Integration Push Signals a Major Shift Coming for Telecom
• Direct-To-Satellite Connectivity Could Become Critical for a Market-Competitive Smartphone SoC Design
• Leadership in Satellite Connectivity Will Soon Mean Leadership in Smartphone SoCs

4. NVIDIA Becomes The Latest To Back Intel’s GoFundMe Appeal

By William Keating, Ingenuity

• NVIDIA will invest $5 billion in Intel’s common stock at a purchase price of $23.28 per share
• Intel will supply custom x86 server CPUs to NVIDIA, who in turn will sell RTX graphics cores to Intel to combine into an new type SOC for the PC market 
• Under sustained questioning during the Q&A, Jensen did a remarkable marketing pitch for TSMC, drowning any hopes of a looming Intel Foundry deal for the foreseeable future

5. TSMC’s COUPE Signals Silicon Photonics Go-Time — Early Winners in Taiwan’s Listed Supply Chain

By Vincent Fernando, CFA, Zero One

• Last week at SEMICON, TSMC unveiled COUPE, moving silicon photonics from lab demos into industrial-scale advanced packaging.
• Himax, ASE, Zhen Ding, GlobalWafers, ACON, and Accton form Taiwan’s listed ecosystem for silicon photonics adoption.
• As NVIDIA Corp (NVDA US)-driven AI clusters proliferate, the power and cost of moving data between chips have become as constraining as compute itself.

6. Taiwan Tech Weekly: Starlink Engaging Chipmakers in Direct-To-Phone Push; Intel’s TSMC Dependency

By Vincent Fernando, CFA, Zero One

• Starlink Engaged with Chipmakers to Bring  Satellite Connectivity Direct to Smartphones — Mediatek Well Placed to Benefit
• Intel CFO @ Citi’s 2025 Global TMT Conference: “We Will Use TSMC Forever”
• TSMC’s COUPE Signals Silicon Photonics Go-Time — Early Winners in Taiwan’s Listed Supply Chain 

7. Intel (INTC.US): NVIDIA’s $5B Intel Stake — A Shift in Tech’s Competitive Landscape?

By Patrick Liao

• NVIDIA Corp (NVDA US) surprised the market with its announcement of a $5 billion investment in Intel Corp (INTC US).
• The market seems to read this as the beginning of a deeper Intel–NVIDIA partnership in AI chips.
• We also note that Japan’s push to establish its own foundry industry through Rapidus deserves continued attention, as it could reshape the competitive map in the years ahead.

8. Memory Monitor: The Sticky Era — Memory’s Transition from Spot Pricing to Long-Cycle Commitments

By Vincent Fernando, CFA, Zero One

• The Industry Is Moving From Cyclical Volatility Into a Sticky Pricing Era.
• Why Memory Pricing is Becoming Sticky. — HBM Memory is Hard to Swap Out Once Designed Into a GPU Product.
• Investment View: Entering Memory’s Sticky Pricing Era — Structurally Long Micron & SK Hynix; Underperform for Nanya Tech.

9. UK Sovereign AI Proudly Paid For & Made In The USA

By William Keating, Ingenuity

• Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced his intention to spend $30 billion on AI infrastructure in the UK. NVIDIA, Coreweave, Alphabet and OpenAI are also ponying up further billions
• Jensen Huang declared the UK and AI powerhouse, third in line globally behind the US and China
• Is it really UK sovereign AI when it’s mostly paid for and made in the USA?