China’s top chip execs claim ASML alternative ‘small, fragmented, and weak’ — Chinese industry titans call for national effort to invest in advanced chipmaking tools

China’s most senior semiconductor executives issued a public call this week for a consolidated national effort to build a domestic alternative to Dutch lithography giant ASML.
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Intel CEO embraces its 18A node for external customers as 18A-P gets ‘inbound interest’ — company cites increasing yields

Intel sees ‘inbound interest’ for 18A-P process technology despite 18A process variability.

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ISSCC 2026: Rebellions details industry’s first quad-chiplet AI solution with UCIe interconnects — claims Rebel100 AI accelerator equals the power of Nvidia H200 with lower power envelope

Rebellions details how it developed one of the world’s first quad-chiplet AI accelerator with UCIe interconnects and how it did not use all of the technologies that the UCIe 1.0 specifications includes.
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ISSCC 2026: AMD discloses how the Instinct MI355X doubled per-CU throughput despite lower compute unit count — ‘We are actually matching the performance of the more expensive and complex GB200’

Taking to the stage at ISSCC, AMD’s Ramasamy Adaikkalavan talked through how AMD managed to fit nearly double the compute throughput into the same die area as its predecessor,
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Rapidus secures $1.7 billion from Japan’s government and private investors for 2nm chip production — company says it is in active discussions with more than 60 potential customers

Under the arrangement, the government will initially hold roughly 10% of Rapidus’s voting shares and the majority of its stake in non-voting stock.
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Imec’s new post-exposure bake method speeds up EUV chipmaking tools, boosting production for the most advanced chips — 20% gain in photoresist improvement from increased oxygen concentration

Increased oxygen concentration during the EUV lithography post-exposure bake step can increase photoresist performance by 15% – 20%, according to Imec’s findings.
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Intel Foundry boss leaves for Qualcomm — Naga Chandrasekaran takes charge of the unit

Naga Chandrasekaran promoted to Chief Technology and Operations Officer as well as the general manager of Intel Foundry responsible for development of advanced process technologies and day-to-day operations.
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Chipmakers still suffering from rare earth shortages, says report — US-China trade truce apparently still hasn’t eased pressures despite agreement taking place in October last year

Sources told Reuters that some U.S. chipmaking firms are running low on scandium — a crucial rare earth material for making 5G chips — as they suffer delays from acquiring export licenses from Beijing.
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China to increase leading-edge chip output by 5x in two years, report claims — aims to lift 7nm and 5nm production to 100,000 wafers per month, targeting half a million monthly by 2030

Chinese foundries looking to increase 7nm and below capacity to 100,000 wafer starts per month in one or two years, says Nikkei.
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US gov’t warned Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Tim Cook, and Lisa Su that China could invade Taiwan by 2027 — Apple CEO reportedly said he sleeps ‘with one eye open’

A new investigative report from The New York Times reveals that, in July 2023, senior US intelligence officials privately briefed some of the tech industry’s most powerful executives on classified assessments regarding Chi…

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