Samsung Electro-Mechanics Expands Beyond MLCCs into Silicon Capacitor Business Samsung Electro-Mechanics is in discussions with multiple global Big Tech companies to supply silicon capacitors (Si-Cap) for AI servers. The company is rapidly emerging as a major supplier alongside Japan's Murata and Taiwan's TSMC. On the 11th, Samsung Electro-Mechanics held a technology seminar at the Taepyeongno Building in Jung-gu, Seoul, where it shared its silicon capacitor technology and commercialization roadmap. Kim Won-gi, head of Samsung Electro-Mechanics' Si-Cap Development Group, said, "Global Big Tech companies whose names you would immediately recognize are reviewing the adoption of silicon capacitors," adding, "Because the market is formed around a small number of players, Samsung Electro-Mechanics is also aggressively pursuing sales activities." The silicon capacitor market is led by Japan's Murata and Taiwan's TSMC. Barriers to entry are high because the business requires both semiconductor wafer process and passive component capabilities, and the number of suppliers is limited. Samsung Electro-Mechanics President Chang Duck-hyun is cultivating silicon capacitors as a core growth business in the company's push into the AI market. The company made its full-scale entry into the market last year as it began supplying customers. It supplied products for the AI accelerators of Marvell—a leader in custom networking chips (ASICs)—and for the package of Samsung Electronics' mobile application processor (AP), the Exynos 2600, among others. More recently, it secured a supply contract worth 1.5 trillion won from a global Big Tech company—the largest single contract in Samsung Electro-Mechanics' history. The related revenue is scheduled to be reflected in earnings starting in 2027. Samsung Electro-Mechanics presented a "total solution" strategy—bundling its silicon capacitor, multilayer ceramic capacitor (MLCC), and package substrate businesses—as a differentiating factor. Silicon capacitors are mounted inside or adjacent to the package substrate. By supplying both products together, Samsung Electro-Mechanics can design and optimize the package and components simultaneously. Samsung Electro-Mechanics is the only company that operates both passive component and package substrate businesses. Rather than building large-scale production facilities, the company has chosen a design-centric strategy. It employs a fabless model, outsourcing wafer production to foundries and componentization to specialized semiconductor back-end (OSAT) firms, while Samsung Electro-Mechanics handles product design, testing, and quality verification. The company has a silicon capacitor design and development organization at its Central Research Institute in Suwon. Samsung Electro-Mechanics' silicon capacitors are manufactured on a 300-millimeter (mm) wafer basis. A silicon capacitor is a passive component made from a silicon wafer. It temporarily stores electricity and supplies it when needed, keeping the voltage inside the semiconductor package stable. Whereas conventional MLCCs secure capacitance by stacking multiple layers of ceramic, silicon capacitors bore microscopic holes into a wafer and place electrodes inside them. This allows the thickness to be reduced to 100 micrometers (㎛) or less. Samsung Electro-Mechanics drew its business idea from DRAM technology. DRAM uses a capacitor inside each cell to store data. Samsung Electro-Mechanics developed the silicon capacitor by taking just the capacitor portion of this structure and advancing it into a separate component. The fine-process technology it accumulated while shrinking DRAM circuit linewidths was transferred directly into silicon capacitor development. The more microscopic holes formed in the wafer, the greater the capacitance a silicon capacitor can achieve. There are differences in silicon capacitor technology between competitors. Samsung Electro-Mechanics utilizes a DRAM-based structure, while TSMC is known to use a logic-process-based trench structure. Samsung Electro-Mechanics mass-produces its products on a 300mm wafer basis, the type primarily used for memory semiconductors. Samsung Electro-Mechanics projected that the silicon capacitor market will grow at an average annual rate of more than 18%. Its scope of application is expanding from a mobile focus into AI servers, automotive electronics, aerospace, and optical communications. AI servers in particular are emerging as the largest source of demand, as power density increases and package integration intensify simultaneously. Kim said, "The higher semiconductor performance becomes, the more important power stabilization becomes," adding, "Silicon capacitors will see their range of application continuously expand in the AI server and next-generation high-performance semiconductor markets."

個人的に多くの示唆を与えてくれる日経の記事です。 かつてジェンスン・フアンが韓国には立ち寄らず、台湾や中国ばかりを訪れていた頃、韓国ではビッグテック企業が韓国を素通りするとして「コリア・パッシング(韓国外し)」が蔓延していると韓国メディアが盛んに騒ぎ立てていました。 しかし、昨年10月にメモリ不足がちょうど始まった頃からジェンスン・フアンが韓国を訪れるようになり、今や韓国が大きな注目を集めています。 ジェンスン・フアンを日本にも立ち寄らせるには、メモリを持たない日本は、結局のところ日本独自のAI開発企業を大きく育てるしかありません。キオクシアだけでは足りないのです。 NVIDIAのチップを毎年とてつもない規模で消費する企業——今の日本であれば、それを生み出せると私は考えています。

The unfortunate reality is that while models may become commoditized, semiconductors will not. And the leading-edge foundries that manufacture those semiconductors are effectively oligopolized by three countries. Memory, meanwhile, is oligopolized by two countries. In the end, this AI export-control shock is ultimately positive for the AI supply chain.

Wow, this is genuinely awful. AI accelerator development takes two years until launch, and yet they evaluate the performance of the people working on it every six months? This is exactly why MTIA is shit.

LMAO, apparently one of Intel’s Fellows once considered suing TSMC, claiming that TSMC’s CoWoS-L copied Intel’s silicon bridge concept lol.

Nvidia has told its Chinese customers that its new AI data center CPU, Vera, could launch as early as August and that they may begin placing orders, according to Reuters.