Semiconductors

Why is everyone suddenly talking about CoWoS, HBM, and ABF whenever AI, NVIDIA, or AI servers come up? Many people know they are important, but still get stuck the first time they run into these terms. This essay is a plain‑language walkthrough of what they actually are, why they are always mentioned together, and how they map onto Taiwan’s role in the global AI supply chain. When Google, Amazon, and Tesla are all designing their own chips, is Taiwan’s manufacturing ecosystem still structurally important — or just enjoying a temporary window? ...

Every layer that looks solved hides another constraint beneath it. §1 The Illusion of Infinite Compute The headlines say NVIDIA is winning. The hyperscalers are spending. The models are getting bigger. But the real question is not where demand is going. It is where compute, physically, can still be built fast enough to meet it. The harder answer requires tracing the full physical stack — from silicon wafer, through memory stack, through packaging interposer, through substrate material — and asking at each layer: can this actually scale at the speed the demand curve requires? ...

Huang, Po-Sung (Sinclair) (2026) | SSRN Working Paper No. 6285318 Posted: February 22, 2026 | Under Review This paper examines infrastructure-based leading indicators as predictive signals for technology investment cycles, with empirical evidence from the semiconductor industry. The analysis demonstrates how physical infrastructure constraints precede and predict shifts in capital allocation patterns across the semiconductor value chain. View on SSRN → Note: This is a preprint under peer review. All data collection, statistical analysis, results, and interpretations are the author’s own.