NVIDIA has been raking in lots of cash this year and hit a major milestone back in late May, with a trillion dollar valuation—its stock price doubled thanks to upward trends in the artificial intelligence market, with growing global demand for AI-hardware. Business Insider believes that Team Green will continue to do very well for itself over the next couple of years: "Mizuho analyst Vijay Rakesh has given NVIDIA's stock price another 20% upside to run—and even this new target of $530 is "conservative," according to a Sunday client note seen by Insider. Rakesh's previous price target for NVIDIA was $400. NVIDIA shares closed 0.7% higher at $446.12 apiece on Monday. The stock has surged 205% so far this year."

Despite the emergence of competing hardware from the likes of AMD and Intel, Rakesh predicts that NVIDIA will maintain a dominant position in the AI chip market until at least 2027: "With demand for generative AI accelerating, we see significant opportunities for hardware suppliers powering the higher compute needs for large-language models, particularly AI powerhouse NVIDIA. Insider reports that the company: "could generate around $300 billion in AI-specific revenue by 2027 with a 75% market share of AI server units...That's 10 times his projection of $25 billion to $30 billion in AI revenues this year." Rakesh has reportedly stuck with a $140 buy rating and price target for AMD shares.

LG Electronics Inc. (LG) today announced second-quarter 2023 consolidated revenue of KRW 20 trillion with operating profit of KRW 741.9 billion. The company recorded the highest second-quarter revenues in company history. The second-quarter results underscore the success of the company's strategy to drive continuous growth while strengthening its business competitiveness. The record revenue reflects the company's actions to fundamentally improve its business structure by pursuing new platform-based service businesses and continuously expanding the business-to-business (B2B) segments. Profitability also was strong, although operating income was 6.3 percent lower than the second quarter last year, primarily due to a one-time second-quarter 2023 provision.

The company plans to drive further profitability improvements by optimizing efficiencies and by preemptively meeting market demands through enhanced demand forecasting and manufacturing competitiveness. LG also plans to continuously strengthen its online brand store and direct-to-consumer businesses.

Recent rumors suggested that Intel contemplated a price hike across all of its Core processors. This speculation originated from a forum staff member from PCGH who claimed to have received related information indicating a possible correspondence from Intel to its wholesalers about an impending price rise. In response to these rumors, Intel confirmed to HardwareLuxx that it has no plans to increase processor prices currently. The company stated that the Recommended Customer Price (RCP), which is generally quoted in US dollars for 1,000 unit prices as per their Ark database, will persist unchanged. Intel clarified that it hadn't shared such news with its customers or partners, nor was it considering a price change for its CPU portfolio at the moment.

The speculated price increase was reportedly associated with Intel's ongoing and planned factory constructions and company restructuring, according to PCGH. The need to refinance the 'fabs' was cited as the primary reason. Presently, Intel is streamlining its expenses, shutting down multiple smaller business areas, and investing significantly with state aid. However, it is doubtful that these reasons would be expressed in a wholesaler letter as grounds for price hikes. The PC market is currently sluggish, and though an uplift is predicted for the second half of this year, most segments of the PC market are still witnessing double-digit percentage reductions. In such a scenario, where buyers are becoming increasingly price-sensitive, and the market is trying to rebound, a price rise could be counterproductive.

Microsoft Corp. today announced the following results for the quarter ended June 30, 2023, as compared to the corresponding period of last fiscal year:

• Revenue was $56.2 billion and increased 8% (up 10% in constant currency)
• Operating income was $24.3 billion and increased 18% (up 21% in constant currency)
• Net income was $20.1 billion and increased 20% (up 23% in constant currency)
• Diluted earnings per share was $2.69 and increased 21% (up 23% in constant currency)

"Organizations are asking not only how - but how fast - they can apply this next generation of AI to address the biggest opportunities and challenges they face - safely and responsibly," said Satya Nadella, chairman and chief executive officer of Microsoft. "We remain focused on leading the new AI platform shift, helping customers use the Microsoft Cloud to get the most value out of their digital spend, and driving operating leverage."

Worldwide silicon wafer shipments increased 2.0% quarter-over-quarter to 3,331 million square inches in the second quarter of 2023, down 10.1% from the 3,704 million square inches recorded during the same quarter last year, the SEMI Silicon Manufacturers Group (SMG) reported in its quarterly analysis of the silicon wafer industry.

"The semiconductor industry continues to work through excess inventory in various market segments, necessitating that fabs operate below full capacity," said Anna-Riikka Vuorikari-Antikainen, Chairman of SEMI SMG and Chief Commercial Officer at Okmetic. "As a result, silicon wafer shipments are lagging their 2022 peak. Second-quarter wafer shipments held steady quarter-on-quarter with 300 mm showing quarterly growth among all wafer sizes."

The Council has today approved the regulation to strengthen Europe's semiconductor ecosystem, better known as the 'Chips Act'. This is the last step in the decision-making procedure. The Chips Act aims to create the conditions for the development of a European industrial base in the field of semiconductors, attract investment, promote research and innovation and prepare Europe for any future chip supply crisis. The programme should mobilise €43 billion in public and private investment (€3.3 billion from the EU budget), with the objective of doubling the EU's global market share in semiconductors, from 10% now to at least 20% by 2030.

With the Chips Act, Europe will be a frontrunner in the world semiconductors race. We can already see it in action: new production plants, new investments, new research projects. And in the long run, this will also contribute to the renaissance of our industry and the reduction of our foreign dependencies. - Héctor Gómez Hernández, Spanish Minister for Industry, Trade and Tourism

Today ASML Holding NV (ASML) has published its 2023 second-quarter results.

• Q2 net sales of €6.9 billion, gross margin of 51.3%, net income of €1.9 billion
• Quarterly net bookings in Q2 of €4.5 billion of which €1.6 billion is EUV
• ASML expects Q3 2023 net sales between €6.5 billion and €7.0 billion and a gross margin of around 50%
• ASML expects 2023 net sales growth towards 30% compared to 2022

CEO statement and outlook
"Our second-quarter net sales came in at €6.9 billion, at the high end of our guidance, with a gross margin of 51.3%, higher than guided, primarily driven by additional DUV immersion revenue in the quarter. "Our customers across different market segments are currently more cautious due to continued macro-economic uncertainties, and therefore expect a later recovery of their markets. Also, the shape of the recovery slope is still unclear. However, our strong backlog of around €38 billion provides us with a good basis to navigate these short-term uncertainties.

TrendForce reports that OEMs have continued making concerted efforts to scale back production. However, given that the trajectory of market demand is still unclear, it's expected that the NAND Flash market will continue to be in a state of oversupply in 3Q23. Cautious inventory management by buyers is preventing a stabilization in NAND Flash prices even with an anticipated seasonal surge in demand for 2H23. TrendForce predicts that NAND Flash wafers will be the first to see a price hike in 3Q23 as prices for module products such as SSDs, eMMCs, and UFS will likely continue to fall due to tepid downstream demand. Consequently, the overall ASP of NAND Flash is forecast to continue dropping by about 3~8% in 3Q23, though a possibility exists prices may recover in 4Q23.

Client SSD: Although notebook shipments are expected to gradually recover in 3Q23, reversing an oversupply of SSD will continue to be challenging. Furthermore, a portion of suppliers have implemented aggressive promotions to secure customer orders and hit shipping targets in light of weakened demand and less-than-satisfactory order volumes from major clients, putting pressure on other suppliers. TrendForce estimates that the ASP of client SSDs will fall by 8~13% in the third quarter.

TrendForce has predicted a noticeable recovery in the global notebook market for 2Q23. Shipments are projected to hit 40.45 million units—a QoQ increase of 15.7%. This marks a pivotal turnaround after six consecutive quarters of decline. However, despite this growth, shipments are still down by 11.6% YoY. TrendForce expects this upward trend to persist into the third quarter, estimating global notebook shipments to reach 43.08 million units, albeit at a decelerated growth rate of 6.5%.

Notebook brands were primarily focused on reducing excess terminal inventory in 1Q23, which led to slower procurement and subsequently impacted ODM sell-in sales. However, as Q2 unfolds and inventory levels of finished products and components start to stabilize, supply chain pressures should ease, triggering a wave of restocking demand. This trend is expected to extend into Q3—a season typically characterized by robust sales due to back-to-school demand and shopping promotions, further stimulating inventory demand and fostering further growth in global notebook shipments.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 was released more than four years ago. With its TU117 graphics processor, it features 896 CUDA cores, 56 texture mapping units, and 32 ROPs. NVIDIA has paired 4 GB GDDR5 memory with the GeForce GTX 1650, which are connected using a 128-bit memory interface. Interestingly, according to the latest Steam Hardware Survey results, this GPU still remains the most popular choice among gamers. While the total addressable market is unknown with the exact number, it is fair to assume that a large group participates every month. The latest numbers for June 2023 indicate that the GeForce GTX 1650 is still the number one GPU, with 5.50% of the users having that GPU. The second closest one was GeForce RTX 3060, with 4.60%.

Other information in the survey remains similar, with CPUs mostly ranging from 2.3 GHz to 2.69 GHz in frequency and with six cores and twelve threads. Storage also recorded a small bump with capacity over 1 TB surging 1.48%, indicating that gamers are buying larger drives as game sizes get bigger.

Samsung Electronics, a world leader in advanced semiconductor technology, today announced its latest foundry technology innovations and business strategy at the 7th annual Samsung Foundry Forum (SFF) 2023. Under the theme "Innovation Beyond Boundaries," this year's forum delved into Samsung Foundry's mission to address customer needs in the artificial intelligence (AI) era through advanced semiconductor technology.

Over 700 guests, from customers and partners of Samsung Foundry, attended this year's event, of which 38 companies hosted their own booths to share the latest technology trends in the foundry industry.

TrendForce reports that inventory reduction in Q1 fell short of expectations and coincided with the industry's traditional off-season, leading to overall subdued demand. However, due to new product release and a surge in urgent orders for specialized specifications, Q1 revenue of the global top ten IC design houses remained on par with 4Q22, with a modest QoQ increase of 0.1% for a total revenue of US$33.86 billion. Changes in ranking included Cirrus Logic slipping from the top ten as well as the ninth and tenth positions being replaced by WillSemi and MPS, respectively. The rest of the rankings remained unchanged.

The smartphone supply continues to grapple with overstock, but AI applications are entering a period of rapid growth
Qualcomm witnessed an uptick in its revenue, largely attributed to the launch and subsequent shipments of its latest flagship chip, the Snapdragon 8Gen2. The company saw 6.1% in QoQ growth in its smartphone business, which effectively offset the downturn from its automotive and IoT sectors. As a result, Qualcomm's Q1 revenue increased marginally by 0.6%, cementing its position at the top of the pack with a market share of 23.5%.

TrendForce reports that in the first quarter of 2023, global shipments of LCD monitors fell 7.4% QoQ to 28.8 million units, marking a YoY decline of 20.5%. Major brands, including Dell, HP, and Lenovo, experienced significant drops in shipment levels, falling by 15.6%, 22.8%, and 19.2% respectively.

On the other hand, several consumer brands saw quarterly growth in their shipments in the first quarter, primarily due to channels replenishing their inventories in March. Among these brands, AOC/Philips stood out, benefiting greatly from demand in the Chinese consumer market. Their shipments not only grew 10.9% QoQ but also increased 3.3% compared to the first quarter of 2022.

Intel's marketing machine is not always all-encompassing with new product launches—case in point the recent whisper quiet appearance of a trio of "Arizona Beach" Atom SKUs on the market. It took a ServeTheHome reader to inform the publication about edge-based solutions becoming available to clients—mosty notably Silicom's Valencia Network Appliance. Ark site information from 2022 suggested that Team Blue launched its Arizona Beach series last summer, but zero marketing (at their end) has resulted in publications only taking notice a year later. Silicom started advertising its Valencia network models just before Christmas.

The Intel Atom C1100 (dual-core), C1110 (quad-core), and C1130 (octa-core) have been compared to the Alder Lake-N series—at first glance somebody could assume that the new platform is related to older E-core solutions. The site is already familiar with the previous generation since a staffer recently reviewed a Fanless Intel N100 Firewall. The top-end C1130 has a TDP rating of 32 W which comes as mild surprise—this is an Intel 7 part with a 2.5 GHz base and turbo frequency clock, alongside 6 MB L3 cache and 4 MB L2 cache. ServeTheHome compiled their own spec infographic of the Atom SKUs side-by-side, and soon discovered key selling points: support for dual-channel LPDDR5 memory and PCIe Gen 4 in "either 1x x16 + 1x x4 or 2x x8 + 1x x4 configurations." They conclude that the new Atom series has the potential to become an excellent platform for low-power edge devices, the author also hopes that a Mini-ITX option will turn up eventually.

A set of reports published by Niko Partners has calculated that the games market in China generated $45.5 billion in revenue last year. Native games companies (including Tencent and NetEase) accounted for 47% of worldwide mobile games revenue, along with a 39% revenue share of international PC games sales. Domestic figures show that 66% of China's gaming revenue comes from mobile, 31% from PC and 3% from console titles. The company's analysts posit that China persists as the largest global games market, with upward trends pushing growth to a predicted $57 billion of revenue by the year 2027. The gaming population is expected to expand to around 730 million participants by then.

Lisa Hanson, CEO and founder of Niko Partners included her own observations of the region's dominance: "Chinese game companies are growing internationally, and they are making bold investments at higher rates than ever. PC games revenue generated overseas by Chinese owned companies rose by 22% in 2022 and is expected to grow by a 13.8% CAGR through 2027 - which is higher than the domestic growth rate by a significant margin... China's market can be tough for domestic and foreign companies, but the country remains the number one market globally for games revenue and the number of gamers, and cannot be ignored.

Lenovo Group today announced full-year results, reporting Group revenue of US$62 billion and net income of US$1.6 billion, or US$1.9 billion on a non-Hong Kong Financial Reporting Standards (HKFRS) [1] basis. Profitability was stable with gross margin and operating margin both delivering 18-year highs and non-HKFRS net margin flat year-to-year. While Group revenue was impacted due to the softness in the device market, revenue from non-PC businesses reached a fiscal year high of nearly 40%, fueled by Lenovo's diversified growth engines of Solutions and Services Group (SSG) and Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG) growing revenue to record highs of US$6.7 billion and US$9.8 billion respectively, up 22% and 37% year-on-year.

After a year of industry and global uncertainties, Lenovo sees positive signs of the market stabilizing. The Group expects the entire PC and smart devices market to resume year-to-year growth in the second half of 2023, and for the IT services market to resume relatively high growth - together these will drive the total IT market in 2023 back to moderate growth. In the mid-to-long term, digital and intelligent transformation will continue to accelerate, leading to a big growth potential for cloud and computing infrastructure.

TrendForce reveals that alongside the four major CSPs reducing their procurement volumes, OEMs like Dell and HPE have also scaled back their annual shipment volume forecasts at some point between February and April, predicting YoY declines of 15% and 12%, respectively. Furthermore, server demand in China is facing headwinds due to geopolitical and economic challenges. Consequently, TrendForce projects a downward revision in global server shipment volumes for this year—a 2.85% YoY decrease at 13.835 million units.

TrendForce emphasizes that the server market in 1H23 remains pessimistic, with 1Q23 shipments experiencing a 15.9% QoQ decrease due to off-season factors and end-user inventory adjustments. The expected industry boom in 2Q23 failed to materialize, leading to a modest QoQ growth estimate of only 9.23%. Persistent influences on server shipments include OEMs lowering shipment volumes, subdued domestic demand in China, and continuous supply chain inventory adjustments. ESG issues have also led CSPs to prolong server lifecycles and reduce procurement volume. Moreover, OEMs are lengthening supports period for older platforms as businesses seek to control capital expenditures, further contributing to market strain.

Due to the current lack of demand for NAND flash, the merger talks between Kioxia and Western Digital have picked up pace once again. The two companies have been at it since 2021 and it was reported back in January that the two companies once again wanted to try and combine their NAND production business. According to Reuters, the two have been pushed into the meeting room once again, largely due to the two NAND giants wanting to cut costs in a market where demand for their products isn't what it once was.

Kioxia and Western Digital are the second and fourth largest manufacturers of NAND flash, although all the memory is made in Kioxia's facilities. A merger of the two would create a company that is said to be owned at 43 percent by Kioxia and 37 percent by Western Digital, with current shareholders of the two companies getting the remaining 20 percent. However, a potential merger isn't without hurdles, as it's likely to be scrutinised by both the US and the PRC due to potential antitrust issues, with the combined company owning a third of the global NAND flash market. Kioxia has even shelved plans for a public offering, due to the sluggish demand for NAND flash. Time will tell if the two can come to an agreement, but it doesn't look like the best of times for a merger either.

According to data from Mercury Research posted on Twitter, AMD has gained CPU market share against Intel over the past year. AMD has gone from a 27.7 percent market share in Q1 2022 to a 34.6 percent market share in the first quarter of 2023, which is an increase of 6.9 percent, whereas Intel has gone from 72.3 percent to 65.4 percent, still placing Intel at almost two thirds of the market of x86 CPUs. It should be noted that this includes all types of CPUs, but it's unclear if it includes the chips AMD sells to Microsoft and Sony for their respective consoles.

A separate screenshot posted by @firstadopter details server CPU market share, excluding IoT, although it's unclear what that means in this specific case. Here, AMD has gained 6.3 percent market share, but the company has only gone from a meager 11.6 percent last year, to 18 percent this year, with Intel holding a massive 82 percent market share. AMD's gain here was lower than overall, but it shows that larger corporations are starting to adopt more and more AMD hardware on the server side, where in all fairness, AMD has taken something of a lead over Intel when it comes to the maximum amount of CPU cores each company can offer, even though the per core performance still lags behind Intel to a degree. It'll be interesting to see if AMD can maintain its momentum in market share gain once Intel launches more competitive products later this year, especially in the server market space.

According to Taiwanese United Daily News, Acer and ASUS are expecting the downturn in PC sales to turn around in the second half of the year. That said, Acer reported its worst results in years for the first quarter this year and ASUS is expected to follow suit, when its first quarter earnings numbers are released on Friday this week. The slow sales for both companies are expected to continue for the first half of 2023, but according to the report, there should be an improvement in the second half of the year.

That said, both companies are betting on improved sales of not just PCs to improve their books, as Acer is hoping to sell more displays, while ASUS is focusing on its component business. ASUS has already seen a small improvement in component sales, which the company is hoping is the first signs of a stabilising components market, with more of its potential customers upgrading their systems. That said, with certain components like graphics cards still being priced at levels that many consumers aren't willing to pay for the performance on offer, it might be a slower recovery than these companies are expecting.

AMD is reported to be reissuing its old Zen+ (12 nm) tech in order to meet demand for cheaper, lower-end systems in China, according to information released by Board Channels this week. The insider source claims that a new production order has been placed for Ryzen 3000G series APUs (requesting up to 30,000 units) and these processors are likely to be sold as part of hardware bundles with (similar vintage) low-end AM4-based motherboards - for example the B450 and A320 series, these older boards are still popular budget choices in China and readily available. The leak does not mention whether AMD is choosing to issue completely new hardware or if it is simply reproducing its 2019-era SKUs.

AMD released two Ryzen 3000G models back in 2019 - the 3400G and 3200G, both are quad-core Picasso APUs although the latter is lacking in simultaneous multithreading. It is not clear whether the super low budget AMD Athlon 3000G model will be included as part of the alleged 30K unit order. The 3000G series' onboard iGPUs (based on AMD's first generation Vega architecture) are likely preferred by the budget-conscious buyer since a discrete graphics card is not an essential part of builds intended for an office setting or a simple/functional home computer setup.

Silicon Motion Technology Corporation ("Silicon Motion", the "Company" or "we") today announced its financial results for the quarter ended March 31, 2023. For the first quarter of 2023, net sales (GAAP) decreased sequentially to $124.1 million from $200.8 million in the fourth quarter of 2022. Net income (GAAP) decreased to $10.2 million, or $0.30 per diluted American Depositary Share ("ADS") (GAAP), from net income (GAAP) of $23.5 million, or $0.71 per diluted ADS (GAAP), in the fourth quarter of 2022.

For the first quarter of 2023, net income (non-GAAP) decreased to $11.2 million, or $0.33 per diluted ADS (non-GAAP), from net income (non-GAAP) of $41.1 million, or $1.22 per diluted ADS (non-GAAP), in the fourth quarter of 2022.

According to the Nikkei, Microsoft is cutting production for a wide range of its Surface accessories, i.e. keyboards, mice, docking solutions, headsets etc. This is despite the fact that the company has invested heavily into its Surface brand of computers and accessories over the past decade. This is said to be in response to the poor performance of the business unit in Microsoft's last financial report. The Nikkei mentioned that Microsoft is suspending all standalone keyboards in the Surface series and it seems like Microsoft is also looking at calling it quits when it comes to its own branded accessories, or there won't at least be any new models from the company in the foreseeable future.

Microsoft used to be a significant competitor in the keyboard, mouse and webcam market, but with increasing competition from more brands, it seems like the company has been having a hard time making a niche for itself in what can only be said to be a crowded market. Consumer expectations have also changed and most people don't want membrane keyboards any more and are instead buying more expensive mechanical keyboards. Microsoft has also been late to market with many of its Surface computers and have delivered overpriced and underwhelming products, which in turn has led to fewer sales of both the computers and the matching accessories. We'll have to wait and see if Microsoft makes an official announcement as to what will happen to its Surface brand of products, but right now it doesn't look like there's a very bright future for the Surface line of products as a whole.

Samsung Electronics today reported financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2023. The Company posted KRW 63.75 trillion in consolidated revenue, a 10% decline from the previous quarter, as overall consumer spending slowed amid the uncertain global macroeconomic environment. Operating profit was KRW 0.64 trillion as the DS (Device Solutions) Division faced decreased demand, while profit in the DX (Device eXperience) Division increased.

The DS Division's profit declined from the previous quarter due to weak demand in the Memory Business, a decline in utilization rates in the Foundry Business and continued weak demand and inventory adjustments from customers. Samsung Display Corporation (SDC) saw earnings in the mobile panel business decline quarter-on-quarter amid a market contraction, while the large panel business slightly narrowed its losses. The DX Division's results improved on the back of strong sales of the premium Galaxy S23 series as well as an enhanced sales mix focusing on premium TVs.

According to Ming-Chi Kuo, an industry analyst known for making accurate predictions about Apple, we have some new information regarding Intel's Sapphire Rapids Xeon processors. As Kuo notes, Intel's major Cloud Service Provider (CSP) client, Microsoft, has notified the supply chain that the company is cutting orders of Sapphire Rapids Xeons by 50-70% in the second half of 2023. Interestingly, Intel's supply chain has notified the company to cut chip orders by around 50% amidst weak server demand. This comes straight after Intel's plans to start shipping Sapphire Rapids processors in the second quarter of 2023 and deliver the highly anticipated lineup to customers.

Additionally, Kuo has stated that Intel isn't only competing for clients with AMD but also with Arm-based CPUs. Microsoft also plans to start buying Arm-based server processors made by Ampere Computing in the first half of 2024. This will reduce Microsoft's dependence on x86 architecture and induce higher competition in the market, especially if other CSPs follow.