Asianometry

Beijing Orient Electronics or BOE Technology Group as it is now called is a publicly traded display technologies company based out of Beijing.   With $19 billion in revenue, they are the world’s second largest OLED vendor and the biggest seller of flat panel displays. They are China's most advanced display technologies company - the only one equipped to produce LCDs in the 6th generation category or above.   They are a serious challenger to Samsung and LG Display and might supply the next iPhone. In this video I want to take a look at BOE’s development and how they are challenging the current display incumbents.   Links: - The Asianometry Newsletter: https://asianometry.substack.com- Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Asianometry

We are already more than halfway into the year. Time really flies, doesn't it? 

It has been a while since my video deep dive on TSMC's $28 billion capital expenditure plan at the start of 2021. Some time has passed since then and so I think we are due for another review. 

So in this review, we are going to look back at the first half of TSMC's 2021 year. This is going to be a collection of individual thoughts on the company, its environment, and more. We will review financials, the Arizona fab, the outbreak, water, and more. 

Thus, at the risk of looking too obsessed with TSMC, let us dive in! 

Not everything is about the sexy microprocessor or GPU in your desktop. Memory is one of the major categories in the semiconductor world.   The memory industry as it currently exists is dominated by a number of incumbents. The reason for this is because memory is a brutal and cyclical industry. But it can also serve as a critical starting point for many semiconductor companies to nurture their fabbing expertise. The industry’s dynamics also make it easier for new, low cost entrants to sell in the market.   One of those new entrants into the market is Wuhan-based Yangtze Memory Technology Company. The company began as a low cost supplier but has impressively scaled the value chain in recent years. In this video, I want to look at one of China's leading memory companies and one of its flagship semiconductor champions. 

I regularly make use of YouBike here in Taipei. It is a simple, easy-to-use bike share that makes biking around Taipei as convenient as the MRT. I use it regularly to get to places while enjoying the outdoors.   YouBike would not work half as well as it does if the bikes sucked. And luckily they do not. These bikes were provided by Giant, Taiwan's biggest bicycle brand.   I do not know much about the bicycle industry, so Giant's success and name recognition came as a surprise to me. It is pretty cool that in the midst of a bunch of semiconductor and electronics companies, one of Taiwan's most well-known brands makes bicycles of all things.   In this video, I want to profile Taichung-based Giant Bicycle. Their beginnings, rise to prominence, and how they managed to make it from being a white label manufacturer to a global brand of their own.

It is a question that every developing country in the world wants to know: How can we upscale our economy? How can we make more competitive, technologically advanced product that everyone else wants?

The early 1970s gave the people of Taiwan such a challenge. Times were changing. The island needed to adapt in order to survive in a new world full of challenges. Its economy then was made up mostly of agricultural products and simple electronic assembly - exports of low value and would be easily replaced.  

In this video, I want to briefly review how the government created a world-class next-generation manufacturer, the plan they followed, and what lessons we can take away as a result. 

Recently, I watched a video by a popular YouTube channel about the economy of the Soviet Union. I have long been interested in how Soviet society worked. But sadly that particular video failed to scratch the itch. It felt a bit watered down. So I figured I would make my own. 

For generations, the Soviet Union grew faster than every other developing country except one. But once that strategy ran its course, the Soviets failed to adapt and things fell apart. It is a challenge that every country has to face at one time or another in the process of its development. 

In this video, I want to look at the rise and decline of the Soviet Economy. 

Malaysia's semiconductor industry has seen impressive growth. Following in the footsteps of its Asian neighbors, the country successfully built itself up as an attractive location for foreign direct investment. It leveraged that to make a place of its own in the semiconductor industry. 

But that industry has found itself sort of caught in the middle. Unable to invest in the future, the country’s small local cluster of semiconductor firms find themselves stuck in a tenuous place low in the value chain. With seemingly few good prospects. 

Here, we are going to look at Malaysia's place in the global semiconductor industry. 

What do Amazon Web Services and TSMC have in common? One is the cloud computing division inside the biggest e-commerce company in the world. The other is a Taiwanese state-backed semi giant. 

While these companies might seem quite different, one thing that I notice unifies them is that they provide a platform that enables other companies to succeed and exist. 

TSMC's focus on manufacturing and commitment not to compete with its customers has spawned a generation of "fabless" semiconductor companies. AWS has allowed Silicon Valley to build pure internet service companies without needing to build a data center of their own. 

For this episode, I want to look at and draw a few parallels between these two special companies. The plumbing providers of the modern internet.