The TPCA (Taiwan Printed Circuit Association) announced the production and sales statistics of H1 2020, indicating that the output of the Taiwanese PCB industry across the Taiwan strait in the first half of 2020 reached NT$ 298.1 billion (approx. US$ 9.9 billion), increasing by 3.4% from NT$ 288.2 billion in the first half of 2019. This is a record high on a year-over-year basis. After the companies in Mainland China resumed production, Taiwanese companies’ production ratio in Mainland China in Q2 bounced back to 63.4% from 60.7% in Q1. It is estimated that the annual output in 2020 will reach NT$ 672.1 billion. 
　　According to the TPCA, while the PCB industry is affected by the pandemic, and various products suffered from short-term negative impact, the Q1 output of the Taiwanese PCB industry saw a 0.5% growth of the Q1 output on a YoY basis, which stands out among many industries. While the production capacity has bounced back in Q2, the economic activities in many countries are restrained by the pandemic, which leads to a slowdown of the demands of end consumers. However, the Taiwanese PCB industry has jumped on the 5G bandwagon and has performed well.
　　For various products, while the HDI board is affected by the poor sales of mobile phones, it sees a growth rate of 11.3% because the 5G smartphone is characterized by high integration and each major brand has focused more on 5G phones in the first half of the year. For IC substrate the continuously high demands for high-end computing chips and high-speed memory has driven the strong demands for ABF with a growth of 17.2%. In addition, despite the decline of the overall sales of mobile phones, the Flex PCB also benefits from new 5G phone models and enjoys a growth rate of 0.9% in the second half of the years after taking the positive and negative factors into consideration. The output of the Rigid-Flex PCB saw a significant decline of 23.0% in H1 due to the poor sales of multi-lens, batteries, wireless earphones, and smartphones, plus its high YoY figures and introduction of TWS by SiP which has eroded the demand for Rigid-Flex PCB. While the demands for multi-layer boards with more than 4 layers benefit from the strong sales of notebooks, their growth rate declined by 1.6% due to the significant decline of vehicle sales.
　　The PCB industry is preparing for the advent of the traditional peak season in the second half of 2020. Due to the growth in the first half of the year, the output of this year is expected to grow slightly. Overall, the following key points should be considered for industrial development in the second half of the year:
1.    The subsequent pandemic control over the world has a great impact on the global economy and the development of the end electronic products. In short, there are several variables for the total shipments of electronic products. Servers, notebooks, Ultra PC, and gaming consoles benefit from the short-term opportunities, such as zero contact (remote) and stay-at-home business opportunities; the new 5G phones from US companies will be launched in the market in the second half of the year, which will be one of the favorable factors for Taiwanese companies. 
2.    Global trade barriers are getting more obvious. The United States announced a new ban on Chinese companies and squeezed their development through its national power. Fortunately, Taiwanese companies operate across the globe and the 5G cell-related products have driven the sales of substrate. Despite this, the technical competition caused by the US-China Trade War should be considered for the mid-term and long-term response measures.