TPCA Show 2026, the industry’s flagship annual event, opened to strong crowds. In his opening keynote, Unimicron Chairman said Taiwan’s PCB industry is entering a rare “golden era.” AI computing power now doubles roughly every five months, and hardware demand is surging. Taiwan’s deep strengths in process expertise and yield put the industry in a strong position to ride this wave.
He explained that evolving AI models are driving larger chips and soaring memory demand, leaving data centers with three key bottlenecks: high-speed interconnect, efficient power delivery and thermal management. Substrate area, once limited to reticle size, is expected to grow fivefold by 2026 and eight to ninefold by 2028. Meeting these demands will require heterogeneous integration technologies such as CoWoS and advanced substrates to overcome warpage, signal integrity and noise challenges.
On the supply-demand outlook, he acknowledged that longer lead times for materials and equipment pose a serious challenge, with some critical tools now taking up to 30 months to deliver. He stressed that no company can expand capacity alone. Only through information sharing and close collaboration across the entire supply chain can the industry align supply with demand and grow together in the age of exploding compute.
The opening ceremony featured a special keynote speech by Unimicron Chairman and CSO S.C. Chien, titled “Taiwan's PCB Industry in the Era of Heterogeneous Integration: From Supply Chain to Ecosystem,” highlighting key opportunities and strategic directions for the industry in the era of AI.