China has 70% of a material AI needs, IQE’s CEO warns, Bloomberg reports
A Welsh chipmaker has just posted a 40% jump in revenue. Its shares are up 849% this year. And its chief executive has told an interviewer that the industry has a supply problem it cannot fully solve.
Sofia Gerace reported the interview for Bloomberg. Jutta Meier runs IQE, based in Cardiff. She said access to indium phosphide substrates is becoming a key risk for the whole semiconductor industry. Chinese export controls have made the supply uncertain.
Indium phosphide is the material behind photonics. Those are the chips that generate and amplify the light signals moving data around an AI data centre. Demand is rising faster than supply.
China holds 70% of it
That figure comes from the US Geological Survey, and it is the whole problem in one number.
Meier said the company is managing the risk through what she called broad engagement with different suppliers. She then added...
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