The global technology infrastructure has been under strain due to the increasing digitization of the economy and the emergence of several powerful innovations such as artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things and the Metaverse should only exacerbate latency and bottleneck issues.
To support the AI, real time and 3D requirements of this new generation of applications, a multi-year investment cycle in cloud, and edge computing is on its way.
As an illustration, Intel stated that the Metaverse will require 1,000x more computing power than today’s digital applications.
AI is the underlying and necessary base for many new technologies and the increasing complexity of training deep learning models is having a profound impact on the cloud computing architecture.
Hyperscalers are notably redesigning their cloud infrastructures with data transfer speed and energy consumption optimization in mind.
Longer term, quantum computing emerges as the next step in high-performance computing.
Tech infrastructure vendors (semiconductors, software) will obviously benefit from this upcoming investment cycle to train AI and deliver AI services to customers at scale.
Industrial and consumer goods companies should also have the opportunity to leverage their installed base of IoT products and devices (cars, industrial machines…) to offer a wide range of connected digital services and over-the-air options through subscription-based models.
The phenomenal success of Generative AI (GAI) services like ChatGPT or DALL-E has literally triggered an arms race amongst AI’s world leaders as the accuracy level coupled to the creative skills of GAI models are disrupting the $120bn annual revenue generating Web search industry (still heavily dominated by Google) as well as the nascent AI-based…
The so-called Moore’s law, promulgated by Intel’s co-founder Gordon Moore in the mid-60s, states that the number of transistors in an integrated circuit (or IC) doubles every two years. Contrary to what many media said and are still saying nowadays, the doubling of IC’s density doesn’t mean that semiconductor chips are twice as powerful every…
ChatGPT literally took the world by storm since its release in November 2022. The chatbot is so successful that it added 1 million users in only 5 days, slashing the iPhone’s (74 days) and Instagram’s (2.5 months) previous adoption speed records. OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, was founded in 2015 and backed by prominent figures…
Semiconductor stocks have suffered an across-the-board selling in recent months thanks to the rapid deterioration of several end-markets (PC, smartphones…) and new export controls imposed by the US government on chips and equipment shipped to China. But this “implosion” could also create buying opportunities as some end-markets and, more specifically, the data center one enjoys secular…
As illustrated by Google’s recent acquisition of Mandiant and Cisco’s increasing focus on security, a convergence between tech hardware and cybersecurity software has been taking place, a move that should intensify over coming years. For networking hardware specialists such as Cisco and Juniper, implementing firewalling and threat detection software in their routers and switches is…
SpaceX’s Starlink, owned by Elon Musk, and US wireless operator T-Mobile made the headlines recently when they announced a partnership aimed at connecting users’ current mobile phones directly to satellites in orbit, hence providing mobile users with (limited) network coverage in remote areas of the United States. The use of satellites for bi-directional telecommunications…
Over the last few months, some cloud software vendors have faced an unexpected and counter-intuitive risk: the rising efficiency of cloud computing platforms such as Amazon’s AWS stemming from improved chip performances. Cloud-based data storage company Snowflake notably came under the spotlight. It uses AWS cloud to store and process its customers’ data which are…
According to various media reports, semiconductor giant Broadcom is in talks to acquire cloud software infrastructure company VMware. Having started with server virtualization, a software solution that morphs a single and physical server into several virtual ones, VMware gradually added storage and networking virtualization in order to offer a complete infrastructure software stack that allows…
Marvell’s impressive earnings last night (61% growth, 8% above consensus ; 34.5% operating margin vs. 32% expected) are likely to cast a positive light on most connectivity and data center semiconductor players today as Marvell has one of the most comprehensive semiconductor portfolios, covering notably telecoms, data centers, enterprise networking and auto. Marvell is one our…
Recently, we commented that the Internet-of-Things (IoT) was finally gaining traction in the industrial world and was on track to become 5G’s killer app as it provides industrial companies with the opportunity to attach a wide range of digital services and features (monitoring, analytics…) to their installed base of cars, factory machines or robots. The…
If 5G roll-outs are now well on track, there is also a lot of activity in space-based connectivity that is expected to complement 5G in hard-to-reach locations, make the Internet of Things a reality (e.g. providing connectivity to a ship in the middle of the ocean) and provide faster Internet to rural areas. SpaceX’s Starlink,…
After having reached the top-level in the graphic chips (GPU) segment, Nvidia is now attacking the server microprocessor (CPU) market, currently dominated by the Intel–AMD duopoly. The CPU and GPU markets are linked but independent. Every computer integrates, by default, a graphic processing unit inside its CPU. But discrete GPU chips, like the ones provided by…
It is now crystal clear that the worldwide rollout of the 5th generation of cellular networks is strongly catching up last year’s Covid-19 induced slowdown. Despite many closed retail locations, Apple was able to grow its iPhone line by 17% year-over-year in Q4, with customers rushing to buy its latest 5G enabled models. Skyworks, a…
Like their semiconductor counterparts (Intel, AMD, Nvidia), optical and photonics companies have been riding the data center spending wave since the end of last year, a wave that is only getting stronger in a world where remote services become the norm as illustrated by the strength of their quarterly earnings and guidelines. But contrary to…
Even if people around the world spend more time than ever on their mobile devices to play, zoom, tweet or snap, global smartphone demand is expected to drop by around 15% this year due to the health crisis and its economic consequences. The adverse conditions are even reportedly leading Apple to mull a delayed launch…
The health crisis and country lockdowns drastically slowed most businesses in recent weeks and the 5G industry has been no exception. 5G infrastructure work has been paused in most geographies, spectrum auctions have been pushed back in several countries (France, Spain Austria, Portugal…) with an immediate impact on capex plans, and concerns emerged about a…
If one needed fresh evidence that current full or partial country lockdowns are sparking a surge in cloud computing and gaming and, as a result, putting a strain on telecom networks and data centers, Verizon and Nintendo just provided it. The US telecom giant reported streaming demand was up 12% week-over-week, web traffic up 20%…
Following in the footsteps of other Tech companies highly exposed to China, Apple warned it will not meet its March quarter revenue guidance as the coronavirus hit both demand and manufacturing in the country. In addition, the company was expected to launch, sometime in Q1, a low-cost iPhone model (currently nicknamed SE2 or iPhone 9),…
While the data center chip market had hit a speed bump in 2018 after years of massive spending, it started to show signs of life again at the end of 2019, as illustrated by the material recovery in Intel’s data center revenue growth (+4% vs. -10% in the previous quarter) and recent encouraging comments from…
NAV & Performance
ISIN
CH0473585260
Currency
USD
Type
Active Equity
Issuer / Rating
UBS / S&P A+
Inception Date
04.11.2019
Liquidity
Daily