Semiconductor & Technology Specialist, Ingenuity

William Keating

Dr. William Keating is a highly experienced senior executive with over 25 years experience in the IT/Semiconductor Industry. The majority of Dr. Keating's career was spent at Intel Corporation where he held senior leadership positions in Europe, the US and Asia from 1992 through 2014. He served as Intel's IT Director for APAC, China & Japan from 2005 through 2014 when he was based in Hong Kong and was responsible for the IT systems (Infrastructure, Networks, Data Centres, ERP, Sales & Marketing systems, Business Intelligence etc. ) for all of Intel's offices & factories through the region. From 1998 through 2005, he was the founder & director of an internal IT Consulting Organisation (IT Flex Services), a 500-person team which remains a core part of the Intel IT Organisation to this day. Dr. Keating's first 6 years at Intel were spent in charge of the Factory Automation Systems (Robotics, Databases, Networks, Servers, Clients etc.) supporting Intel's then state-of-the-art 200mm factory network. Since leaving Intel in 2014, Dr Keating established his own Technology Research & Consulting Company (www.ingenuity.hk) where he focuses on the products, roadmaps & technologies of companies such as Intel, AMD, Samsung, Apple, Micron- as well as the key equipment suppliers to those companies e.g. ASML, AMAT, Canon, Nikon etc. Dr. Keating specializes in niche topics of high significance within the semiconductor industry. These include the future of Moore's Law and in particular the significance of Lithography in maintaining Moore's Law (EUV, SDA, NanoImprint), the role & growth of the GPU in specialised applications such as Deep Learning (Neural Networks) for Voice, Image & Pattern recognition at companies such as Facebook, Google & Baidu. He also holds regular discussions on the future of memory, in particular the rise of 3D NAND and the emergence of new memory technologies such as 3D Xpoint.

Semiconductor & Technology Specialist

TSMC Rally Pause, Recycle Support with Macro Upside Targets

TSMC. Setting The Stage For Record Growth In 2020 And Beyond

TSMC. Why Their Surprise 6nm Process Is A Winning Strategy.

TSMC Recovery Is Nigh As Tailwinds Mount On 5G Strength & Likely Return Of Apple's Modem Business

Ingenuity

Our focus is exclusively on in-depth research & consulting in the broader semiconductor industry. We focus on the key players, namely Intel, Micron, Qualcomm, Apple, Samsung, NVIDIA, AMD, TSMC & Global Foundries - as well as some of the lesser known, but nonetheless critical, companies such as ASML (for EUV), Mellanox, Cavium, Xilinx etc. We specialise in their products, roadmaps, process technologies, competitive advantages & threats etc. We also help our clients understand the implications of new and emerging technologies, e.g. 3D X-Point, 3D NAND, Carbon Nanotubes, Autonomous Driving, Graphene, Silicon Photonics, Wafer-Level Optics, Artificial Intelligence, FPGA, GPU, ASIC etc. 

Semiconductor Analysis & Research

Equity Bottom-Up

Taiwan Semiconductor (TSMC) / Equity Bottom-Up

With second quarter revenues of $7.75 billion slightly ahead of expectations and up 10.2% sequentially, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/taiwan-semiconductor-manufacturing-company-tsmc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:11230:1" rel="noopener">Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC)</a> set the stage for a second half recovery during their latest earnings report. Noting that Q3 revenues will rise a further 18% sequentially to $9.15 billion, TSMC confidently claims to be well past the bottom of the current semiconductor downturn. 
Apart from the strong results and upbeat outlook, the company had further good news to share. Customers are demanding additional capacity on TSMC's 7nm processes family on the back of more rapid acceleration of 5G infrastructure build-out and stronger than forecasted demand from HPC. For the same reasons, the company is now mulling a more aggressive approach to ramping their next-generation 5nm process node. 
During the earnings call, TSMC teased a novel transistor architecture for their 3nm process node, currently under technology development. While <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/samsung-electronics-co-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:191:1" rel="noopener">Samsung Electronics</a> has opted for a "Gate All Around" (GAA) approach, TSMC refused to be drawn on their design choice while giving the strong impression that it would be different from Samsung's. If this is indeed the case, it will introduce a whole new competitive dynamic whereby customers on their 3nm process will find it significantly more difficult to switch between foundries.  
Buoyed by these positives, little wonder then that on the earnings call TSMC predicted that they would not just maintain but actually grow their market share on leading edge nodes in the coming years.

With second quarter revenues of $7.75 billion slightly ahead of expectations and up 10.2% sequentially, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) set the stage for a second half recovery during their latest earnings report. Noting that Q3 revenues will rise a further 18% sequentially to $9.15 billion, TSMC confidently claims to be well past the bottom of the current semiconductor downturn. 
Apart from the strong results and upbeat outlook, the company had further good news to share. Customers are demanding additional capacity on TSMC's 7nm processes family on the back of more rapid acceleration of 5G infrastructure build-out and stronger than forecasted demand from HPC. For the same reasons, the company is now mulling a more aggressive approach to ramping their next-generation 5nm process node. 
During the earnings call, TSMC teased a novel transistor architecture for their 3nm process node, currently under technology development. While Samsung Electronics has opted for a "Gate All Around" (GAA) approach, TSMC refused to be drawn on their design choice while giving the strong impression that it would be different from Samsung's. If this is indeed the case, it will introduce a whole new competitive dynamic whereby customers on their 3nm process will find it significantly more difficult to switch between foundries.  
Buoyed by these positives, little wonder then that on the earnings call TSMC predicted that they would not just maintain but actually grow their market share on leading edge nodes in the coming years. 

TSMC. Shrugging Of The Competition With Robust 2H19 Outlook & Increasing Demand For Both 7nm & 5nm