AI is driving force behind 'Moore's Law on steroids,' says Merck's Benjamin Hein

AI is fundamentally reshaping the semiconductor industry's core logic, shifting from isolated process breakthroughs to systemic integration innovation. Upstream material and equipment vendors face heightened demands for integration, such as EUV photoresist and high-k dielectrics aligning with AI compute needs; midstream chip design accelerates toward heterogeneous integration and advanced packaging. Policy-wise, geopolitical tech rivalry intensifies, particularly in securing critical supply chains for materials and equipment, forcing companies to adopt dual-track strategies of localization and global sourcing. Competitors are reinforcing ecosystem dominance through M&A and strategic alliances—TSMC and Samsung are advancing AI-specific process nodes, while Intel focuses on software-hardware convergence platforms. Over the next 12-24 months, AI-driven semiconductor innovation will enter a full-stack collaborative phase across materials, processes, packaging, and software, with competitive focus shifting from individual node advantages to system-level integration capabilities, making cooperation a survival imperative.