This article was first published here in New Electronics magazine.
Back in March, I wrote here in New Electronics magazine that Taiwan sits at the core of global AI infrastructure, and that any company in the AI or quantum business needs to be engaging there. This month, I stood on the UK Pavilion at Semicon Taiwan and watched more than 20 British companies act on exactly that argument.
This year, the UK was there in force. The UK Semiconductor Centre led a delegation of more than 20 British companies and organisations on the UK Pavilion, back for a fourth consecutive year. The line-up said a lot about where UK strength actually lies. We saw Pragmatic Semiconductor and its flexible electronics platform, Porotech in GaN micro-LEDs, Aegiq in photonic quantum computing, Vector Photonics and Wave Photonics in photonics, Analogue Insight in mixed-signal IP, IceMOS, CoolLED, Oxford Lasers, Pickering Interfaces, Clas-SiC Wafer Fab, plus the Compound Semiconductor Applications Catapult.
The Pavilion's theme was AI and power efficiency. The UK is not pretending to compete with Taiwan on wafer scale manufacturing. It is selling the technologies that complement it.
Previously, I wrote about Taiwan's push into quantum-AI hybridisation under its Ten Major AI Infrastructure Projects, alongside silicon photonics and robotics. On the Pavilion, the UK side of that same story was on display: Aegiq's photonics-based quantum computing, and two Scottish photonics companies, Vector Photonics and Wave Photonics, selling into exactly the ecosystem Taiwan is building. The complementarity is not just theoretical.
Semicon Taiwan naturally featured many keynote speeches. A common thread in these was that semiconductors, AI and robotics must advance through collaboration between like-minded countries.
Taiwan's Minister of Digital Affairs described how the global supply chain split roughly a decade ago into a 'red' chain, built around China's self-reliance push, and a 'democratic' chain. TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) sits at the heart of the latter, but the panel discussions were less about TSMC and more about everything around it.
SEMI E187, the cybersecurity standard for semiconductor equipment developed with the Taiwanese authorities, is now moving into an open certification scheme. Israel is drafting its first national chip programme and making Taiwan its first international stop, while Japan, France and the Netherlands are each offering its own model of trusted-supply-chain cooperation.
My conversations at the show – with engineers and executives from Taiwan's logic and memory fabs and leading display makers – were highly revealing of what Taiwanese manufacturers want right now.
One major logic fab laid out an AI agenda in three parts: production AI, AI governance and physical AI.
A memory fab discussed data-driven optimisation with genuine interest, but the conditions it set for potential suppliers were to first show its value to their engineers on the shop floor in solving their pain points – and then the bosses would listen.
Taiwan's memory makers, meanwhile, are clearly pragmatic to the bone.
Display makers admitted their automation wasn’t as optimised as it could be as they are at the start of a journey, and there are dozens like them, not just in this sector but also across PCB and back-end manufacturing.
Two threads ran through all of these conversations. Firstly, fabs are drowning in sensor data they cannot turn into decisions with AI the only credible answer.
Secondly, even the most advanced manufacturers do not expect humanoid robots in their fabs within three years. Physical AI is coming to semiconductor manufacturing, but through interfaces and retrofits, not androids – at least not now. UK companies in sensing, instrumentation, photonics and control software should read that as an opening.
So, what does this mean for a British semiconductor SME wondering whether Taipei is worth the flight?
Firstly, the trusted supply chain is now a commercial product. SEMI E187 certification, cybersecurity for equipment and hardware roots of trust are becoming procurement requirements, not policy papers.
The UK's strength in security, IP and design fits directly with this, and the UKSC's presence in Taipei is a door-opener that did not exist five years ago.
Secondly, Taiwan's fabs and panel makers are buying software and instrumentation, not just tools. The meetings I sat in were about data quality, sampling strategy and AI platforms. A UK company with clever measurement or analytics technology will find engineers here who want to talk technicalities, and quickly.
Thirdly, capital is looking for exactly what the UK can bring.
The UKSC spent its first morning in Taipei meeting dozens of Taiwanese VCs and corporate investors. Taiwan's investors are rich, technologically literate and seeking exposure to AI, quantum and advanced materials. For UK companies raising growth capital, this may be the Pavilion's biggest return.
The UK-Taiwan Semiconductor Reception at Semicon Taiwan 2026
The contrast with Semicon China was put to me bluntly in one meeting: in Shanghai, 90% of exhibitors are Chinese companies. Semicon Taiwan, by contrast, is genuinely international, and that is the point.
In March, my message was that companies in AI and quantum need to engage with Taiwan or risk missing the ecosystem that will define both fields. Semicon Taiwan 2026 showed what engagement looks like in practice: real technology on real booths, and real conversations with real fabs.
The risk now is that we treat the Pavilion as an annual photo opportunity rather than the start of a pipeline. Will the conversations die now they’ve all flown back to the UK?
The door is open to the right technologies. Walking through it is up to us.
To discuss prospects for your tech company in Taiwan, you can contact Stewart at stewart.randall@intralinkgroup.com.