TDK Corporation

TDK and Taiyo Yuden announced on the 29th that they will form a business alliance for the joint development of cutting-edge electronic components, sending both companies' share prices sharply higher. TDK's stock rose as much as 5.0% from the previous day to 3,066 yen, while Taiyo Yuden climbed as much as 9.1% to 9,955 yen. With demand growing for multilayer ceramic capacitors and other components for data centers and physical AI, the two companies will pool their technology and management resources to build a stable supply system, and will also explore the possibility of a future capital alliance. As the pairing brings together two Kanto-based companies, some see it as a counterweight to Murata Manufacturing of Kansai, and IwaiCosmo Securities senior analyst Kazuyoshi Saito noted, "It could become a force capable of rivaling Murata Manufacturing, and the east-versus-west rivalry will become clearer." In the MLCC field, Taiyo Yuden is said to be strong in small, high-performance types for package substrates used in data centers, while TDK is strong in components for power semiconductors.

Among the individual announcements made on the 29th, Taiyo Yuden revealed that it will sign a business alliance agreement with TDK covering joint development of electronic components and other areas. Sekichu raised its standalone operating profit forecast for the fiscal year ending February 2027, while Ito En will abolish its shareholder benefit program. Honey's Holdings posted a sharp profit decline in its consolidated results for the first quarter of the fiscal year ending May 2027, covering June to August 2026. BB Tower won a large order from a global IP company for storage products and maintenance services, with the order value at approximately 3.8 billion yen. Bank Innovate announced a consolidated operating profit forecast of 2.02 billion yen for the fiscal year ending September 2026, down 6.2 percent from the previous year, figures it had previously left undisclosed, and Nifco announced it will cancel treasury shares equivalent to 9.78 percent of its total issued shares, effective October 7.

The global analogue computing market is projected to grow from $0.58 billion in 2025 to $0.64 billion in 2026, a compound annual growth rate of 11.5%, and is expected to reach $1 billion by 2030, according to a new report from ResearchAndMarkets.com. Growth is driven by demand for energy-efficient computing, AI hardware acceleration, and edge processing, with hybrid analog-digital and neuromorphic systems emerging as key trends. The report highlights that data centres consumed about 485 terawatt-hours of electricity in 2025, 1.7% of global demand, projected to rise to 945 terawatt-hours by 2030, underscoring the need for low-power alternatives. Notable developments include TDK Corporation's prototype analogue reservoir AI chip introduced in October 2025, and a partnership between the Hertz Foundation and Analog Devices announced in June 2025. North America led the market in 2025, while Asia-Pacific is expected to be the fastest-growing region.

According to the Nikkei, Apple announced on the 26th that it will hold a new product launch event at 2 a.m. Japan time on September 10 (10 a.m. Pacific Time on September 9). The report suggests that the company is expected to unveil its first foldable model of its flagship smartphone, the iPhone. In response, Apple-related companies such as Murata Manufacturing, TDK, Taiyo Yuden, and Nitto Denko are likely to attract attention.

Defiance ETFs has launched the Defiance AI Capacitors Leaders ETF (Cboe: CAPA), the first U.S.-listed ETF targeting the capacitor supply chain powering AI infrastructure. The fund tracks the BITA AI Capacitors Leaders Index, which holds companies deriving at least 50 percent of revenue from advanced capacitors and passive components used in AI servers, accelerators, and data centers. Top holdings include TDK Corp at 23.0 percent, Samsung Electro-Mechanics at 20.2 percent, and Murata Manufacturing at 18.3 percent. Industry reporting cited by Defiance indicates a single AI server built on Nvidia's GB300 platform can require roughly 30,000 multilayer ceramic capacitors, and Murata expects MLCC shipments into AI servers to grow about 30 percent annually through 2030. Defiance CIO Sylvia Jablonski said the market has spent three years pricing the chips, while CAPA focuses on what powers them, as rack power architectures move from 12 volts to 48 and even 800 volts.

The Nikkei Stock Average fell in the morning session on the Tokyo stock market, closing at 63,240.51 yen, down 1.74 percent from the previous trading day. As the yen strengthened in the foreign exchange market, selling intensified, particularly in export-related stocks, and the Nikkei at one point dropped 2.58 percent to 62,703.47 yen. The dollar briefly fell to the lower 155 yen range, and Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama referred to the coordinated Japan-U.S. intervention on July 31. Kioxia Holdings and TDK were firm on the back of their earnings announcements, while Casio Computer hit its daily limit up. The TOPIX ended the morning session down 2.17 percent at 3,916.61 points, and trading value on the Tokyo Stock Exchange Prime Market was 6.430933 trillion yen.

QD Laser, listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange Growth Market, is developing quantum dot laser technology that is attracting attention as a next-generation solution to heat and power issues in data centers. However, in the fiscal year ending March 2026, quantum dot-related sales amounted to only 174 million yen, or about 13% of total revenue of 1.372 billion yen, indicating the technology is still in the research and development stage. Former institutional investor Ryosuke Izumida points out that the company's strategy of keeping manufacturing know-how secret without obtaining patents carries the risk of falling behind in mass production and ecosystem formation, similar to how plasma televisions lost out to LCD televisions in the past. For the fiscal year ending March 2027, the company forecasts a return to profitability with net income of 441 million yen, driven by an extraordinary gain of approximately 500 million yen from the partial transfer of patents to TDK, but its operating income forecast is only 3 million yen. Currently, in the field of optoelectronic integration, the ELS method adopted by companies such as NVIDIA is leading the way, and it remains uncertain whether quantum dot technology will become the industry standard.