wei

$RKLB won a $30M HASTE contract from Anduril for 3 hypersonic test launches out of Virginia. The missions will support Mach 5+ defense tech with the first launch expected within 12 months and HASTE now nearly 1/3 of Rocket Lab’s launch backlog.

Why are power semiconductors the future? Barclays: The power consumption of AI chips is rising rapidly. NVIDIA’s current Blackwell-generation GPU chips have already reached around 1.2 kW, and the power consumption of GB200 rack-level servers is about 120 kW. Even more striking is the Rubin Ultra chip scheduled for release in 2027. The power consumption of this GPU is expected to reach three times that of Blackwell, and the power consumption per server rack will rise to around 600 kW. By the time of the Feynman architecture, power is expected to increase by another 1.5 times, reaching more than eight times the current Blackwell level, with rack-level server power consumption likely to hit the megawatt (1 MW) range. To address this issue, NVIDIA has announced a new power system called “Kyber,” which adopts an 800 V architecture. This will significantly increase the content of power semiconductors, and all major power semiconductor manufacturers are now competing to enter this supply chain. Power semiconductor content to grow 10x, reaching $140,000 per rack The report expects GPU power demand to grow about fivefold over the next few years, while rack power demand will grow tenfold, with 1 MW-per-rack demand already coming into view. Currently, the value of power semiconductors in a single rack is around $12,000–$15,000. Taking into account the reference design and the increase in power demand, the report projects that by 2027, the power semiconductor content (on a BoM basis) will grow more than sixfold, and by 2029 it will increase by more than another 50%, reaching about $140,000 per rack (at today’s prices). What is noteworthy is that even under the most optimistic assumptions, power semiconductors still account for less than 1% of total rack spending. This clearly illustrates how much “leverage” power semiconductors have within the overall system. 800 V architecture reshapes the power semiconductor market landscape The traditional 54 V power delivery architecture scales poorly once rack power demand exceeds 200 kW. NVIDIA’s proposed 800 V data center architecture is a fundamentally different approach that overturns this limitation. In the new architecture, it is no longer a matter of converting 54 V DC down to 1 V, but implementing a large-step conversion from 800 V down to 1 V. This change will significantly reduce, or in some cases entirely replace, the role of PSUs (power supply units) in data centers. As a result, it can save space, while also reducing power loss and copper usage. This new architecture is expected to begin deployment from 2027, coinciding with the launch timing of NVIDIA’s Rubin Ultra chips. New opportunities for wide-bandgap semiconductors, with companies like Infineon set to benefit The report points out that in recent years, silicon carbide (SiC) has struggled due to oversupply, while gallium nitride (GaN) has been mostly confined to consumer applications. However, the surge in AI power demand is creating major new opportunities for both of these materials. In future server architectures, GaN could account for up to 30% of the bill of materials (BoM), while SiC is expected to account for around 10–15%. A hundred-billion-dollar-scale market is taking shape, with the competitive landscape likely to be reshaped The report estimates that if AI data center capacity increases by around 16 GW every month, the annual market size for power semiconductors will reach 1.4–8.5 billion dollars. This projection is based on the assumption that all newly added capacity adopts the new 800 V architecture. At present, the AI power semiconductor market is mainly shared by three players: Infineon, and Renesas and Monolithic Power, which are outside the coverage of this report. However, NVIDIA has already released a long list of potential suppliers for its 800 V architecture, with a total of 14 companies named as potential vendors. As the 800 V data center era begins in earnest, competition among power semiconductor suppliers is expected to intensify. The report assumes that, over the forecast period, AI power semiconductor prices will see a low- to mid-single-digit annual decline. This “energy efficiency revolution” triggered by AI compute demand is reshaping the structure of the power semiconductor industry. As the 800 V architecture is gradually commercialized from 2027 onward, a hundred-billion-dollar-scale new market is quietly taking shape, and the technological leaders have already moved to secure an early lead.