The End of the Off-the-Peg Era
For a few years, the AI chip market was a delightfully simple monopoly. You bought NVIDIA, or you simply did not compete. That dynamic is shifting rapidly.
Consider the recent agreement between Qualcomm and ByteDance. The parent company of TikTok is not just buying off-the-peg processors anymore. They are commissioning custom AI chips for their data centres. This is a deliberate, calculated move to break free from a single dominant supplier.
Monopolies are notoriously brittle when tech giants decide to build their own tools.
When hyperscalers start ordering bespoke silicon, it changes everything. They pull in foundries, memory suppliers, and server builders. The ripple effect cascades through an ossified supply chain.