Niche PCB manufacturers have recently seen a surge in stock prices, drawing increased attention from investors. In a newly released report on Taiwan's PCB, CCL, and substrate industries, JPMorgan highlights three major trends expected to benefit leading Taiwanese firms such as Taiflex Scientific (TWSE: 2383), Unimicron (TWSE: 3037), and Tripod Technology (TWSE: 3044).

JPMorgan tech analyst Zong-Yu Tsai points to the adoption of Midplane designs—positioned between compute and switch modules in AI GPU servers—as a key structural change likely to impact the PCB and CCL markets starting in 2027 or later.

Tsai believes the impact will be overwhelmingly positive. Compared with current AI server architectures, Midplane introduces entirely incremental demand. On the materials level alone, this could represent a $1 billion annual opportunity for copper-clad laminate (CCL), given the significant increase in both board area and layer count.

NVIDIA has already adopted the Midplane structure in its NVL 576 servers, with other hyperscalers like Meta and Amazon expected to follow. Tsai forecasts that high-speed CCL will become the mainstream choice in this transition, directly benefiting leading supplier Taiflex.

The second trend centers on the expected shift back to multilayer PCB designs in GPU servers by 2026. Tsai warns that supply will remain tight—or even face shortages—due to rapidly increasing specifications and limited new capacity. More suppliers are likely to enter the AI server supply chain, particularly for large-scale ASIC projects requiring high-layer-count PCBs.

Notably, many of today's mainstream GPU servers still rely on HDI boards produced by Unimicron and Tripod. But with the expected reversion to multilayer boards by 2026, the supply strain in that segment could worsen.

Third, Tsai points to cooling trends in AI server motherboards. While air-cooled systems remain dominant in 2024—including in Q4—liquid-cooled server boards are expected to begin shipping as early as Q3. Although next-generation AI chips are not expected to debut until early 2026, the shift to liquid cooling reflects early preparations across the supply chain for future thermal design upgrades.

These structural changes in server architecture, materials, and thermal design are expected to reshape demand dynamics—and may significantly favor key Taiwanese PCB and CCL suppliers over the coming years.