GF SEC: Urgent demand for automation equipment driven by optical modules and servers.

GF SEC released a research report stating that benefiting from the global AI infrastructure boom, the demand for optical modules and server assembly markets continues to grow, and the expansion of production lines + technological iteration also brings about the demand for automated production lines. With leading manufacturers maintaining high capital expenditure, equipment vendors are expected to continue to benefit. The agency recommends focusing on companies that layout equipment for optical module packaging, testing and automated assembly and inspection of servers. Key points from GF SEC: Benefiting from strong demand for AI infrastructure, the market space for optical modules is further opening up Optical modules are core devices in optical communication for achieving photoelectric/electro-optical conversion. Under the dual logic of Scale-Up+Scale-Out, the market potential for ultra-high-speed optical modules is being further opened up. On one hand, Scale-Out as the main source of demand for optical modules, with the increasing requirements for data transmission rates, the demand for iteration from 800G to 1.6T/3.2T benefits optical modules; on the other hand, as traditional copper cable connections in ScaleUp approach bottlenecks, the penetration rate of future optical interconnect technologies in Scale-Up networks is expected to increase. According to the Zhongji Innolight 25 semi-annual report citing Lightcounting forecast data, the global Ethernet optical module market is expected to grow from $18.9 billion in 2026 to $35 billion in 2030. Optical module equipment: Capacity expansion + technological iteration, strong demand for automated production lines In the past, optical module production was a labor-intensive industry, and capacity expansion relied on a significant increase in the number of employees. However, with the current increase in optical module production and the significant improvement in production accuracy requirements, manual assembly can no longer meet the demands of optical module preparation, and the demand for automated production lines has arisen. From the process perspective, optical module manufacturing includes multiple processes such as die bonding, wire bonding, optical coupling, packaging, and aging testing, with equipment involving die bonding machines, bonding machines, coupling machines, testing equipment, etc. According to the prospectus of Lichang Intelligent citing Frost & Sullivan data, the global market size of optical module packaging and testing equipment is expected to increase from 590 million yuan in 2020 to 10.16 billion yuan in 2029, with a CAGR of 37.2%, with die bonding machines, optical coupling machines, and testing machines being the most core equipment, and relatively high unit prices. Automated assembly equipment for servers: Following the "Fruit Chain" example, the trend towards production line automation is inevitable AI data center servers are generally composed of "computing cards - computing nodes - cabinets - clusters", with server manufacturing levels divided into Level1-Level12, a total of 12 levels based on integration. Drawing on the development path of "Fruit Chain" enterprises, although AI server contract manufacturing is still mainly in the early stage of manual assembly, in the future, as the complexity of servers increases and assembly difficulty gradually increases, the demand for production line automation is expected to gradually emerge, thereby driving the demand for automation equipment. Risk warning Expansion of optical module production falls short of expectations, server assembly line automation falls short of expectations, global AI infrastructure investment falls short of expectations, risks of technological iteration and deteriorating competitive landscape.