Sealand: The AI wave drives a significant increase in material demand, maintaining a "recommended" rating for the basic chemical industry.

Sealand released a research report stating that the AI wave is expected to drive the industry chain into a new era. As the foundation material of various industries, the chemical industry is expected to usher in a new development pattern. With the drive of AI, the demand for related chemical materials is expected to maintain sustainable growth. Under the promotion of AI, the pace of technological progress and innovation is expected to accelerate, and at the same time, the process of replacing imported "bottleneck" materials with domestic ones is expected to accelerate. Taking into account the empowerment and driving effect of AI on the chemical industry, the basic chemical industry is maintained at a "recommended" rating. Sealand's main points are as follows: The increase in computing power and the trend of liquid cooling technology, liquid cooling materials have great potential. The rapid development of AI technology has increased the demand for high-performance computing in related industries, thereby placing higher requirements on equipment cooling. Liquid cooling technology uses liquid instead of air as a cooling medium, directly or indirectly contacting heat-generating devices with liquid, which can significantly improve cooling efficiency and effectively meet the high cooling demand of single points, whole cabinets, and data centers. AI chips are the core of artificial intelligence, driving the major development of semiconductor materials. AI chips are the core of AI and will experience rapid development and application under the AI wave. Semiconductor materials are the foundation of chips. Benefiting from the pull of AI demand, semiconductor materials will have greater development space, and the pace of technological innovation and domestic substitution will be further accelerated. Semiconductor materials are mainly divided into manufacturing materials (silicon wafers/compound semiconductors, photoresists, wet chemicals, electronic gases, masks, CMP polishing liquids and pads, sputtering targets, etc.) and packaging materials. Among them, the nationalization rate of several core consumables in the semiconductor industry is generally low, with strong demand for domestic substitution, which is expected to achieve a significant increase in demand and technological breakthroughs in the rapid development of AI. Under the drive of AI, the demand for equipment and components is expected to grow, high-frequency high-speed PCBs are expected to become the mainstream, and the PCB industry chain is expected to be reshaped and benefited. Printed circuit boards (PCBs) are the key electronic interconnect components of electronic products and are known as the "mother of electronic products." The rapid development of AI requires high computing power, which places higher demands on equipment, the number and quality of electronic components, leading to increased demand for PCBs. High-frequency high-speed PCBs are expected to become the mainstream of future development. According to Prismark, it is expected that the global PCB production value will reach 94.661 billion dollars in 2029, with a CAGR of 5.2% from 2024 to 2029, and the global PCB production value will experience a revival. The demand for PCB industry chain-related materials is expected to be reshaped in the new development pattern. The demand for MLCC powder for AI servers is expected to surge, driving the prosperity of the MLCC industry. With the improvement of MLCC reliability and integration, its range of applications is becoming increasingly wide, being widely used in various military and civilian electronic devices, making MLCC known as the "staple food of the electronics industry." According to the China Electronic Components Industry Association, the industry expects that by 2027, the global MLCC market size will reach 118 billion yuan, with a CAGR of 5.46% from 2024 to 2027, and the global demand for MLCC will reach 5.8312 trillion units, with a CAGR of 3.36% from 2024 to 2027. The cost of MLCC primarily consists of ceramic powders, internal electrodes, external electrodes, packaging materials, labor costs, depreciation of equipment, and others. New display technologies are the window through which AI presents itself and are expected to lead a new round of development in optical display materials. As the carrier of digital era information presentation and human-machine interaction, display panels are the core portal for humans to obtain visual information, and the display industry is deeply integrated with emerging industries such as artificial intelligence, 5G, and the Internet of Things. Many areas of AI require new display technologies as presentation carriers, and the new demand brought by AI will lead to rapid development of new display technologies, benefiting related display and optical materials. China's optical film, OLED emitting materials, OCA adhesives, and other materials are still in the second or third echelon and lag behind companies in the United States, Japan, and South Korea, indicating a high demand for domestic substitution. Risk warning: AI technology development and demand growth are not as expected, technological iteration risks, new project production progress is not as expected, new material technology development and domestic substitution are not as expected, raw material prices fluctuate significantly, industry competition intensifies, international situation becomes unstable, industry policies change significantly, concerns about company performance growth not meeting expectations and valuation risks causing a decline.