Major players like Micron Technology (MU.US) are expanding their presence in Asia, and GVT, a rising star in the semiconductor industry, firmly believes that the AI boom is far from over.

As tech giants such as Micron Technology (MU.US) and Infineon Technologies (IFNNY.US) build new factories in Asia, Singapore chip equipment maker Grand Venture Technology Ltd (GVT) is benefiting.

GVT chief executive Julian Ng said demand for AI chips would grow in the coming years as more industries adopted AI agents such as Microsoft (MSFT.US) Copilot in healthcare, education and finance. That is good news for emerging equipment suppliers such as GVT, as chipmakers need to invest in their production systems.

“We are riding the AI wave,” said Mr Ng, adding that the AI bubble talk was wrong because many industries have yet to adopt the technology.

While GVT remains a niche player in the chip ecosystem, its annual revenue and share price have grown threefold since its 2019 listing on the Singapore stock exchange. The company has benefited from the growth of the chip industry in Asia, selling manufacturing tools for factories from Malaysia to China.

Mr Ng said Asia would remain the main location for the global chip supply chain despite efforts by the US and Europe to build chip factories at home.

“It won’t be that easy to bring manufacturing back because it takes years of qualification and understanding of the ecosystem,” he said.

GVT has developed technologies such as hybrid bonding, which allows more layers of chips to be stacked in a single package, increasing the efficiency of the product. The technology is key to producing complex semiconductors such as high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, which are widely used in AI computing to provide faster data access speeds and lower energy consumption.

Many chipmakers are ramping up production in Southeast Asia. Last week, Micron announced a $7bn plan to produce HBM chips in Singapore. Infineon began producing data centre chips at a $7.2bn plant in Malaysia last year and is currently building a new power module factory in Thailand.

However, Donald Trump’s tariff policies as US president have created uncertainty for the chip industry. Citigroup analysts Atif Malik and Elizabeth Sun warned last week that weak consumer demand and a slowdown in the global economy could also affect capital spending by large chipmakers such as Samsung Electronics and Intel (INTC.US).

GVT is considering a secondary listing in Kuala Lumpur to diversify its investor base. Mr Ng did not give details of the listing plan but said the funds raised would help the company grow its business and fund acquisitions of advanced materials companies.