3D InCites Podcast
3D InCites Podcast
Relocating SEMICON West: Phoenix's Rise in the Semiconductor Industry
SEMI's flagship event, SEMICON West, is moving to Phoenix, Arizona this October 7-9, 2025, after 35 years in San Francisco, coinciding with the region's semiconductor manufacturing boom and $200 billion in announced investments. In this episode, Françoise speaks with SEMI Americas president, Joe Stockunas, who shares reasons for the move and what attendees can expect to experience. This includes:
• Move driven by need to refresh the event and bring it closer to industry growth
• New October timing based on attendee feedback to avoid disrupting July holidays
• CEO Summit featuring keynotes from Arizona Governor Hobbs, TSMC, NVIDIA, and Intel
• Exhibition floor expanding to over 1,500 booths (50% increase from last year)
• Technical tracks focused on advanced packaging, AI, cybersecurity, and workforce development
• Street fair networking event Tuesday evening on 3rd Street
• Student attendance expected to jump from 700 to 7,000 thanks to proximity to Arizona's educational institutions
• Special SemiQuest exhibit at Arizona Science Museum running September through year-end
• Global Semicon events continue growing, with Semicon India doubling to 1,000 booths
For registration and complete program information, visit semiconwest.org or download the event app to navigate the show and build your agenda.
A global association, SEMI represents the entire electronics manufacturing and design supply chain.
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This episode of the 3D Insights podcast is brought to you by SEMI, the leading microelectronics industry association, with programs that help its members grow their business and address top challenges worldwide. With a global focus on advocacy, the microelectronics supply chain, sustainability and workforce development, semi works with industry leaders to align goals, share best practices and accelerate progress. Learn more at semiorg. Hi there, I'm Francoise von Trapp, and this is the 3D Insights Podcast.
Francoise von Trapp:Hi everyone, are you ready for a big change in the semiconductor industry event space this year? Because, if you haven't already noticed, semi's flagship event, semicon West, did not take place in San Francisco in July, like it has for the past 35 years, and that's because SemiCon West 2025 is happening in a new location in Phoenix, arizona, and if you've ever visited Phoenix in July, well, you know that that's not really something you want to do and, trust me, I live here. But by mid-October, which is when Semicon West is happening October 7th to 9th, it should be lovely. So here to talk to me all about it is President of Semi-America's, joe Stacunas. Welcome back to the podcast, joe.
Joe Stockunas:Thank you, Francois. It's great to be with you again and we are very excited about the move to Phoenix and all that we've got planned. So I'm yours.
Francoise von Trapp:So you know, we've been talking about this change for, I think, two years. Let's remind the listeners, though why did we decide to move?
Joe Stockunas:We've been having Semi-Cons for over 50 years and this was really something I personally drove. I've been going to shows for a long time and I really do think that shows have a bit of a life and you've got to change them, You've got to refresh them, You've got to bring something to keep your audience.
Francoise von Trapp:Yeah.
Joe Stockunas:I thought it was a good idea to move it around a little bit and making that choice, I do want to rest assured we're really focused on supporting our communities. You know a lot of shows are in Orlando or Las Vegas, you know, but you know I have a hard time finding any semiconductor employees in Las Vegas. So we really look hard at you know, where could we go, do something a little bit different and excite our audience? And so we looked at Phoenix, we looked at Portland, we looked at San Jose, we looked at Austin and it really came down to. You know, san Francisco and Phoenix are the only two locations in the US that really have a sizable convention center that could host Semi-Columbia. And then, when you combine it with just all what's going on in Phoenix, I mean it is just so exciting. You know I'm tracking how many investments have been announced since Chiptek and we're up to about $600 billion around the country and over 200 of that is in Phoenix.
Francoise von Trapp:So nowhere more exciting than that in Phoenix, so nowhere more exciting than that. Why the decision to go back and forth, then, between Phoenix and San Francisco? Wouldn't it be easier just to keep it here?
Joe Stockunas:Well again, it's a big change. We've been in San Francisco for 35 years. Semicon is a part of that. The one thing I do want to clarify on the show will be in October. We did get feedback. We would often disrupt folks' Independence Day holiday with Semicon West. You know the weekend would be getting over and folks would be going on, and we got feedback. You know a lot of folks want to take vacation with their families and all. So we did get a significant amount of feedback that folks would prefer not to meet in July. So October works well and we do have a very busy Semicon schedule.
Joe Stockunas:As you and I have talked in the past. We have 80 to 100,000 to even more attending our Semicons around the world, and we're up to eight right now. It is a bit of a crowded schedule, but boy, there's just so much going on in our industry and it doesn't appear that there's any resistance to our schedule. The shows just keep getting bigger everywhere. I mentioned the number 180,000 people attend at Semicon China. Wow, last December we had 106,000 people at Semicon Japan. We'll have 80,000 people in Taiwan next month and we're expecting 35,000 to 40,000 at Semicon West this year.
Francoise von Trapp:How about Semicon India, india?
Joe Stockunas:Wow, amazing. Last year was the first year, right? These numbers will blow you away. We were planning on having 60 to 80 booths and we had something like 500. And it's going to double again this year. So we're expecting 1,000 booths in India this year.
Francoise von Trapp:Well, I've definitely been getting news from our members who are participating in India this year, so that's really interesting. But you don't think there's going to be impact on having these shows close together for exhibitors to be able to go to all of them, or do you think they're just dividing and conquering and having different teams at different shows?
Joe Stockunas:There's different teams at different shows, there's different markets, our folks in Asia. We're trying to space the shows in Asia, that there's at least a two-month gap. India is a little different market, but we have Taiwan in September and then we don't have Japan until January and then we have December excuse me, thank you and then Korea's in February, china's in March and then Southeast Asia in May. So we're trying to space things because folks do like to reuse their boots from one show to the next in Asia, but it's not financially viable to ship boots from one continent to the other, from Asia to the US, or so, so folks come to S other, from Asia to the US, or so, so folks come to SEMICA bottom line.
Joe Stockunas:We start the year every year here in the US with ISS and the message that was repeated each day at least once by our speakers on the stage at ISS was it's a good time to be in the semiconductor industry and with that goes along, it's a good time to be with STEMI as well. So our STEMI events are really just tremendous. From our small regional events to our large SEMICONs. It's been a really good turnout.
Francoise von Trapp:Okay, so let's talk about SEMICON West. What are some of the highlights that attendees should plan on from the CEO Summit keynote program this year?
Joe Stockunas:We've got about 12 presentations and a couple of panels. We're doing things a little bit different this year. Last year we went all day on key issues in the US on Tuesday and all day on global issues on Wednesday, and my only disappointment was the keynote stage competed with the show floor and we had great speakers and the speakers in the afternoon deserved a bigger audience. So this year what we're doing is we're just going to keep it to the morning, but we're going to go Tuesday, wednesday, thursday. We've got anchor presentations for each of the days, so, really excited about that. We've had tremendous support from our partners in Arizona and, to point to that, our very first presenter will be Governor Hobbs, the governor of Arizona, and she's a real dynamo and a tremendous supporter of our industry and we're really pleased to have her lead things off. And we'll anchor the day also with the TSMC presentation on Tuesday. Lam's got some really cool technology that we'll showcase on the stage. Tuesday, lam's got some really cool technology that we'll showcase on the stage.
Joe Stockunas:Dupont is spinning off their electronics business on the 1st of November, so this will be an opportunity for the gentleman who currently runs the DuPont electronics business. He'll become the CEO of the new entity and we're giving him an opportunity to talk about the challenges of the global material supply chain. The other thing we're looking to do if I may just Move off just slightly on this to make a point, we've had just tremendous response, great attendance, growth in exhibitors, wonderful content on the show floor. But the other thing that I feel we really should do is we should also have a few each day, a few 10-minute breaks where we recognize different things that are really wonderful for our industry.
Joe Stockunas:And on Tuesday, for example, semi has been selected by a joint funding from the National Science Foundation and the Department of Commerce to operate the National Network for Microelectronics Education. So we'll make that formal announcement and we'll have folks from NSF and DOC on the stage with us. And we're also going to award on Tuesday our Semi-Americas Award, which recognizes really big enabling technology that's had a strong impact on continuing to provide growth in the semiconductor industry. So we'll be making that award as well on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the focus is going to be principally on AI. We can't have a meeting without talking about AI these days. We do have a new chairman of the board of CEMI's governing board and that's Tian Wu, who's the CEO of ASC, and he'll start off the day and share his vision for CEMI in just a few minutes.
Francoise von Trapp:He's a fabulous speaker. I love hearing him.
Joe Stockunas:But our first true keynote presentation will be NVIDIA, such a key player in AI today and semiconductor, so really excited to have the NVIDIA folks with us. I'm encouraging them to bring the dog robot. I think it would be great to have the dog robot on the stage.
Francoise von Trapp:I was just going to say are there going to be any AI demonstrations or is it just going to be a lot of talking about it?
Joe Stockunas:The speaker is their leader for robotics. I'll let the robot chase me around on the stage.
Francoise von Trapp:That'll be fun.
Joe Stockunas:We'll do whatever it takes and we're also going to have a great panel. I've got five industry leaders representing two equipment companies, representing two device manufacturers and a material supplier, and again very leading individuals for our industry, and they're going to talk about the impact on AI, both from a market perspective, but then also how AI will benefit our industry operationally and from an infrastructure perspective.
Francoise von Trapp:That's a big story. Right now, anybody going to be talking about the power drain that AI is creating on the global grid?
Joe Stockunas:That'll come up in the panel as well, and I do expect there'll be others who are going to bring up and show how we have improved the power consumption of semiconductors in the last 30 years by 10,000 fold. We will continue to drive efficiency in semiconductor power efficiency and I am confident that that will come up in that panel discussion. The design community is very vibrant within the STEMI world and John Cabrarian, who's the CEO of PDF and also the co-chair of the ESDA tech community at STEMI, will speak to how AI is creating markets for design and then how AI is enabling design capability at new levels too. So that'll be a great presentation. We're going to have Gil from Amcor Amcor's got a $4 billion investment you know another example of what's going on in Phoenix and he'll talk about advanced packaging, which is so important to enabling AI chips, both from the processor and from a high bandwidth memory perspective. So it'd be great to have him. And then the last presentation is going to be really interesting. We're actually having the folks from Merck. They're bringing in their head of strategy and their head of HR. They call it the chief people person. Those two folks will present a very interesting presentation on how AI will affect the workplace and all the individuals who come to work within the semiconductor industry.
Joe Stockunas:So, again, really exciting day on Wednesday and very much anchored with some really key presentations from leading investors and thought providers, and then on Thursday we're going to take on the challenges in the industry. It's a great time to be in Semi but boy, there's a lot going on and things that we all struggle with. So we've invited Paul DeBar, who I met last month he's the Deputy Secretary of Commerce and invited him to come and share perspective on where the administration is going with supporting the semiconductor industry. We will have an Intel presentation the leader of Intel and then we'll have presentations on workforce development, on sustainability, which will also talk about energy needs, and our last presentation, I think, will be a very interesting one as well.
Joe Stockunas:One of the really driving issues right now is cybersecurity and industrial security as a whole, and Keith Kroc. He was the CEO of DocuSign and also served in the administration as an undersecretary of state. He's focused now on technical diplomacy and basically ensure that we have a safe infrastructure within the global tech network. So I think that'll be a really interesting experience to hear his thoughts on what's important and how we manage that going forward. So that's the CEO Summit. We'll use the CEO stage in the afternoons on Tuesday and Wednesday Great panel discussions. We will have five folks who are leaders in the government affairs organizations within our large companies. We'll have folks from device manufacturers, equipment suppliers and materials Again, that holy trinity that makes up our industry in so many ways on stage with a leading journalist from Reuters and having a discussion around what has become arguably the most significant issue. New to us this year is the increasing uncertainty and questions around tariff and trade.
Francoise von Trapp:I mean, everything's kind of up in the air, joe, isn't it? It's all really up in the air, nothing's certain. The tariff conversation that we have in October might be completely different than the tariff conversation we could have today.
Joe Stockunas:I've been very careful to put a very broad title on the panel discussion for just that reason. God only knows where we'll be Just seven weeks away. Yeah.
Francoise von Trapp:I'm so glad that you're addressing all of these challenges, because I do believe that that's what a lot of people really want to come to hear about and what Semi is doing and what the industry is doing to address the challenges.
Joe Stockunas:We'll have a panel discussion on energy efficiency, which you brought up already, and we will have a panel discussion on the challenges of the global supply chain and you know you see it in the news all the time now critical materials, critical minerals, and how important that is and how challenging it is, so that'll all get discussed. Finally, we'll have something that I personally have been going to for 30 years and always get a kick out of. We'll bring the Wall Street analysts on the stage for our bulls and bears and get their perspective on how things are going. You know that 401k is probably looking pretty good for you and everyone else right now, francois.
Francoise von Trapp:It took a big dive in April.
Joe Stockunas:It's coming back, but you know we're really helping a lot of portfolios right now, so it'll be fun to have those folks there as well.
Francoise von Trapp:I want to encourage people who are attending to make sure they make time, especially to stay through to Thursday morning, because we often see where the hot days are Tuesday and Wednesday and people start trickling out on Thursday. But it seems like a lot of those challenges are going to be addressed on Thursday, so plan accordingly. Listeners, how about some of the technical tracks? How is that being handled?
Joe Stockunas:I walked away from last year's SemiCon West with some of the thoughts that really hit me, and the number one thought was my last assignment when I was in industry. I led a back-end packaging and test business and we were very fortunate. We got involved in advanced packaging early and did really well with it. I can go back almost 10 years now, but it was always referred to as the future, and I walked away from Semicon West last year with the first item that hit me at Semicon West is the future of advanced packaging is now heterogeneous integration, the technologies that are moving forward, the challenges, how chiplets will make everything work a little bit better, what the testing challenges are as we go forward. So that's been very prevalent. We will also have a full day on cybersecurity. So what goes on in the keynote stage? In many cases, we will then have a day or up to three days of content at the show. In total, we have over 500 speakers, 63 sessions of content. There'll be something for everyone.
Joe Stockunas:One of the things that's new this year I really want to feature. Our industry has been the place where companies do startup work, and before you know it, they're NVIDIA and they're worth $4 trillion. So you know people who start off in Denny's end up being the most valued company in the world. We're co-sponsoring with Plug and Play this year an afternoon session that will focus on the progression from basically being a startup to raising venture capital and what it takes and how to be successful in developing new technologies. You will have test and vision, as we've had for the last few years. Again, that lies very nicely with some of the things that are going on with advanced packaging. There'll be a smattering of the future. You'll see presentations on quantum computing and where that's going and how fast it's actually coming. Bottom line is there's something for everyone at Semicom West this year.
Francoise von Trapp:Of course, we don't want to leave out the exhibitors. While you're spending time in all of the sessions, also make sure to walk through the floors, because how many exhibitors do we have this year?
Joe Stockunas:We've got more than 1,500 booths occupied and last year in Moscone, to give you some feel, we were at 1,053. So I'm rather confident that we'll get up to right around a 50% increase in exhibition space and we will have plenty of product. But we also have folks who are looking to develop market and folks from the economic development organizations around the world will be present at West. West is very firm in its position as the place where the thought leaders, the know, the movers and shakers of the semiconductor industry come together every year for three days and we'll also, on Monday, before the show starts, we'll have our market symposium, which is very popular. We get five 600 people to come and pay a little bit extra to hear what the market analysts are thinking is going to happen in the market in the next 12 months or so. So that also is a key feature for it.
Joe Stockunas:I mentioned that I really want to do a little bit more celebration and recognition. So we've got something pretty much every day on the keynote stage that we're recognizing folks who are making a difference in our industry. We'll have a 20 under 30 recognition, which is 20 people under 30 years. We're recognizing a European company that's been in Phoenix for more than 30 years and have been a real mover and shaker in technology that's been enabling and continues to enable key players in the heterogeneous integration world today. So we'll recognize them. We'll have our semiemi-Technology Award, and then what I think is really going to be fun is we're having a street fair on Tuesday evening. Convention Center straddles 3rd Street in Phoenix and we're able to shut down the street and we'll have a street fair from 8 to 11 on Tuesday evening as well. So we'll have a country-western band, we'll have all kinds of theme in the street and I'm very confident that we'll have a really good time for everyone.
Francoise von Trapp:I was just going to ask you about the networking. So there's the street fair. I mean, we know that a lot of companies have their own satellite parties. Is that going to be different this year? People going to be expecting to get invitations to different functions to be different this year.
Joe Stockunas:People are going to be expecting to get invitations to different functions. So we're very cognizant of that and you can certainly have a lot of fun because usually late in the day, around four o'clock, we have a happy hours and different adjacent to the show floor where, you know again, the different communities come together for a quick networking session for an hour or so and then basically from 530 to 830, there's a lot of hospitality held by our member companies and we're not going to get in the way of that. Our event starts at about 8.30 at night and we expect it to go to 11. We're really looking to present quite the party, so there'll be opportunities for folks to get together, network and socialize from 4 pm to about 11 on Tuesday night and then some of the vendors are actually going to use that space on 3rd Street on Wednesday night for their hospitality as well.
Francoise von Trapp:Okay, well, it sounds like a really good old Phoenix. Good time.
Joe Stockunas:Absolutely.
Francoise von Trapp:People need to pace themselves. Hydrate people. This is Phoenix. Even if it's cooler, it's still dry. I cannot stress this enough Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate.
Joe Stockunas:I do have a task for you. I'm a little nervous about the temperature, and this is where I cannot stress this enough Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate. I do have a task for you. I'm a little nervous about the temperature, and this is where you come in. You're the coolest person in the semiconductor industry, so I've got to have you right smack in the center of Third Street. So just to ensure that if we need to cool things down a little bit, it's just your presence will take care of that. So I'm really looking forward to having you there?
Francoise von Trapp:Oh my God, front and center. Yeah, yeah, I know I'm looking forward to it. I've been waiting a long time to have Semicon West in Phoenix, so it's going to be great. Heck, I don't even have to get a hotel room, I'm just going to Uber in and out every day. Save on parking and not have to worry about the traffic.
Joe Stockunas:You're not going to Waymo. I'm a little disappointed. You're not going to Waymo. I love Waymo. I love Waymo.
Francoise von Trapp:I'm not an early adopter, I'm really not.
Joe Stockunas:It's worked great for me. I've been doing it for the last year or so.
Francoise von Trapp:I do know that some people prefer Waymo because they don't have to deal with creepy drivers. So there's that, and I hear actually that Waymo has expanded into other countries and that they're having Waymo in Paris and London. So maybe it will be time to try it out, you know. So I don't know, We'll see. So we've been talking a lot about Arizona's chip making boom, but we haven't talked about how Arizona is a hub for industry talent development. So you know we've got industry and government and academia all working together here. Can you talk a little bit about the workforce development activities that are going to happen at Semicon West?
Joe Stockunas:So you're absolutely right about Arizona. We are thrilled to be in Arizona. Semi has been I mentioned a little bit earlier. Semi's been selected to operate the National Network for Microelectronics Education and we have a strong team focused on workforce development in the Arizona community already and a lot going on there. At the show itself we will have three days of programming nonstop, featured on the keynote stage but then a workforce development pavilion which is a hotbed of activity, and this year we're really expecting it to be a hotbed because the community in Arizona is so much.
Joe Stockunas:Arizona State has 32,000 engineering students and then of course Maricopa Community College and the community college structure in Phoenix is really focused on supporting our industry. And of course U of A is right there as well and there's a really integrated activity between SEMI, the semiconductor community within Phoenix, and the advanced education program. So last year we had about 700 students at Semicon West in San Francisco. We're in the summer Students are away from school Having it in Phoenix, having it during the school year time. We're expecting that 700 to grow to 7,000 this year.
Joe Stockunas:And then we also have a special feature I'd like to share with you too. It'll be happening and it'll be featured very prominently during Semi-West but it'll be operating for several months, from September through the end of the year. At the Arizona Science Museum we're having a featured exhibit called SemiQuest and it'll really provide an opportunity for younger students students in middle school and high school to get an appreciation of how semiconductor processing takes place. So really excited that again it's not just for three days and our workplace development focus in Phoenix it never stops. It's there day in and day out.
Francoise von Trapp:I'm excited to hear about SemiQuest because I think Jillian and I need to pay a visit and maybe cover that for 3D Insights as well, and we've got some opportunity for that too. So it's nice to know that it's going to be there between September and November.
Joe Stockunas:We greatly appreciate you coming by. So where can people go to learn more? Hey, semiconwestorg, it's all there. So we've got, as I said, 63 sessions of content. Over 500 speakers can find out how to register and get a hotel room Everything you need. We will also have an app that you can load onto your phone and, when you're at the show, it'll make it easy for you to get around and develop your agenda for the three days and get the very most possible out of a wonderful event Really the premier event in the semiconductor world in the United States each year.
Francoise von Trapp:So I'm really excited and looking forward to seeing you, Joe, again at Semicon West. And yeah, thanks for joining me today.
Joe Stockunas:Francois, I can't say enough about what a great supporter of SEMI you are and I really appreciate being here with you today and I look forward to seeing you as our partner at the show in October. Thank you.
Francoise von Trapp:Thanks so much. There's lots more to come, so tune in next time to the 3D Insights podcast. The 3D Insights podcast is a production of 3D Insights LLC.