ASE Investment Holdings (日月光投控) is adding US$1 billion each to buildings and to equipment capital spending this year specifically for its LEAP advanced packaging line, with a company target of doubling LEAP revenue by 2027, according to CNA (E5). The added spending comes alongside comments from Chief Operating Officer Tien-Yu Wu (吳田玉), who told reporters that customer order visibility "has not only extended through this year, but into next year as well," per UDN's report on the July 30, 2026 earnings call (E9). CNA and UDN both frame the LEAP-specific capex increase as tied directly to this extended order horizon, though neither source discloses order volumes or specific customer names.
ASE Semiconductor (日月光半導體) announced it will pay cash to acquire land and an above-ground building in the Chungli Industrial Zone (中壢工業區) of Taoyuan from snack company Kuai Kuai (乖乖). CNA reported the price as approximately NT$5.672 billion (E1), while UDN's figure was NT$5.673 billion — a discrepancy on the order of NT$10 million between the two outlets' reporting of the same deal. UDN additionally specified the physical scope of the transaction: roughly 11,400 ping (坪) of land and about 8,862 ping of building space (E13).
Separately, ASE Semiconductor agreed to pay NT$6.3 billion to acquire part of AUO's (友達) plant and related ancillary facilities at the Luzhu Road Science Park (路科) in Kaohsiung, per CNA (E2). As part of the deal, ASE will compensate AUO for the cost of removing its process and facility equipment, estimated at approximately NT$500 million before tax (E3). For AUO, the sale is expected to generate a disposal gain of about NT$4.28 billion, net of transaction fees and estimated taxes (E4). On timing, AUO Chief Financial Officer Bo-Yi Chang (張博儀) said the fifth-generation C5E fab at the Kaohsiung site is still operating, and the company still needs to plan a production halt and apply to regulators for a use-change approval — meaning there is currently no handover schedule (E15).
Combined, the Kuai Kuai and AUO transactions total NT$11.973 billion, according to UDN's tally of the two land-and-plant deals announced the same day (E14).
| Transaction | Counterparty | Amount | Additional detail |
|---|---|---|
| Chungli land & building | Kuai Kuai (乖乖) | NT$5.672B (CNA) / NT$5.673B (UDN) | Land ~11,400 ping; building ~8,862 ping |
| Luzhu plant & facilities | AUO (友達) | NT$6.3B | Equipment-removal compensation to AUO: ~NT$500M (untaxed) |
| Combined total | — | NT$11.973B | Per UDN tally of both deals |
| AUO disposal gain | — | ~NT$4.28B | Net of transaction fees and estimated taxes |
According to UDN, ASE Investment Holdings (日月光投控) originally planned roughly US$7 billion in capex for 2026 at the start of the year, raised that to US$8.5 billion at its April earnings call, and then signaled a second upward revision at the July 30 briefing because the US$8.5 billion figure proved insufficient (E7, E16). The company has not disclosed the exact revised figure, but analysts cited by UDN estimate it will break past US$10 billion to reach approximately US$10.5 billion — which would mark the company's largest capex ever, an increase of about 23% from the prior US$8.5 billion plan (E6, E8). Of the full-year total, analysts estimate about US$4 billion will go toward new buildings and infrastructure and US$6.5 billion toward production equipment, supporting expansion of LEAP advanced packaging as well as mainstream packaging and test capacity (E17). Within that total, the US$1 billion-plus-US$1 billion added specifically for LEAP buildings and equipment noted above (E5) forms part of the broader increase.
| Capex milestone | Amount | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Original plan (start of 2026) | ~US$7B | UDN |
| Revised at April earnings call | US$8.5B | UDN |
| Second revision (analyst estimate) | ~US$10.5B (+23%) | UDN, analyst estimate |
| — of which: buildings/infrastructure | ~US$4B | UDN, analyst estimate |
| — of which: production equipment | ~US$6.5B | UDN, analyst estimate |
| — of which: LEAP-specific addition | +US$1B buildings, +US$1B equipment | CNA |
ASE Investment Holdings forecast its consolidated revenue for the current quarter to grow 21% to 22% quarter-on-quarter, with gross margin around 25% to 25.5% and operating margin of 11.5% to 12.5%, according to UDN's report of the earnings briefing (E10). Within that, the Assembly, Test and Materials (ATM) business — the packaging and testing segment — is expected to see revenue grow 11% to 13% quarter-on-quarter, with gross margin rising from 27.3% in the second quarter to 28% to 29%, and potentially exceeding 30% in the fourth quarter (E11). The Electronic Manufacturing Services (EMS) business is forecast to grow revenue by roughly 40% quarter-on-quarter, which the company described as another major driver of this quarter's growth (E12).
| Metric | This quarter forecast |
|---|---|
| Consolidated revenue (QoQ) | +21% to +22% |
| Consolidated gross margin | 25% to 25.5% |
| Consolidated operating margin | 11.5% to 12.5% |
| ATM revenue (QoQ) | +11% to +13% |
| ATM gross margin | 28% to 29% (from 27.3% in Q2); Q4 target >30% |
| EMS revenue (QoQ) | ~+40% |
The property purchases and the capex revision are reported by CNA and UDN as separate but same-day disclosures, and together they outline a company adding physical capacity at the same time it is raising overall spending: the NT$11.973 billion in land and plant deals with Kuai Kuai and AUO (E14) sit alongside a capex plan that has moved from roughly US$7 billion to US$8.5 billion and now toward an analyst-estimated US$10.5 billion (E16, E8), of which about US$4 billion is earmarked for buildings and infrastructure (E17) — the same category the Chungli and Luzhu land purchases fall under. The LEAP-specific US$1 billion-plus-US$1 billion addition (E5) and COO Wu's comment on order visibility extending into next year (E9) were both disclosed at the same briefing where the quarterly revenue and margin forecasts were given (E10, E11, E12), tying the capacity expansion to the near-term demand outlook the company described. On the AUO side, the still-undetermined handover timeline for the Kaohsiung plant (E15) means the physical capacity from that acquisition is not yet available, even though the transaction price and AUO's expected disposal gain (E2, E4) have already been set.
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