Taiwan's CCL makers including Iteq and Taiwan Union Technology (TUC) will see their shipments of high-frequency/speed CCL materials for 5G base station application rise significantly in the third quarter of the year, as China telecom operators have resumed procurement bids for sub-6GHz network equipment, according to industry sources.

China has slowed down its construction of 5G base stations over the past year, but it is still expected to command 70% of global equipment demand for such facilities in 2021, given that its major telecom operators have planned to build over 700,000 sub-6GHz 5G base stations by the end of the year, including 242,000 recently up for equipment bidding at China Telecom and China Unicom and another 520,000 stations by China Mobile and China Broadcasting Network, the sources said.

Iteq, which mainly supplies CCL to China's PCB makers Shennan Circuits and Wus Printed Circuit for applications to ZTE's 5G base station equipment, was asked by clients to start volume production in mid-second quarter, and is therefore upbeat about its shipments for this segment in the second half of the year, the sources indicated.

TUC, a major CCL vendor in the supply chain of Huawei's 5G base station equipment, also sees a significant rebound in demand for 5G infrastructure applications in second-half 2021, although its shipments were notably dented by tough US trade sanctions on Huawei, the sources said. Other smaller telecom equipment makers in China are actively seeking cooperation with TUC for the development of high-end antenna modules for 5G base stations, added the sources.