Ajinomoto raises AI chip-film prices 30% as profit jumps 127%

Ajinomoto (TYO: 2802), the 117-year-old Japanese maker of MSG, which also produces the film that insulates nearly every advanced AI chip, has raised its prices by about 30%. 

The company has also lifted its full-year forecast after it experienced a 127% increase in its quarterly revenue. 

How did Ajinomoto become critical to AI technology? 

Ajinomoto, which most people know for a seasoning invented in 1909, has now become an important pillar of the AI hardware supply chain through its product, Ajinomoto Build-up Film (ABF). It is a thin resin layer that provides electrical insulation inside the substrates of high-performance processors. 

Ajinomoto currently holds more than 95% of the ABF market, with Sekisui Chemical accounting for roughly the remaining 5%. A single AI accelerator can require between 8 and 16 layers of the film, which Nvidia, Intel, and AMD all rely on to insulate the microscopic wiring inside their chip packages. 

Ajinomoto revealed that the technology of ABF traces back to its amino acid chemistry research, the same science behind MSG. The film was first adopted by a semiconductor manufacturer in 1999 and has been refined since then to keep pace with denser CPUs. Notably, big tech is projected to spend more than $670 billion on AI infrastructure in 2026, as reported by Cryptopolitan.

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