Yageo's Chen Tai-ming becomes Taiwan's richest person with 490 billion! The passive component king's AI stock soars 125% annually

Yageo Chairman Terry Gou's net worth of 15.6 billion USD (about 490 billion TWD) ranks first on Forbes' real-time billionaire list in Taiwan, surpassing Foxconn founder Terry Gou, who had held the top spot for many years. Yageo's stock price has surged 125% this year, with a market capitalization breaking through the trillion-dollar mark. The driving force behind this is the explosive demand for passive components in AI servers, where a high-end AI server uses MLCCs equivalent to 30 times the amount used in smartphones.
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• AI servers consume 30 times more MLCCs than smartphones
• The 49-year layout of the acquisition king
• Frequently Asked Questions

The Forbes list was officially announced in May, and 69-year-old Terry Gou rose from third to first. He started from scratch and took 49 years to transform a small ceramic capacitor factory into a global passive component giant. When AI became a hot trend, he was dethroned as the richest person by the industry’s new leader.

AI servers consume 30 times more MLCCs than smartphones

The strategic importance of passive components in the AI era is being redefined. A high-end AI server uses approximately 10 to 15 times more multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) than a typical server, and 30 times more than smartphones. For each Blackwell GPU card sold by NVIDIA, a whole array of passive components is shipped along with it.

Yageo reported its best-ever Q1 performance this year, with consolidated revenue of 38.16 billion TWD, up 22.7% year-over-year; net profit of 8 billion TWD, up 44.6%; earnings per share of 3.9 TWD; and a gross margin of 38.1%, hitting a 14-quarter high. Revenue from AI-related applications has increased to 15%, with tantalum polymer capacitors accounting for over 30% of revenue from AI applications. The company says this figure is still accelerating.

The MLCC price increase cycle has been established. Major manufacturers like Murata in Japan and Samsung Electro-Mechanics in Korea are shifting capacity toward high-end products, and Yageo is taking on a large volume of spillover orders. Since Q4 last year, the company has repeatedly adjusted prices, with the effects directly reflected in improved gross margins.

The 49-year layout of the acquisition king

Terry Gou co-founded Yageo in 1977 with his brother Terry Chen, starting with ceramic capacitors and resistors. In recent years, the global acquisition strategy includes the American firm KEMET (acquired for $1.6 billion), Pulse Electronics, Germany’s Hella Sensory Division, France’s Schneider Industrial Sensors Division, and Japan’s Shibaura Electronics, transforming Yageo into the world’s largest chip resistor and tantalum capacitor manufacturer, and the third-largest MLCC producer. The nickname “Passive Component Acquisition King” is well earned.

Currently, about 75% of Yageo’s revenue comes from high-threshold applications such as AI, automotive, industrial standards, medical, and aerospace defense—products built over nearly two decades through acquisitions.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Terry Gou’s net worth, and where does he rank globally?

According to the latest Forbes real-time billionaire list, Yageo Chairman Terry Gou’s net worth is approximately $15.6 billion (about 490 billion TWD), ranking 186th worldwide, surpassing Terry Gou to become Taiwan’s richest person.

Why has Yageo’s stock price surged so much this year?

Mainly due to the explosive increase in demand for MLCCs in AI servers (usage per machine is 30 times that of smartphones). Coupled with the start of a price increase cycle for MLCCs, Yageo’s Q1 revenue grew 22.7% year-over-year, net profit increased 44.6%, leading to a 125% rise in stock price from the beginning of the year.