Will the explosive popularity of the AI agent Muse benefit hardware? Jefferies: Server CPUs are back in the spotlight; PCBs and ABF substrates may see a revaluation.

Will the explosive popularity of the AI agent Muse benefit hardware? Jefferies: Server CPUs are back in the spotlight; PCBs and ABF substrates may see a revaluation.

The phenomenal success of Meta's AI agent Muse is drawing market attention back to the server CPU supply chain. Jefferies believes that as AI accelerates its evolution from chatbots to agent applications, the demand for computing power in inference, orchestration, and infrastructure layers will continue to expand, potentially creating a systemic revaluation opportunity for PCB and ABF substrate suppliers.

Muse topped the US iOS App Store free app chart on September 18, just 10 days after its launch. Jefferies, in its latest research report, points out that this achievement signifies that AI agents are moving from niche tools to mainstream consumer products, reigniting discussions about server CPU demand.

According to market forecasts, Jefferies expects the total addressable market (TAM) for AI PCBs to grow from $7 billion in 2025 to $73 billion in 2030, representing a CAGR of approximately 60%; the ABF substrate TAM is expected to expand from $8 billion to $30 billion during the same period, representing a CAGR of approximately 30%. These figures provide clear medium- to long-term growth support for related supply chain stocks.

Muse Goes Viral: AI-Powered Agents Enter the Mainstream of Consumer Life

Meta's Muse is not the first AI agent product aimed at ordinary consumers, but thanks to the endorsement of a major company and its mainstream product positioning, it has become one of the most well-known cases of bringing the concept of "intelligent agent" into the public eye.

Jefferies points out that while similar products were previously targeted at professional users or high-end paid tools, Muse's launch strategy is distinctly different—encapsulating AI agent functionality into a consumer-grade product usable in everyday life. Reaching the top of the US iOS free app charts in just 10 days has prompted the market to re-evaluate the pace of large-scale deployment of AI agents.

Jefferies believes this event will be one of the key drivers for the market's renewed focus on server CPU demand – agent applications consume significantly more computing power for inference, multitasking, and underlying infrastructure than traditional chatbot scenarios.

ABF substrates: Structural growth coupled with capacity squeeze effect

At the ABF substrate level, Jefferies stated that major suppliers from Japan, South Korea, and Europe will continue to benefit from strong demand for server CPUs. Product iteration trends—larger package areas, higher layer counts, and more complex designs—are putting continuous pressure on yield control and production capacity, thereby raising industry barriers.

At the same time, the expansion of ABF substrate production overlaps to some extent with BT substrate production in terms of raw materials and equipment. This structural feature will create an extrusion effect on BT substrate production.

According to Prismark data and Jefferies forecasts, ABF substrate TAM is expected to grow from $8 billion in 2025 to $30 billion in 2030, with server CPUs and AI accelerators being the two core sources of demand driving this growth.

In terms of overall volume, Jefferies predicts that server CPU shipments will grow from approximately 29 million units in 2025 to approximately 75 million units in 2030, covering three types of scenarios: general-purpose, AI head nodes, and standalone AI deployments, with an average annual compound growth rate in the double digits.

In terms of overall TAM for AI PCBs, Jefferies (citing Prismark data) predicts that the market size will expand from approximately $7 billion in 2025 to approximately $73 billion in 2030, with a five-year CAGR of approximately 60%, with CPUs, NVIDIA and non-NVIDIA accelerators, switches, and optical modules all contributing to the incremental growth.

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