AT&S shares surge over 450% in AI hardware boom

AT&S, an electronics company based in Leoben, Austria, has seen its shares rise more than 450 percent this year as demand grows for hardware used in artificial intelligence systems.

The company makes integrated circuit substrates, which connect chips to computer memory and power supplies. The components are used in advanced AI systems and high-speed data processing.

Chief executive Michael Mertin said AT&S shows that Europe can still occupy important niches in the AI race, even if it cannot match US rivals in chip innovation or Asian firms in production scale.

Founded in 1987, AT&S first made printed circuit boards before entering the integrated circuit substrate business in 2016, when it began serial production at a plant in Chongqing, China. It opened a second factory for the substrates in Malaysia in 2024.

The company's Hinterberg plant in Leoben is its global headquarters and research and development base. After more than 500 million euros in investment in a research and production centre opened last year, the site has become Europe's only major commercial manufacturer of advanced integrated circuit substrates.

Malcolm Penn, chairman of semiconductor consultancy Future Horizons, said AT&S was among the few European companies directly benefiting from demand for AI hardware. He said the substrates are critical because they help reduce power consumption and noise while increasing speed.

Senior operations director Barbara Decker-Schloegl said customer inquiries were rising across the company. Mertin said he did not expect demand for AI computing modules to slump foreseeably.

About 2,200 people from more than 70 countries work at the Leoben site, in a former iron mining town of about 28,000 people in Styria. Decker-Schloegl said around 60 percent of staff are Austrian and that AT&S is one of the region's largest employers.

Kerstin Neukamp, a spokeswoman for the mayor's office, said AT&S had brought highly qualified jobs and more international visibility to the town, while also increasing demand for housing, education, childcare and other city services.