This ‘Hidden’ Market Is Quietly Essential

Managing Editor’s Note: This IPO season is shaping up to be one for the history books…

It started with SpaceX… but Anthropic and OpenAI are hot on its heels, lining up to be the next trillion-dollar-plus IPOs this year.

That’s why Jeff is hosting a briefing next week to discuss his strategy for playing this historic IPO season…

And while he’s there, he’ll even reveal three of his top recommendations for playing three major upcoming IPOs – Anthropic, OpenAI, and one that few seem to be talking about…

Just go here to sign up with one click to join him next Wednesday, September 16, at 8 p.m. ET…

A Market Hidden in Plain Sight

Jeff Brown

Founder and CEO

Electronic design automation (EDA) is the software that underpins semiconductor design. It is what makes today’s extremely complex semiconductors possible.

And most investors have never heard of it.

The process begins with a simple question: What should the chip do?

An engineer might want a processor that can run an artificial intelligence model, control a self-driving vehicle, or connect a smartphone to a wireless network. The engineer describes those goals in software.

Key parameters like the size of the chip, the electricity budget, and memory requirements are also determined. EDA tools help translate the instructions into the billions of switches and connections required to make the chip work.

But the initial blueprint is only the beginning.

The software determines where each component should sit. It routes the electrical connections between them. It tests whether signals can arrive at precisely the right time. It models how much electricity the design will consume and whether it will generate too much heat.

Then it checks every microscopic feature against the manufacturing rules supplied by the semiconductor foundry. A design can work perfectly in theory and still be useless if a factory cannot manufacture it at scale and with high manufacturing yields.

We can think of EDA software as the architect, engineering team, and building inspector rolled into one.

The reason most investors have never heard of EDA is that its customers are other technology companies. Yet, the EDA market grows about 13% a year, nearly twice the 7% growth rate of total semiconductor research and development spending.

The reason for the faster growth rate is simple. Each new semiconductor manufacturing node requires more software, verification, simulation, and design iterations.

As the industry moves closer to the atomic scale, semiconductors get more complex and costly to develop.

And we can see that the fastest-growing segments of EDA are software and verification. Yet, the cost of EDA software is small compared with the cost of a failed or delayed chip.

When the downside is measured in hundreds of millions or billions of dollars, customers do not experiment with unproven tools to save a modest amount of money.

The AI race is forcing every major technology company to explore custom processors optimized for its own models and workloads. Those designs are becoming more complex with every generation, even as the semiconductor engineering workforce fails to keep pace.

That will make the electronic design automation software even more important in the coming years as it enables engineers to increase their efficiency.

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The AI Buildout Has Years to Run

Nick Rokke

Senior Analyst

The American interstate system is estimated to have cost $128.9 billion. Those are nominal dollars. Adjusting to 1944 dollars—the year the Federal-Aid Highway Act was signed—the final price tag was somewhere in the ballpark of $2.5 trillion.

It also took decades to complete. New interstate routes were still being built well into the 1990s.

Now imagine that every three months, people asked when the new interstate would “pay for itself.”

That’s the tension at the heart of the AI infrastructure boom …

Goldman Sachs estimates that AI capex will surpass $1 trillion this year alone. And investors want evidence that massive spending will produce profits.

But the companies making those investments must secure semiconductors, networks, and electricity years before the finished infrastructure can generate revenue.

Three announcements this week show just how far ahead they’re planning.

On Tuesday, Verizon (VZ) and Corning (GLW) announced a multibillion-dollar agreement covering more than 80 million miles of optical fiber. That’s enough fiber to wrap around the Earth over 3,200 times. Deliveries will run from 2027 through 2032 and support broadband expansion and connect data centers powering artificial intelligence.

Verizon is securing supplies for a deployment schedule six years from now.

That same day, Qualcomm (QCOM) announced a collaboration with Amazon covering multiple generations of customized AI chips and advanced optical connections. The companies are working on inference—the computing required to put a trained AI model to work.

Then, on Wednesday, Google announced €13 billion of investment in Finland. The package includes digital infrastructure, wind power, battery storage, and a 22-year agreement supporting the life extension of a nuclear power plant.

Fiber through 2032. Multiple generations of chips. A nuclear power agreement spanning decades.

Together, these commitments reveal the planning horizon behind the AI buildout. Companies are securing the resources needed to expand long after this quarter’s earnings calls are forgotten.

And there’s a practical reason for it: Infrastructure comes together in stages. And spending arrives before the revenue that spending makes possible.

This creates a difficult period for investors. Cash flow can come under pressure while a company expands its future earning capacity. The key question is whether customer demand and eventual returns justify that investment.

Our view is that the AI buildout has years to run. This week’s announcements reinforce that conviction.

For investors, the opportunity unfolds in stages, too.

Suppliers can generate revenue as they deliver chips, fiber, and equipment. Operators can generate revenue as customers begin using the added capacity. We don’t have to wait for the entire buildout to finish for businesses along the supply chain to benefit.

Wall Street measures results every three months. The infrastructure enabling those results will be built out over years and decades.

Many investors still want to know when the AI infrastructure buildout will be “complete.”

The answer: Not anytime soon …

"D-day" for Critical Metals

Dave Forest

Senior Analyst

Nowhere’s off limits anymore in the hunt for critical metals.

Backed by massive funding from the government’s $12 billion “Project Vault,” U.S. companies are going literally anywhere in the world to secure tech metals.

Consider the funding agreements struck so far in 2026:

• Over $1 billion for a rare earths mine in Brazil;
• $400 million for an Australian mine producing scandium;
• $62.8 million for multiple rare earths projects in the African nations of Malawi, Angola, Madagascar, and South Africa;
• $1 billion for copper transport infrastructure in the Democratic Republic of Congo;
• $500 million for a nickel mine in Tanzania.

It’s so desperate that U.S. companies are even looking to expressly forbidden countries—with implicit approval from the government.

At least two U.S. groups are reportedly considering a bid for nickel and cobalt mines in Cuba. One is Gillon Capital, a Texas family office run by former Trump administration official Ray Washburne.

The frenzy is understandable. We’re just two months away from “D-Day” for metals: Nov. 10, when China will decide whether to renew tougher rules on critical metals exports.

China originally introduced new export rules in October 2025—including a provision that could completely cut off critical metals sales to U.S. military suppliers. But Chinese officials relented at the last minute, granting a one-year pause until Nov. 10, 2026.

Even then, Chinese companies choked off metals exports to a minimum over the past year. This November, they could restrict shipments to some buyers completely.

No one wants to be left in the cold if that happens. AI developers, data centers, tech giants such as SpaceX and Amazon, not to mention Tesla and its aspirations with its general-purpose intelligent humanoid robot Optimus, and the military could see their operations curtailed or even halted without metals supplies.

So, they’re kicking over any rock, anywhere on the planet, for alternatives.

But here’s the thing: While these tech and industry giants are perfectly prepared to go to Africa, South America, or even Greenland to avoid a business disaster, they’d much rather have mines within the security of America’s borders.

That’s why top scientists are poring over leads on where to find new metal supplies across the U.S.

The Department of Energy has pledged $500 million in funding for domestic critical metals projects. Separately, the Pentagon called directly for funding proposals from U.S. metals suppliers. That’s a lot of cash driving a lot of research on where to find critical metals across America.

It’s more evidence of what I shared back in August: We’re on the verge of a new commodities supercycle. And investors should be paying attention.