January 18, 2026, Taipei — ASUS officially announced a major shift in its business focus: Chairman Jonney Shih told VideoCardz in an interview that ASUS will stop releasing new smartphone models and will put R&D and product efforts "all in AI."
Shih noted that the smartphone market has entered a highly mature and homogenized stage, with diminishing marginal returns from launching incremental new models. Rather than pouring extensive resources into the fiercely competitive phone market, ASUS has chosen to concentrate its limited personnel, capital and design capabilities on AI areas that can deliver differentiated competitive advantages.
The company will focus on three product and technology directions: AI PCs (notebooks and desktops integrating on‑device inference and generative AI capabilities), AIoT devices (bringing AI into home and industrial endpoints), and AI solutions for enterprises and data centers. ASUS plans to increase investment at both hardware and software levels, emphasizing an integrated "software‑hardware" approach rather than simply labeling existing devices as "AI."
In the interview, Shih specifically addressed the company’s commitment to existing phone users: although ASUS will not introduce new models, it will continue to provide system updates, security patches and after‑sales support to ensure sold devices are not abandoned. ASUS will retain mobile maintenance teams to extend device lifecycles and deliver software services.
From a timeline perspective, ASUS’s long‑standing accumulation in PCs and gaming peripherals provides the technical and channel foundation for this strategic shift. The company emphasized that the new investments will concentrate on AI accelerator compatibility, model optimization, local offline inference capabilities, and cross‑device collaborative experiences, aiming to find new growth opportunities between the consumer and commercial segments.
The decision also implies a reallocation of supply chain and contract manufacturing resources. Shih said ASUS will strengthen collaboration with existing manufacturing partners and AI ecosystem players, prioritizing the stability of supply for key components and AI hardware. In addition, ASUS is evaluating cloud‑edge collaboration schemes to meet dual requirements for low latency and data privacy.
Industry reaction is mixed: some analysts consider ASUS’s timely shift in focus a rational response to long‑term competitive dynamics; others note that abandoning new phone models means ASUS will lose direct influence on mobile‑end innovation. However, if the company can create unique experiences on AI terminals and platforms, the value of a closed‑loop ecosystem could far exceed mere phone sales.
Shih’s public confirmation marks ASUS’s entry into a new strategic phase — shifting from expanding hardware product lines to building differentiated services and platforms centered on AI capabilities. ASUS’s next challenge is to seamlessly extend PC‑side AI capabilities to home, office and enterprise scenarios and to bring its first wave of AI‑focused products to market in 2026.
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