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The AI boom is dominated by companies from the U.S. and China, but a handful of European tech stocks have soared this year as investors pile money into the companies building the infrastructure needed to power the tech. Chipmaking equipment company Aixtron has risen 189% year-to-date. Technoprobe , which also makes equipment used in the chipmaking process, has rallied 129% and chipmaker STMicroelectronics 133% in 2026. Nokia , a legacy phonemaker that has shifted its focus to AI, has seen its stock jump 108% this year. In recent years, U.S. and Chinese companies have been the biggest beneficiaries of the AI boom as they lead the way on frontier models and the most powerful processing chips. But, as compute demand rises, investors are broadening out to "enablers" like companies developing data centers, networking and chip equipment, alongside power, cooling and software tools, expanding the drive to snap up European stocks, Fabio Bassi, head of cross-asset strategy at J.P. Morgan, told CNBC. "In Europe, scarcity amplifies the trend," he said. "There are few large, liquid AI pure-plays, so flows concentrate in a small group of perceived AI proxies, combining real AI-linked demand with crowded positioning."
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Germany's Aixtron, which designs and manufactures advanced equipment that is used to apply ultra-thin layers of materials onto silicon wafers, known as deposition, has seen its stock rocket more than 300% in the past 12 months. It's the second biggest mover on the Stoxx 600 in that time, behind pharma company Abivax. Citi hiked the target price of Aixtron by more than 66% in an April note, on the basis that the company is seeing stronger demand and margins. AI is the primary revenue driver of Aixtron's 2026 guidance, Citi said. "The [AI] buildout is consuming semiconductors of all types, which bodes well for STMicroelectronics and its peers," Brian Colello, senior equity analyst at Morningstar, told CNBC. STMicroelectronics has exposure to AI via two avenues: power semiconductors going into the upcoming 800-volt power transition — an industry-wide shift from traditional lower-voltage architectures to more efficient systems, and a move to optical products for faster data center connectivity, Colello said.
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