Aiming to gain a larger slice of the domestic flash-memory market, Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) has selected a new local distributor of the chips used for easy and fast information storage in such devices as cellphones and digital cameras.
"As consumer demand for 3C products such as digital cameras, cellular phones and games consoles continues to rise, it stimulates the demand for flash memory," Joe Krystofik, an AMD vice president, said yesterday.
"We have chosen Kuen Chaang Uppertech Corp as our new flash memory distributor because of their professionalism," he said.
Krystofik was in Taipei to name Uppertech, a chip distributor, as AMD's fourth local distributor for flash-memory products.
AMD has 15 percent to 20 percent of the global flash-memory market, trailing its largest rival Intel Corp which has a 30 percent share.
One local analyst says AMD has a long way to go in Taiwan.
"Taiwan is very important for flash memory because it makes a lot of personal digital assistants [PDAs] and mobile-phone hand-sets," said George Wu (吳裕良), a chip industry analyst at Primasia Securities Co. "So far AMD's flash memory has not been very common in Taiwan," Wu said.
The last two years have been very bad for the flash-memory market, but next year will be a better year for all manufacturers as sales grow of devices that need the new memory standard, Wu said.
Krystofik said he was optimistic about his company's prospects next year in the local market, and with good reason.
According to the government-funded Market Intelligence Center, Taiwan will ship 27 million mobile-phone handsets this year, more than double last year's figure. And next year that figure is expected to be more than 40 million.
Manufacturers are also expected to pump out 10 million digital cameras next year, another device that relies on flash memory.
As for PDAs, local companies will ship out 3.15 million of the electronic devices this year, accounting for nearly 15 percent of global PDA production.
The major makers are constantly working to create more efficient chips to outdo the competition.
Last year AMD introduced a new flash-memory technology called MirrorBit that doubles the amount of data that can be stored on the same-sized chip. Last fall Intel introduced its newest technology -- called StrataFlash -- which layers memory on a chip to increase capacity.
So far, however, AMD has not been able to convince the market of the benefits of its new technology.
"AMD must convince customers that the technology is robust and announce significant design wins quickly to gain traction in the market," said Richard Gordon, memory analyst at international research firm Gartner Inc.
"The importance of MirrorBit to AMD's flash memory future cannot be overstated -- it is a critical technology if AMD is to have any chance of countering Intel's market share gains on the back of its StrataFlash technology," Gordon said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last