Mosel, creditors reach deal
Computer-memory chipmaker Mosel Vitelic Inc (茂矽) reached an agreement with its creditors yesterday to pay back a NT$4.7 billion (US$135.4 million) loan that came due at the end of last month.
Mosel offered to pay 35 percent of the debt, or NT$1.64 billion, in cash by Monday, followed by 10 monthly installments to clear the remaining 65 percent, allowing it to keep ProMOS Technologies Inc (茂德科技) shares pledged as collateral.
Creditors had rejected Mosel's previous offer of a 10-percent cash payment followed by 12 monthly installments, and threatened to sell Mosel's controlling stake in ProMOS, the nation's second-largest memory-chip maker.
IBM now No. 3 chipmaker
International Business Machines Corp (IBM) overtook Singapore's Chartered Semiconductor Manu-facturing Ltd (特許) last year as the third-largest supplier of made-to-order semiconductors, a market researcher said.
IBM's chip sales were US$760 million last year compared with US$449 million for Chartered, according to Scottsdale, Arizona-based IC Insights.
IBM will probably aim to take more business from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world's largest supplier of made-to-order chips, IC Insights said.
IBM on March 26 said it won a multiyear contract to make Nvidia Corp's latest computer-graphics chip, beating TSMC, previously Nvidia's sole supplier.
Yamaha delays bike launch
Japan's Yamaha Motor Co said yesterday that the company will postpone its release of new motorbikes in Taiwan for two months due to the outbreak of SARS.
Yamaha had originally planned to introduce the new 125cc model, Cygnus X, in this country tomorrow. But Yamaha said the launch will be delayed due to problems found in parts of the model, as well as the SARS outbreak in Taiwan which has prohibited Japanese staff from inspecting the new units. It expects to start selling the model by July 20.
EIU forecasts weakness
The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) said in a report released on Tuesday that Taiwan's position as a key technology-product exporter makes it vulnerable to the continued weakness of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) economies.
With the weak pace of recovery in the OECD, countries in emerging Asia including Taiwan are relying instead on exports to China and efforts to boost their own domestic demands, the EIU said.
Although Taiwan's economy is growing again after experiencing a sharp recession in 2001, the nation's growth will be subdued until next year, it said.
Taipower delays LPG contract
Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) postponed until next month an announcement on the winning bidder to supply it with liquefied-natural gas (LNG) after the outbreak of SARS disrupted meetings with suppliers.
Taipower was due this month to name the winning bidder for a contract to supply 1.7 million tonnes a year of LNG to its planned Tatan power plant.
The utility is negotiating with four companies that are bidding to supply the fuel for 25 years starting in 2008.
Taipower may name the winning bidder in the middle of next month, said media relations officer Lee Chun-lai (李傳來).
NT dollars loses ground
The New Taiwan dollar continued to lose ground against its US counterpart yesterday, falling NT$0.018 to close at NT$34.73 on the Taipei foreign exchange market.
Turnover yesterday was US$524.5 million.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to