Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd, Taiwan's third-largest maker of flat-panel displays for electronic products, expects to raise about NT$15 billion (US$433 million) this year to help build a new plant, a Chinese-language newspaper reported, citing the company chairman.
Chunghwa Picture expects in the second half this year to sell US$250 million of debt that's convertible into stock and sell 700 million new shares abroad, the report said. Based on the stock's closing price of NT$11.30 yesterday, the planned sale implies a 20 percent discount to the NT$7.9 billion that could be raised now.
Chunghwa Picture may need to expand to keep up with larger rivals in South Korea and Taiwan that have opened new factories to help cut costs. While the industry is moving to more efficient fifth generation or 5G technology -- which means that flat-panel companies can make larger more profitable screens in bigger quantities -- Chunghwa picture is still using older 4G technology. Rivals in South Korea began using 5G technology last year, with Taiwanese playing catch-up this year.
The company on April 29 forecast its loss this year will widen by a quarter to NT$3.9 billion, compared with NT$3.1 billion last year. The forecast implies a third straight year of losses for the company, which had a loss of NT$6.5 billion in 2001.
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