The stagnant market for personal digital assistants (PDA) can only be revived by developing the handheld computers into devices for both work and play, industry insiders said yesterday.
"The market for pure PDAs that function as just an organizer or for data storage is shrinking," said Jim Tsai (
Making PDAs a necessity for up to 90 percent of daily activities will be key to the future of the handheld devices, Tsai said.
PalmOne Inc, which International Data Corporation (IDC) ranked as the world's largest handheld device vendor with 37 percent market share last year, yesterday rolled out its newest model, Zire72, in Taiwan, following its global launch on April 29.
The Zire72, priced at NT$10,980, can take photos with an integrated 1.2-million megapixel digital camera, and play short films and MP3 music files. The device is Microsoft Office compatible and allows users to surf the Internet with built-in Bluetooth technology.
"This is a product for both work and fun and we hope to sell 3 million units within a year of launch," Tsai said.
With the production of most of PalmOne's PDAs outsourced to local contract makers, including Asustek Computer Inc (
"Contract makers see a decent gross margin of between 20 percent and 25 percent from making wireless PDAs and an average of 15 percent on conventional PDAs," said Calvin Wei (魏建發), an analyst at Yuanta Core Pacific Capital Management (元大京華投顧).
Taiwanese original-equipment-manufacturers shipped nearly 1.8 million PDAs in the first quarter, about 70 percent more than a year ago, as handheld device vendors like PalmOne, Hewlett-Packard Co and Dell Inc placed more orders, according to figures by local research house Market Intelligence Institute (MIC) under the Institute for Information Industry (
Local makers are expected to ship 1.8 million units in this quarter, MIC said.
Growth in the market for handheld devices, however, appears to have reached a ceiling.
The global market dropped to 11.4 million units last year from 12.2 million units in 2002, according to MIC.
The research house forecasted shipments to grow to 12 million units this year, bolstered by the global economic recovery.
Smartphones that combine communication and some PDA functions are expected to boom as their prices fall next year, further squeezing the PDA sector, especially the middle and low-end gadgets priced under US$299, MIC analyst Annie Yang (
Before then, the handheld devices need to evolve into wireless and multimedia gadgets to keep their appeal to users, Yang 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