Quanta, Sanyo venture placed on hold

Quanta said it shipped 350,000 flat panel televisions last year, translating to a mere 2 percent of its overall revenues. It expected the new venture to double the quantity of shipments.

Another analyst said the delay would have little effect on Quanta.

"The deferral will have a very minimal impact on Quanta as the planned joint venture is not as important as it was earlier in the year," said Daniel Wang (王德善), an analyst with Primasia Securities in Taipei.

At the time, Quanta had hoped to sell TV panels made by its then LCD panel manufacturing affiliate Quanta Display Inc (廣輝電子) by assembling TV sets for Sanyo, Wang said.

There was no need for this now as the computer maker had already sold the display unit to the nation's top panel maker AU Optronics Corp (友達光電) in June, Wang said.

"Quanta now counts on making laptops for generating profits, not assembling LCD TVs," he reasoned.