Quanta shares up on forecast strong growth in sales

Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦) shares rose yesterday after its president predicted that combined sales of the company and its subsidiaries would grow more than 20 percent this year.

Quanta, the world's largest notebook contract maker, is targeting consolidated sales of more than NT$600 billion (US$18 billion) this year, Quanta president Michael Wang (王震華) said.

This year will see strong growth in notebook shipments, Wang said in an interview with the Chinese-language Economic Daily News yesterday. The business daily Commercial Times carried a similar report.

Shares of Quanta rose 1.3 percent to NT$56.30 yesterday.

Notebook shipments will hit the 25 million mark this year, Wang said. That would represent an annual growth of 30 percent from last year, which was slightly up from 18 million in 2005.

Rival Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶電腦) said on Jan. 20 that it aimed to unseat Quanta as the top laptop maker this year. Compal produced 14.6 million notebook computers last year, up nearly 50 percent from 2005.

The company forecast total shipments to expand at least 37 percent this year to more than 20 million units, president and CEO Ray Chen (陳瑞聰) said at the time.

In the interview, Wang said that Quanta plans to set up an Education PC Business Unit to manage the One Laptop per Child project. The company will start mass production in the second quarter with initial volumes set at 5 million units.

The proposed business unit will also undertake research and development of other low-cost computers targeted at emerging markets, such as China, he said.