Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (
"Our sales in the first four months rose 110 percent from the same period last year," said Christin Wang (
The strong results came from robust sales in the Middle East and South America -- Hon Hai's fastest growing markets.
Foxconn's sales in Europe, Middle East and Africa were up 43 percent in the first four months of the year, the company said in a statement.
Foxconn's sales in the Americas posted four-fold growth, while revenues were up eight-fold in Central and South America, it said.
In the Asia-Pacific region, sales growth was 132 percent, with emerging markets India and Vietnam posting a five-fold rise.
"There are no `best products' for these markets, but there are `right products' which cater to the needs of each market," said Wang on the sidelines of the Computex trade fair yesterday.
Three years ago, Hon Hai started selling computer connectors and coolers under the Foxconn brand in the overseas clone market after supplying electronics components to companies such as Dell Inc for years.
Hon Hai, which has more than 200 sales and marketing teams that promote the Foxconn brand, will dedicate more resources to high-end products in fields like gaming this year, Wang said.
The company has also been closely following Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) into the motherboard field. Asustek, the world's largest motherboard maker, and Intel Corp unveiled a low-cost laptop that would sell for less than US$200 at Computex yesterday.
Meanwhile, commenting on the impact of the merger of Flextronics International Ltd and Solectron Corp, Vincent Chen (
"Flextronics' management will be focused on making sure the integration of Solectron goes smoothly over the next 12 months. And during this time, Hon Hai can aggressively win more businesses from either one of them," he said in a research note.
The combined revenues of Flextronics and Solectron were about US$28 billion last year, compared with Hon Hai's US$40 billion, he said.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
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Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day