Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) unveiled yesterday its much anticipated Seashell Eee PC netbook and said it expects half of its netbook sales this year to come from the mainstream version of its latest offering.
“We expect revenue contribution from the Seashell netbook to take place predominantly in the second half of 2009 and mostly from countries in Asia and Europe,” chief operating officer Tony Chen (陳志雄) told a press conference yesterday.
Based on the company’s new business strategy, Seashell netbooks would be on the market for up to one year to take advantage of economies of scale in production and avoid inventory problems, Chen said.
PHOTO: HU SHUN-HSIANG, TAIPEI TIMES
Forecasts by Asustek showed that full-year netbook shipments would be about 3.5 million units. The company anticipates between 1.5 million and 2 million units will be SeaShell Eee PCs.
The company, which competes head-to-head with Acer Inc (宏碁) in the netbook market, said global netbook shipments would reach 21 million units this year, followed by 30 million and 40 million units next year and in 2011 respectively, citing forecasts by International Data Corp.
In the first quarter of this year, the top three netbook vendors were, in market share order, Acer (宏碁), Asustek and Hewlett-Packard Co.
With its white casing and ultra slim design, the Seashell netbook looks like a hybrid between the MacBook and MacAir. It features a 10.1 inch light-emitting diode liquid-crystal-display screen and weighs 1.1kg.
Bulkier components, such as the SATA II 2.5 inch 160 GB hard drive and minimized motherboard, are located in the thickest end (25.7mm) of the netbook, while the molded lithium-ion polymer battery is located on its thinner side (18 mm), product manager Jason Wu (吳南馨) said.
“The biggest challenge, of course, was where to put the battery. So we went with the lithium-ion polymer battery used in the Apple MacAir to achieve the slim look and give users up to six hours of battery time. With enough venting slots, testing showed no overheating,” Wu 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],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
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