Prime View International Co (PVI, 元太科技) yesterday said it had signed a memorandum of understanding with Chi Mei Optoelectronics Corp (CMO, 奇美電子) to secure sufficient supply of flat panels for its electronic readers.
Prime View, which supplies electronic paper displays to Amazon Inc and Sony Corp, said it has the full support of Chi Mei’s fifth-generation (5G) plant to help it expand its e-paper business, the company said in a joint statement with CMO.
“Support from CMO’s 5G production line will enable PVI to provide more cost-competitive products to customers in the face of rapid demand growth in the e-paper market,” Prime View chairman Scott Liu (劉思誠) said.
“The mutual collaboration is not only advantageous but also complementary, bringing with it a synergy that is greater than just the alliance of two parties,” he said in the statement.
The demand for electronic paper displays has surged in recent months because of a strong push by Amazon and Sony into the electronic reader market, as well as rising environmental awareness.
The Taipei-based Market Intelligence & Consulting Institute (MIC, 產業情報研究所) expects worldwide e-reader shipment volume to reach 3.05 million units this year and reach 19.76 million units in 2013.
Another market researcher, NextGen, estimated that the global e-paper reading device market would post a compounded annual growth rate of 124 percent from last year to US$2.5 billion by 2013.
Chi Mei said it expected the collaboration with Prime View to facilitate its entry into the fast-developing electronic paper business.
“We are delighted to work with PVI to provide the most mature e-paper solution in the market. Through the collaboration, not only can CMO expand its presence in the e-paper industry, but its 5G production line will also have a wider range of applications, enhancing its efficiency in capacity allocation,” Chi Mei chairman Frank Liao (廖錦祥) said in the statement.
Prime View’s new partnership with Chi Mei came one day after the company, also a leading maker of smaller flat screens for portable devices, said on Wednesday it would sweeten the terms of its planned acquisition of E Ink Corp to secure the US company’s electronic paper display technologies.
Last year, Prime View acquired South Korean panel maker BOE-Hydis Technology Co to secure production capacity, which was four times larger than its own at the time.
BOE-Hydis mainly manufactures liquid-crystal-display panels for notebook computers.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
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],”