HTC Corp (宏達電), the nation’s largest mobile-phone maker, is studying whether to equip phones with its own operating system, a move that may intensify competition with Google Inc and Microsoft Corp.
“We continue to assess, but that requires a few conditions to justify” having our own system, chief financial officer Cheng Hui-ming (鄭慧明) said yesterday.
The Taoyuan-based company’s own operating system would enable it to reduce its reliance on outside developers. HTC, which designs and produces phones using Google and Microsoft software, is among possible bidders for Palm Inc, three people familiar with the situation said this month.
“If you look at the successful smartphone players, like Apple and Research in Motion, a reason for their success is that they have their own platform,” said Steven Tseng (曾緒良), who rates HTC “buy” at RBS Asia Ltd in Taipei and favors the company having its own operating system in the long term. “The negative is the amount of resources they’d need to allocate.”
Cheng declined to comment on whether HTC has studied Palm for possible acquisition. HTC has no timeframe for deciding whether to have its own platform, he said.
“There are many multiple factors to be considered together, rather than a simple statement as to own or not to own” proprietary software, Cheng said.
HTC declined 1.4 percent to close at NT$389 in local trading yesterday.
Palm is working with Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Frank Quattrone’s Qatalyst Partners to find a buyer possibly as early as this week, according to the people familiar with the matter. They declined to be identified because a sale hasn’t been announced.
The domestic unit of the Chinese-owned, Dutch-headquartered chipmaker Nexperia BV will soon be able to produce semiconductors locally within China, according to two company sources. Nexperia is at the center of a global tug-of-war over critical semiconductor technology, with a Dutch court in February ordering a probe into alleged mismanagement at the company. The geopolitical tussle has disrupted supply chains, with some carmakers reportedly forced to cut production due to chip shortages. Local production would allow Nexperia’s domestic arm, Nexperia Semiconductors (China) Ltd (安世半導體中國), to bypass restrictions in place since October on the supply of silicon wafers — etched with tiny components to
Taiwan’s foreign exchange reserves fell below the US$600 billion mark at the end of last month, with the central bank reporting a total of US$596.89 billion — a decline of US$8.6 billion from February — ending a three-month streak of increases. The central bank attributed the drop to a combination of factors such as outflows by foreign institutional investors, currency fluctuations and its own market interventions. “The large-scale outflows disrupted the balance of supply and demand in the foreign exchange market, prompting the central bank to intervene repeatedly by selling US dollars to stabilize the local currency,” Department of Foreign
Taiwan is open to joining a global liquefied natural gas (LNG) program if one is created, but on the condition that countries provide delivery even in a scenario where there is a conflict with China, an energy department official said yesterday. While Taiwan’s priority is to have enough LNG at home, the nation is open to exploring potential strategic reserves in other countries such as Japan or South Korea, Energy Administration Deputy Director-General Chen Chung-hsien (陳崇憲) said. While the LNG market does not have a global reserve for emergencies like that of oil, the concept has been raised a few times —
AI-FUELED DEMAND: The company has been benefiting from the skyrocketing prices for DRAM chips amid the AI frenzy, especially its core product — DDR4 DRAM chips DRAM chipmaker Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday reported that its revenue for the first quarter surged 582.91 percent to NT$49.09 billion (US$1.54 billion) from NT$7.19 billion a year earlier, as the supply crunch caused chip price spikes. Last quarter’s figure is the highest on record. On a quarterly basis, revenue jumped 63.14 percent from NT$30.09 billion, the company said. In January, Nanya Technology expected global DRAM supply scarcity to continue through the first half of 2028, thanks to strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) forecast prices of standard DRAM chips would rise between 58 percent and 63
RSS