Chimei Innolux Corp (奇美電子) yesterday signed an agreement with Hitachi Display Ltd to supply high-end flat panels used in tablet devices such as Apple Inc’s iPad, using the Japanese company’s technology.
Based on the agreement, Chimei will be licensed by Hitachi to manufacture and supply high-end LCD panels based on IPS technology to the Japanese company and Chimei’s major customers from next year.
The deal would broaden Chimei’s IPS product line-up, according to a company statement released yesterday. In the strategic alliance, both sides would benefit from the growing demand for IPS panels because of rising demand for netbook laptops and tablet PCs.
Shipments of netbooks and tablet PCs are expected to grow to 86 million units with a composite annual growth rate of 139 percent during the period from last year to 2015, according to market researcher DisplaySearch’s forecast.
IPS is currently one of the most suitable display technologies for such devices because of its better visibility from any viewing angle, DisplaySearch said.
Separately, E Ink Holding Inc (元太科技), the world’s biggest e-paper display supplier, yesterday unveiled its latest e-paper displays, primarily for electronic readers with enhanced resolution, allowing the display to have an appearance similar to paper used in print publication.
The US online bookstore giant Amazon.com has used E Ink’s latest e-paper display, called Pearl, for its new-generation Kindle e-reader series, dubbed Kindle DX. E Ink said the new e-paper display has a 50 percent higher contrast ratio than existing e-paper displays.
The Hsinchu-based E Ink, which was originally named Prime View International Co Ltd, sells e-paper displays using E Ink Corp’s electronic paper technology. E Ink acquired E Ink Corp last year.
“With features such as its thin size, light weight and low power consumption, E Ink’s Pearl displays can be widely used in e-readers, electronic reference books and electronic magazines in the future, replacing traditional paper, or liquid crystal displays,” E Ink Corp chairman Felix Ho (何奕達) said in a company statement yesterday.
The new product targets the fast-growing e-reader market and budding electronic magazine and electronic newspaper businesses, the company said.
This year, global shipments of e-readers are expected to amount to US$837 million and could grow by 44 percent to US$1.2 billion next year, E Ink said, citing DisplaySearch’s forecast.
The Austin, Texas-based research firm said E Ink’s new e-paper display technology would help the company safeguard its leadership in the market.
Shares of E Ink Holding rose 1.9 percent to NT$40.3 yesterday, ending five straight days of losses, while Chimei shares dropped for the fifth trading session in a row to end at NT$32.65.
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