Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday posted a second consecutive quarterly loss as a slower-than-expected switch to a new production technology curbed output growth and raised costs, leaving the nation’s top PC memory chipmaker at a disadvantage amid recovering PC demand.
Last quarter, Nanya’s losses contracted to NT$1.02 billion (US$37.3 million), from losses of NT$1.63 billion in the first quarter, after the average selling price rose 11 percent quarter-on-quarter in the period between April and last month. That represented an improvement from losses of NT$6.54 billion a year ago.
Shipments inched up 2 percent last quarter from the previous quarter, the company said.
PHOTO: BLOOMBERG
Looking ahead, “demand from PC OEM customers [such as Dell Inc] looks quite good, especially those with a bigger exposure to the corporate market ... We are positive about the third quarter,” company spokesman Pai Pei-lin (白培霖) said, adding that the company expected rising demand for corporate PC replacements to help support chip prices later this year.
He expected chip prices to be flat, or to slide slightly this quarter as supply and demand could reach parity in the traditional peak season this quarter.
Yesterday, Nanya cut its output growth rate for this year to 35 percent year-on-year from 45 percent, ahead of schedule, as it plans to start mass production of next-generation, 42-nanometer technology.
To match the technological migration, Nanya raised its spending on new equipment for this year by 36 percent to NT$30 billion, from NT$22 billion estimated in April.
“The company’s business will improve quarter by quarter,” Pai said in response to a reporter’s question about whether the chipmaker would make a profit again this quarter.
Inotera Memories Inc (華亞科技), a memory chip joint venture between Nanya Technology and US memory chipmaker Micron Technology Inc, yesterday posted wider quarterly losses of NT$1.81 billion, compared with losses of NT$1.56 billion in the first quarter.
Inotera lost NT$4.11 billion in the second quarter of last year.
“The results are short of our expectations,” company president Charles Kau (高啟全) said. "That is mainly because of the switch to stack technology from trench.... We made some mistakes in [equipment] arrangement. We was probably overoptimistic," Kau said.
However, Kau said Inotera would return to profitability “soon.”
“We will have explosive growth in the fourth quarter,” he said, citing significant output growth.
Inotera also slashed its output growth to more than 50 percent annually from a range between growth of 70 percent and 80 percent.
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