LCD prices are expected to rise this month as companies stock up for the back-to-school season and rebuild their inventories amid concerns about possible supply disruptions related to the earthquake and tsunami in Japan on March 11, a report said.
A statement issued by US-based tech research house IHS iSuppli on Thursday said that this month is expected to be the first time in 14 months that all three main large LCD panel applications — TVs, monitors and notebook PCs — will go up in price.
Large LCDs are defined as those with a diagonal dimension of 10.1 inches or larger.
For this month, all three applications for large LCD panels are expected to post slight price increases, rising 0.1 percent for desktop PC monitors, 0.2 percent for TVs and 0.5 percent for notebooks, rounding up to an average price rise of 0.2 percent, it said.
This contrasts with previous months, when prices increased in only one or two panel applications, while prices in other applications fell steeply and dragged down the overall average, it said.
Buyers are still purchasing panels to mitigate the risk of any shortages of components used to make LCDs following continued supply problems in Japan, a major producer of LCD components.
Furthermore, companies are buying more LCDs as they prepare for the upcoming summer and back-to-school season, which is traditionally a busy period for panel makers, IHS said.
Weaker consumer demand for end devices and high channel inventory reported by brand companies, would prevent prices from rising too high it added.
“Consumer demand for the major products using LCD panels, like TVs and computers remains weak, especially in the US and Europe,” IHS senior director Sweta Dash said.
Looking forward, panel demand from international brands in particular will be crucial to support panel pricing in the third quarter.
“In one sign of potential trouble, panel inventory replenishment efforts in China could slow down next month, prompting panel suppliers to cut utilization rates at their fabs,” the report added.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last