While PC makers are betting on “ultrabooks” to entice consumers to upgrade to the soon-to-be-launched thinner, cheaper notebooks with longer battery life, a research house apparently thinks otherwise.
“While some believe ultrabooks could revive notebook growth and Asustek [Computer Inc (華碩)], the first to introduce the ultrabook, should benefit, we think the ultrabook is killing notebook contract makers’ premium lines and may dilute their profit margins,” Daiwa Capital Market analyst Calvin Huang (黃文堯) said.
“We forecast zero growth for global notebook shipments for 2011 and believe the ultrabook alone may not be enough to revive notebook growth in 2012,” he said in a report dated Wednesday.
At the Computex trade show early last month, Intel Corp introduced the ultrabook platform, which it said would make notebooks thinner, lighter and more affordable, with price tags of less than US$1,000. The battery life would be for more than 10 hours.
These ultrabook notebooks are intended to compete with Apple Inc’s MacBook Air, whose worldwide shipments could easily top 600,000 units per month, the report said.
Asustek general sales manager Kevin Lin (林福能) said on Monday that the company was on schedule to debut its first two ultrabook notebooks in September.
He said depending on the specifications, some may cost more than NT$30,000 (US$1,041).
Daiwa said Intel was lowering the price of its low-voltage processors to make thin and light notebooks mainstream.
“In other words, Intel is cutting prices to stimulate notebook demand,” Huang wrote.
Intel’s subsidy is not enough because to make an ultrabook, other advanced and expensive components, like ultra-thin panels, solid state drives, metal casings and polymer batteries, are required to make it comparable to the MacBook Air.
Huang said these advanced components generally cost 50 to 100 percent more than mainstream components used in notebooks.
Because of this, to match the MacBook Air’s price tag, Taiwanese notebook contract makers may have to compromise and use second-grade components in the ultrabooks, which could compromise performance, he said.
The other deciding factor is that Microsoft Corp’s Windows 8 may or may not add to the overall user experience of ultrabooks, and consumers would only be able to tell when the operating system finally comes on the market late next year, Daiwa said.
Despite Daiwa’s pessimism, Compal Electronics Co (仁寶), the world’s second-largest notebook contract maker, said last month it believed ultrabooks would revive sluggish notebook sales.
Compal president Ray Chen (陳瑞聰) said ultrabooks would spur consumers to replace their older laptops, and replacement demand would boost overall shipments starting from the second half of next year.
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],”