Electronics component maker Lite-On Technology Corp (光寶科技) yesterday said it expected its operations to remain in high gear this quarter as it did last quarter, helped by persistent growth in demand for high-margin power supply units for servers and high-end camera modules for mobile devices.
LED lighting will remain a major growth area, Lite-On said, adding that revenue from its LED lighting business has tripled from a year ago.
“The third quarter will be slightly better than the second quarter, which was already a strong period,” Lite-On chief executive officer Warren Chen (陳廣中) said. “It looks like the second half will be stronger than the first half.”
STRONG Q2
On Thursday, Lite-On reported that net profit last quarter was the strongest it has seen in three quarters. Second-quarter earnings rose 11.3 percent to NT$1.9 billion (US$63 million), or NT$0.84 per share, from NT$1.7 billion, or NT$0.65 per share, in the same period last year. On a quarterly basis, that represented about 40 percent growth from NT$1.34 billion, or NT$0.6 a share, in the first quarter.
Gross margin climbed to 13.4 percent last quarter, the highest level seen since 13.9 percent in the third quarter of 2010.
This quarter, the growth momentum is set to come from high-end power supply units used in cloud-computing servers and networking devices and from high-end camera modules such as 8-megapixel modules for tablets, Chen said.
Seasonal demand also helped to bump up the figures, he said.
Increasing demand for camera modules would help expand Lite-On’s global market shares in handsets and notebook computers this year, Chen said. The company took 10 percent and 30 percent of the market in handset and laptop camera modules respectively last year.
LOSS-MAKING UNIT
Lite-On Mobile, a casing manufacturing arm of Lite-On Technology, reported a wider net loss of 5.4 million euros (US$6.8 million) last quarter because of weak demand from its major client Nokia, which follows the first quarter’s loss of 4.7 million. However, compared with the same period last year, the second-quarter loss shrank from a loss of 16.3 million euros.
Lite-On Technology aims to help Lite-On Mobile, which it bought from Nokia, return to profit next quarter by expanding its customer portfolio, Chen said. He said the company has landed orders from global mobile phone brands.
In addition to Nokia, Lite-On Mobile currently supplies handset casings to Sony Ericsson, as well as Chinese handset makers Huawei Technology Co (華為) and ZTE Corp (中興).
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