Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, is likely to secure orders from Apple Inc to produce next-generation processors “starting as early as the second quarter of 2013,” Credit Suisse said last week.
The projected timeframe would come “earlier than expected,” Manish Nigam, head of the brokerage’s non-Japan Asia technology research division, said in note to clients on Friday, citing their recent checks with several equipment suppliers and other companies in Japan, Taiwan and China.
Previously, Credit Suisse said it expected Apple would seek a second source for its chips other than Samsung Electronics Co by either late next year or early 2014.
Nigam said their checks also suggested Apple might start chip production at TSMC by using the Taiwanese firm’s 28-nanometer (nm) technology, rather than its prior views on the 20nm node.
“If our checks are correct, the market would take this move as a surprise,” Nigam wrote in the note, although he said it was still hard to determine which product is going to be manufactured at TSMC.
Nevertheless, the brokerage said any new product would be a net addition to demand and therefore it was increasingly confident about the prospects for TSMC and Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (ASE, 日月光半導體), which is expected to package the chips, in the belief that the two companies will be ramping up capacity for a sizeable new customer starting some time in the first quarter of next year.
The brokerage on Friday upgraded shares of TSMC to “outperform” from “neutral,” and raised its target price from NT$95 to NT$109.
Shares in TSMC ended at NT$98.1 in Taipei trading on Friday, up 1.55 percent from the previous session, while ASE’s closed 0.2 percent up at NT$24.75, down 4.44 percent so far this year, according to data from the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
Intel Corp chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) is expected to meet with Taiwanese suppliers next month in conjunction with the opening of the Computex Taipei trade show, supply chain sources said on Monday. The visit, the first for Tan to Taiwan since assuming his new post last month, would be aimed at enhancing Intel’s ties with suppliers in Taiwan as he attempts to help turn around the struggling US chipmaker, the sources said. Tan is to hold a banquet to celebrate Intel’s 40-year presence in Taiwan before Computex opens on May 20 and invite dozens of Taiwanese suppliers to exchange views
Application-specific integrated circuit designer Faraday Technology Corp (智原) yesterday said that although revenue this quarter would decline 30 percent from last quarter, it retained its full-year forecast of revenue growth of 100 percent. The company attributed the quarterly drop to a slowdown in customers’ production of chips using Faraday’s advanced packaging technology. The company is still confident about its revenue growth this year, given its strong “design-win” — or the projects it won to help customers design their chips, Faraday president Steve Wang (王國雍) told an online earnings conference. “The design-win this year is better than we expected. We believe we will win
Chizuko Kimura has become the first female sushi chef in the world to win a Michelin star, fulfilling a promise she made to her dying husband to continue his legacy. The 54-year-old Japanese chef regained the Michelin star her late husband, Shunei Kimura, won three years ago for their Sushi Shunei restaurant in Paris. For Shunei Kimura, the star was a dream come true. However, the joy was short-lived. He died from cancer just three months later in June 2022. He was 65. The following year, the restaurant in the heart of Montmartre lost its star rating. Chizuko Kimura insisted that the new star is still down
While China’s leaders use their economic and political might to fight US President Donald Trump’s trade war “to the end,” its army of social media soldiers are embarking on a more humorous campaign online. Trump’s tariff blitz has seen Washington and Beijing impose eye-watering duties on imports from the other, fanning a standoff between the economic superpowers that has sparked global recession fears and sent markets into a tailspin. Trump says his policy is a response to years of being “ripped off” by other countries and aims to bring manufacturing to the US, forcing companies to employ US workers. However, China’s online warriors
RSS