Taiwan’s major notebook contract makers posted a range of monthly declines in revenue this month from last month as tablets cut into notebook demand.
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), the world’s largest contract notebook producer, yesterday posted its smallest monthly revenue since May last year at NT$75.5 billion (US$2.6 billion) for last month.
This was down 12.3 percent from November’s NT$86.05 billion, and down 17.5 percent from NT$91.47 billion a year ago.
“The drop in revenue was due mainly to delays in shipments of Apple Inc’s iPad Mini and iPad 4 tablets last month,” Fubon Securities Investment Services Co (富邦投顧) analyst Arthur Liao (廖顯毅) said by telephone yesterday.
The firm’s total revenue for last year fell 10 percent to NT$972.6 billion from NT$1.81 trillion in 2011.
Liao expected Quanta’s sales to grow this quarter as it has received orders to make Amazon.com Inc’s Fire tablet and Google Inc’s Nexus 7 tablet.
Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶電腦), the world’s second-largest contract laptop maker, yesterday reported NT$60.77 billion in consolidated revenue last month, down 4.1 percent from NT$63.35 billion in November.
That was an increase of 15.2 percent compared with NT$52.87 in the same period a year ago.
Compal’s consolidated revenue for last year slipped 1.4 percent from NT$693.12 billion in 2011 to NT$682.77 billion.
The world’s No. 3 contract laptop maker, Wistron Corp (緯創), said revenue dropped 4.2 percent to NT$55.41 billion last month, compared with NT$57.87 billion in November and down 16.38 percent from NT$66.27 billion a year ago.
For the whole of last year, Wistron’s sales fell slightly to NT$657.83 billion from NT$658.24 billion in 2011, which was a record high.
Liao forecast that Wistron’s sales would bounce back this month because its client Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) may increase orders ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday.
Wistron said it shipped 31.55 million laptops, little changed from 2011’s 31.5 million units.
Smaller contract laptop maker Inventec Corp (英業達) posted NT$28.85 billion of revenue for last month, down 2.4 percent compared with NT$29.56 billion in the previous month.
The firm posted revenue of NT$320.47 billion last year, down from 2011’s NT$338.42 billion.
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