Asustek Computer Inc (華碩電腦), the world’s No. 5 PC vendor, yesterday said its unaudited standalone revenue decreased by 23.1 percent month-on-month to NT$30.47 billion (US$1.05 billion) due mainly to weak demand during the slow season, but expects sales to pick up in March as demand from the Chinese market enters its boom season.
On an annual basis, Asustek’s revenue for last month increased by 24.15 percent from NT$24.55 billion in the same period of 2011.
For the whole of last year, Asustek’s revenue grew 18.08 percent to NT$375.12 billion, compared with NT$317.67 billion in 2011.
Asustek’s revenue decrease was because of a high comparison base, Hua Nan Securities Investment Management Co (華南投顧) assistant vice president Green Wu (吳積霖) said by telephone.
“Despite Asustek posting a decline in sales last month, it still achieved nearly 20 percent growth last year, proving that its products appeal to the market and that the company has the correct product strategy,” Wu said.
Meanwhile, Acer Inc (宏碁), the world’s No. 4 PC brand, yesterday said last month’s revenue expanded 20.78 percent to NT$29.41 billion, from November’s NT$24.35 billion.
However, the figure represents a 10.95 percent decrease compared with NT$33.03 billion for the same period a year ago.
For the whole of last year, Acer posted NT$359.89 billion in sales, down 11.3 percent compared with NT$405.71 billion in 2011.
“Acer needs to look to Asustek to improve its product design in order to grab back market share and sales,” Wu said.
He added that although Acer rolled out a new budget tablet priced at US$149 to take on Asustek and Google Inc’s Nexus 7 tablet, the product is not as feature-rich as the Nexus 7 and is obviously targeted at buyers from emerging markets.
“Acer set an attractive price for its new product, but it still needs to improve its design skills to catch up with Asustek,” Wu said.
“Acer’s product strategy is correct from the perspective that tablets are likely to replace notebooks in the future. However, Acer needs to diversify and expand its product portfolio so that customers have more options. A pure budget tablet is not enough,” Wu said.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to