ELECTRONICS
HTC eyes shipments boost
Smartphone maker HTC Corp (宏達電) yesterday said its shipments at home would rise more than 50 percent this quarter from a year earlier and shipments for next quarter would also increase by a double-digit percentage year-on-year. HTC North Asia president Jack Tong (董俊良) said the shipment forecast for next quarter would be higher than this quarter thanks to the launch of the firm’s new flagship One M9. The new product goes on sale on Monday, making Taiwan the first nation in the world to sell HTC’s newest product, he said. The One M9 will initially be available in three colors — dual-tone silver and rose gold, single-tone gunmetal gray and single-tone gold — and priced from NT$21,900 (US$690) for a 32GB model, the firm said.
COMPUTERS
Inventec to reassign workers
Contract PC maker Inventec Corp (英業達) yesterday confirmed that it would conduct a workforce adjustment at its Taoyuan plants at the end of this month to utilize its manpower more efficiently, after local media reported the firm is planning large layoffs. Inventec chief financial officer Yu Chin-pao (游進寶) said in a Taiwan Stock Exchange filing that the company plans to transfer about 100 of its employees at its computer server business to Inventec Solar Energy Corp (英穩達) to cope with market changes. The solar-energy subsidiary is also based in Taoyuan. Those who do not want to work at Inventec Solar would be offered a severance package better than legal requirements, Yu said in the filing. The latest workforce adjustment came just days after Inventec said on Sunday that the group plans to recruit about 1,000 employees in the next two years to boost its research and development capabilities.
CONSTRUCTION
Huaku dividend lifts sector
Huaku Development Co (華固建設), which earned more than NT$5 per share last year, yesterday saw its shares rise by the 7 percent maximum daily limit after the company on Wednesday announced it would distribute a NT$5 cash dividend per share. Huaku posted a net income of NT$1.41 billion last year, or NT$5.08 per share, after consolidated sales of NT$6.44 billion, according to a company filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange. With the company’s shares closing at NT$61 yesterday, the proposed dividend represents a yield of 8.2 percent. The company’s high dividend payout ratio of nearly 100 percent also boosted other construction shares, which advanced 0.94 percent yesterday in Taipei trading, compared with the broader market’s 0.76 percent rise.
MACHINERY
Goodway forecast cut
Yuanta Investment Consulting Co (元大投顧) has revised down its price-earnings (PE) ratio estimate for Goodway Machine Corp (程泰機械), which makes computerized numerical control latches, saying the company’s revenue and earnings growth this year may miss its own guidance. Goodway on Wednesday reported earnings of NT$852 million, or NT$6.88 per share, for last year on revenue of NT$7.82 billion, the highest earnings in the firm’s history, but Yuanta believes that Goodway will trade at 14 times PE ratio this year, rather than the 16 times forecast earlier, citing the company’s revenue goal of 28 percent growth year-on-year to NT$10 billion this year as too aggressive. The brokerage is forecasting a more conservative 8 percent year-on-year growth in sales this year, according to a note issued yesterday.
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],”