STEELMAKERS
JFE to acquire Formosa stake
JFE Steel Corp yesterday said it would acquire a 5 percent stake in Formosa Ha Tinh Steel Corp (台塑河靜鋼鐵興業), which is constructing an integrated steelworks — Vietnam’s first — in Ha Tinh Province, according to a statement issued by the Japanese firm. JFE Steel did not offer numbers for its share purchase, but said it and Formosa Plastics Group (FPG, 台塑集團), the parent company of Formosa Ha Tinh Steel, would formalize the agreement in the near future. The steelworks, which is to include a hot-rolling mill, blast furnaces and steelmaking facilities, is scheduled to begin operating sequentially from this autumn, the company said. Formosa Ha Tinh Steel invested US$10.5 billion in the first phase of the project. Initial crude steel output capacity is expected to be approximately 7 million tonnes per year.
IC DESIGNERS
Ali plans share buyback
Integrated circuit designer Ali Corp (揚智) plans to buy back 4.55 million of its shares, or 1.5 percent of outstanding stock, on the open market, the company said yesterday. The share buyback is to begin today and run through Sept. 30, with the company planning to repurchase the shares at between NT$10.1 and NT$22.1 each. Ali shares ended 1.58 percent higher at NT$12.85 yesterday. The company reported a second-quarter loss of NT$135 million (US$4.27 million), or NT$0.46 per share, and sales dropped significantly to NT$658 million last quarter due to softening demand in most emerging markets and a slowdown in Pay-TV operator demand. Ali said decreasing product margin for certain segments and inventory provisions caused its gross margin to fall 3 percentage points quarterly to 39 percent last quarter.
PHARMACEUTICALS
TWi reports legal victory
TWi Pharmaceuticals Inc (安成), a developer of specialty generic drugs, yesterday saw shares rise 5.53 percent to close at NT$210 in Taipei trading after the company said on Wednesday it received a favorable verdict in a US trial concerning a generic version of Megace ES. TWi, the only supplier of generic Megace ES, said it is able to sell its generic megestrol acetate immediately in the US market after the District Court of Maryland reinstated its ruling that a Par Pharmaceutical Inc patent was invalid. Megace ES is for the treatment of appetite loss, severe malnutrition or unexplained, significant weight loss in AIDS patients. Total sales of Megace ES were about US$44 million last year and TWi is expected to grab a 30 percent share of the US market, analysts forecast.
MANUFACTURING
Silitech releases finances
Handset keypad supplier Silitech Technology Corp’s (閎暉) board yesterday signed off on the firm’s financial report for the first six months, during which the company posted net profit of NT$890 million, compared with a net loss of NT$122.26 million a year earlier, while earnings per share rose to NT$0.47 from losses per share of NT$0.65 a year earlier. However, revenue in the first half dropped from NT$2.32 billion a year earlier to NT$1.72 billion. Silitech is a keypad manufacturing arm of Lite-On Technology Inc (光寶科技). With clearer market visibility of the adoption of 3D cover glass and growing business opportunities in industries such as PC, networking and gaming, Silitech expects solid revenue contributions to increase quarter over quarter during the second half of this year.
BUSINESS UPDATE: The iPhone assembler said operations outlook is expected to show quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year growth for the second quarter Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported strong growth in sales last month, potentially raising expectations for iPhone sales while artificial intelligence (AI)-related business booms. The company, which assembles the majority of Apple Inc’s smartphones, reported a 19.03 percent rise in monthly sales to NT$510.9 billion (US$15.78 billion), from NT$429.22 billion in the same period last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 14.16 percent, it said. The company in a statement said that last month’s revenue was a record-breaking April performance. Hon Hai, known also as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), assembles most iPhones, but the company is diversifying its business to
Apple Inc has been developing a homegrown chip to run artificial intelligence (AI) tools in data centers, although it is unclear if the semiconductor would ever be deployed, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. The effort would build on Apple’s previous efforts to make in-house chips, which run in its iPhones, Macs and other devices, according to the Journal, which cited unidentified people familiar with the matter. The server project is code-named ACDC (Apple Chips in Data Center) within the company, aiming to utilize Apple’s expertise in chip design for the company’s server infrastructure, the newspaper said. While this initiative has been
Clambering hand-over-hand, sweat dripping into his eyes, a durian laborer expertly slices a cumbersome fruit from a tree before tossing it down to land with a soft thump in his colleague’s waiting arms about 15m below. Among Thailand’s most famous and lucrative exports, the pungent “king of fruits” is as distinctive in its smell as its spiky green-brown carapace, and has been farmed in the kingdom for hundreds of years. However, a vicious heat wave engulfing Southeast Asia has resulted in smaller yields and spiraling costs, with growers and sellers increasingly panicked as global warming damages the industry. “This year is a crisis,”
HIGH-TECH: As leading-edge process technologies become more complicated, only a handful of players are able to provide design services, the company’s CEO said Artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯) yesterday said that revenue would grow significantly again in 2026 after adding a major AI chip customer, reversing moderation amid a product transition next year. The Taipei-based application-specific IC (ASIC) designer reiterated its strong revenue growth forecast for this year and 2026 after its stock plummeted about 23 percent to NT$3,145 from a peak of NT$4,085 on March 6 amid growing competition. Alchip said it has built strong partnerships with cloud service providers (CSP), denying that it had lost orders to smaller competitors such as Faraday Technology Corp (智原). Faraday said it has secured