CHIPMAKERS
TSMC shelves power idea
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, yesterday said it is not considering building a power plant on its own, citing regulation problems. Company spokesperson Elizabeth Sun (孫又文) said the idea might be a future consideration. Sun’s comments came after the Chinese-language newspaper Commercial Times reported yesterday that TSMC is evaluating the feasibility of building a power plant to avoid power supply constraints. The chipmaker’s power consumption is expected to increase 85 percent within 10 years, the report said. TSMC consumed 7.52 units of power last year, accounting for 3 percent of Taiwan’s total power consumption, the company said. This year, the chipmaker expects to consume 9.1 billion units of power. The company expects power consumption to grow 1.85 times by 2022 as it continues to expand capacities and migrate to advanced technologies.
PHARMACEUTICALS
Cancer vaccine results
OBI Pharma Inc (台灣浩鼎) yesterday announced that it will unveil the latest results of a clinical study for OBI-822/821, the company’s breast cancer vaccine, in March next year. The clinical study was initiated in December 2010 and was completed on Aug. 25 last year, the company said in a statement. The study enrolled 349 female subjects with metastatic breast cancer who had at least one course of conventional anticancer therapy. OBI-822 is designed to trigger the immune system to generate antibodies that activate certain cells to destroy cancer cells. OBI Pharma shares yesterday gained 1.48 percent to close at NT$274. The company’s shares were listed on the Taipei Exchange on March 23 and closed at NT$355 that day.
REAL ESTATE
Market transactions down
The volume of transactions in the domestic housing market decreased 17 percent last month from July — due to the effect of Ghost Month — despite the central bank easing its selective credit control. Although the government continued to take measures to stimulate buying, stock fluctuations and the month of August, which usually coincides with the lunar Chinese month known as “Ghost Month,” have impacted housing purchases, H&B Realty Co (住商不動產) researcher Jessica Hsu (徐佳馨) said yesterday. While anticipating lower housing prices last month, buyers were mostly reserved in making bids, Hsu said. Housing transactions in Taipei shrank 8.8 percent last month from July, while those in Kaohsiung decreased 8.4 percent.
SMARTPHONES
Asustek’s market growing
Taiwan’s Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) took the lead in the Philippines’ big-screen phone market during the second quarter, thanks to the launch of its 5.5-inch ZenFone 2 smartphone in April. Citing data compiled by research firm International Data Corp (IDC), Asustek said in a statement on Saturday that it topped the Philippines market in mid-tier and high-end smartphones with a 5.5-inch or larger screen in the April-June quarter, without giving its market share or shipments. Asustek noted that the Philippines has become one of its key markets since last year, as the company’s first and second generation ZenFone models have topped the Google Trends search volume index there, outperforming other brands such as Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics Co.
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