Analysts expect Pegatron Corp’s (和碩) revenue to pick up in the second half of this year as it focuses on assembling Apple Inc’s 4.7-inch iPhones instead of entering the supply chain for larger iPhones.
“Despite seasonal weakness in the first half of this year, we expect Pegatron’s revenue to improve in the second half after the likely launch of the next-generation iPhone around the third quarter of this year,” Daiwa Capital Markets analyst Steven Tseng (曾緒良) said.
The analyst’s remarks came after Pegatron on Thursday last week reported a record-high net income of NT$28.87 billion (US$887.08 million) for last year, which represented a 52.5 percent increase from NT$14.65 billion the previous year.
Tseng said he expects Pegatron to assemble between 45 percent and 50 percent of the 4.7-inch iPhones this year, gaining a larger share of Apple’s supply chain after it assembled 40 percent of the 4.7-inch iPhones last year.
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), the other main assembler of Apple’s iPhones, reportedly accounted for 60 percent of the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 and iPhone 6S models, while having about 100 percent share in the assembly of the iPhone 6 Plus and iPhone 6S Plus series, analysts said.
Tseng said Pegatron is to focus on the 4.7-inch next-generation iPhones, allowing the company to enjoy scales of economy and likely a much shorter learning curve when assembling the upcoming new iPhones in the third quarter of this year.
Yuanta Securities Investment Consulting Co (元大投顧) shared a similar view, saying that it expects Pegatron to focus on 4.7-inch iPhones rather than the larger models in the second half of this year.
“This could help Pegatron to avoid price competition from Hon Hai. It will also help reduce expenditure, and achieve a better yield and gross margin for Pegatron, which is a sensible decision in our view,” Yuanta analyst Vicent Chen (陳豊丰) wrote in a client note.
Tseng said he expects Pegatron’s revenue to fall 33.49 percent to NT$274 billion this quarter from last quarter’s NT$411.98 billion and remain flattish from last year’s NT$274.75 billion due to the slow season and weaker iPhone sales.
For the whole of this year, Tseng forecast Pegatron revenue would grow by 6 percent to NT$1.28 trillion from last year’s NT$1.21 trillion.
Chen expects the company’s annual revenue to increase by 8.9 percent year-on-year to NT$1.32 trillion this year.
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
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],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day