Memorychip designer AP Memory Technology Corp (愛普科技) said it is to launch a NT$985 million (US$31.07 million) cash takeover bid for local rival Zentel Electronics Corp (力積電子) to expand into the Internet of Things (IoT) market.
The offer is the latest in a slew of mergers and acquisitions in the nation’s semiconductor industry, topped by a NT$128.7 billion acquisition bid by Advanced Semiconductor Engineering Inc (ASE, 日月光半導體) to absorb rival Siliconware Precision Industry Co (SPIL, 矽品精密).
AWAITING APPROVAL
ASE, the world’s largest chip tester and packager, is awaiting the approval of fair-trade authorities around the world before it can proceed with the transaction.
“AP Memory focuses on developing memory chips used in communications electronics, while Zentel has been good at developing niche memory chips for consumer electronics, networking devices and computer-related devices,” AP Memory chairman Brian Hsieh (謝再居) told a media briefing on Friday night.
“The two companies complement each other in terms of market segments,” Hsieh said. “The combination of the two companies’ research and development teams in Japan, the US and Taiwan would help us explore new business opportunities in the IoT market.”
AP Memory supplies its new low-power memory chips to handset chip designers MediaTek Inc (聯發科) and China’s Spreadtrum Communications Inc (展訊) for mid and low-end smartphones. The company’s largest revenue source is pseudo SRAM chips used in smartphones.
RESEARCH AND DESIGN
A tie-up with Zentel would significantly boost the company’s revenues, as it would help expand research and design capabilities as well as broaden chip portfolios and sales channels, AP Memory said.
AP Memory’s revenue next year might double from last year’s NT$2.6 billion if the acquisition deal is completed next year as planned, the firm said.
Zentel also made NT$2.6 billion in revenue last year, according to the company’s financial statement submitted to the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
AP Memory is offering to buy all outstanding common shares of Zentel at NT$14.5 per share, which would represent a 15.54 percent premium on Zentel’s closing price of NT$12.55 on Friday last week on the Taipei Exchange.
AP Memory plans to buy 50 percent of Zentel shares in the first of a planned two-stage acquisition process from tomorrow through Oct. 25.
AP Memory’s net profit soared 44.49 percent to NT$187.8 million in the first half, compared with NT$129.97 million in the same period last year, the company’s financial statements showed.
Gross margin improved to 36.48 percent in the first half from 35.04 percent in the same period last year, company data show.
Revenue increased 11.3 percent to NT$1.28 billion in the first half from NT$1.15 billion in the same period last year, the data show.
CHIP RACE: Three years of overbroad export controls drove foreign competitors to pursue their own AI chips, and ‘cost US taxpayers billions of dollars,’ Nvidia said China has figured out the US strategy for allowing it to buy Nvidia Corp’s H200s and is rejecting the artificial intelligence (AI) chip in favor of domestically developed semiconductors, White House AI adviser David Sacks said, citing news reports. US President Donald Trump on Monday said that he would allow shipments of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China, part of an administration effort backed by Sacks to challenge Chinese tech champions such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為) by bringing US competition to their home market. On Friday, Sacks signaled that he was uncertain about whether that approach would work. “They’re rejecting our chips,” Sacks
NATIONAL SECURITY: Intel’s testing of ACM tools despite US government control ‘highlights egregious gaps in US technology protection policies,’ a former official said Chipmaker Intel Corp has tested chipmaking tools this year from a toolmaker with deep roots in China and two overseas units that were targeted by US sanctions, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the matter. Intel, which fended off calls for its CEO’s resignation from US President Donald Trump in August over his alleged ties to China, got the tools from ACM Research Inc, a Fremont, California-based producer of chipmaking equipment. Two of ACM’s units, based in Shanghai and South Korea, were among a number of firms barred last year from receiving US technology over claims they have
It is challenging to build infrastructure in much of Europe. Constrained budgets and polarized politics tend to undermine long-term projects, forcing officials to react to emergencies rather than plan for the future. Not in Austria. Today, the country is to officially open its Koralmbahn tunnel, the 5.9 billion euro (US$6.9 billion) centerpiece of a groundbreaking new railway that will eventually run from Poland’s Baltic coast to the Adriatic Sea, transforming travel within Austria and positioning the Alpine nation at the forefront of logistics in Europe. “It is Austria’s biggest socio-economic experiment in over a century,” said Eric Kirschner, an economist at Graz-based Joanneum
BUBBLE? Only a handful of companies are seeing rapid revenue growth and higher valuations, and it is not enough to call the AI trend a transformation, an analyst said Artificial intelligence (AI) is entering a more challenging phase next year as companies move beyond experimentation and begin demanding clear financial returns from a technology that has delivered big gains to only a small group of early adopters, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Taiwan said yesterday. Most organizations have been able to justify AI investments through cost recovery or modest efficiency gains, but few have achieved meaningful revenue growth or long-term competitive advantage, the consultancy said in its 2026 AI Business Predictions report. This growing performance gap is forcing executives to reconsider how AI is deployed across their organizations, it said. “Many companies
RSS