Memorychip maker Winbond Electronics Corp (華邦電子) forecast its profits would expand this year from last year, supported by robust demand for memory chips used in mobile, automotive and Internet-of-Things devices, a company executive said yesterday.
“We have remained profitable for the fourth consecutive year. We foresees this year’s earnings outpacing last year on our continued efforts to increase sales of high-end products and enhance our customer portfolio,” Winbond president Chan Tung-yi (詹東義) told an investors’ conference in Taipei.
Chan declined to offer a growth estimate.
Growth momentum in Winbond’s mobile DRAM segment, which accounted for 14 percent of the firm’s total sales, would extend into this year, as Winbond has secured orders from a leading global handheld devices vendor, Chan said.
Sales contribution from automotive products is to climb from last year’s 18 percent, while shipments of SLC NAND flash would also expand this year, Chan said.
Chan said the company started migrating from 4x-nanometer technology to more advanced 3x-nanometer technology from December last year in its production of DRAM chips.
The 3x-nanometer process technology is expected to begin mass production and contribute to revenue in the third quarter of this year, he said.
As technology migration continues, Winbond expects to receive customers’ certification of its 2x-nanometer technology in the first half of next year.
To finance the technology migration plans, Winbond plans to spend up to NT$16.6 billion (US$535 million) on capital expenditure this year, including new equipment purchases and research and development, Chan said.
It would be Winbond’s highest annual capital expenditure in the company’s history, Chan said.
Winbond yesterday reported a better-than-expected net income of NT$820 million for last quarter, up from NT$817 million the previous year.
The figure represented a quarterly growth of 24.24 percent from NT$660 million in the third quarter of last year, company data showed.
In total, the firm made a net profit of NT$3.14 billion last year, down 9.51 percent from the previous year’s NT$3.47 billion.
Revenue last year climbed 10 percent to NT$42.09 billion, the data showed.
Chan attributed the decline in annual net income to higher investment in research and development.
The firm invested NT$5.75 billion in research and development last year, accounting for 13.67 percent of the company’s annual revenue of NT$42.09 billion, a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange said.
Winbond also released its revenue for last month, which fell 1.02 percent year-on-year to NT$3.42 billion.
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
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: The chipmaker last month raised its capital spending by 28 percent for this year to NT$32 billion from a previous estimate of NT$25 billion Contract chipmaker Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電子) yesterday launched a new 12-inch fab, tapping into advanced chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) packaging technology to support rising demand for artificial intelligence (AI) devices. Powerchip is to offer interposers, one of three parts in CoWoS packaging technology, with shipments scheduled for the second half of this year, Powerchip chairman Frank Huang (黃崇仁) told reporters on the sidelines of a fab inauguration ceremony in the Tongluo Science Park (銅鑼科學園區) in Miaoli County yesterday. “We are working with customers to supply CoWoS-related business, utilizing part of this new fab’s capacity,” Huang said, adding that Powerchip intended to bridge
Microsoft Corp yesterday said that it would create Thailand’s first data center region to boost cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, promising AI training to more than 100,000 people to develop tech. Bangkok is a key economic player in Southeast Asia, but it has lagged behind Indonesia and Singapore when it comes to the tech industry. Thailand has an “incredible opportunity to build a digital-first, AI-powered future,” Microsoft chairman and chief executive officer Satya Nadella said at an event in Bangkok. Data center regions are physical locations that store computing infrastructure, allowing secure and reliable access to cloud platforms. The global embrace of AI
Qualcomm Inc, the world’s biggest seller of smartphone processors, gave an upbeat forecast for sales and profit in the current period, suggesting demand for handsets is increasing after a two-year slump. Revenue in the three months ended in June will be US$8.8 billion to US$9.6 billion, the company said in a statement Wednesday. Excluding certain items, earnings will be US$2.15 to US$2.35 a share. Analysts had projected sales of US$9.08 billion and earnings of US$2.16 a share. The outlook signals that the smartphone market has begun to bounce back, tracking with Qualcomm’s forecast that demand would gradually recover this year. The San