Despite the widely reported explosion of several Galaxy Note 7 smartphones, Samsung Electronics Co remained the largest smartphone vendor in Taiwan last year, market researcher International Data Corp (IDC) said yesterday.
A total of 8.74 million smartphones were sold in the nation last year, down 18 percent from 2015, IDC’s data showed.
It was the first year-on-year decline in smartphone sales in Taiwan, indicating that the market has reached a saturation point, IDC said.
Smartphones accounted for 95 percent of local handset sales last year, the data showed.
Samsung accounted for 22 percent of total smartphone sales, followed by Apple Inc’s 20 percent, IDC said.
Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) was the third-largest vendor, with an 18 percent share, followed by HTC Corp (宏達電), with a 15 percent share, and Sony Corp, which had 9 percent, IDC said.
Smartphones with larger-sized screens dominated the market last year, with phablets that have a display of 5.5-inch or larger accounting for about 50 percent of the local market.
Their share of the market is expected to increase to 84 percent this year, IDC said.
Separately, Apple has revealed plans to set up two more research centers and boost investment in China, a pivotal market in which the iPhone has been rapidly elbowed aside by local competitors.
The US company said it plans to build new research facilities in Shanghai and Suzhou, on top of centers already scheduled to open in Beijing and Shenzhen.
Apple also pledged to spend at least 3.5 billion yuan (US$507 million) on research institutions.
All four centers are to open later this year, the company said in a statement on its Chinese Web site.
They will help Apple cooperate with local partners and attract personnel from its local suppliers, as well as from top educational institutes, it said.
The company’s announcement comes after iPhone shipments fell for the first time in China on an annual basis last year, as local vendors, such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為), Oppo (歐珀) and Vivo (維沃), are eroding its market share with increasingly high-end devices.
Apple is counting on the release of the 10th anniversary iPhone later this year to bolster growth.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last