SEMICONDUCTORS
WT gives revenue guidance
IC distributor WT Microelectronics Co (文曄科技) yesterday said it expects consolidated revenue of between NT$85 billion and NT$91 billion (US$2.77 billion and US$2.96 billion) this quarter, after posting sales of NT$84.8 billion last quarter, which was better than its guidance. Gross margin is likely to range between 3.2 percent and 3.4 percent, compared with 3.65 percent last quarter, while operating expenses would decrease to between 1.6 percent and 1.8 percent, compared with last quarter’s 2.01 percent, the company said. Net income was NT$990 million for last quarter, or earnings per share of NT$1.79. In the first three quarters of this year, the company earned NT$2.19 billion, up 20.42 percent year-on-year, or earnings per share of NT$3.96.
ELECTRONICS
Delta sales rise 10 percent
Delta Electronics Inc (台達電), the nation’s leading power and thermal solutions provider, yesterday reported consolidated sales of NT$21.3 billion for last month, a 10 percent increase from NT$19.44 billion in the same period last year. Cumulative sales from January to last month totaled NT$193.69 billion, up 7 percent from NT$181.66 billion in the same period last year. Separately, Lite-On Technology Corp (光寶科技), a top electronics components supplier, reported consolidated sales of NT$17.6 billion for last month, up 7 percent year-on-year. Thanks to stable end demand from core businesses, cumulative sales in the first 10 months of the year decreased 2.14 percent annually to NT$174.22 billion, Lite-On said in a statement.
NETWORKING
Accton to end GDR program
Accton Technology Corp (智邦科技), a local maker of computer networking equipment such as routers, yesterday said its board of directors has resolved to terminate the firm’s global depositary receipt (GDR) program and deposit agreement to lower relevant management costs. As of Wednesday last week, the firm’s outstanding GDRs on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange totaled 37,332 units (representing 74,664 common shares), Accton said in a statement. In the first three quarters of the year, Accton reported cumulative sales of NT$30.07 billion and operating income of NT$2.44 billion. Net income reached NT$2.15 billion, or earnings per share of NT$3.89.
SEMICONDUCTORS
Wafer shipments rise 8.6%
Global silicon wafer shipments last quarter increased 8.6 percent from a year earlier in terms of surface area, the SEMI Silicon Manufacturers Group (SMG) said on Wednesday in a news release. Shipments totaled 3.255 billion square inches, up from the 2.997 billion square inches a year earlier, SMG data showed. On a quarterly basis, shipments rose from 3.164 billion square inches.
E-COMMERCE
KKday reveals new investors
Travel e-commerce platform KKday yesterday announced that Line Ventures, the corporate venture arm of Line Corp, and Alibaba Entrepreneurs Fund (阿里巴巴創業者基金), a not-for-profit initiative of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴), participated in its Series B+ funding. Existing investors, including CDIB Capital Group (中華開發資本) and Monk’s Hill Ventures, a Southeast Asia-focused fund, also participated with follow-on investments, KKday said in a news release. The strategic funding would accelerate KKday’s efforts to leverage innovative technologies in travel bookings and experiences, the firm said.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to