Camera lens mold maker Zhong Yang Technology Co Ltd (中揚光電) on Friday said it is seeking an initial public offering in Taiwan this year to fund its capacity expansion to cope with growing demand for camera lenses used in mobile phones and vehicles.
Zhong Yang is the latest in a slew of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) subsidiaries debuting their shares in Taiwan or China. Hon Hai holds a share of about 30 percent in the company via its investment arms.
“Our production lines are being fully utilized,” Zhong Yang chairman Cheng Cheng-tien (鄭成田) told an investors’ conference. “We are adding more equipment... We aim to more than double our capacity in the next year or so, as we are also adding new customers.”
Zhong Yang said it has an optimistic view for its outlook.
“Although worldwide sales growth for smartphones is reaching its ceiling, demand for camera lenses are on the rise,” Zhong Yang president Lee Jung-chou (李榮洲) said. “New phones with three or four cameras are to offer improved features for 3D sensing and selfies.”
“On-screen fingerprint recognition is also popular and such features will be available on a lot of smartphones next year,” Lee said. “We have received a lot of orders to supply camera lens molds for fingerprint cameras.”
In the first three quarters, about 85 percent of the company’s revenue came from mobile phone camera lens molds and 10 percent from automotive camera lens molds. In that period, Zhong Yang made NT$939.23 million (US$30.41 million) in revenue, a 30 percent increase from the same period last year.
However, net profit fell 12.46 percent year-on-year to NT$151.64 million, or NT$2.53 per share, due to higher operating costs. The company more than doubled its research and development for the year to Sept. 30, spending NT$59.73 million, up from NT$21.3 million in the same period last year.
The Taichung-based firm supplies molds to the world’s major camera lens suppliers, including China’s Sunny Optical Technology (Group) Co (舜宇光學) and Kantatsu Co, a handset camera lends manufacturing arm of Sharp Corp.
The company started as a supplier of plastic molds and has gradually increased its reach to supply glass molds and to make handset camera lenses.
Last year, the company began supplying glass molds after merging with lens maker Eterge Opto-Electronics Co (紘立光電) to make inroads into molds for vehicles and smart-city surveillance systems.
Zhong Yang expects its automotive molds to grow by between 50 and 60 percent annually next year and by a higher rate in 2020, as its products have been adopted by the world’s major car brands from Germany, France and Japan for advanced driver-assistance systems.
The company plans to auction 60 million shares to investors at a floor price of NT$58 each from Thursday to Monday next week ahead of its debut.
It also plans to offer 8 million shares to existing stakeholders from Friday next week to Dec. 4 at a starting price of NT$50 each.
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
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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