Qualcomm Inc, the world’s largest supplier of chips for mobile phones, yesterday said it is stepping up its recruitment of engineers for labs in Taiwan this year in response to growing demand for 5G devices ahead of global commercialization.
Taiwanese component and hardware manufacturers are among the world’s pioneers in taking up the new-generation mobile technology, as they are better prepared to embrace the arrival of the 5G era than they were for the 4G era, Qualcomm said.
Wistron NeWeb Corp (啟碁) and Askey Computer Corp (亞旭), a wholly owned subsidiary of Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) that makes high-end routers and networking equipment, showcased their latest 5G-enabled consumer premise equipment (CPE) powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X50 processor during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, last week.
Photo: Lo Chien-yi, Taipei Times
HTC Corp (宏達電) unveiled its first 5G hub, rather than mobile phones as it did before, ahead of the opening of the annual show.
“The migration to 5G will be much faster than the last transition from 4G to 3G, as there is already a lot of 4G applications in use... 5G is becoming a reality now,” Qualcomm Taiwan president S.T. Liew (劉思泰) said.
“5G is not about mobile phones only. There is a lot of applications beyond mobile phones, including apps for industrial devices and more,” Liew said.
“Qualcomm is deepening its partnership with Taiwan and helping it reach out for 5G businesses,” he said.
The San Diego, California-based company has set up a 5G module research-and-design center in Taiwan, the second worldwide after the one at its headquarters, to assist local partners in solving engineering and technological issues and promote exchanges of 5G technology, he said.
The 5G center is one of three centers Qualcomm plans to open in Taiwan — the other two are a millimeter-wave testing center and a biometric sensor testing center.
The chipmaker has about 600 engineers at its local labs in Taipei and Hsinchu, a spike from 160 engineers last year.
The company plans to further increase its headcount this year, but declined to confirm a report by the Chinese-language Economic Daily News that it plans to add 200 more engineers.
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
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RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six