Delta Electronics Inc (台達電), the nation’s biggest power and thermal solutions provider, yesterday said its revenue this year would continue to grow beyond last year’s historic level, fueled mainly by rising demand for electric vehicles, data centers and industrial automation.
The growth would offset a likely decline in the PC segment, Delta said.
“We believe the company will continue to grow organically this year,” Delta chairman Yancey Hai (海英俊) told an investors’ conference in Taipei.
Hai did not disclose any specific growth target.
Yuanta Securities Investment Consulting Co (元大投顧) forecast that Delta would post 4.4 percent year-on-year growth in revenue to NT$256.46 billion (US$8.3 billion) this year from NT$237 billion last year.
The growth forecast is weaker than a consensus of 10 percent growth.
“Electric vehicle is a growing segment. We have engaged with some global electric vehicle companies. Now, we are going to fulfill [those orders],” Hai said.
The company in 2015 set a five-year goal to generate US$500 million from the electric vehicle segment. That goal remains unchanged, Hai said.
Hai said he is positive about Tesla Inc’s price cuts, saying that an affordable price tag would be an effective way to stimulate demand for new products.
Data centers are also a growing area, given Internet firms such as Google, Facebook Inc and Microsoft Corp are building more data centers to cope with growing Internet traffic, Hai said.
Delta is supplying more components, such as power supplies and cooling systems, to those clients, he said.
Industrial automation revenue is expected to grow by a double-digit percentage this year as manufacturers look to reduce costs by replacing costly workers with automated systems, he said.
Half of Delta’s industrial automation business comes from China, Hai said, but it is to play a smaller role as Delta diversifies into Southeast Asia, the US, Africa and Japan, he said.
Commenting on the impact from the US-China trade dispute, Hai said only 5 percent of the company’s products would be affected by the tariffs imposed by the US.
Delta is moving production out of China to Thailand, India and Taiwan, in a bid to prevent any imposition of tariffs, he said.
The company on Monday posted a net profit of NT$6.05 billion for the fourth quarter of last year.
The profit surpassed the NT$5.52 billion forecast by Yuanta.
That meant Delta’s net profits for the whole of last year shrank 1 percent to NT$18.19 billion from NT$18.38 billion in 2017, or earnings per share of NT$7.00 from NT$7.08.
Delta’s board of directors on Monday approved a proposal to distribute a cash dividend of NT$5 per common share.
The distribution is subject to shareholders’ approval at the company’s annual general meeting scheduled for June 10.
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