O-Ta Precision Industry Co Ltd (大田精密), the world’s third-largest maker of heads for golf clubs, expects profit for the second half of the year to grow on the back of increased shipments of high-margin products.
“Orders from our top five customers have increased annually so far this year,” an O-Ta public relations official told the Taipei Times by telephone on Friday.
The official declined to provide growth rates in orders from its top five clients, but said sales and profits this year would be better than expected.
“The growth momentum is expected to continue into the second half of the year,” said the official, who asked to remain anonymous.
The Pingtung County-based company, established in 1988, counts golf clubs as its top revenue source, contributing about 90 percent to overall sales in the first half of the year.
Bicycle frames and stainless steel faucets made up 10 percent of sales in the period, the company said.
O-Ta’s US and Japanese customers, each of which contributed half of the company’s annual sales, have been placing more orders for high-margin products this year, the official said, declining to specify its customers and their exact orders.
As next year’s Tokyo Olympics approaches, O-Ta’s Japanese customers plan to introduce new golf products in the first quarter of next year, which would boost sales next year, he said.
The company’s factory in Shenzhen, China, which makes mainly bicycle frames, is expected to relocate to Huizhou next quarter at the earliest, or early next year at the latest, the official said.
“The reason for the relocation is due to higher operation costs,” he said, adding that the new factory would start operations once it receives approval from the local government and gains certification from its customers.
O-Ta had combined profits for May and last month of NT$114 million (US$3.67 million), compared with net losses of NT$136 million in the same period last year, with earnings per share improving to NT$1.75 from NT$1.32 a year earlier, the company said in a regulatory filing on Wednesday.
The company attributed the improvement to better performance of its core business and higher foreign-exchange gains compared with a year earlier.
Revenue for the second quarter climbed 24.31 percent annually and 31.76 percent quarterly to NT$1.12 billion, the company said.
That saw cumulative revenue for the first half of this year rise 3.08 percent to NT$1.97 billion from NT$1.91 billion a year earlier, it said.
Jih Sun Securities Investment Consulting Co (日盛投顧) is positive about global demand for golf products as the Tokyo Olympics draw near and growth potential in China, expecting the golf industry’s output to grow by about 3.04 percent to US$13.3 billion this year.
Shares of O-Ta Precision rose 0.11 percent to close at NT$46.3 in Taipei trading on Friday. They have surged 151.63 percent since the beginning of the year.
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