MediaTek Inc (聯發科技), the world's largest maker of semiconductors for DVD players, said it will introduce its first mobile-phone chips in the current quarter to widen the company's product range and boost profit.
"The chips will start contributing to revenue by next year," MediaTek chairman Tsai Ming-chieh (
He didn't give a forecast.
MediaTek said it has two customers for the chips, both handset makers in Taiwan.
MediaTek is counting on new products to maintain profit growth as competition increases for DVD player chips, which account for most of its sales.
The company this year started selling chips for DVD recorders after introducing new semiconductors for the DVD player market last year.
MediaTek's profit grew 83 percent last year after more than doubling in 2001. The company's shares have risen 83 percent this year, against a 32 percent rise on the TAIEX.
The company said on May 16 it aimed to sell its first handset chips by the middle of this year. The chips are designed to work with phones based on the global system for mobile communications, or GSM, standard that's used in most of the world.
MediaTek will offer digital signal processors, the "brains" of a mobile phone, in competition with makers such as Texas Instruments Inc, the No. 1 supplier, Motorola Inc and Analog Devices Inc. The Taiwanese company is also selling a chip that transmits phone signals.
The new products will be a "stepping stone" to making chips for phones that allow faster wireless access to the Internet, the company said.
MediaTek said that it plans to sell mobile-phone chips to many of its existing customers in China, the world's biggest market for handsets.
MediaTek last year became the first company to offer one chip for DVD players that combines the functions of several, helping DVD-player makers cut production costs.
Rivals such as ALi Corp (揚智) of Taiwan and ESS Technology Inc of the US this year introduced similar chips.
Intel Corp chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) is expected to meet with Taiwanese suppliers next month in conjunction with the opening of the Computex Taipei trade show, supply chain sources said on Monday. The visit, the first for Tan to Taiwan since assuming his new post last month, would be aimed at enhancing Intel’s ties with suppliers in Taiwan as he attempts to help turn around the struggling US chipmaker, the sources said. Tan is to hold a banquet to celebrate Intel’s 40-year presence in Taiwan before Computex opens on May 20 and invite dozens of Taiwanese suppliers to exchange views
Application-specific integrated circuit designer Faraday Technology Corp (智原) yesterday said that although revenue this quarter would decline 30 percent from last quarter, it retained its full-year forecast of revenue growth of 100 percent. The company attributed the quarterly drop to a slowdown in customers’ production of chips using Faraday’s advanced packaging technology. The company is still confident about its revenue growth this year, given its strong “design-win” — or the projects it won to help customers design their chips, Faraday president Steve Wang (王國雍) told an online earnings conference. “The design-win this year is better than we expected. We believe we will win
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) chairman Barry Lam (林百里) is expected to share his views about the artificial intelligence (AI) industry’s prospects during his speech at the company’s 37th anniversary ceremony, as AI servers have become a new growth engine for the equipment manufacturing service provider. Lam’s speech is much anticipated, as Quanta has risen as one of the world’s major AI server suppliers. The company reported a 30 percent year-on-year growth in consolidated revenue to NT$1.41 trillion (US$43.35 billion) last year, thanks to fast-growing demand for servers, especially those with AI capabilities. The company told investors in November last year that
Power supply and electronic components maker Delta Electronics Inc (台達電) yesterday said it plans to ship its new 1 megawatt charging systems for electric trucks and buses in the first half of next year at the earliest. The new charging piles, which deliver up to 1 megawatt of charging power, are designed for heavy-duty electric vehicles, and support a maximum current of 1,500 amperes and output of 1,250 volts, Delta said in a news release. “If everything goes smoothly, we could begin shipping those new charging systems as early as in the first half of next year,” a company official said. The new
RSS