■ Investors eye HSIP
Fueled by an encouraging domestic economic outlook, a large amount of investment has flooded into the Hsinchu Science-based Industrial Park (HSIP) in northern Taiwan, the park's administration director James Lee (李界木) said yesterday. Lee said that investments of NT$23.9 billion (about US$725 million) expected to be injected into the HSIP by 12 companies was approved by the administration in the first quarter, an increase of 795 percent from a year ago. In addition, applications for capital increment worth NT$3.76 billion by nine companies which are already operating at the park were also approved by the administration, marking a 241.8 percent growth over the year before, Lee said. Other investment projects worth about NT$10.9 billion raised by another 46 companies are awaiting approval, he said. However, Lee pointed out that demand to open up shop in the science-based industrial parks in northern, central and southern Taiwan is high, creating space problems at these compounds, which have been doing their best to lure investments in recent years.
■ Microsoft, TSMC team up
Microsoft Corp, the US software giant, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world's largest made-to-order chipmaker, said yesterday that they will team up in the production of future Xbox game consoles. Under the partnership, TSMC will provide semicondctor manufacturing services for Microsoft's future Xbox products. This agreement will also help expand an ongoing relationship between the two companies by providing Microsoft with direct, collaborative access to TSMC's advanced semiconductor process technologies, TSMC said in a statement. "Microsoft's future Xbox products and services will require leading-edge semiconductor technologies," said Rick Tsai (蔡力行), president of TSMC.
■ IT companies to Saudi Arabia
Eighteen Taiwanese computer and information technology companies have registered to take part in the 2004 GITEX computer expo scheduled to be held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia from April 18 to April 22, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The ministry is assisting the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA, 外貿協會) to facilitate the Taiwanese manufacturers' participation in the GITEX, said King Yu (游金榮), deputy director of the ministry's department of economic and trade affairs. Saudi Arabia is the largest market of IT products in the Middle East, absorbing some US$4.6 billion worth of IT products last year, which was 40 percent of the entire IT market in that part of the world the previous year, Yu said.
■ AU's sales rise
AU Optronics Corp (友達光電), the nation's largest maker of flat-panel displays used in computers and televisions, said sales last month rose 119 percent from a year ago to NT$13.9 billion (US$422 million). Sales rose from NT$6.4 billion in March last year and NT$12.5 billion in the previous month. On Monday, Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd (中華映管), the country's No. 3 maker of flat panel displays, said its March sales hit an all-time high of NT$11.01 billion. March sales rose by 5.6 percent from NT$10.42 billion in February, but represented a 92.2 percent increase from a year ago, the company said.
■ NT dollar lower
The New Taiwan dollar remained weak against its US counterpart, dropping by NT$0.041 to close at NT$32.990 on the Taipei foreign exchange market. Turnover was US$665 million.
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
Nvidia Corp’s demand for advanced packaging from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) remains strong though the kind of technology it needs is changing, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday, after he was asked whether the company was cutting orders. Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Blackwell, consists of multiple chips glued together using a complex chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) advanced packaging technology offered by TSMC, Nvidia’s main contract chipmaker. “As we move into Blackwell, we will use largely CoWoS-L. Of course, we’re still manufacturing Hopper, and Hopper will use CowoS-S. We will also transition the CoWoS-S capacity to CoWos-L,” Huang said
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
INDUSTRY LEADER: TSMC aims to continue outperforming the industry’s growth and makes 2025 another strong growth year, chairman and CEO C.C. Wei says Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday said it aims to grow revenue by about 25 percent this year, driven by robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips. That means TSMC would continue to outpace the foundry industry’s 10 percent annual growth this year based on the chipmaker’s estimate. The chipmaker expects revenue from AI-related chips to double this year, extending a three-fold increase last year. The growth would quicken over the next five years at a compound annual growth rate of 45 percent, fueled by strong demand for the high-performance computing
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