■ China van venture formed
Taiwan's China Motor Corp (中華汽車), DaimlerChrysler AG from Germany and China's Fujian Motor Industrial Group (福汽集團) will form a joint venture making vans in China, a spokeswoman for the Taiwanese firm said yesterday. Fujian Motor will take a 50 percent stake in the new project, at Fuzhou in China's southeastern Fujian Province, while DaimlerChryler AG will share 33 percent and the Taiwan partner 17 percent, the spokeswoman said. "We expect the joint venture to be set up by the end of this year after obtaining approval from Chinese authorities," she said. DiamlerChrysler will provide production know-how for the joint venture, to be named DaimlerChrysler Vans (China), and the Taiwan firm will take charge of marketing, eyeing China and Southeast Asian countries, she added. The new company is scheduled to begin commercial production in early 2007 and reach its capacity of 40,000 units in 2013.
■ Third-quarter Hon Hai profits rise
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), Taiwan's largest electronics company, had a 40 percent rise in third-quarter profit on demand for game consoles and music players from customers such as Sony Corp and Apple Computer Inc.
Net income rose to NT$11.1 billion (US$330 million) from NT$7.9 billion a year earlier, according to figures derived by subtracting first-half earnings from nine-month numbers provided by the company to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday. Demand for Sony's video-game player and Apple's iPod fueled sales of component and assembly provider Hon Hai, according to Kirk Yang (楊應超), an analyst at Citigroup Inc. The iPod is the best-selling music player in the US, according to researcher NPD Group Inc. Sony this month raised its full-year shipment forecast for game players by 7.7 percent.
■ Quanta posts profit gain
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦), the world's largest maker of notebook computers, posted its first profit gain in six quarters as sales increased. Third-quarter net income rose 10 percent to NT$3.4 billion (US$101 million), from NT$3.1 billion a year earlier, the figures were derived by Bloomberg by subtracting the six-month profit from the computer maker's nine-month earnings that announced yesterday. Sales at Quanta Computer rose 32 percent to NT$104 billion in the third quarter, from NT$78.9 billion a year earlier, according to the company's monthly releases.
■ CAL profits fall
China Airlines (華航), Taiwan's largest carrier, said yesterday its net profit in the nine months to September fell 70.2 percent from a year earlier, reflecting soaring global oil prices. Net profit for the period was NT$1.01 billion (US$30.05 million), compared with NT$3.39 billion a year earlier. In the nine months, sales of China Airlines rose 12.8 percent to NT$79.02 billion from NT$70.05 billion a year earlier. The soaring fuel prices also battered another local carrier EVA Airways (長榮航空), which said yesterday that its net profit in the January-September period fell 48.7 percent from a year earlier to NT$1.37 billion (US$40.77 million). Sales in the nine months, however, rose 6.97 percent from a year earlier to NT$64.29 billion dollars, the airliner said. "EVA Airways was no exception under fuel price impact," a company spokesman said.
■ NT dollar advances
The New Taiwan dollar advanced against the US dollar on the Taipei Foreign Exchange yesterday, rising NT$0.055 to close at NT$33.551. A total of US$587 million changed hands during the day's trading.
TARIFF TRADE-OFF: Machinery exports to China dropped after Beijing ended its tariff reductions in June, while potential new tariffs fueled ‘front-loaded’ orders to the US The nation’s machinery exports to the US amounted to US$7.19 billion last year, surpassing the US$6.86 billion to China to become the largest export destination for the local machinery industry, the Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI, 台灣機械公會) said in a report on Jan. 10. It came as some manufacturers brought forward or “front-loaded” US-bound shipments as required by customers ahead of potential tariffs imposed by the new US administration, the association said. During his campaign, US president-elect Donald Trump threatened tariffs of as high as 60 percent on Chinese goods and 10 percent to 20 percent on imports from other countries.
Taiwanese manufacturers have a chance to play a key role in the humanoid robot supply chain, Tongtai Machine and Tool Co (東台精機) chairman Yen Jui-hsiung (嚴瑞雄) said yesterday. That is because Taiwanese companies are capable of making key parts needed for humanoid robots to move, such as harmonic drives and planetary gearboxes, Yen said. This ability to produce these key elements could help Taiwanese manufacturers “become part of the US supply chain,” he added. Yen made the remarks a day after Nvidia Corp cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said his company and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) are jointly
United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) expects its addressable market to grow by a low single-digit percentage this year, lower than the overall foundry industry’s 15 percent expansion and the global semiconductor industry’s 10 percent growth, the contract chipmaker said yesterday after reporting the worst profit in four-and-a-half years in the fourth quarter of last year. Growth would be fueled by demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers, a moderate recovery in consumer electronics and an increase in semiconductor content, UMC said. “UMC’s goal is to outgrow our addressable market while maintaining our structural profitability,” UMC copresident Jason Wang (王石) told an online earnings
MARKET SHIFTS: Exports to the US soared more than 120 percent to almost one quarter, while ASEAN has steadily increased to 18.5 percent on rising tech sales The proportion of Taiwan’s exports directed to China, including Hong Kong, declined by more than 12 percentage points last year compared with its peak in 2020, the Ministry of Finance said on Thursday last week. The decrease reflects the ongoing restructuring of global supply chains, driven by escalating trade tensions between Beijing and Washington. Data compiled by the ministry showed China and Hong Kong accounted for 31.7 percent of Taiwan’s total outbound sales last year, a drop of 12.2 percentage points from a high of 43.9 percent in 2020. In addition to increasing trade conflicts between China and the US, the ministry said
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