Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said sales grew 16.6 percent month-on-month to NT$14.2 billion (US$430 million) last month, marking the first monthly increase over the past seven months as the bleak economy hurt spending on electronics.
The boost brought TSMC’s first-quarter revenues to NT$39.5 billion, better than the chipmaker’s estimate of between NT$36 billion and NT$38 billion. Last month, TSMC raised its first-quarter revenues forecast by about 8.6 percent to between NT$36 billion and NT$38 billion, up from the NT$32 billion to NT$35 billion, citing rush orders and increasing demand from China.
TSMC’s first-quarter revenues, however, showed a decline of 54.8 percent from the NT$87.48 billion reported in the same period last year.
On Wednesday, rival United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) reported its sales last month rose 44.45 percent month-on-month to NT$4.54 billion, but declined 46.56 percent year-on-year.
In the first three months of the year, UMC posted NT$10.84 billion in revenues, down 54.85 percent from a year earlier.
TSMC has cancelled the unpaid leave policy from this month as growing rush orders helped improve factory usage. The firm also planned to recruit about 100 people for research and development and engineering work at advanced 12-inch plants.
Against this backdrop, Morgan Stanley on Tuesday raised its target price on TSMC to NT$44 from NT$39, and lifted its estimate on UMC to NT$8.6 from NT$7.7. Credit Suisse recommended target prices on TSMC and UMC at NT$58 and NT$12, respectively, in a March 26 report.
As demand may rebound across almost all sectors, Morgan Stanley predicted TSMC’s second-quarter revenues would increase by more than 50 percent from the previous quarter, higher than a 38 percent quarterly rise estimated by Credit Suisse.
Credit Suisse forecast TSMC would post NT$1.03 billion in net income in the first quarter.
Sales of the nation's foundry companies fell 31.9 percent year-on-year, or declined 29.7 percent quarter-on-quarter, to NT$86.8 billion in the fourth quarter of last year, as global economic recession hurts demand, the Taiwan Semiconductor Industry Association (TSIA, 台灣半導體協會) said in a press release on Monday.
Overall, sales of the Taiwan's chip industry, which includes foundry companies, memory chip manufacturers, chip designers, chip packagers and testers, decreased 8.1 percent to NT$1.37 trillion from a year ago, according to the Hsinchu-based TSIA's tally.
The association forecast additional 26.9 percent year-on-year decline in sales this year as unresolved economic slowdown may continue to take toll on the nation's chip industry this year. In 2009, sales of Taiwan's chip industry may amount NT$984.5 billion as a whole, TSIA projected.
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
EUROPE ON HOLD: Among a flurry of announcements, Intel said it would postpone new factories in Germany and Poland, but remains committed to its US expansion Intel Corp chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger has landed Amazon.com Inc’s Amazon Web Services (AWS) as a customer for the company’s manufacturing business, potentially bringing work to new plants under construction in the US and boosting his efforts to turn around the embattled chipmaker. Intel and AWS are to coinvest in a custom semiconductor for artificial intelligence computing — what is known as a fabric chip — in a “multiyear, multibillion-dollar framework,” Intel said in a statement on Monday. The work would rely on Intel’s 18A process, an advanced chipmaking technology. Intel shares rose more than 8 percent in late trading after the
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has appointed Rose Castanares, executive vice president of TSMC Arizona, as president of the subsidiary, which is responsible for carrying out massive investments by the Taiwanese tech giant in the US state, the company said in a statement yesterday. Castanares will succeed Brian Harrison as president of the Arizona subsidiary on Oct. 1 after the incumbent president steps down from the position with a transfer to the Arizona CEO office to serve as an advisor to TSMC Arizona’s chairman, the statement said. According to TSMC, Harrison is scheduled to retire on Dec. 31. Castanares joined TSMC in
RSS