Despite a rising threat from tablet PCs, netbooks are here to stay, said Scott Lin (林顯郎), president of Acer Inc’s (宏碁) Taiwan operations, yesterday.
“When netbooks were launched in 2007, I was asked the same question about whether they would replace traditional notebooks,” Lin told reporters yesterday. “Notebooks still exist today.”
He said “brand new star products” — such as the Eee PC introduced in 2007 by Asustek Computer Inc (華碩電腦) and the iPad from Apple Inc — would grab the public’s attention who would develop a fondness for them.
PHOTO: CHUO I-CHUN, TAIPEI TIMES
Competition will increase, but tablets won’t be able to eat away at the whole netbook pie, he said.
Citing statistics from Gartner Inc, Lin said worldwide netbook shipments this year would post 9 percent growth from last year to 35.6 million units and that number will approach 50 million in 2014.
Acer, the world’s second--largest PC brand, is the largest netbook brand and will ship about 10 million netbooks worldwide this year, he said.
However, Lin kept mum on the launch date for the company’s -tablet PC, only saying the company would launch products that will “wow the market with a strong selling point.”
Supply chain sources have said Acer is set to test the waters in Europe and the US by rolling out its first tablet model, which runs on a Windows operating system, this month.
The company yesterday -unveiled the industry’s first slew of netbooks with dual-core processors. The new “Happy” Aspire One netbooks feature dual operating systems — Android and Windows 7 Starter — and have a built-in 250GB hard drive, a specification that exceeds the maximum 160GB offered by the earlier generation.
The price tag is NT$13,800 (US$431) and they will be available in Taiwan this month.
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) today announced that his company has selected "Beitou Shilin" in Taipei for its new Taiwan office, called Nvidia Constellation, putting an end to months of speculation. Industry sources have said that the tech giant has been eyeing the Beitou Shilin Science Park as the site of its new overseas headquarters, and speculated that the new headquarters would be built on two plots of land designated as "T17" and "T18," which span 3.89 hectares in the park. "I think it's time for us to reveal one of the largest products we've ever built," Huang said near the
China yesterday announced anti-dumping duties as high as 74.9 percent on imports of polyoxymethylene (POM) copolymers, a type of engineering plastic, from Taiwan, the US, the EU and Japan. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce’s findings conclude a probe launched in May last year, shortly after the US sharply increased tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, computer chips and other imports. POM copolymers can partially replace metals such as copper and zinc, and have various applications, including in auto parts, electronics and medical equipment, the Chinese ministry has said. In January, it said initial investigations had determined that dumping was taking place, and implemented preliminary
Intel Corp yesterday reinforced its determination to strengthen its partnerships with Taiwan’s ecosystem partners including original-electronic-manufacturing (OEM) companies such as Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and chipmaker United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電). “Tonight marks a new beginning. We renew our new partnership with Taiwan ecosystem,” Intel new chief executive officer Tan Lip-bu (陳立武) said at a dinner with representatives from the company’s local partners, celebrating the 40th anniversary of the US chip giant’s presence in Taiwan. Tan took the reins at Intel six weeks ago aiming to reform the chipmaker and revive its past glory. This is the first time Tan
CUSTOMERS’ BURDEN: TSMC already has operations in the US and is a foundry, so any tariff increase would mostly affect US customers, not the company, the minister said Taiwanese manufacturers are “not afraid” of US tariffs, but are concerned about being affected more heavily than regional economic competitors Japan and South Korea, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said. “Taiwan has many advantages that other countries do not have, the most notable of which is its semiconductor ecosystem,” Kuo said. The US “must rely on Taiwan” to boost its microchip manufacturing capacities, Kuo said in an interview ahead of his one-year anniversary in office tomorrow. Taiwan has submitted a position paper under Section 232 of the US Trade Expansion Act to explain the “complementary relationship” between Taiwan and the US
RSS