AU Optronics Corp (AUO, 友達光電) has suspended production at a plant, which makes polysilicon used in solar wafer manufacturing, in Japan and is assessing potential quake damage to supply chains in the LCD panel industry, the company said.
The Hsinchu-based company said in a statement on Saturday that its manufacturing facilities had not been damaged and there had been no casualties at its Japanese solar-wafer unit, M.Setek Co, in Fukushima Prefecture, one of the areas hardest hit by the magnitude 8.9 earthquake on Friday.
M.Setek produces polysilicon and solar wafers in Soma City, Fukushima Prefecture, both of which are key raw materials for making solar cells. AUO has in recent years expanded into the solar power business, aiming to gain a foothold in the fast-growing green energy market.
AUO has about 800 employees in Japan, with about 700 working at M.Setek, chairman Lee Kun-yao (李焜耀) said yesterday on the sidelines of a job fair in Taipei.
“The [M.Setek] plant was not hit by the tsunami, but ... because of a lack of water and electricity, it is not operational at the moment,” local cable TV network UBN quoted Lee as saying yesterday.
The company downplayed the potential financial impact from the production suspension, adding that M.Setek contributed just 0.3 percent of AUO’s NT$102.62 billion consolidated revenue in the fourth quarter of last year.
As for the possible knock-on effect on the LCD panel industry, Lee said there would certainly be an impact in terms of the upstream supply chain, but that an accurate assessment would require more time.
“We have alternative sources of chemical materials,” Lee said, hinting that the earthquake has had a limited impact on the company’s flat-panel business.
US market researcher IHS iSuppli said on Friday that the earthquake would affect the production of components for LCD panels — including glass, color filters, polarizers, cold cathode fluorescent lamps and light-emitting diodes — as Japanese suppliers play an important role in this line of business.
Meanwhile, Lee said yesterday the company would re-apply to the Investment Commission for permission to change its Chinese investment plan, after the government announced on March 8 that it would allow Taiwanese LCD makers to buy a stake in or merge with Chinese counterparts, as well as invest in Chinese fabs using the same level of technology they currently employ in Taiwan.
In December, the company won government approval to invest US$3 billion in a 7.5-generation fab in Kunshan, China.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CHEN MEI-YING
STEADY: Prices are to rebound following inventory rebuilding demand, TrendForce said, with Samsung Electronics Co further trimming capacity as it slashes DDR4 lines The contract prices of DRAM chips are to rise by as much as 18 percent sequentially this quarter — the first price upticks in about eight quarters — driven mainly by inventory rebuilding demand for DRAM chips used in mobile devices and PCs, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) projected yesterday. The price rebound is led by a quarterly increase of mobile DRAM chips, which are to climb between 13 percent and 18 percent quarter-on-quarter this quarter, which has not been seen since the fourth quarter of 2021, the Taipei-based market researcher predicted. Likewise, the price of mainstream PC DDR4 DRAM is expected to bounce
SOLID FOUNDATION: Given its decades of expertise in megatronics, manufacturing and robotics, Japan has the wherewithal to create its own AI, Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp plans to help build an artificial intelligence (AI) tech-related ecosystem in Japan to meet demand in a country eager to gain an edge in this emerging technology. The US company will seek to partner with Japanese research organizations, companies and start-ups to build factories for AI, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday during opening remarks in a meeting with Japanese Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Yasutoshi Nishimura. The company is to set up an AI research laboratory, and invest in local start-ups and educate the public on using AI, Huang said. Huang earlier this week met with Japanese Prime
A Hong Kong court postponed a court hearing on troubled Chinese property developer Evergrande Group’s (恆大集團) winding-up petition scheduled for yesterday until Jan. 29. Evergrande is trying to win support from its creditors for a plan to restructure more than US$300 billion in debt to stave off liquidation. The company’s lawyer told the court it was requesting an adjournment to “refine” its new debt restructuring plan. The Hong Kong High Court has postponed the hearing over Evergrande’s potential liquidation several times. Judge Linda Chan (陳靜芬) had said in October that yesterday’s hearing would be the last before a decision is handed down. Chan
Huawei Technologies Co (華為) is among a field of “very formidable” competitors to Nvidia Corp in the race to produce the best artificial intelligence (AI) chips, Nvidia chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday. Huawei, Intel Corp and an expanding group of semiconductor start-ups pose a stiff challenge to Nvidia’s dominant position in the market for AI accelerators, Huang told reporters in Singapore. Shenzhen-based Huawei has grown into China’s chip tech champion and returned to the spotlight this year with an advanced made-in-China smartphone processor. “We have a lot of competitors, in China and outside China,” Huang said. “Most of our competitors
RSS