HTC Corp’s (宏達電) stock price dropped 13.11 percent this week, dragged down by the company’s announcement that it was postponing the launch of its first virtual reality headset from this month to April next year.
The stock, which opened lower this week, continued its downtrend to close at NT$69 in Taipei trading yesterday, after it announced the delay on Tuesday.
The company said it planned to make an additional 7,000 units of the HTC Vive available to developers at the beginning of next year, and launch its commercial version in April.
Photo: EPA
The announcement sparked market concern about the company’s preparation and strategy for its new wearable product lineup, as HTC had said the headset would hit the market this quarter.
The company yesterday said it decided to delay the launch because it was in the process of making a technological breakthrough.
“It was a tough decision to make, as we could have started to ship Vive this month, but after discussing it with Valve, our strategic partner, we decided that we can offer a more technologically advanced product if we postpone it for another quarter,” the Chinese-language Apple Daily quoted HTC chairperson Cher Wang (王雪紅) as saying in an interview published yesterday.
Wang said she understood the public disappointment over the delay, but the company made the decision to be able to offer buyers a better user experience.
HTC announced the Vive headset prototype, which it codeveloped with US-based video game developer Valve, in March this year.
HTC chief financial officer Chang Chia-lin (張嘉臨) has said that the company expects its non-smartphone segment, which includes the Vive headset, to contribute as much as 10 percent to overall revenues next year.
However, as pre-orders have been delayed to the end of February next year and commercial shipment scheduled to start in April, HTC will only start to see revenue contribution from the new product in the second quarter.
Deutsche Bank AG thinks Vive is a technologically excellent product, but believes the company’s VR headset development is just in the early stages.
“Vive is not enough for HTC to stage a meaningful turnaround,” Deustche Bank analyst Birdy Lu (呂家霖) said in a client note on Nov. 30.
Due to weaker-than-expected smartphone demand, HTC posted a net loss of NT$4.4 billion (US$133.4 million), or a loss per share of NT$5.41, for last quarter, marking its second consecutive quarter of losses this year.
Cumulative sales in the first 11 months of the year reached NT$115.16 billion, plummeting 33.32 percent from NT$172.76 billion in the same period last year.
Real estate agent and property developer JSL Construction & Development Co (愛山林) led the average compensation rankings among companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) last year, while contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) finished 14th. JSL Construction paid its employees total average compensation of NT$4.78 million (US$159,701), down 13.5 percent from a year earlier, but still ahead of the most profitable listed tech giants, including TSMC, TWSE data showed. Last year, the average compensation (which includes salary, overtime, bonuses and allowances) paid by TSMC rose 21.6 percent to reach about NT$3.33 million, lifting its ranking by 10 notches
SEASONAL WEAKNESS: The combined revenue of the top 10 foundries fell 5.4%, but rush orders and China’s subsidies partially offset slowing demand Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) further solidified its dominance in the global wafer foundry business in the first quarter of this year, remaining far ahead of its closest rival, Samsung Electronics Co, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday. TSMC posted US$25.52 billion in sales in the January-to-March period, down 5 percent from the previous quarter, but its market share rose from 67.1 percent the previous quarter to 67.6 percent, TrendForce said in a report. While smartphone-related wafer shipments declined in the first quarter due to seasonal factors, solid demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC) devices and urgent TV-related orders
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic fuel stations are this week to rise NT$0.2 and NT$0.3 per liter respectively, after international crude oil prices increased last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices last week snapped a two-week losing streak as the geopolitical situation between Russia and Ukraine turned increasingly tense, CPC said in a statement. News that some oil production facilities in Alberta, Canada, were shut down due to wildfires and that US-Iran nuclear talks made no progress also helped push oil prices to a significant weekly gain, Formosa said
MINERAL DIPLOMACY: The Chinese commerce ministry said it approved applications for the export of rare earths in a move that could help ease US-China trade tensions Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng (何立峰) is today to meet a US delegation for talks in the UK, Beijing announced on Saturday amid a fragile truce in the trade dispute between the two powers. He is to visit the UK from yesterday to Friday at the invitation of the British government, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. He and US representatives are to cochair the first meeting of the US-China economic and trade consultation mechanism, it said. US President Donald Trump on Friday announced that a new round of trade talks with China would start in London beginning today,
RSS