Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which supplies chips for Apple Inc’s iPhones, yesterday reported an 8.5 percent decline in revenue for last month, but it expects revenues this quarter to grow as projected.
Revenues fell to NT$66.84 billion (US$2.05 billion) last month, compared with NT$73.09 billion in March. On an annual basis, revenues contracted 11.3 percent from NT$75.33 billion.
Despite the decline, TSMC yesterday reiterated its revenue guidance of NT$215 billion and NT$218 billion for the current quarter, representing sequential growth of between 5.6 percent and 7.13 percent from last quarter’s NT$203.5 billion.
TSMC co-chief-executive-officer Mark Liu (劉德音) attributed the growth to above seasonal demand from customers as they are restocking inventories ahead of new product launches.
In the first four months, revenue dropped 9.1 percent to NT$270.34 billion, from NT$297.34 billion in the same period last year, TSMC said.
In a separate statement yesterday, the Hsinchu-based chipmaker said that its board of directors have approved capital appropriations of US$4.1 billion for the installation and expansion of advanced technology capacity, to convert certain logic capacity to specialty technology.
The capital is also to be used for research and development capital investment and sustaining capital expenditures in the third quarter, TSMC said.
TSMC budgets capital spending between US$9 billion and US$10 billion for the full year of this year, mostly for advanced technology development. The budget rises by between 10 percent and 23 percent from US$8.12 billion last year.
Local rival United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) on Monday posted a 16.72 percent decline in revenue to NT$10.76 billion for April, compared with NT$12.92 billion the previous month.
Revenue this quarter might grow between 6 percent and 7 percent from last quarter’s NT$34.4 billion, as UMC expects wafer shipments to rise 5 percent and average selling prices to rise by 1 or 2 percent from the previous quarter.
In the four-month period ending last month, revenue contracted 10.86 percent to NT$45.17 billion from NT$50.67 billion a year ago.
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