Contract electronics maker Inventec Corp (英業達) is laying off employees at its all-in-one (AIO) computer subsidiary TPV-Inventa Technology Co Ltd (英冠達) and plans to close the subsidiary next year at the earliest, following a drastic decline in orders, a company executive confirmed yesterday.
“We are downsizing at TPV-Inventa and moving all of its operations to Inventec,” Inventec spokesman Yu Chin-pao (游進寶) said by telephone.
Yu’s remarks came after the Chinese-language Apple Daily reported that Inventec is laying off 39 of its 59 remaining staff at TPV-Inventa before the end of this year, leaving only 20 employees at the unit’s financial department to settle the company’s accounts.
The report quoted a former employee, who was recently dismissed by the company, as saying that TPV-Inventa had more than 300 employees at the beginning of last year, but Inventec reallocated 60 of the firm’s headcount to other business units and began laying off workers in the second half of last year.
Inventec dismissed one or two employees at a time and waited for weeks to continue scaling down its head count in an attempt to avoid having to report to labor authorities about a mass layoff, the report said.
Yu declined to disclose the actual number of employees who had left the company, but confirmed that the layoffs were staggered over the past year.
The company plans to dissolve and liquidate TPV-Inventa after resources and employee reallocation is completed, Yu said.
Established in 2000 with a paid-in capital of NT$1.25 billion (US$39.23 million), TPV-Inventa was a joint venture of Inventec and TPV Technology Group (冠捷科技).
Its clients include Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想), HP Inc and Dell Inc.
The decision came as a surprise, because it followed a cash injection of US$22 million by Inventec in September last year to increase its shareholding in the AIO subsidiary, while TPV left the joint venture’s board.
TPV-Inventa’s AIO business contributed about 2 percent, or NT$2.23 billion, to Inventec’s consolidated revenue of NT$111.63 billion last quarter, according to company statistics.
However, with its business continuing to fall, “TPV-Inventa is not likely to turn profitable this year,” Yu said, declining to disclose the amount of losses at the subsidiary.
Industry sources told the Taipei Times that TPV-Inventa lost a significant number of AIO PC orders from Lenovo this year, after the Chinese company reallocated orders for 1.2 million units to Asia Vital Components Co Ltd (奇鋐) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶).
Merida Industry Co (美利達) has seen signs of recovery in the US and European markets this year, as customers are gradually depleting their inventories, the bicycle maker told shareholders yesterday. Given robust growth in new orders at its Taiwanese factory, coupled with its subsidiaries’ improving performance, Merida said it remains confident about the bicycle market’s prospects and expects steady growth in its core business this year. CAUTION ON CHINA However, the company must handle the Chinese market with great caution, as sales of road bikes there have declined significantly, affecting its revenue and profitability, Merida said in a statement, adding that it would
RISING: Strong exports, and life insurance companies’ efforts to manage currency risks indicates the NT dollar would eventually pass the 29 level, an expert said The New Taiwan dollar yesterday rallied to its strongest in three years amid inflows to the nation’s stock market and broad-based weakness in the US dollar. Exporter sales of the US currency and a repatriation of funds from local asset managers also played a role, said two traders, who asked not to be identified as they were not authorized to speak publicly. State-owned banks were seen buying the greenback yesterday, but only at a moderate scale, the traders said. The local currency gained 0.77 percent, outperforming almost all of its Asian peers, to close at NT$29.165 per US dollar in Taipei trading yesterday. The
RECORD LOW: Global firms’ increased inventories, tariff disputes not yet impacting Taiwan and new graduates not yet entering the market contributed to the decrease Taiwan’s unemployment rate last month dropped to 3.3 percent, the lowest for the month in 25 years, as strong exports and resilient domestic demand boosted hiring across various sectors, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. After seasonal adjustments, the jobless rate eased to 3.34 percent, the best performance in 24 years, suggesting a stable labor market, although a mild increase is expected with the graduation season from this month through August, the statistics agency said. “Potential shocks from tariff disputes between the US and China have yet to affect Taiwan’s job market,” Census Department Deputy Director Tan Wen-ling
UNCERTAINTIES: The world’s biggest chip packager and tester is closely monitoring the US’ tariff policy before making any capacity adjustments, a company official said ASE Technology Holding Inc (日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packager and tester, yesterday said it is cautiously evaluating new advanced packaging capacity expansion in the US in response to customers’ requests amid uncertainties about the US’ tariff policy. Compared with its semiconductor peers, ASE has been relatively prudent about building new capacity in the US. However, the company is adjusting its global manufacturing footprint expansion after US President Donald Trump announced “reciprocal” tariffs in April, and new import duties targeting semiconductors and other items that are vital to national security. ASE subsidiary Siliconware Precision Industries Co (SPIL, 矽品精密) is participating in Nvidia