Apple Inc is expected to crank out a small volume of next-generation Micro-LED displays from a plant in Taoyuan by the end of this year for its wearable devices, an IDC analyst said yesterday.
The US technology giant is forecast to begin mass production of Micro-LED displays at the plant in Longtan District (龍潭) next year, ahead of rival display makers, IDC analyst Annabelle Hsu (徐美雯) said.
Apple might initially use the brighter, more energy efficient and foldable Micro-LED displays on new Apple Watches, Hsu said.
The company has kept a low profile about the Longtan display factory since it began operations two years ago. The Hsinchu Science Park Bureau in 2015 confirmed the presence of the Apple plant, without elaborating.
Apple has placed more focus on Micro-LED technology after acquiring LuxVue Technology Corp in 2014.
The newest self-emitting display technology shares traits with expensive organic LED (OLED) technology, but costs less.
“Many display makers consider Micro-LED technology a panacea for making flexible displays due to lower technological barriers, compared with OLED technology,” Hsu said. “Flexible display technologies are seen as the possible driving force to developments in end products in the next decade.”
However, Hsu does not expect Micro-LED technology to become commercially available before 2020.
Innolux Corp (群創), a Hon Hai Group (鴻海集團) flat-panel manufacturing subsidiary, has allocated resources to explore Micro-LED technology, but has not yet released any details.
Samsung Electronics Co is the only company in the world capable of supplying OLED panels for mobile phones at present, while LG Display Inc and AU Optronics Corp (友達光電) are mostly making smaller-sized OLED displays used in wearable devices, Hsu said.
APPLE PAY CONCERNS
In other news, the launch on Wednesday of Apple Pay in Taiwan has raised concerns about the possibility of declining credit card fee income for local banks, the Chinese-language Economic Daily News reported yesterday, citing an industry insider.
The newspaper said Apple would soon be joining issuing banks and network operators such as Visa Inc and MasterCard Inc in taking a slice of the profits from transaction fees.
“Apple Pay operates in existing transaction markets wherever credit cards are accepted; it is not a new segment and it does not make the pie bigger for issuer banks,” the newspaper quoted a bank manager, who wished to remain unidentified, as saying.
Apple Pay is not expected to catalyze significant growth in the local market for credit card transactions, but the new service would take its 0.0015 percent cut of transactions made with the mobile wallet, the manager said.
Compared with conventional credit cards, banks collect lower fees when purchases are made with Apple Pay, and fee income would decline more rapidly if the mobile wallet gains popularity, the manager said.
Market observers have said that the payment service, which is only available for Apple’s newer smartphones, trails behind that of the rival Android operating system.
Samsung, an Android smartphone maker, commands 24.6 percent of Taiwan’s smartphone market, compared with Apple’s 18.7 percent, market statistics showed.
Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行), the nation’s leading credit card issuer with 4.2 million active cards as of the end of last month and NT$392.9 billion (US$12.96 billion) total transactions last year, reported that credit card had contributed NT$5.7 billion out of the NT$18.4 billion in overall fee income that the bank earned last year.
PATENTS: MediaTek Inc said it would not comment on ongoing legal cases, but does not expect the legal action by Huawei to affect its business operations Smartphone integrated chips designer MediaTek Inc (聯發科) on Friday said that a lawsuit filed by Chinese smartphone brand Huawei Technologies Co (華為) over alleged patent infringements would have little impact on its operations. In an announcement posted on the Taiwan Stock Exchange, MediaTek said that it would not comment on an ongoing legal case. However, the company said that Huawei’s legal action would have little impact on its operations. MediaTek’s statement came after China-based PRIP Research said on Thursday that Huawei filed a lawsuit with a Chinese district court claiming that MediaTek infringed on its patents. The infringement mentioned in the lawsuit likely involved
Taipei is today suspending work, classes and its US$2.4 trillion stock market as Typhoon Gaemi approaches Taiwan with strong winds and heavy rain. The nation is not conducting securities, currency or fixed income trading, statements from its stock and currency exchanges said. Authorities had yesterday issued a warning that the storm could affect people on land and canceled some ship crossings and domestic flights. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) expects its local chipmaking fabs to maintain normal production, the company said in an e-mailed statement. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp said it has activated routine typhoon alert
GROWTH: TSMC increased its projected revenue growth for this year to more than 25 percent, citing stronger-than-expected demand for AI devices and smartphones The Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER, 台灣經濟研究院) yesterday raised its forecast for Taiwan’s GDP growth this year from 3.29 percent to 3.85 percent, as exports and private investment recovered faster than it predicted three months ago. The Taipei-based think tank also expects that Taiwan would see a 8.19 percent increase in exports this year, better than the 7.55 percent it projected in April, as US technology giants spent more money on artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure and development. “There will be more AI servers going forward, but it remains to be seen if the momentum would extend to personal computers, smartphones and
Catastrophic computer outages caused by a software update from one company have once again exposed the dangers of global technological dependence on a handful of players, experts said on Friday. A flawed update sent out by the little-known security firm CrowdStrike Holdings Inc brought airlines, TV stations and myriad other aspects of daily life to a standstill. The outages affected companies or individuals that use CrowdStrike on the Microsoft Inc’s Windows platform. When they applied the update, the incompatible software crashed computers into a frozen state known as the “blue screen of death.” “Today CrowdStrike has become a household name, but not in