Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯) and Global Unichip Corp (創意), which provide silicon intellectual property (IP) and design services to semiconductor firms, have seen their shares rally over the past year, as investors snapped up the stocks amid a positive sentiment toward cryptocurrency mining.
Bitcoin’s 1,500 percent rally last year led to a robust demand for the vast computing power used to verify transactions of the cryptocurrency, which requires application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) that are designed just for bitcoin mining.
Some mining companies last year outsourced part of their ASIC orders to Alchip and Global Unichip, Sanford C Bernstein & Co said in November.
Meanwhile, the growing demand for high-performance computing and artificial intelligence-related chips is also expected to continue to lend support to the companies’ business performance this year, analysts have said.
That is because smaller IC design houses and global semiconductor integrated design manufacturing companies have increasingly turned to specialized non-recurring engineering (NRE) and ASIC firms, such as AIchip and Global Unichip, to shoulder the development costs of advanced process technologies, analysts said.
Shares of Alchip closed 1.26 percent higher at NT$120.5 on Friday, having surged 33.15 percent this month, while Global Unichip shares rose 5.42 percent to NT$360 on Friday, soaring 41.18 percent since the beginning of the year, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed.
Alchip, headquartered in Taipei’s Neihu District (內湖), on Wednesday said it swung into profit last year after reporting net income of NT$308 million (US$10.58 million), compared with a net loss of NT$211 million a year earlier.
Earnings per share were NT$5.05, up from losses per share of NT$3.45 in 2016, with total revenue rising 15.6 percent to NT$4.27 billion from NT$3.69 billion a year earlier, Alchip said in a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
Global Unichip started the year with a positive outlook, saying it expects annual revenue to increase more than 30 percent from last year on the back of increasing orders for ASIC products.
Sales last year grew 30.89 percent year-on-year to NT$12.16 billion, while operating income rose 50.37 percent to NT$930 million, the Hsinchu-based company said on Monday last week, when its celebrated the 20th anniversary of its founding.
Global Unichip is 35 percent owned by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker.
Global Unichip’s sales split was 80-20 for ASIC orders and NRE services last year respectively, with ASIC revenue expanding three to four times from 2016, the company said.
The company forecast that NRE sales will grow more than 50 percent this year, compared with 4 percent last year, benefiting from more orders for such applications as machine learning, high-performance computing, data center storage and 5G base stations.
Global Unichip last year saw net income rise 54.9 percent from a year earlier to a record NT$854 million, with earnings per share rising from NT$4.11 to NT$6.38.
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