Contract electronics manufacturer Inventec Corp (英業達) is to invest NT$4.8 billion (US$156.93 million) to expand local production facilities, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday as it approved the firm’s application to join a government plan to boost investments in Taiwan.
The news came after Inventec president Maurice Wu (巫永財) told investors last month that the company is planning to shift all of its operations to produce US-bound laptops to Taiwan to avoid US tariffs on Chinese-made goods.
The Taipei-headquartered Inventec is relocating some of its production lines from Chongqing in China’s Sichuan Province to a manufacturing site in Taoyuan’s Dasi District (大溪).
At the same time, Inventec also plans to move some of its server production lines from Shanghai to its Gueishan District (龜山) plant in Taoyuan, the ministry said, adding that the company’s latest investment would create up to 1,526 jobs.
The ministry also approved precision metal ball manufacturer Tan Kong Precision Tech Co’s (天工精密) application to invest NT$1.7 billion in a new plant at the Central Taiwan Science Park (中部科學園區) to expand its production capacity in Taiwan.
Through the investment, Tan Kong aims to develop smart production systems solutions and incorporate ceramic materials into its production process, the ministry said.
Since January, Taiwanese companies returning to Taiwan have pledged a total of NT$622.3 billion in investments, which are expected to create 54,889 jobs, the ministry said.
In related news, the ministry approved three companies’ applications, worth NT$12.2 billion in combined investments, to participate in a separate government program.
Hiwin Mikrosystem Corp (大銀微系統), which makes components and system for linear motion and positioning controls, plans to invest more than NT$4.3 billion to expand its plant at the Fengshan Industrial Park (鳳山工業區) in Hsinchu County and establish a new plant at the Yunlin Technology Industrial Park (雲林科技工業區), the ministry said.
The new facility would produce alternating current servo motors and would be completed next month, Hiwin Mikrosystem executive vice president Yu Kai-sheng (游凱勝) told a news conference last month.
The investment is expected to create 157 jobs, the ministry said.
APEX Dynamics Inc (台灣精銳科技), which specializes in high-precision planetary gearboxes for servo motors, plans to invest NT$3 billion to expand its plant at the Central Taiwan Science Park, the ministry said.
The company exports more than 90 percent of its products, with major brand customers including Apple Inc, Royal Philips NV, Samsung Electronics Co, AU Optronics Corp (友達光電) and Innolux Corp (群創光電).
An unnamed optoelectronics manufacturer plans to invest NT$4.8 billion to set up a production facility at the Central Taiwan Industrial Park, which would create about 300 jobs, the ministry added.
CHIP HANG-UP: Surging memorychip prices would deal a blow to smartphone sales this year, potentially hindering one of MediaTek’s biggest sources of revenue MediaTek Inc (聯發科), the world’s biggest smartphone chip designer, yesterday said its new artificial intelligence (AI) chips used in data centers are to account for 20 percent of its total revenue next year, as cloud service providers race to deploy AI infrastructure to meet voracious demand. MediaTek is believed to be developing tensor processing units for Google, which are used in AI applications. While it did not confirm such reports, MediaTek said its new application-specific IC (ASIC) business would be a new growth engine for the company. It again hiked its forecast for the addressable ASIC market to US$70 billion by 2028, compared
Motorists ride past a mural along a street in Varanasi, India, yesterday.
MediaTek Inc (聯發科), the world’s biggest smartphone chip supplier, yesterday said it plans to double investment in data center-related technologies, including advanced packaging and high-speed interconnect technologies, to broaden the new business’ customer and service portfolios. The chip designer is redirecting its resources to data centers, mainly designing application-specific integrated circuits (ASIC) with artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities for cloud service providers. The data center business is forecast to lead growth in the next three years and become the company’s second-biggest revenue source, replacing chips used in smart devices, MediaTek president Joe Chen (陳冠州) told a media event in Taipei. “Three or four years
AT HIGH CAPACITY: Three-month order visibility on stable customer demand would push factory utilization to between 80 and 85 percent, Vanguard’s president said Foundry service provider Vanguard International Semiconductor Corp (世界先進) yesterday said it is unable to fully satisfy surging demand for chips used in artificial intelligence (AI) servers and data centers, amid an AI infrastructure investment boom that is crowding out production of less advanced chips. Vanguard is facing an “undersupply of chips” made using mature process technologies, due to strong demand for AI products and improving demand from customers in the commercial, industrial and auto sectors, which are digesting excess inventory to a healthier level, company chairman Fang Leuh (方略) told a virtual investors’ conference. However, Vanguard gave a more conservative view on