Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海), Apple Inc’s largest iPhone assembler, has mapped out a five-year plan to drive growth for the company, chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) told shareholders at an annual general meeting in New Taipei City yesterday.
Highlighting a three-step plan revolving around digital transformation, Liu said the company is focused on developing three core technologies: artificial intelligence, semiconductors and new-generation communication.
“To improve our profit margin, we have set our sights on three new industries: electric vehicles, digital healthcare and robotics,” Liu said.
Photo: Reuters / Ann Wang
Upon succeeding Hon Hai founder Terry Gou (郭台銘) as chairman last year, Liu has vowed to increase the company’s gross margin from about 6 percent to 10 percent within five years.
“With a compound annual growth rate of more than 20 percent ... output value from these industries are estimated to reach US$1.4 trillion by 2025,” Liu said, expressing the hope to claim up to 10 percent of market share.
Pointing to saturation in the information and communications technology industry, Liu said that the company would see little growth if it focuses only on its main assembling business.
Photo: Bloomberg / Ashley Pon
Heavily reliant on Apple’s orders of iPhones, which are mostly still assembled at its China plants, Hon Hai has witnessed an 89.49 percent drop in net profit for last quarter due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The company has trimmed its outlook for this year following a dampened smartphone market.
Liu said Hon Hai is cutting down on management and operational costs to recover from losses.
Hon Hai’s shareholders approved a plan to distribute a cash dividend of NT$4.2 per common share.
Liu said that the company would hold a technology forum in about October to showcase new developments by the company’s research institute, which comprises five centers specializing in artificial intelligence, semiconductors, next-generation communications, cybersecurity and quantum computing.
ENERGY ISSUES: The TSIA urged the government to increase natural gas and helium reserves to reduce the impact of the Middle East war on semiconductor supply stability Chip testing and packaging service provider ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控) yesterday said it planned to invest more than NT$100 billion (US$3.15 billion) in building a new advanced chip testing facility in Kaohsiung to keep up with customer demand driven by the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. That would be included in the company’s capital expenditure budget next year, ASE said. There is also room to raise this year’s capital spending budget from a record-high US$7 billion estimated three months ago, it added. ASE would have six factories under construction this year, another record-breaking number, ASE chief operating officer Tien Wu
The EU and US are nearing an agreement to coordinate on producing and securing critical minerals, part of a push to break reliance on Chinese supplies. The potential deal would create incentives, such as minimum prices, that could advantage non-Chinese suppliers, according to a draft of an “action plan” seen by Bloomberg. The EU and US would also cooperate on standards, investments and joint projects, as well as coordinate on any supply disruptions by countries like China. The two sides are additionally seeking other “like-minded partners” to join a multicountry accord to help create these new critical mineral supply chains, which feed into
For weeks now, the global tech industry has been waiting for a major artificial intelligence (AI) launch from DeepSeek (深度求索), seen as a benchmark for China’s progress in the fast-moving field. More than a year has passed since the start-up put Chinese AI on the map in early last year with a low-cost chatbot that performed at a similar level to US rivals. However, despite reports and rumors about its imminent release, DeepSeek’s next-generation “V4” model is nowhere in sight. Speculation is also swirling over the geopolitical implications of which computer chips were chosen to train and power the new
Intel Corp is joining Elon Musk’s long-shot effort to develop semiconductors for Tesla Inc, Space Exploration Technologies Corp and xAI, marking a surprising twist in the chipmaker’s comeback bid. Intel would help the Terafab project “refactor” the technology in a chip factory, the company said on Tuesday in a post on X, Musk’s social media platform. That is a stage in the development process that typically helps make chips more powerful or reliable. The chipmaker’s shares jumped 4.2 percent to US$52.91 in New York trading on Tuesday. The Terafab project is a grand plan by Musk to eventually manufacture his own chips for
RSS