Wistron Corp (緯創), one of Apple Inc’s iPhone assemblers, yesterday reported that first-quarter net profit plunged 95 percent quarter-on-quarter and 84 percent year-on-year to NT$113 million (US$4.05 million), dragged by non-operating losses.
That compared with a net profit of NT$726.71 million a year earlier and NT$2.32 billion in the fourth quarter of last year.
Earnings per share (EPS) dipped to NT$0.04, from NT$0.26 a year earlier and NT$0.83 the previous quarter.
Photo: CNA
Wistron attributed the losses to its holdings of Luxshare Precision Industry Co (立訊精密), whose share price has plunged about 40 percent since it bought 3 billion yuan (US$466 million) of the cable and connector supplier’s common shares in July last year.
Last year, Wistron sold two of its subsidiaries — Wistron InfoComm Manufacturing (Kunshan) Co (緯新資通崑山) and Wistron Investment (Jiangsu) Co (緯創投資江蘇) — to Luxshare for 3.3 billion yuan. The stock purchase, which came after the sales, gave Wistron an 0.81 percent stake in Luxshare, which it described as a “strategic partner.”
Wistron’s operating income surged 62 percent year-on-year to NT$3.08 billion last quarter, but declined 28 percent from a quarter earlier.
Consolidated revenue slid 2 percent year-on-year to NT$177.3 billion last quarter.
The company also reported consolidated revenue for last month of NT$68.22 billion, down 2.01 percent from a year earlier.
QUANTA
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦), the world’s largest laptop contract maker, reported consolidated revenue of NT$84.84 billion last month, down 10.2 percent month-on-month, but up 1.7 percent year-on-year.
Cumulative revenue in the first four months of this year was NT$353.79 billion, up 29.3 percent year-on-year.
The company shipped 6.1 million laptops last month, down 7.58 percent month-on-month, but up 32.6 percent year-on-year.
COMPAL
Fellow laptop contract manufacturer Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶) experienced a sharper month-on-month drop in revenue, which fell 17.38 percent month-on-month and 5.25 percent year-on-year to NT$89.35 billion.
Compal shipped 4.4 million laptops last month, down 20 percent from a month earlier, but up 2.33 percent year-on-year.
The company said that demand remained strong, but tight components supply, including CPUs, monitors and power supplies, affected shipments.
Compal expects to ship more than 47 million laptops this year, at least 10 percent more than it did last year.
Contract electronics manufacturer Inventec Corp (英業達) yesterday posted sales of NT$38.19 billion for last month, down 6.8 percent month-on-month and 22.5 percent year-on-year.
Cumulative sales in the first four months of the year rose 8.75 percent year-on-year to NT$150.04 billion.
BUSINESS UPDATE: The iPhone assembler said operations outlook is expected to show quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year growth for the second quarter Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported strong growth in sales last month, potentially raising expectations for iPhone sales while artificial intelligence (AI)-related business booms. The company, which assembles the majority of Apple Inc’s smartphones, reported a 19.03 percent rise in monthly sales to NT$510.9 billion (US$15.78 billion), from NT$429.22 billion in the same period last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 14.16 percent, it said. The company in a statement said that last month’s revenue was a record-breaking April performance. Hon Hai, known also as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), assembles most iPhones, but the company is diversifying its business to
Apple Inc has been developing a homegrown chip to run artificial intelligence (AI) tools in data centers, although it is unclear if the semiconductor would ever be deployed, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. The effort would build on Apple’s previous efforts to make in-house chips, which run in its iPhones, Macs and other devices, according to the Journal, which cited unidentified people familiar with the matter. The server project is code-named ACDC (Apple Chips in Data Center) within the company, aiming to utilize Apple’s expertise in chip design for the company’s server infrastructure, the newspaper said. While this initiative has been
GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓), the world’s No. 3 silicon wafer supplier, yesterday said that revenue would rise moderately in the second half of this year, driven primarily by robust demand for advanced wafers used in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, a key component of artificial intelligence (AI) technology. “The first quarter is the lowest point of this cycle. The second half will be better than the first for the whole semiconductor industry and for GlobalWafers,” chairwoman Doris Hsu (徐秀蘭) said during an online investors’ conference. “HBM would definitely be the key growth driver in the second half,” Hsu said. “That is our big hope
The consumer price index (CPI) last month eased to 1.95 percent, below the central bank’s 2 percent target, as food and entertainment cost increases decelerated, helped by stable egg prices, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. The slowdown bucked predictions by policymakers and academics that inflationary pressures would build up following double-digit electricity rate hikes on April 1. “The latest CPI data came after the cost of eating out and rent grew moderately amid mixed international raw material prices,” DGBAS official Tsao Chih-hung (曹志弘) told a news conference in Taipei. The central bank in March raised interest rates by