Smartphone maker HTC Corp (宏達電) has reported another quarterly net loss in the third quarter of the year, although its gross margin continued to improve.
In a statement on Tuesday, HTC said that it reported a net loss of NT$770 million (US$27.63 million) in the July-to-September period, higher than the NT$550 million net loss a quarter earlier.
Hurt by its struggling smartphone business, HTC has run a net loss every quarter since the second quarter of 2015, except for the first quarter of 2018, when an asset sale helped it post a quarterly net profit.
Photo courtesy of HTC Corp via CNA
Its losses per share in the third quarter rose for the first time in five quarters to NT$0.94, from NT$0.68 in the second quarter, as it continued to encounter stiff competition in the global smartphone market.
However, HTC’s gross margin — the difference between revenue and cost of goods sold — continued to climb in the third quarter to 31.6 percent from 29.9 percent in the second quarter.
In addition, HTC’s operating loss fell to NT$880 million in the third quarter from NT$1.05 billion in the second quarter, helped by a slightly improved operating margin — the difference between sales, the cost of goods sold and operating expenses — of minus-65.8 percent, compared with minus-77.8 percent in the second quarter.
Analysts said that the improving gross margin largely reflected HTC’s efforts to diversify its product mix and develop its virtual reality business to take pressure off its lackluster smartphone sales.
In September alone, HTC posted consolidated sales of NT$601 million, up 64 percent from a year earlier.
It was the company’s second-highest monthly sales figure for the year, behind its NT$664 million in June.
The increase in September sales came after the company unveiled the HTC Vive Pro 2 virtual reality (VR) headset.
Still, HTC’s consolidated sales for the third quarter fell by 0.7 percent from a quarter earlier to NT$1.34 billion.
HTC, which launched its first VR headset — the HTC Vive — in 2015, has seen rising demand for its VR gadgets amid a booming stay-at-home economy.
The latest VR gadget from HTC — the Vive Flow — went on sale in Taiwan on Monday.
The lightweight, compact immersive glasses, weighing no more than 189g, have an expansive 100° field of view, 3.2K resolution, a 75 Hertz refresh rate and full 3D spatial audio that can also connect to external Bluetooth earphones, the company said.
Analysts have said that the portable Vive Flow is HTC’s attempt to embrace the so-called “metaverse” concept talked up by Facebook Inc chief executive officer Mark Zuckerberg since July.
The metaverse — a term coined by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 book Snow Crash — refers to a digital world where people can move between devices and communicate in a virtual environment.
Charles Huang (黃昭穎), general manager for the HTC Vive in the Asia-Pacific region, said that the Vive Flow is expected to go on sale in other countries later in the fourth quarter or in the first quarter of next year.
CAUTIOUS RECOVERY: While the manufacturing sector returned to growth amid the US-China trade truce, firms remain wary as uncertainty clouds the outlook, the CIER said The local manufacturing sector returned to expansion last month, as the official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) rose 2.1 points to 51.0, driven by a temporary easing in US-China trade tensions, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The PMI gauges the health of the manufacturing industry, with readings above 50 indicating expansion and those below 50 signaling contraction. “Firms are not as pessimistic as they were in April, but they remain far from optimistic,” CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said at a news conference. The full impact of US tariff decisions is unlikely to become clear until later this month
With an approval rating of just two percent, Peruvian President Dina Boluarte might be the world’s most unpopular leader, according to pollsters. Protests greeted her rise to power 29 months ago, and have marked her entire term — joined by assorted scandals, investigations, controversies and a surge in gang violence. The 63-year-old is the target of a dozen probes, including for her alleged failure to declare gifts of luxury jewels and watches, a scandal inevitably dubbed “Rolexgate.” She is also under the microscope for a two-week undeclared absence for nose surgery — which she insists was medical, not cosmetic — and is
GROWING CONCERN: Some senior Trump administration officials opposed the UAE expansion over fears that another TSMC project could jeopardize its US investment Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is evaluating building an advanced production facility in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and has discussed the possibility with officials in US President Donald Trump’s administration, people familiar with the matter said, in a potentially major bet on the Middle East that would only come to fruition with Washington’s approval. The company has had multiple meetings in the past few months with US Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff and officials from MGX, an influential investment vehicle overseen by the UAE president’s brother, the people said. The conversations are a continuation of talks that
CHIP DUTIES: TSMC said it voiced its concerns to Washington about tariffs, telling the US commerce department that it wants ‘fair treatment’ to protect its competitiveness Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday reiterated robust business prospects for this year as strong artificial intelligence (AI) chip demand from Nvidia Corp and other customers would absorb the impacts of US tariffs. “The impact of tariffs would be indirect, as the custom tax is the importers’ responsibility, not the exporters,” TSMC chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said at the chipmaker’s annual shareholders’ meeting in Hsinchu City. TSMC’s business could be affected if people become reluctant to buy electronics due to inflated prices, Wei said. In addition, the chipmaker has voiced its concern to the US Department of Commerce