Quanta Cloud Technology (QCT, 雲達科技), a server unit of Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦), yesterday said it would accelerate its expansion of capacity next year to catch up with growing demand for servers and cloud-computing products.
QCT has two new investments in the US totaling US$42 million to fund the expansion of laptop and server assembly lines, and to “support the future growth of our server business,” QCT president Mike Yang (楊麒令) said.
“We are also adding a new factory in Thailand and preparing for capacity expansion in Europe,” Yang said. “We are investing in a promising future.”
Photo: CNA
In total, QCT plans to introduce more than 10 new production lines next year, Yang told a media briefing, following the launch of the company’s first 5G Open Lab in New Taipei City’s Linkou District (林口) in collaboration with Intel Corp.
The lab would assist partners in carrying out end-to-end integrated development and testing on a private 5G network set up by QCT, and would serve as an incubation center for 5G solutions, the company said.
Yesterday at the lab, QCT demonstrated how smart manufacturing works on 5G enterprise private networks. The lab offers services for customers from Taiwan, Japan, Singapore and South Korea.
Photo: CNA
To meet demand from more customers, the company plans to open a similar lab in Germany next year and another one in the US, Yang said.
Despite the challenges ahead, the company has landed “more orders for next year than this year,” Quanta chairman Barry Lam (林百里) said
“Some customers placed orders for the whole of next year, or even for the next two years. This is the first time in Quanta’s 30-year history that we have seen short supply and such a long period of ordering,” Lam said.
Next year, the supply of materials and components should gradually improve, although it could remain a concern, Lam said.
Quanta is facing a less severe situation than other firms, given its large-scale production and prestigious customers, he added.
Lam said that Quanta should see continued revenue growth for the whole of this year, after revenue increased 2.41 percent to NT$1 trillion (US$36.08 billion) in the first 11 months, up from NT$981.04 billion for the same period last year.
Asked what he thought of the metaverse, Lam said Quanta is ready with augmented-reality and virtual-reality devices, and hopes to create more business opportunities through the 5G lab.
PERSISTENT RUMORS: Nvidia’s CEO said the firm is not in talks to sell AI chips to China, but he would welcome a change in US policy barring the activity Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said his company is not in discussions to sell its Blackwell artificial intelligence (AI) chips to Chinese firms, waving off speculation it is trying to engineer a return to the world’s largest semiconductor market. Huang, who arrived in Taiwan yesterday ahead of meetings with longtime partner Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), took the opportunity to clarify recent comments about the US-China AI race. The Nvidia head caused a stir in an interview this week with the Financial Times, in which he was quoted as saying “China will win” the AI race. Huang yesterday said
Nissan Motor Co has agreed to sell its global headquarters in Yokohama for ¥97 billion (US$630 million) to a group sponsored by Taiwanese autoparts maker Minth Group (敏實集團), as the struggling automaker seeks to shore up its financial position. The acquisition is led by a special purchase company managed by KJR Management Ltd, a Japanese real-estate unit of private equity giant KKR & Co, people familiar with the matter said. KJR said it would act as asset manager together with Mizuho Real Estate Management Co. Nissan is undergoing a broad cost-cutting campaign by eliminating jobs and shuttering plants as it grapples
The Chinese government has issued guidance requiring new data center projects that have received any state funds to only use domestically made artificial intelligence (AI) chips, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. In recent weeks, Chinese regulatory authorities have ordered such data centers that are less than 30 percent complete to remove all installed foreign chips, or cancel plans to purchase them, while projects in a more advanced stage would be decided on a case-by-case basis, the sources said. The move could represent one of China’s most aggressive steps yet to eliminate foreign technology from its critical infrastructure amid a
MORE WEIGHT: The national weighting was raised in one index while holding steady in two others, while several companies rose or fell in prominence MSCI Inc, a global index provider, has raised Taiwan’s weighting in one of its major indices and left the country’s weighting unchanged in two other indices after a regular index review. In a statement released on Thursday, MSCI said it has upgraded Taiwan’s weighting in the MSCI All-Country World Index by 0.02 percentage points to 2.25 percent, while maintaining the weighting in the MSCI Emerging Markets Index, the most closely watched by foreign institutional investors, at 20.46 percent. Additionally, the index provider has left Taiwan’s weighting in the MSCI All-Country Asia ex-Japan Index unchanged at 23.15 percent. The latest index adjustments are to