PC vendor Acer Inc (宏碁) yesterday said that lockdowns in China to control COVID-19 upended key component supply and disrupted PC production, although chip shortages have been improving.
While chip supply constraints largely eased in the first quarter, the company faces uneven supplies of key components due to COVID-19 restrictions in China, Acer chairman and CEO Jason Chen (陳俊聖) told an online news conference.
“Semiconductor shortage was the biggest problem in the first half of last year,” Chen said. “Now, we are beset by a supply chain issue caused by China's lockdowns.”
Photo: Screenshot from the Internet
With key components unable to be delivered and backing up in warehouses, notebook computer makers have had to halt production, Chen said, adding that a full reopening, and not gradual steps, would be the only way to resume production.
Inventory has increased to about twice its normal levels due to port gridlocks, he said, adding that channel inventory has recovered to pre-pandemic levels.
“Supply and demand balance is a task we have been trying to achieve. There is a great deal of difficulty in doing it right,” Chen said.
Acer experienced a significant decline in revenue about two years ago, as it did not have sufficient inventory to satisfy sudden demand due to the work-from-home and remote learning trends, he said.
Acer now has sufficient raw materials and finished goods in stock, he said.
Demand is weakening as the war in Ukraine has stoked fears over inflation and an economic slowdown, Chen said, adding that lower household disposable income is affecting PC sales.
Worldwide PC shipments fell 3 percent annually to 118.1 million units in the first quarter, Canalys data showed.
However, commercial PCs and green PCs are growing, despite the industry downtrend, as enterprises are purchasing computers for employees returning to offices, he said, adding that sales of Acer’s green Vero PC series expanded 6 percent month-on-month last month.
Acer expects back-to-school demand and the Christmas holiday to bolster demand, Chen said, adding that new 3D technology should also stimulate PC demand.
The company yesterday launched seven new PC series including green PC series, Vero PCs, with chassis utilizing 30 percent post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastics that help reduce 21 percent in carbon emissions. The computer’s screen bezel uses 30 percent PCR plastics and the keycap uses 50 percent PCR plastics.
This time was supposed to be different. The memorychip sector, famous for its boom-and-bust cycles, had changed its ways. A combination of more disciplined management and new markets for its products — including 5G technology and cloud services — would ensure that companies delivered more predictable earnings. Yet, less than a year after memory companies made such pronouncements, the US$160 billion industry is suffering one of its worst routs ever. There is a glut of the chips sitting in warehouses, customers are cutting orders and product prices have plunged. “The chip industry thought that suppliers were going to have better control,” said
Enimmune Corp (安特羅生技) has obtained marketing approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for its EnVAX-A71 vaccine for enterovirus 71 (EV-71), becoming the nation’s first enterovirus vaccine completely made in Taiwan, it said yesterday. After spending 13 years and NT$1.5 billion (US$49.77 million) on the research and development of the vaccine, Enimmune plans to start manufacturing and marketing it by the end of March, the company said in a statement, without disclosing customer order figures. “It is possible that the vaccine would not be included in a national vaccination program initially, and consumers would need to pay for it themselves,” parent
Vaccine skeptics blocking transfusions for life-saving surgeries, Facebook groups inciting violence against doctors and a global search for unvaccinated donors — COVID-19 misinformation has bred a so-called “pure blood” movement. The movement spins anti-vaccine narratives focused on unfounded claims that receiving blood from people inoculated against COVID-19 “contaminates” the body. Some have advocated for blood banks that draw from “pure” unvaccinated people, while medics in North America say they have fielded requests from people demanding transfusions from donors who have not received a vaccine. In closed social media groups, vaccine skeptics — who brand themselves as “pure bloods” — promote violence against doctors
Asteroid mining start-up AstroForge Inc is planning to launch its first two missions to space this year as it seeks to extract and refine metals from deep space. The first launch, scheduled for April, is to test AstroForge’s technique for refining platinum from a sample of asteroid-like material. The second, planned for October, would scout for an asteroid near Earth to mine. The missions are part of AstroForge’s goal of refining platinum-group metals from asteroids, with the aim of bringing down the cost of mining these metals. It also hopes to reduce the massive amount of carbon emissions that stem from mining