SEMICONDUCTORS
Vanguard revenue drops
Vanguard International Semiconductor Corp (世界先進), which makes display driver ICs and power management chips, yesterday said revenue dropped 3.73 percent month-on-month to NT$3.56 billion (US$111.6 million). Last month’s revenue fell 5.6 percent from a year earlier and was the lowest in about 17 months, company data showed. Vanguard attributed the decline to a reduction in wafer shipments due to a slowdown in market demand, as customers made inventory adjustments amid central banks’ interest rate hikes to curb inflation. United Microelectronics Corp (聯電), the world’s third-largest contract chipmaker, reported that revenue fell 3.4 percent monthly to NT$24.34 billion last month. That represented an annual expansion of 27 percent from NT$19.16 billion, it said.
ELECTRONICS
Novatek eyes rise in revenue
Novatek Microelectronics Corp (聯詠), which designs display driver ICs, on Tuesday forecast revenue would increase 2.25 percent this quarter to NT$20 billion, from NT$19.56 billion last quarter, aided by rush orders for driver ICs used in TVs and rising demand for driver ICs used in OLED panels. Gross margin is predicted to fall to between 38.5 and 40.5 percent this quarter from 42.65 last quarter due to higher costs and lower prices, the company said. Novatek said inventory adjustments in the supply chain would likely return to normal in the first quarter of next year. The company’s net profit for last quarter almost halved to NT$4.31 billion from NT$8.49 billion in the previous quarter and was 65 percent less than the NT$12.27 billion it posted a year earlier, company data showed.
COMPUTERS
PC firms post mixed results
Contract notebook computer makers Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶) yesterday reported mixed sales results for last month. Revenue at Quanta decreased 9.9 percent month-on-month, but increased 8.1 percent year-on-year to NT$108.79 billion, the company said in a statement. It shipped 4.2 million notebook computers last month, down 1.1 million units from September. Quanta is expected to hold an investors’ conference tomorrow to report on its outlook for its fourth-quarter performance. Compal said in a separate statement that its sales declined 9.3 percent monthly and 18.8 percent annually to NT$94.85 billion. It shipped 2.9 million laptops last month, a decrease of 200,000 units from a month earlier, the company said. In the first 10 months of the year, Quanta’s sales totaled NT$1.06 trillion, up 19.3 percent year-on-year, while Compal’s sales fell 6.6 percent to NT$919.39 billion.
FOOD AND BEVERAGE
Uni-President earnings slip
Uni-President Enterprises Corp (統一企業), the nation’s largest food-and-beverage conglomerate, yesterday reported that earnings for last quarter fell from a year earlier due to rising raw material costs and smaller contributions from its subsidiaries. Net profit was NT$5.53 billion last quarter, down 3.31 percent from a year earlier, or earnings per share of NT$0.97, even though consolidated revenue rose 13.48 percent year-on-year to NT$141.76 billion. Gross margin fell 0.74 percentage points to 31.97 percent last quarter. In the first three quarters, net profit dropped 11.45 percent to NT$14.61 billion, with earnings per share of NT$2.57. Tainan-based UPE’s major subsidiaries include President Chain Store Corp (統一超商), Ton Yi Industrial Corp (統一實業), ScinoPharm Taiwan Ltd (台灣神隆) and President Securities Corp (統一證券), as well as its Chinese unit, Uni-President China Holdings Ltd (統一中國控股).
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday said it would work with US chipmaker Intel Corp to jointly develop and deploy next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure and intelligent computing platforms in a move to capture booming demand for AI computing systems. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康), said in a statement that the partnership would combine its global manufacturing scale, system integration expertise and AI data center deployment capabilities with Intel’s strengths in processor architecture, silicon technologies and software ecosystem. The companies said they plan to work on equipment used in AI data centers, including server racks powered by
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