Netherlands-based ASML Holding NV, a leading global supplier of semiconductor production equipment, has received the green light to invest more than NT$10 billion (US$314 million) in Taiwan to set up a plant in New Taipei City’s Linkou District (林口).
The Investment Commission has approved an application by ASML to infuse about NT$5.65 billion and 140 million euros (US$152 million), which is in excess of NT$10 billion in total, into ASML Taiwan Ltd (台灣艾司摩爾), a subsidiary that specializes in wafer measuring equipment and provides its clients with technological support and training, it said in a statement.
Commission spokesperson Su Chi-yen (蘇琪彥), said the Dutch-based company filed an application with the authorities for approval of the investment plan it announced late last year to build a plant in Linkou.
Photo: Reuters
In November last year, when the investment plan was announced, ASML said it would invest globally and in Taiwan to prepare for the company’s continued growth, while supporting global customers and the development of the semiconductor industry.
ASML is the world’s sole supplier of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography photolithography machines used by semiconductor manufacturers to produce chips.
Currently, ASML has 60 operations hubs in 16 countries worldwide, with Taiwan being its largest hub in Asia. In Taiwan, ASML has four client support centers, two R&D centers and two training centers, and is believed to provide EUV machines to the world’s largest contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電).
In addition to ASML, the commission said it approved a plan submitted by Netherlands-based Yahoo Holdings BV to inject about NT$3.6 billion into Yahoo! Digital Marketing Ltd (雅虎數位行銷), which provides electronic information services and advertising services in Taiwan.
Meanwhile, CTBC Bank Co (中信銀行) was approved to remit US$37.05 million to CTBC Bank (Philippines) Corp as a loan to conduct banking business in the Southeast Asian country, and Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) secured approval to invest US$329 million in Foxconn Singapore Pte Ltd for the company’s investments in India and Vietnam, the commission said.
HORMUZ ISSUE: The US president said he expected crude prices to drop at the end of the war, which he called a ‘minor excursion’ that could continue ‘for a little while’ The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Kuwait started reducing oil production, as the near-closure of the crucial Strait of Hormuz ripples through energy markets and affects global supply. Abu Dhabi National Oil Co (ADNOC) is “managing offshore production levels to address storage requirements,” the company said in a statement, without giving details. Kuwait Petroleum Corp said it was lowering production at its oil fields and refineries after “Iranian threats against safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz.” The war in the Middle East has all but closed Hormuz, the narrow waterway linking the Persian Gulf to the open seas,
Apple Inc increased iPhone production in India by about 53 percent last year and now makes a quarter of its marquee devices there, reflecting the US company’s efforts to avoid tariffs on China. The company assembled about 55 million iPhones in India last year, up from 36 million a year earlier, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be named because the numbers aren’t public. Apple makes about 220 million to 230 million iPhones a year globally, with India’s share of the total increasing rapidly. Apple has accelerated its expansion in the world’s most populous country in recent years, bolstered
HEADWINDS: The company said it expects its computer business, as well as consumer electronics and communications segments to see revenue declines due to seasonality Pegatron Corp (和碩) yesterday said it aims to grow its artificial intelligence (AI) server revenue more than 10-fold this year from last year, driven by orders from neocloud solutions clients and large cloud service providers. The electronics manufacturing service provider said AI server revenue growth would be driven primarily by the Nvidia Corp GB300 server platform. Server shipments are expected to increase each quarter this year, with the second half likely to outperform the first half, it said. The AI server market is expected to broaden this year as more inference applications emerge, which would drive demand for system-on-chip, application-specific integrated circuits
PROJECTION: TSMC said it expects strong growth this year, with revenue in US dollars projected to grow by about 30 percent, outperforming the industry Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday reported consolidated sales last month reached NT$317.66 billion (US$9.98 billion), the highest ever for the month of February, driven by robust demand for chips built using the company’s advanced 3-nanometer (3nm) process. Last month’s figure was up 22.2 percent from a year earlier, but fell 20.8 percent from January, the world’s largest contract chipmaker said in a statement. For the first two months of the year, TSMC posted cumulative sales of NT$718.91 billion, up 29.9 percent from a year earlier. Analysts attributed the growth to sustained global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) products