Materials Analysis Technology Inc (MA-tek, 閎康), a semiconductor materials analysis service provider, yesterday said its revenue soared about 21 percent annually last year to a historic high, thanks to strong customer demand for its analysis services from Taiwan and Japan.
Revenue expanded to NT$4.81 billion (US$155.2 million) last year, compared with NT$3.97 billion in 2022, after registering a record-high monthly revenue of NT$443 million last month, the company said in a statement.
Material Analysis attributed the robust growth momentum to unresolved geopolitical tensions, which are reshaping the global supply chain of the semiconductor industry, giving Japan a chance to return to play an important role in the industry.
Photo: Grace Hung, Taipei Times
Japan is striving to boost domestic semiconductor production, with an aim to treble its domestic chip production to ¥15 trillion (US$109.77 billion) by 2030, from ¥5 trillion in 2020, the Hsinchu-based company said.
That trend has helped fuel Material Analysis’ revenue growth from Japan, with its first lab in Nagoya to contribute about 8 percent to the company’s overall revenue last year after four years of establishment, it said.
The company expected the lab’s revenue contribution to increase further this year, it said.
The company also expects its second Japanese lab to contribute significant revenue this quarter as it has received orders from multiple semiconductor customers.
The lab was launched in September last year in Kumamoto, where its major customer Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is to launch its first Japanese fab next month.
Materials Analysis usually sets up labs close to its customers’ plants to ensure immediate service and support with cost efficiency.
In Taiwan, Materials Analysis also expects revenue growth this year, benefiting from customer’s migration to advanced 2-nanometer process technology.
As customers adopt new nanosheet transistor structures, Materials Analysis expects that the technology complexity and challenges would require more materials analysis to help boost yield rate.
Increasing demand from Taiwan and Japan has reinforced Material Analysis’s confidence that revenue this year would outpace last year’s 20 percent expansion. The company operates 25 labs in Taiwan, China and Japan.
Taiwan made up more than half of the company’s revenue, followed by China. Materials Analysis has planned to spend 85 percent of its capital spending on overseas capacity expansion last year.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, booked its first-ever profit from its Arizona subsidiary in the first half of this year, four years after operations began, a company financial statement showed. Wholly owned by TSMC, the Arizona unit contributed NT$4.52 billion (US$150.1 million) in net profit, compared with a loss of NT$4.34 billion a year earlier, the statement showed. The company attributed the turnaround to strong market demand and high factory utilization. The Arizona unit counts Apple Inc, Nvidia Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc among its major customers. The firm’s first fab in Arizona began high-volume production
VOTE OF CONFIDENCE: The Japanese company is adding Intel to an investment portfolio that includes artificial intelligence linchpins Nvidia Corp and TSMC Softbank Group Corp agreed to buy US$2 billion of Intel Corp stock, a surprise deal to shore up a struggling US name while boosting its own chip ambitions. The Japanese company, which is adding Intel to an investment portfolio that includes artificial intelligence (AI) linchpins Nvidia Corp and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), is to pay US$23 a share — a small discount to Intel’s last close. Shares of the US chipmaker, which would issue new stock to Softbank, surged more than 5 percent in after-hours trading. Softbank’s stock fell as much as 5.4 percent on Tuesday in Tokyo, its
COLLABORATION: Softbank would supply manufacturing gear to the factory, and a joint venture would make AI data center equipment, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) would operate a US factory owned by Softbank Group Corp, setting up what is in the running to be the first manufacturing site in the Japanese company’s US$500 billion Stargate venture with OpenAI and Oracle Corp. Softbank is acquiring Hon Hai’s electric-vehicle plant in Ohio, but the Taiwanese company would continue to run the complex after turning it into an artificial intelligence (AI) server production plant, Hon Hai chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) said yesterday. Softbank would supply manufacturing gear to the factory, and a joint venture between the two companies would make AI data
The prices of gasoline and diesel at domestic fuel stations are to rise NT$0.1 and NT$0.4 per liter this week respectively, after international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to rise to NT$27.3, NT$28.8 and NT$30.8 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to rise to NT$26.2 per liter at CPC stations and NT$26 at Formosa pumps, they said. The announcements came after international crude oil prices