Gudeng Equipment Co Ltd (家碩科技), a supplier of semiconductor equipment and components used in advanced chip manufacturing processes, yesterday said it has tentatively set a price of NT$216.8 per share for its debut on the Taipei Exchange next month at the earliest.
The price represents about a 15 percent premium compared with the auction price of NT$188.52 a share, which was based on the average trading price of the company’s shares on the Emerging Stock Market over a 30-day period before the auction.
Investors would be able to buy Gudeng Equipment shares through an auction or via subscription. Yuanta Securities Co (元大證券) is underwriting the initial public offering (IPO).
Photo: CNA
Gudeng Equipment offers automotive extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) pod surface inspection tools, a critical tool for EUV pod quality management.
Gudeng Equipment is 47.19 percent owned by Gudeng Precision Industrial Co (家登精密), the sole EUV pod supplier to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電).
TSMC was the world’s first chipmaker to utilize EUV tools in producing an advanced version of its 7-nanometer chips in 2019 and now on more advanced chips.
Gudeng Equipment gave a bullish view about the company’s business prospects as a significant expansion in capital spending by the world’s major chipmakers on advanced technologies would provide a boon to the company, chairman Bill Chiu (邱銘乾) told investors on Monday.
“We are to benefiting from the AI [artificial intelligence] boom as more companies are joining the ranks of AMD and Nvidia in developing AI chips,” Chiu said.
Global semiconductor equipment spending on front-end facilities is expected to grow 21 percent year-on-year this year to US$92 billion, with Taiwan continuing to be the biggest spender, SEMI has forecast.
For Gudeng Equipment, China is to be a new growth engine as Chinese chipmakers are racing to produce advanced chips, Chiu said.
China accounted for a mere 3 percent of the company’s total revenue last year, while Taiwan contributed about 70 percent and the US 13 percent.
Since a key customer operates chip manufacturing facilities in Ireland, Gudeng Equipment has also started shipping equipment to that nation.
To cope with rising demand, Gudeng Equipment is planning to build a new factory in Tainan later this year, it said.
Gudeng Equipment last year posted a net profit of NT$228 million, up 12.32 percent from NT$203 million in 2022. Gross margin improved to 49 percent last year from 43 percent the previous year.
Revenue grew 15.24 percent year-on-year to NT$1.21 billion last year from NT$1.05 billion.
With an approval rating of just two percent, Peruvian President Dina Boluarte might be the world’s most unpopular leader, according to pollsters. Protests greeted her rise to power 29 months ago, and have marked her entire term — joined by assorted scandals, investigations, controversies and a surge in gang violence. The 63-year-old is the target of a dozen probes, including for her alleged failure to declare gifts of luxury jewels and watches, a scandal inevitably dubbed “Rolexgate.” She is also under the microscope for a two-week undeclared absence for nose surgery — which she insists was medical, not cosmetic — and is
CAUTIOUS RECOVERY: While the manufacturing sector returned to growth amid the US-China trade truce, firms remain wary as uncertainty clouds the outlook, the CIER said The local manufacturing sector returned to expansion last month, as the official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) rose 2.1 points to 51.0, driven by a temporary easing in US-China trade tensions, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The PMI gauges the health of the manufacturing industry, with readings above 50 indicating expansion and those below 50 signaling contraction. “Firms are not as pessimistic as they were in April, but they remain far from optimistic,” CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said at a news conference. The full impact of US tariff decisions is unlikely to become clear until later this month
GROWING CONCERN: Some senior Trump administration officials opposed the UAE expansion over fears that another TSMC project could jeopardize its US investment Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is evaluating building an advanced production facility in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and has discussed the possibility with officials in US President Donald Trump’s administration, people familiar with the matter said, in a potentially major bet on the Middle East that would only come to fruition with Washington’s approval. The company has had multiple meetings in the past few months with US Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff and officials from MGX, an influential investment vehicle overseen by the UAE president’s brother, the people said. The conversations are a continuation of talks that
CHIP DUTIES: TSMC said it voiced its concerns to Washington about tariffs, telling the US commerce department that it wants ‘fair treatment’ to protect its competitiveness Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday reiterated robust business prospects for this year as strong artificial intelligence (AI) chip demand from Nvidia Corp and other customers would absorb the impacts of US tariffs. “The impact of tariffs would be indirect, as the custom tax is the importers’ responsibility, not the exporters,” TSMC chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said at the chipmaker’s annual shareholders’ meeting in Hsinchu City. TSMC’s business could be affected if people become reluctant to buy electronics due to inflated prices, Wei said. In addition, the chipmaker has voiced its concern to the US Department of Commerce
RSS