Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), which makes servers and laptop computers on a contract basis, yesterday said it expects artificial intelligence (AI) devices to bring explosive growth to Taiwan’s electronics industry, as AI applications are starting to run on edge devices such as AI PCs.
Taiwanese electronics manufacturers such as chipmakers, component suppliers and hardware assemblers are likely to benefit from a rapid uptake of AI applications, Mike Yang (楊麒令), president of Quanta Cloud Technology Inc (雲達科技), a server manufacturing arm of Quanta, told reporters on the sidelines of a technology forum in Taipei yesterday.
“I believe the growth potential is promising once shipments ramp up,” Yang said.
Photo by: Kirill Kudryavtsev, AFP
He said he is optimistic about Quanta’s business growth prospects this year and that the company has clear order visibility for this year and next year.
The company expected to ramp up production of new AI servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s new GB200 processors in September, with a significant portion earmarked for the world’s four major cloud service providers, Quanta said last month.
AI PCs are meant to enjoy “explosive’ growth, as it is an “ideal” edge computing device to handle confidential data and run small language models for businesses, Yang said, adding that it has lower latency compared with cloud-based servers.
The ecosystem is ready to embrace the arrival of AI PCs, Yang said.
Google is building Gemini Nano, the most compact AI model developed by the company, directly into the Chrome desktop client, starting with Chrome 126, Google said at its annual I/O developer conference on Tuesday. That followed the company’s announcement of two Gemma models early this year, which would run on a local device like computers, rather than servers in the cloud.
AI PC shipments are expected to soar to 132 million units in 2026, making up 48.4 percent of overall PC shipments, the Market Intelligence & Consulting Institute (MIC) said.
This year’s shipments would be about 36.65 million units, representing a 15.7 percent penetration rate, MIC said.
Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) said it expects that the AI features on PCs would help usher in a new wave of growth momentum for the whole PC industry, given the much better user experience and productivity improvement, Asustek co-CEO Samson Hu (胡書賓) said at the forum.
It also expects AI PCs to help improve the profitability of the industry, the company said.
An AI PC would deliver a price premium of between US$100 and US$150 per unit, as those machines are equipped with an extra neutral process unit and bigger memory storage, Asustek said.
For electronic component suppliers like Lite-On Technology Corp (光寶科技), AI-enabled hardware from servers to PCs is proving to be a boon.
To meet the higher power consumption of AI devices, the company plans to roll out more high wattage power supply units including 5-kilowatt, 8-kilowatt and even 16-kilowatt power supply units in 2027, Lite-On president Anson Chiu (邱森彬) said.
It produces 3-kilowatt and 5-kilowatt power supply units for AI servers at a factory in Kaohsiung.
Lite-On said it expects strong AI server demand to boost its business this quarter and in the second half, together with the introduction of AI PCs.
The seizure of one of the largest known mercury shipments in history, moving from mines in Mexico to illegal Amazon gold mining zones, exposes the wide use of the toxic metal in the rainforest, according to authorities. Peru’s customs agency, SUNAT, found 4 tonnes of illegal mercury in Lima’s port district of Callao, according to a report by the non-profit Environmental Investigations Agency (EIA). “This SUNAT intervention has prevented this chemical from having a serious impact on people’s health and the environment, as can be seen in several areas of the country devastated by the illegal use of mercury and illicit activities,”
NEW PRODUCTS: MediaTek plans to roll out new products this quarter, including a flagship mobile phone chip and a GB10 chip that it is codeveloping with Nvidia Corp MediaTek Inc (聯發科) yesterday projected that revenue this quarter would dip by 7 to 13 percent to between NT$130.1 billion and NT$140 billion (US$4.38 billion and US$4.71 billion), compared with NT$150.37 billion last quarter, which it attributed to subdued front-loading demand and unfavorable foreign exchange rates. The Hsinchu-based chip designer said that the forecast factored in the negative effects of an estimated 6 percent appreciation of the New Taiwan dollar against the greenback. “As some demand has been pulled into the first half of the year and resulted in a different quarterly pattern, we expect the third quarter revenue to decline sequentially,”
DIVERSIFYING: Taiwanese investors are reassessing their preference for US dollar assets and moving toward Europe amid a global shift away from the greenback Taiwanese investors are reassessing their long-held preference for US-dollar assets, shifting their bets to Europe in the latest move by global investors away from the greenback. Taiwanese funds holding European assets have seen an influx of investments recently, pushing their combined value to NT$13.7 billion (US$461 million) as of the end of last month, the highest since 2019, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Over the first half of this year, Taiwanese investors have also poured NT$14.1 billion into Europe-focused funds based overseas, bringing total assets up to NT$134.8 billion, according to data from the Securities Investment Trust and Consulting Association (SITCA),
Taiwan’s property transactions in the first half of this year fell 26.4 percent year-on-year to about 130,000 units, as credit controls and mortgage restrictions dampened demand, data from the Ministry of the Interior showed yesterday. Keelung saw the steepest decline, with transactions plummeting 45.6 percent to just 2,041 units — the lowest since the ministry began its survey in 2006. In contrast, Miaoli County was the only region to experience year-on-year growth, with transactions rising 2.4 percent to 3,229 units. Great Home Realty Co (大家房屋) attributed the increase in deals in Miaoli, particularly Jhunan (竹南) and Toufen (頭份) townships, to spillover demand
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