Chunghwa Precision Test Technology Co (CHPT, 中華精測), a chip testing and wafer probing services provider, yesterday said the effect of Washington’s potential tariff hikes would be minimal as only a small portion of its products would ship directly to the US.
The company in 2022 upgraded its unit in San Jose, California, into a subsidiary and quadrupled capacity at a factory there to cope with customers’ demand for testing artificial intelligence (AI) chips and smartphone processors, CHPT president Scott Huang (黃水可) said.
“Only a small fraction of our shipments go directly to the US. A majority of our testing capacity is in Taiwan,” Huang said, adding that most chips made in Taiwan are usually assembled with hardware and then shipped to destinations worldwide.
Photo: CNA
The company expects North America, which houses the world’s major AI chip suppliers such as Nvidia Corp, to be a rapidly growing market, thanks to the AI boom, Huang said.
To better serve its customers there, the company’s board of directors on Tuesday approved a plan to provide its North American team with more power and financial resources, he said.
North America last year replaced Taiwan as the biggest revenue source for the company, making up about 60 percent of its total revenue compared with 30 percent in 2023, while China only accounted for 10 percent, he said.
CHPT is positive about this year, given the robust testing solutions business, including testing of advanced load boards and probe cards amid strong demand for high-performance computing and AI applications, Huang said.
The company expects “better-than-seasonal” performance during the first two quarters with an annual growth in revenue, extending the strong momentum from the final quarter of last year, he said.
The first two quarters of a year are usually the slack season for the electronics industry, he said.
Huang said CHPT employees had to work overtime during the nine-day Lunar New Year holiday to meet customer demand.
“Our factory utilization continues to be at a high level, approaching full capacity,” he said. “The equipment utilization for load boards would be full until April.”
“The first quarter is likely to be the strongest first quarter in the company’s history,” he added.
CHPT supplies advanced load boards used to test advanced wafers, which Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) makes for Nvidia and other companies.
Net profit last quarter surged to an all-time high of NT$322 million (US$9.8 million), compared with NT$17.47 billion a year earlier, while on a quarterly basis, net profit doubled from NT$107 million, the company said.
Earnings per share (EPS) rose to NT$9.83 last quarter from NT$0.53 a year earlier and NT$3.25 a quarter earlier.
For the whole of last year, net profit soared to NT$510 million from NT$32.6 million in 2023, while EPS rose to NT$15.55 from NT$0.99.
The board of directors has approved a proposal to distribute a cash dividend of NT$7.8 per share, representing an about 50.16 percent payout ratio, the company said.
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