Qualcomm Inc is strengthening its partnerships with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and original design manufacturers (ODMs) in Taiwan as it expands its presence in the artificial intelligence (AI) computer market, CEO Cristiano Amon said in Taipei yesterday ahead of the annual Computex trade show.
“Historically we’ve always been a very big customer of TSMC, and we continue to be,” Amon said during a media Q&A session.
“For chip manufacturing, we’re among the largest fabless [semiconductor designers],” he said, noting that Qualcomm, a leading provider of mobile and AI-enabled chipsets, ships about 40 billion components every year, with TSMC being the company’s “primary manufacturing partner.”
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
Amon, who has a background in electronic engineering, also said that Taiwan has always been “very, very strong” in the personal computer (PC) ecosystem, highlighting Qualcomm’s growing ties with the country’s PC sector, especially in collaboration with ODMs on new hardware designs and industrial applications.
ODMs are firms that design and build devices which are then sold under another company’s brand — a sector in which Taiwan plays a leading global role, with major players such as Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶).
Amon said Qualcomm’s relationships with Taiwan’s PC ecosystem are growing at “a very fast pace,” adding that the company’s team in Taiwan has always been active and is continuing to expand.
The remarks related to Taiwan came after Amon’s keynote speech earlier in the day, in which he outlined Qualcomm’s vision for AI PCs powered by the Snapdragon X series, the company’s latest line of high-performance, AI- accelerated processors for Windows PCs.
Following the recent retail launch of laptops powered by the Snapdragon X series, Qualcomm has reached around 9 percent market share in the United States and the top five in European markets as of last quarter, Amon said.
“As new players entered the PC market, sometimes it took seven to nine years to get to about 10 percent (market) share,” he said, adding that “we are very happy” to have reached that level so quickly.
In his keynote speech, Amon also invited top executives from major PC makers — including Taiwan’s Asustek Computer Inc (華碩), the US’ HP Inc, and China’s Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) — to join him on stage, where each showcased new AI-powered laptops featuring Qualcomm chips under their respective brands.
Taiwan’s foreign exchange reserves hit a record high at the end of last month, surpassing the US$600 billion mark for the first time, the central bank said yesterday. Last month, the country’s foreign exchange reserves rose US$5.51 billion from a month earlier to reach US$602.94 billion due to an increase in returns from the central bank’s portfolio management, the movement of other foreign currencies in the portfolio against the US dollar and the bank’s efforts to smooth the volatility of the New Taiwan dollar. Department of Foreign Exchange Director-General Eugene Tsai (蔡炯民)said a rate cut cycle launched by the US Federal Reserve
The US government on Wednesday sanctioned more than two dozen companies in China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, including offshoots of a US chip firm, accusing the businesses of providing illicit support to Iran’s military or proxies. The US Department of Commerce included two subsidiaries of US-based chip distributor Arrow Electronics Inc (艾睿電子) on its so-called entity list published on the federal register for facilitating purchases by Iran’s proxies of US tech. Arrow spokesman John Hourigan said that the subsidiaries have been operating in full compliance with US export control regulations and his company is discussing with the US Bureau of
Businesses across the global semiconductor supply chain are bracing themselves for disruptions from an escalating trade war, after China imposed curbs on rare earth mineral exports and the US responded with additional tariffs and restrictions on software sales to the Asian nation. China’s restrictions, the most targeted move yet to limit supplies of rare earth materials, represent the first major attempt by Beijing to exercise long-arm jurisdiction over foreign companies to target the semiconductor industry, threatening to stall the chips powering the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. They prompted US President Donald Trump on Friday to announce that he would impose an additional
Pegatron Corp (和碩), a key assembler of Apple Inc’s iPhones, on Thursday reported a 12.3 percent year-on-year decline in revenue for last quarter to NT$257.86 billion (US$8.44 billion), but it expects revenue to improve in the second half on traditional holiday demand. The fourth quarter is usually the peak season for its communications products, a company official said on condition of anonymity. As Apple released its new iPhone 17 series early last month, sales in the communications segment rose sequentially last month, the official said. Shipments to Apple have been stable and in line with earlier expectations, they said. Pegatron shipped 2.4 million notebook
RSS