Matsushita Electric Industrial Co said it's in talks to merge its LCD business with that of Toshiba Corp, a cost-cutting move that marks the latest sign of Japan's deepening electronics slump.
The companies may announce their plans sometime today, said Matsushita Electric spokesman Teruhisa Noro. His statement came as Fujitsu Ltd confirmed a report that it may post a wider-than-expected full-year loss, and TDK Corp, Japan's largest disk-drive maker, said its factories have been running at less than 60 percent of capacity since August.
"Those reports are just another reminder that a rebound in the technology sector won't come this year," said Nagayuki Yamagishi, a strategist at Tsubasa Securities Co.
Hitachi Ltd, Toshiba and other Japanese electronics makers in August announced thousands of job cuts and projected losses on slumping demand for computers, mobile phones and the parts that run them. With the largest economy tumbling into recession after Sept. 11's terrorist attacks in the US, Sony Corp, NEC Corp and other companies have revised down their earnings projections.
"It's safer to say a turnaround for the sector will come later than expected, even though some people are beginning to think the terrorist attacks won't snuff out consumption as much as we thought," said Tsubasha's Yamagishi.
Slowing demand has forced Japanese companies to look for more ways to cut costs.
Osaka-based Minolta Co will shift all of its domestic camera production to its Shanghai joint venture by the end of March 2003, said company spokesman Akihisa Maruyama, confirming part of a report earlier today in the Nihon Keizai newspaper.
The company hopes to improve its profitability by using cheaper labor in China, Maruyama said. Minolta's camera business is expected to post a current loss, or pretax loss from operations, of ?4 billion on sales of ?90 billion in its fiscal year ending March 31, he said.
Minolta last month said it will eliminate 2,500 jobs by the end of March 2004 and get rid of some assets in a bid to return to profit. The company forecast a group net loss of 23.5 billion yen in its fiscal first half, ended Sept. 30, compared with a loss of 3.13 billion for a year earlier.
Tokyo-based TDK's factories have been running at 50 to 60 percent of capacity since August, said company spokesman Nobuyuki Koike. The components maker has been carrying 2.6 months worth of inventory since the end of June and hopes to trim stockpiles to 1.5 months, he said.
TDK earlier this month said it will cut 8,800 jobs, or 20 percent of its workforce, because of slumping demand.
Kyocera Corp, the biggest maker of ceramic casings that protect semiconductors, has been running its plants at 60 percent of capacity, said company spokesman Hitoshi Inoue. The components maker in August said it would eliminate 10,000 jobs, or 20 percent of its workforce.
Taiwan has arranged for about 8 million barrels of crude oil, or about one-third of its monthly needs, to be shipped from the Red Sea this month to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and ease domestic supply pressures, CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) said yesterday. The state-run oil company has worked with Middle Eastern suppliers to secure routes other than the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas typically passes, CPC chairman Fang Jeng-zen (方振仁) said at a meeting of the legislature’s Economics Committee in Taipei. Suppliers in Saudi Arabia have indicated they
A global survey showed that 60 percent of Taiwanese had attained higher education, second only to Canada, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan easily surpassed the global average of 43 percent and ranked ahead of major economies, including Japan, South Korea and the US, data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for 2024 showed. Taiwan has a high literacy rate, data released by the ministry showed. As of the end of last year, Taiwan had 20.617 million people aged 15 or older, accounting for 88.5 percent of the total population, with a literacy rate of 99.4 percent, the data
CCP ‘PAWN’? Beijing could use the KMT chairwoman’s visit to signal to the world that many people in Taiwan support the ‘one China’ principle, an academic said Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) yesterday arrived in China for a “peace” mission and potential meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), while a Taiwanese minister detailed the number of Chinese warships currently deployed around the nation. Cheng is visiting at a time of increased Chinese military pressure on Taiwan, as the opposition-dominated Legislative Yuan stalls a government plan for US$40 billion in extra defense spending. Speaking to reporters before going to the airport, Cheng said she was going on a “historic journey for peace,” but added that some people felt uneasy about her trip. “If you truly love Taiwan,
AIR ALERT: China’s reservation of airspace over the Yellow Sea and East China Sea could be an attempt to test the US’ response ahead of a Trump-Xi meeting, the NSB head said China’s attempts to infiltrate Taiwan are systematic, planned and targeted, with activity shifting from recruiting mid-level military officers to rank-and-file enlisted personnel, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said yesterday. The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) integrates national security, intelligence operations and “united front” efforts into a dense network to conduct intelligence gathering and espionage in Taiwan, Tsai said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee. It uses specific networks to screen targets through exchange activities and recruiting local collaborators to establish intelligence-gathering organizations, he said. China is also shifting who it targets to lower-ranking military personnel,
RSS