BRING ON THE ORDERS
Celestics Xbox orders
Microsoft has selected Celestica as the third company that will manufacture Xbox 360 for it. Flextronics and Wistron are the other two. Celestica's orders are for 2006 and will account for 15-20% of Microsoft's 2006 orders of an estimated total of 7M consoles.
STMicroelectronics SRAM orders
ProMOS Technologies has received single-transistor pseudo-SRAM (1T PSRAM) orders from STMicroelectronics. Winbond also supplies to STMicroelectronics.
NEC 16X DVD Burners
Lite-On IT has received orders from NEC for half-height 16x DVD burners with shipments of 200-300K/month to begin 4Q05.
China Unicom PDSN order for Macao
UTStarcom has won a contract from China Unicom (Macao) to deploy its "Total Control" multiservice PDSN platform as part of the first phase of China Unicom's CDMA core network construction in Macao.
Kolin TVs at Circuit City
Kolin (Taiwan) has received a big LCD TV order from Circuit City, a major US consumer electronics chain. Kolin has shipped 20-inch sets to Circuit City and will ship 26-, 32-, and 37-inch TV models soon, for a total of 100K TVs in 2H06. Kolin's sets can also be found in Canada. The company has an annual LCD TV capacity of 500K sets. Kolin gets its LCD panels from which suppliers? Its LCD TVs are also sold in which other N. American retail outlets? THT knows - do you?
Hisense digital signal processor orders
Hisense (China), a household appliance supplier, has contracted TSMC to make DSPs for its color TVs, LCD TVs, and PDP TVs. The chips will be made with 0.18 micron process and the order is expected to be 1M units for 2005.
Intel MB chip-set orders
SiS has reportedly received orders from Intel for low-end chipsets for Intel's MBs. Intel used to supply these chipsets itself. SiS was already contracted by Intel to supply the 861 FX chipset, with shpiments to begin in October. Potential new orders may come for the 915-series and 865-series chipsets.
COMPANY NEWS AND INDUSTRY TRENDS
Xbox 360 fallout
XBox 360 is expected to be launched in the US on Thanksgiving Day, and suppliers of components for the game consoles are enjoying the "fallout." Foxlink supplies cables, connectors, and joysticks for Xbox 360 and expects orders to increase beginning this month. Other cable suppliers for Xbox 360 are Ji-Haw Industrial and Kye Systems.
ECSto downgrade MB forecasts - focusing on NB
ECS is expected to lower its MB forecast from 1M to 600K units for 2005. The company is expected to focus on its NB OEM business and to work on its branded NB OEM orders in China.
FIC moving NB production to China
First International Computer is moving all of its NB production from Taiwan to China. It has a new NB plant in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province and expects its NB shipments to hit 2M in 2006. As do other Taiwan companies that have moved production to China, FIC will maintain a Taiwan office for R&D, customer service and technical support.
Agilent-Sunplus coopration on next gen mice
Agilent Technologies and Sunplus have agreed to cooperate on next gen optical computer mice. They plan to introduce he first SoC for mice mid-2006.
Another BenQ fiasco?
Panel maker and BenQ subsidiary AUO has announced a net loss of NT$1.66 B in 1H05. The company is expecting a better second half.
Hon Hai vs Asustek
Hon Hai (Foxconn) and Asustek are two large Taiwanese contract manufacturers that are in the news a lot. How do they stack up against each other?
Motherboards - 2005 world-wide market share: Hon Hai 24.77; Asustek 36.12
Handsets - 2005 world-wide market share: Hon Hai 7.86; Asustek 0.28
Hon Hai Desktop PC world-wide market share: 2004 - 30; 2005 - 32
Asustek NB PC + Desktop PC world-wide market share: 11.3
The most expensive Dell call center in the world?
Dell Japan will open a second Japan call center this fall (in Miyazaki Prefecture) to support its growing customer base. The 100 workers at the facility will receive orders and provide technical support. Anyone know any Japanese speakers in India?
TDK expanding Blu-ray Disc production
TDK Corp. is planning on building a new plant for Blu-ray Disc production. At the same time, it will stop producing MiniDiscs. TDK currently makes 2.8M MiniDiscs a month and only 20K Blu-ray Discs (Nagano Prefecture plant). The target Blu-ray monthly output at the new plant is 500K by year-end 06. Blu-ray is a nex gen DVD format out of Japan.
TELECOM
HK PCCW sells assets
Hong Kong's PCCW has agreed to sell a 12.1% stake in its subsidiary Mobile One Limited (Singapore) to SunShare Investments Ltd, a TM International Sdn Bhd - Khazanah Nasional Berhad JV. The sale will bring PCCW US$77M.
M & A
Alibaba - Yahoo deal in China
Alibaba.com is a huge China e-commerce site (HK owned). It is acquiring Yahoo China. At the same time, Yahoo isn't giving up on China - it has invested US$1B in Alibaba for a 40% share of the company and Alibaba is using the Yahoo brand name in China. Smart move, Yahoo!
RUMORS! Infineon-Nanya ?
Reports say that Infineon Technologies AG is considering a merger with acquiring Nanya (Taiwan) as a solution for the unprofitability of its memory chip business.
Flash memory JV in China
ProMOS Technologies (Taiwan) and the Putian Group (China) have formed a JV to supply flash memory cards for the China market (to be sold with ProMos's chips and through Putian's stores).
Cisco - Nokia RUMORS !?
What would Cisco gain from acquiring Nokia (besides its name on a lot of mobile phones)? One answer: Nokia's telecom equipment business is particularly strong in Asia, where its customers include China Unicom, Taiwan Mobile, Jiangxi Mobile Communications, LGE, Lenovo Mobile Communications, Panasonic Mobile Communications, Samsung, and Sendo International.
Softbank selling stake in Cisco Japan
Cisco may be on a buying spree, but not everyone wants to own a piece of Cisco. Softbank has said that it plans to sell its entire stake of Cisco Systems Inc.'s Japan unit back to Cisco for US$25M.
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY DISPUTES
Matsushita and Mediatek at war
Matsushita has filed a lawsuit against Mediatek (Taiwan) over patent infringement. Matsushita claims that Mediatek's DVD player chips infringe on three Matsushita patents. Matsushita filed its suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California and is demanding that US sales of the chips and DVD players that used them be haulted.
SEMICON
TSMC
TSMC plans to build a new 12-inch wafer plant at the Central Taiwan Science Park. It will invest US$7.5B for the plant, which will use 65-nanometer and 45-nanometer technology. Construction to begin Aug08 and initial shipments of 11K wafers/month, expanding over time to 105K/month.
CHINA
Microsoft solidifies China development with Langchao
Microsoft and China's Langchao Group have opened an Offsite Development Center (ODC) together in Beijing. Langchao is China's largest supplier of IT and applications services and it cooperates with Microsoft on development of .Net platforms, application software, ERP solutions, and OEM development for servers.
