TaiwanHighTech.Com

The world of OEM and beyond...Motorola MCU orders Motorola has begun outsourcing micro-controller unit production to TSMC, leading TSMC's Fab 2 to reach full capacity. Motorola has outsourced in an attempt to cut costs as it is being threatened in the China domestic market by Taiwan's Holtek Semiconductor and Elan Microelectronics. LSI Logic DSP TSMC will make 50% of LSI Logic's DSPs (digital still processors) this year. TSMC lakes LSI's low-power DSP on 0.13 micron technology. LSI makes the other DSP itself. Chinese Electronics Corporation Telecom (CECT) (China) smartphones CECT is ordering smartphones from Mitac, which will begin shipping its Mio 8380 phones in June. It is the first Chinese language smartphone. In Taiwan, Mitac will sell the phones together with Synnex. The Mio has a clamshell design and Intel's PXA262 processor, which places a 200MHz Intel XScale processor directly on top of 32MB of flash memory in a single package, and it also has a built-in CIF-resolution digital camera. Telefonica WLAN order Gemtek has received an order from the Spanish telecom Telefonica for its 802.11 products. Units shipped will reach 800K with shipments beginning in June. GemTek's 2Q03 shipments were up to 750K units, from 450K in 1Q and its min-PCI module shipments will double from last quarter, reaching 400K (thanks to shipments from Melco, HP and Dell). IBM microchips IBM is hoping VIA Technologies will start ordering microchips from its 12-inch plant. VIA has said it will consider, but its partner is TSMC. IBM makes chips for Xilinx, AMD and nVIDIA. Dell Latitude NB Dell's new Latitude D400 Centrino NB is being made by Wistron. It is Dell's smallest Latitude. Sonicwall WLAN mini-PCI card modules Sonicwall is a US nextwork security equip vendor and it is buying WLAN mini-PCI card modules from Senao International. The cards will be Intersil 802.11b and will go into the company's SOHO TZW secure wireless gateway. Senao expicts to ship the first batch of 20K this month. TCL Group buys from FIC TCL (China) has asked FIC to make its new L9000 Centrino-based NB and in the future plans to outsource telecom and consumer electronics devices from FIC. Taiwan's Gigabyte and the European distributor Medion have also ordered Centrino NB from FIC of a similar design and Legend (China) has contracted > FIC to make its Centrino QDI E360. Lucent China PHS handset Inventec's China subsidiary - Inventec Appliance - is filling orders for PHS handsets from Lucent China. The first handsets were delivered in April and the total 2003 shipments should reach 1M. In other PHS news, Hon Hai won a big PHS assembly order from UTStarcom China for 10M handsets for 2003. The PHS system is lower cost than regular cell phone service and now has 15M subscribers in China. Inventec OKWAP We all thought WAP was dead, but Inventec plans to market its OKWAP brand mobile phones in China beginning this month. The 2003 sales target is 1M units in Taiwan and China combined, up from 350K in 2002, with most being sold in Taiwan. Taiwan WLANs bid for ZTE order Accton, C-Com, D-Link, Senao, and SparkLan have all submitted bids for China telecom equipment vendor ZTE's WLAN big order. ZTE has a contract from China Telecom and is looking to buy the PCMCIA cards and access points from OEMs. COMPANY NEWS Leadtek Leadtek Research is seeing revenues increase from sales of its GPS products and videophones. In 1Q03 Leadtek shipped 4K videophones. Leadtek has shipped the videophones to NTT DoCoMo (Japan), Radvision (US) and China Unicom (PRC). Leadtek is moving into providing its own chips for the phones to increase profits and has already introduced its own video codec chips for videophones. VOS VIA Optical Solution makes DVD-ROM chipsets and until recently sold them to Pioneer, among others. Early in 2003 Pioneer stopped ordering the chipsets from VOS. Pioneer's orders accounted for less than 10% of VOS's shipments. SARS update SARS has made Taiwan's business owners rethink their China strategies, according to a recent poll. Particularly, their concepts of business risks in China have changed following China's cover-up and under-reporting (initially) of the SARS outbreak. 32% of respondents indicated that they would limit or halt new China investment as a result. SARS UPDATE 5/22 SARS cases were up 11% yesterday with 418 probable cases, 504 suspected cases and 52 deaths. TSMC is considering slowing its move to China as a result of SARS. SARS UPDATE 5/21 According to the China post, SARS is not slowing Taiwanese investments in China, with over 40 applications submitted to the Taiwanese government every week. Strange claim though, since in April investment applications were down 19% and investment funds were down 22%. HTC shipments down... Uh-oh. HTC is shipping fewer of its smartphones with embedded Microsoft software this year than expected. Between Orange's January sales of 40K units (compared to forecast of 200K) and T-Mobile delaying its plan to offer the phone, 2003 may not turn out as well as expected. Amtran Tech LCD TVs In 2003, Amtran expects to deliver 100K 15- and 17-inch LCD TVs, beginning in July, for 10% of revenue for the year. Amtran has a 20% world market share in 19-inch and up LCD TVs and is second only to Samsung. Total LCD TV shipments for 1H02 should reach 900K. SOLD!! TO TAIWAN.. Polaris Polaris Securities Group and Microsoft Taiwan have formed a JV to develop applications for fast and reliable securities transactions. Microsoft will provide its enterprise application integration (EAI) solution and Polaris will develop programs for securities transactions via NBs, PDAs and mobile phones. NEW PRODUCTS: Asustek does it again???? Asustek just launched its second own-brand pocket PC, the MyPal A620. Surprise, surprise -- it has most of the same specs as Casio's Cassiopeia E-3000 Pocket PC, which Asustek makes for Casio. If we were managers at Casio, we'd be looking into that very very carefully to see if we had cause for an IP violation suit. Asustek seems to have become a real "expert" at "almost copying" others' products and ideas. We know of several cases in which the company has released hardware or software products that are 'hauntingly' similar to products they make for others or have considered purchasing from others. Asustek - you stink! (and you give a bad name to all Taiwan OEMs). Budget TFT-LCD TVs Teco plans to introduce low-priced 30-inch TFT-LCD TVs in Taiwan and sell them for NT$60K ($1,719), about NT$100K cheaper than comparable products. The TVs have a 1,024 x 868 screen resolution, similar to higher priced models. DVD recorder chips MediaTek Inc plans to introduce its first chips for DVD recorders in 2H03, about six months behind schedule. The company has seen profits fall drastically this year.