TaiwanHighTech.Com

Contract Manufacturing and Beyond...BRING ON THE ORDERS: Warner Brothers pre-recorded DVDs U-Tech Media received on order recently from Warner Brothers to make pre-recorded DVDs. U-Tech also services Paramount, Universal, Twentieth Century Fox Film, Walt Disney Studios and Columbia Pictures. U-Tech is Taiwan's biggest pre-recorded DVD player. Sony DVD RW The word on the street is that Sony will place orders for 2-3M 8X speed and up DVD-RW units from Lite-On in 2004. Sony previously made the drives itself, but will focus its efforts on R and let the Taiwanese do the manufacturing work. ION (Japan) LCD TV Teco has received orders for 20-,27-, and 30-inch LCD TVs from ION of Japan. ION plans to price the products at about half of its competitors in Japan. Source: Digitimes. Dell, HP 15.4-inch NBs AU Optronics, Chi Mei Optoelectronics, and Chunghwa Picture Tubes are expected to supply 15.4-inch NB panels for both Dell and HP following shortages from traditional panel suppliers Samsung and Hitachi. Dell also orders 15-inch panels from HannStar.Hitachi foldable cell phones Lite-On won an order for a foldable color cell phone from Hitachi, with delivery beginning in December. The model will be made in Taiwan and will be Hitachi's first GSM phone. Lite-On also supplies phones to Sony-Ericsson, Alcatel, Siemens, LG, and some China customers. Dell slim-combo drives Rumors on the street (or in the Pateh Lu IT market) say that Dell is transferring its slim-combo driver orders from Quanta Storage to Lite-On.Siliconware ...has signed contracts with Broadcom, Marvell, and LSI Logic recently. Infineon wireless module assembly Orient Semiconductor will assemble Bluetooth wireless modules for Infineon Technologies AG. The modules will be used for next-gen cell phones and hand free telephones. Orders are expected to reach 30M modules a year. Motorola low end handset Compal has received orders for b/w low end cell phones from Motorola. Compal will ship a total of 7.5M handsets world wide in 2004. The low end phones will probably be made in Nanjing, China. Toshiba NB Compal and Inventec have added low-end NB to their Toshiba contract orders for 2004 and 2005. Compal will ship a total of 2M NB to Toshiba in 2004, while Inventec will ship a total of 500K. Once again Quanta - which as contracts from every major NB maker besides Toshiba - was left out.... Servers Taiwan will ship 490K servers in 4Q03, a new high, to international customers such as HP, IBM, Sun, and NEC. Dell - Sercomm or not? Rumors have it that Sercomm has received Dell Wi-Fi router orders, but Sercomm is denying the orders. Is Sercomm just trying to avoid getting into trouble with Dell for publicizing an OEM deal, or are the rumors just that? Philips STB Prime Electronics Satellites, a Taiwan satellite communication equipment maker, received an OEM order for 500K STBs from Philips. COMPANY NEWS AND MARKET TRENDS Novatek According to Novatek's recent press release, it plans to acquire Wiseware Technology, a Taiwan digital image designer, in April 2004. IBM/BenQ pr moves IBM and BenQ have announced that they will work together in the Asia Pacific market. BenQ will supply the LCD monitors/ IBM the desktops. They'll work together on NB sales. YD says this announcement is just "b.s. BenQ pr" and nothing will come of it. Chinese Gamer According to accounting firm Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, Chinese Gamer ranked number one in Asia Pacific in its "Technology Fast 500" rankings. Second and third place were ShanDa (China) and G-Mode (Japan). MSI Sales and shipments are down at MSI, declining month-to-month and below expectations. Come on, MSI! Don't give up on the fight with Asus and ECS!Make Soccer, not War - Buy BenQ Good for BenQ - it plans to be a sponsor of the European Cup in 2004. BenQ will supply LCD screens and laptops and provide real-time computer multimedia-information and game-management systems for reporting results and standings in eight European cities. Acer going 'home' Yawn. Acer is following Dell and Gateway, introducing its own home entertainment center, the Information Entertainment Technology (IET) concept. Come on, Acer. If you want to be #2, start making original products instead of just following Dell and Gateway! New Move to Science Parks Companies like UMC, Winbond, and ProMos are planning to open facilities in Taiwan's Southern Tainan Science Park and in its Central Taiwan Science Park as part of their expansion plans. SOLD TO TAIWAN.. Extended Systems --> VIA VIA Telecom has licensed Extended Systems' infrared software development kit (SDK). VIA expects the deal to enable its customers to add infrared communications capabilities to their products. NEW: R&D IN TAIWAN: A couple of years ago Taiwan's government announced plans to turn the country into a regional R&D and logistics center through government incentive programs. This corner tracks the results Nokia 3G Nokia plans to open a 3G center in Taiwan to help local service providers develop value-added applications. It will begin operations in 1Q04. Nokia has six other such centers world-wide, including one in Asia. Nokia supplies state owned Chung Hwa Telecom with 3G systems. Ericsson and Alcatel also have 3G centers in Taiwan. Alcatel Taiwan wireless-equipment test center Alcatel's Taiwan branch has spent US$8.8M on a test platform to offer to Taiwan's wireless-service providers and handset suppliers. ITRI supported Alcatel in setting up the project, the only such lab in Asia. IBM IBM plans to set up a mobile e-commerce R center in Taiwan. It will provide software and hardware products and services, working with local information appliance makers to develop "integrated mobile e-commerce solutions" that include hardware, software and services. NEW PRODUCTS. TSMC, Himax low-voltage TFT-LCD drive chips TSMC and fables company Himax Technology have jointly developed driver/timing controllers that consume only 2.5-voltage power for TFT-LCD displays. Himax has delivered chip samples to customers in Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea. Himax is Taiwan's #2 supplier of LCD chips.SMARTPHONES/PDA NEWS Motorola smartphones Motorola has ordered Microsoft smartphones from Taiwan companies. Its models MPx100 and MPx300 will be made by Compal and CMCS will make the MPx220. For more information about which Taiwan companies make which international branded products, check out THT's paid report ACCOUNTABILITY CORNER Big companies may not feel they're accountable to their shareholders anymore, but THT holds everyone accountable! Welcome to our accountability corner - where we tell you which companies made exaggerated claims and forecasts that they've subsequently had to back down from.SiS was faking it: it cut its 2003 profit forecast by 71%. SiS blames poor 4Q sales, but a 71% cut can't be the result of just one bad quarter. Someone hasn't been straight with the public for a while. BenQ: early in the year BenQ claimed it would ship 3M units of slim-type optical drives this year. Now they're predicting shipments of 1M for the year, yet they still have the gall to claim they're seeing "surging shipments" of the drives...