South Korean electronics maker Samsung Electronics Co on Sunday forecast that the full-feature handset market would surge from 170 million units this year to 500 million units worldwide in 2012, a press statement released by its joint venture Samsung Mobile Display Co said yesterday.
Ryu Jae-hyun, director of the electronic company’s mobile marketing department in Taipei, vowed to seize a 30 percent market share in Taiwan by the end of the year, up from the current 19 percent, riding on total sales of between 6.5 million and 6.6 million units.
“This year alone, Samsung plans to roll out eight handsets in the first half and another 12 to 15 handsets in the second half,” he said.
Ryu’s estimates exceeded Merrill Lynch analysts Laura Chen (陳佳儀) and Daniel Kim’s earlier projection that Samsung would unveil between 10 and 20 Windows mobile-based smart phone models this year. In addition, Samsung Mobile Display said that smart phones with access to the Internet and a slew of other functions have witnessed increasing sales, while the simple mobile phone market lagged behind.
“Smart phones will make up 29 percent of the industry by 2012, compared with 14 percent in 2009,” the display maker’s statement said.
The display maker also expected touch-screens to become mainstream, prompting their wide adoption in mobile phones, digital cameras, global positioning system devices and media players, adding that 50 percent of the small digital devices produced in 2013 would use touch-screen technology.
Samsung Mobile Display also said that organic light-emitting diodes (OLED) would be used with 50 percent of all mobile phones over the next five years.
OLED displays are lighter and thinner and provide better picture quality, but are far more expensive than alternatives, such as liquid-crystal-displays.
Samsung Mobile Display, a joint venture between Samsung Electronics and Samsung SDI, was launched in January.
It specializes in the production and development of small to medium-sized panels. Research by US-based Strategy Analytics Inc showed that the total global handset market (simple handsets and smart phones combined) grew 4.9 percent in shipment volume to 1.18 billion units last year, from 1.12 billion units in 2007.
Nokia and Samsung claimed the top two spots last year with a market share of 39.8 percent and 16.7 percent respectively on shipments of 468.4 million and 196.6 million units each, Strategy Analytics’ data showed.
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US