Vita Genomics Inc (賽亞基因科技), Taiwan’s largest genomics-based biotechnological and biopharmaceutical company, is in talks with potential buyers eyeing the company’s unique business model, a senior company executive said.
The development came after the New Taipei-based company announced plans to forge partnerships between testing facilities and hospitals aimed at growing mutual clientele and profits, Vita Genomics general manager Eddy Hsieh (謝春成) said.
Hsieh joined Vita Genomics in October 2013 when it was in the red and saw the company into profit last year.
Hsieh said he plans to build Vita Genomics into the healthcare industry’s “7-Eleven,” — the nation’s largest convenience store chain with more than 3,000 outlets.
“Some Taiwanese firms approached us with a view to acquiring Vita Genomics, attracted by its business potential,” Hsieh said.
He refused to name the interested parties for fear of sinking the deals prematurely except to say that they are in the technology sector.
Under Hsieh’s leadership, Vita Genomics is seeking the integration of the companies in its supply chain, including genomics testing facilities, pathology-testing laboratories and clinics.
There are more than 8,000 clinics in the nation and Vita Genomics aims to enter an alliance with at least 5,000 of them in the next three years, allowing them to overcome their inability to perform tests, Hsieh said.
That would give the company the top position in the industry with a 50 percent market share, he said, adding there are no competitors on the horizon.
However, integration is not an easy process, as many clinics prefer to maintain the “status quo,” Hsieh said, adding that like traditional grocery stores, they will be forced out of the market, if they reject strategic alliances.
The company would agree to acquisition bids that might help accelerate the integration, Hsieh said.
Vita Genomics has a market value of NT$3.2 billion (US$101.32 million) after the company booked NT$103 million in net income last year, or NT$2.37 per share, Hsieh said.
The company is in the process of increasing its capital by NT$800 million — from NT$460 million — and it is slated to list on the Emerging Stock Market in June and trade shares on the over-the-counter GRETAI Securities Market next year, Hsieh said.
“The capital increase is virtually completed as venture capital funds at home and overseas have lent their support,” Hsieh said.
China Development Financial Holding Corp (中華開發金控), Transglobe Life Insurance Co (全球人壽) and government-owned National Development Fund (國發基金) have contributed to the boost in capital, Hsieh said.
ADVANCED: Previously, Taiwanese chip companies were restricted from building overseas fabs with technology less than two generations behind domestic factories Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp, would no longer be restricted from investing in next-generation 2-nanometer chip production in the US, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. However, the ministry added that the world’s biggest contract chipmaker would not be making any reckless decisions, given the weight of its up to US$30 billion investment. To safeguard Taiwan’s chip technology advantages, the government has barred local chipmakers from making chips using more advanced technologies at their overseas factories, in China particularly. Chipmakers were previously only allowed to produce chips using less advanced technologies, specifically
BRAVE NEW WORLD: Nvidia believes that AI would fuel a new industrial revolution and would ‘do whatever we can’ to guide US AI policy, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Tuesday said he is ready to meet US president-elect Donald Trump and offer his help to the incoming administration. “I’d be delighted to go see him and congratulate him, and do whatever we can to make this administration succeed,” Huang said in an interview with Bloomberg Television, adding that he has not been invited to visit Trump’s home base at Mar-a-Lago in Florida yet. As head of the world’s most valuable chipmaker, Huang has an opportunity to help steer the administration’s artificial intelligence (AI) policy at a moment of rapid change.
TARIFF SURGE: The strong performance could be attributed to the growing artificial intelligence device market and mass orders ahead of potential US tariffs, analysts said The combined revenue of companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange and the Taipei Exchange for the whole of last year totaled NT$44.66 trillion (US$1.35 trillion), up 12.8 percent year-on-year and hit a record high, data compiled by investment consulting firm CMoney showed on Saturday. The result came after listed firms reported a 23.92 percent annual increase in combined revenue for last month at NT$4.1 trillion, the second-highest for the month of December on record, and posted a 15.63 percent rise in combined revenue for the December quarter at NT$12.25 billion, the highest quarterly figure ever, the data showed. Analysts attributed the
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) quarterly sales topped estimates, reinforcing investor hopes that the torrid pace of artificial intelligence (AI) hardware spending would extend into this year. The go-to chipmaker for Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc reported a 39 percent rise in December-quarter revenue to NT$868.5 billion (US$26.35 billion), based on calculations from monthly disclosures. That compared with an average estimate of NT$854.7 billion. The strong showing from Taiwan’s largest company bolsters expectations that big tech companies from Alphabet Inc to Microsoft Corp would continue to build and upgrade datacenters at a rapid clip to propel AI development. Growth accelerated for
RSS