Taiwanese contract manufacturers are poised to grab a larger slice of the worldwide digital consumer electronics pie, as latest studies showed that their shipments in digital cameras, mobile phones and personal digital assistants (PDAs) will post nearly 50 percent growth this year.
Digital cameras manufactured by Taiwanese vendors will hit 32 million units this year, up 51 percent from last year. This translates to a global market share of 44 percent, according to a report released by Taipei-based market researcher Market Intelligence Center (MIC, 市場情報中心) last week.
Taiwan's global share is expected to rise to 50 percent next year, with production volumes passing 40 million units, the report said.
"Digital cameras have reached saturation in the mature markets of the US, Europe and Japan, and most brandname vendors are now slashing prices to attract users to upgrade to newer models with better functions," MIC analyst Marty Kung (
As US-based Kodak Eastman Co has been successful in pushing lower-priced camera models by bundling them with photo printers to boost sales, its rapid gain in market share will benefit Taiwanese contract manufacturers, he added.
Under pricing pressure, some major Japanese vendors, such as Nikon and Olympus, have released orders to local manufacturers in a bid to lower production costs, according to Kung.
This is good news for local first-tier camera assemblers, as improvements to their process technology means they are catching up with their Japanese peers. These makers, consisting of Premier Image Technology Corp (普立爾), Asia Optical Co (亞光), Ability Enterprise Co (佳能) and Altek Corp (華晶科技), have taken up 80 percent of the local market this year, Kung said.
Meanwhile, mobile phones produced in Taiwan are slated to grow to 76.8 million units this year, up 46.8 percent from last year, according to MIC's estimates.
"The whole year's growth will be mainly pushed by stable orders from Motorola and Sony Ericsson," said another MIC analyst Jeffrey Tai (
Based on the institute's forecast, the peak is expected to fall this quarter, bolstered by increased overseas and local orders. There will be 31 million units produced, which is 86 percent sequential growth and a 103 percent increase from a year ago.
According to Tai, as BenQ Mobile (明基行動通訊) -- the group established after BenQ Corp (明基) acquired Siemens AG's handset business -- started operating early this month, the orders it released to Taiwanese vendors will also help boost local shipments in the fourth quarter through early next year.
Another high-growth segment is PDAs, as local shipments are forecast to hit 13.73 million units by the year's end, up 52 percent from last year's number, MIC's forecast showed.
According to MIC's deputy general director Cynthia Chyn (
“There will be record-high volumes during the October-December period, as
branded vendors are set to introduce a slew of GPS PDAs and phone PDAs
specifically for the Christmas spending period,” Chyn said.
Shipments in the fourth quarter alone will hit 4.16 million units, posting
20 percent sequential growth and up 42 percent from a year ago, she said.
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
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The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
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