Energy consumption by the nation’s industrial and service sectors rose last month, ending consecutive months of decline (except for February) since July last year, the Taiwan Research Institute (台灣綜合研究院) said in a report on Monday.
The electricity prosperity index (EPI), which the institute uses to gauge the health of industrial sectors, found that energy consumption rose 1.05 percent from a year earlier, following a 0.92 percent fall in August, the report said.
Due to a lower comparison base last year and booming private consumption last month, high-voltage electricity usage returned to positive territory for a second straight month, with an annual increase of 0.46 percent, the report said.
Photo: CNA
Although electricity usage in the manufacturing industry decreased 0.37 percent, usage by the service industry rose 4.17 percent, it added.
Power usage increased significantly in the semiconductor, optoelectronic materials, computer and electronics, and optical products sectors compared with the same period last year, it said.
Overall, the EPI showed the third “yellow-blue” climate signal in a row last month, indicating a cycle of slowdown is likely coming to an end, it said.
Based on the latest EPI reading and the business climate of the local manufacturing sector, the institute forecast the nation’s GDP grew 2.5 percent year-on-year last month, with GDP in the July-to-September quarter growing 2.2 percent.
The institute’s third-quarter GDP growth estimate is lower than a 2.54 percent increase the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics projected in August, it said.
Nvidia Corp’s demand for advanced packaging from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) remains strong though the kind of technology it needs is changing, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday, after he was asked whether the company was cutting orders. Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Blackwell, consists of multiple chips glued together using a complex chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) advanced packaging technology offered by TSMC, Nvidia’s main contract chipmaker. “As we move into Blackwell, we will use largely CoWoS-L. Of course, we’re still manufacturing Hopper, and Hopper will use CowoS-S. We will also transition the CoWoS-S capacity to CoWos-L,” Huang said
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
TARIFF TRADE-OFF: Machinery exports to China dropped after Beijing ended its tariff reductions in June, while potential new tariffs fueled ‘front-loaded’ orders to the US The nation’s machinery exports to the US amounted to US$7.19 billion last year, surpassing the US$6.86 billion to China to become the largest export destination for the local machinery industry, the Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI, 台灣機械公會) said in a report on Jan. 10. It came as some manufacturers brought forward or “front-loaded” US-bound shipments as required by customers ahead of potential tariffs imposed by the new US administration, the association said. During his campaign, US president-elect Donald Trump threatened tariffs of as high as 60 percent on Chinese goods and 10 percent to 20 percent on imports from other countries.
INDUSTRY LEADER: TSMC aims to continue outperforming the industry’s growth and makes 2025 another strong growth year, chairman and CEO C.C. Wei says Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday said it aims to grow revenue by about 25 percent this year, driven by robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips. That means TSMC would continue to outpace the foundry industry’s 10 percent annual growth this year based on the chipmaker’s estimate. The chipmaker expects revenue from AI-related chips to double this year, extending a three-fold increase last year. The growth would quicken over the next five years at a compound annual growth rate of 45 percent, fueled by strong demand for the high-performance computing
RSS