Top four OEM notebook en mobo makers see declining revenue
The top four Taiwan notebook makers – Quanta Computer, Compal Electronics, Inventec and Wistron – all saw a sequential drop in January, with notebook shipments declining from the previous month due to weak demand in the off-season, according to data released by the makers.
Quanta saw its revenues drop 26.0% on-month in January as the company’s shipments of notebooks were also affected by an unstable supply of core-logic chipsets, market sources said.
However, Compal fared much better last month, with its revenues declining just 2.8% sequentially, thanks to a sufficient supply of chipsets.
Quanta also saw a sequential decline in its shipments of handsets and servers, which dropped by 22.8% and 18.8% respectively. Compal also saw a 5.7% sequential decline in its shipments of LCD monitors.
The top four Taiwan motherboard makers – Asustek , ECS, Gigabyte and MSI – shipped a combined total of 7.7 million motherboards in January, down 7.2% from 8.30 million units in December. The January shipments were better than market expectations of a 10% drop, said the sources. However, Gigabyte saw its motherboard shipments decline 15.4% on-month in January, which was higher than its prediction of a 10-15% drop.
With the exception of Asustek, most Taiwan makers of graphics cards also recorded declining shipments in January, partly due to weak demand as well as a shortfall in the supply of graphics chips from ATI and nVidia, according to the makers. Asustek’s shipments of graphics cards grew 3.4% sequentially to 880,000 units Tul and Leadtek, however, saw their shipments decline 25% and 50%, respectively, in January, after both had posted record-high shipments in December.
AMD cuts prices of a wide CPU-range of CPUs, aims to boost its notebook-CPU’s
With the introduction of its 64-bit enabled Turion 64 processor, AMD is looking to push its market share in the notebook-CPU segment to 12-15% in 2005, compared to the 5-8% share it had previously, according to sources at Taiwan PC makers. AMD, together with a number of leading vendors, including HP, Acer, Asus and PC distributors, will wage a promotional campaign worldwide on April 18 to promote the Turion 64-based notebooks, the sources said.
Vendors participating in the campaign will unveil new notebooks built using AMD Turion 64 2800+ and 3000+ CPUs, with power consumption averaging 25W or 35W, depending on models. Although AMD has set the prices of its Turion 64 CPUs about 13% cheaper, on average, than Intel’s Pentium M (Dothan) processors, some vendors have suggested that AMD needs to aggressively lower Turion 64 CPU prices to around 25% lower than P4 M CPUs, in order to gain market share from Intel. The sources also pointed out that HP might raise the proportion of AMD-based notebooks to 50% of its total sales in 2005, from about 20-30% in 2004, citing speculation in the market. Acer expects its shipments of AMD-compatible notebooks to increase 20-30% in 2005, from about 1.0-1.2 million units it shipped in 2004. Acer shipped 3.9 million notebooks worldwide last year, according to data from IDC. Asus plans to launch five or six AMD-based notebooks this year, compared to just one or two models launched a year previously, said company sources. Shipments of AMD-compatible notebooks accounted for 5% of Asustek’s total shipments of 700,000 own-brand notebooks last year.
AMD has made comprehensive cuts in the prices of its processors, including the Opteron, Athlon 64, and Sempron. The price of the high-end Athlon 64 3800+ has been slashed by as much as 34%, according to the latest quotation received by Taiwan IT makers from AMD. The new prices became effective on February 15. AMD’s price cuts are aimed at strengthening its market share prior to Intel’s planned introduction of its EM64T-enabled 600-series Pentium 4 CPUs for the desktop, and the reduction of its Celeron D CPU prices, on February 20.
ECS shipping EZ-Buddie 2 in volume
After some fits and starts, ECS is back on track and shipping its EZ-Buddie 2 small-form-factor PC in volume.
ECS began shipping the EZ-Buddie 2 in September, and shipped about 5,000 units the first month. However, beginning in October, the company faced a shortage of the modules used in the unit’s front-panel system status display. According to the sources, ECS was forced to discontinue shipments of the SFF PC, and by the time shipments resumed in December, the company had missed the Christmas season. However, despite shipping only 2,000 units in December, the company is now ready to ship the systems in volume, and ECS is confident it will be able to quickly increase its monthly shipments to about 10,000 units.
The EZ-Buddie 2 is a variation on the SFF PC theme. ECS took a cube-shaped SFF PC and attached two large speakers to the sides, giving the product the appearance of a portable stereo system. The system, which ECS calls a personal entertainment computer (PEC), also includes an alarm clock, remote control and instant-on Linux-based DVD player and FM radio, all of which add to the consumer electronics (CE) feel of the product.
Lenovo notebooks made by Foxconn
Lenovo Group is expected to start marketing a Sonoma-based notebook in China, the Zhaoyang A600, manufactured by Foxconn, in March. This will be the first model in a new series of notebooks that Lenovo has co-developed with Foxconn. Lenovo is handling the procurement of the key parts such as CPUs, hard discs and displays, while Foxconn manufactures the magnesium-alloy cases, chassis, thermal modules and connectors, for the notebook. Foxconn declined to comment on the report, citing client confidentiality.
If the notebook project proves successful, Lenovo and Foxconn may expand their joint projects to include other products, such as handsets, LCD monitors and LCD TVs, sources stated. However, Lenovo would see its notebook design and manufacturing capability strengthened when its acquisition of IBM PC business is realized, and this could lead to a discontinuation of the Lenovo-Foxconn notebook projects.
With another leading Taiwan IT company – Wistron - Foxconn is planning to make point-of-sale equipment. This report came after Advantech, the largest producer of industrial PC’s in Taiwan, announced last month that it would move into the production of POS motherboards through an alliance agreement with Firich Enterprises, a leading Taiwan maker of POS equipment.
SiS signs 1066MHz-FSB license with Intel
Silicon Integrated Systems has signed a agreement with Intel that will allow SiS to produce chipsets supporting front-side bus speeds up to 1066MHz. The licensing is standard, and the company said versions of its 656 and 670 chipsets supporting FSB speeds of up to 1066MHz would not be available until the second half of 2005.
The SiS656 is a PCIe-enabled discrete northbridge that currently supports FSB speeds of up to 800MHz, as well as x16 PCIe lanes and dual-channel memory (DDR2-667/DDR-400). SiS stated that it would begin sampling a version of the 656 northbridge with support for a 1066MHz FSB in the second quarter, with mass production coming one quarter later.
Asustek’s alternative of the SFF universe
Whereas most small-form-factor vendors have attracted attention by targeting gamers and enthusiasts with their cube systems, Asus has adopted a much lower market profile (no pun intended) and is not considered a major player in the segment. Nevertheless, on closer inspection, Asus can, in fact, be considered one of the leaders in the SFF industry. Asus shipped 500,000 barebones last year, of which about 90% were for SFF systems, placing the company only behind Shuttle. Asus has blended in the background mainly because it does not focus on enthusiasts as much as its competitors. Its product specs are not leading-edge, and most of its chassis designs are traditional.
Enthusiasts, the company argues, like to build their own systems, so they are much more likely to choose the ATX form factor, which is a segment the company already targets with its motherboards. Instead, the bulk of Asus’ SFF PC sales come from the mainstream consumer and business segments. The company appears optimistic about these markets, and it expects its shipments to double this year – and that could well end up making Asus Taiwan’s leading SFF vendor.
Although Asustek, like other SFF vendors, believes that the trend in personal computing is towards smaller, quieter systems, the company does not think any one form factor or chassis style will prevail in the SFF market. So instead of producing just one type of SFF, the company targets a variety of market segments by offering five different proprietary SFF motherboard form factors, and over 10 SKD units.
The company also has a consumer-electronics line of SFF PCs, which includes its cube-shaped S-presso and its DigiMatrix products. However, the company does not expect sales of these products to rise dramatically until after Microsoft has introduced its next-generation operating system, Longhorn. This year, the company still expects its mainstream and consumer-SFF systems to account for about two-thirds of its barebones sales. Asus will add some AMD CPU-based products to what is currently an all-Intel lineup, and at CeBIT 2005 there will be some PCIe SFF PCs at the company’s booth.