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Round-up Report
Nov 19, 2011
Foxconn adds 300,000 robots to assembly line(Nov 19, 2011)
Foxconn will add 300,000 robots to the assembly line.in 2012 to do routine and more risky jobs to raise the company's productivity.
The robots won't affect current staff, according to the company. Although in July, the company said Foxconn would replace some of its workers with 1 million robots in three years to cut rising labor expenses and improve efficiency.
The robots would be used to do simple and routine work such as spraying, welding and assembling which are now mainly conducted by workers, Guo then said.
Foxconn, the world's largest electronics contract manufacturer which assembles products for Apple, Sony and Nokia. The company currently has nearly 1.2 million employees at the Chinese mainland plants.
ZTE wins Shandong Mobile's WLAN Purchase(Nov 19, 2011)
Shenzhen-based ZTE, a leading telecommunications equipment and network solution provider, recently won 60% shares of the 5th centralized purchasing of Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) equipments by Shandong Mobile, the branch firm of China Mobile in East China's Shandong province.
By now, ZTW has become the largest WLAN equipment supplier for Shandong Mobile in terms of volume. Since the beginning of 2011, Shandong province has stated to accelerate construction of its WLAN in a bid to alleviate pressure in wireless Internet access.
To date, ZTE has over 30% WLAN equipments market share in China.
China issues industrial innovation plan(Nov 19, 2011)
China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) recently issued the 12th Five-Year Plan for Industrial Technology Innovation (2011-2015) in an effort to boost the industrial transformation and upgrading.
The plan covers four sectors, including raw materials, equipment manufacturing, consumption goods and information industry.
According to the Plan, the government will encourage technology innovation and establishment of service system for technology innovation.
Siemens to set up R&D base for IA products in Chengdu(Oct 19, 2011)
Siemens signed an investment agreement with west China's Chengdu High-Tech Development Zone on October 17 to set up a world-leading manufacturing and R&D base for industrial automation products in Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan province.
According to Mei-Wei Cheng, CEO of Siemens Northeast Asia and president and CEO of Siemens Ltd., China, the facility will become Siemens' largest digital factory in China and the third R&D center for Siemens industry automation products worldwide, following Germany and the United States.
Scheduled to go into operation by the first half of 2013, the planned Electronics Works Chengdu (EWC) facility will produce high-end PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) serial products for the industrial market in China and other countries.The plant will automate and control the entire product lifecycle, covering design, production, logistics, marketing and sales, by integrating the use of IT systems throughout the value chain. Apparently, the construction of the facility is part of the company's global strategy of attracting investment using the company's advantages in the electronics industry.
Hitachi establish its regional headquarter in Chongqing(Oct 19, 2011)
Hitachi is moving its regional headquarter to Chongqing.
Under the terms of the memorandum of understanding, Hitachi and Liangjiang New Area will cooperate on developing new projects in resources recycling and the low-carbon economy (LCE).
Demonstration projects to be developed first are expected to be one or more from Internet of Things (IOT), the smart grid, intelligent residential districts, electric vehicles, solar energy, wind power, rail transit, cloud computing, LEDs, and digital imaging devices.
Haier to establish JV with home retail group in China(Oct 19, 2011)
China's home appliance giant the Haier Electronics Group recently announced to establish a joint venture (JV) with the UK-listed company the Home Retail Group in China.
Foreland Agents, a wholly owned subsidiary of Haier, will hold a 51% stake in the new JV. The other 49% stake will be held by Home Retail Group (Hong Kong). The new JV will run the multi-channel retailing business under the Argos brand. The new business will involve an investment of US$29.5 million in the first stage, of which about US$15 million dollars will be provided by Haier.
Five broadband network projects listed in 12th 5-year Plan(Sept 17, 2011)
Five broadband network projects were listed in the draft of China's 12th Five Year Plan for Broadband Network Infrastructure and would become major infrastructure construction projects in the five years from 2011 to 2015.The optical broadband network facilitation project, the wireless broadband network facilitation project, the data center optimization project, the next-generation Internet facilitation project and the international communication network optimization project are the five projects.
Direct investment of US$79.4 billion will be on the five projects and benefit all related sectors at upstream and downstream of the industrial chain.
According to the draft, the five projects will realize the target of accelerating optical network construction in urban areas, expanding coverage of 3G network and launching TD-LTE scale tests and pre-commercial trial, pushing forward the construction of cloud computing data center, upgrading networks to the IPv6 standard, and accelerating the construction of China's international communication network.
China would achieve the targets of over 250 million cable broadband users, over 40 million fiber-to-the-home users and over 350 million 3G users in the 12th Five Year Plan period.
China's Telecom Equipment Manufacturing Industry Slowed down(Sept 17, 2011)
China's telecom equipment manufacturing industry suffered a 20.5 percent year-on-year decrease in profits in the first seven months of 2011, with 25.2 percent of enterprises in the red, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
Statistics show that the electronic manufacturing sector scored an overall slide in profits during the period, as 25.2 percent of computer makers and 23.4 percent of the electronic components manufacturers incurred losses. The losses incurred by those enterprises in the computer manufacturing industry and the electronic components manufacturing industry grew by 100 percent and 120 percent respectively.
China¡¯s electronics export revenue reached US$331.7 billion, growing by 14.4 percent year on year and accounting for 37.4 percent of the total of above-scale industrial export in China.
China Mobile to Get 8.53 Million iPhone Users(Sept 17, 2011)
China Mobile had 8.53 million iPhone users with their cell phones self-provided by the end of August, though it still have no schedule to sell iPhone in their own business hall.
Jianzhou Wang, chairman of the company, said that China Mobile had not reached any agreement with Apple yet, but its network can accept subscribers with self-provided iPhones.
Wang didn't explain whether China Mobile's 3G standard, the homemade TD-SCDMA, was an obstacle to the agreement with Apple, but he emphasized that the target of achieving 50 million TD-SCDMA users would be realized by the year end.
COC Conducts the 7th New Energy Saving Technical Seminar In Chengdu and Xi¡¯an(August 7, 2011)
China Outlook Consulting(COC) is to conduct New Energy Saving DesignTechnical Seminar in Chengdu and Xi¡¯an, partnered with CNT Networks and China Electronics Fair in August 23-25.
This series of seminar focuses on smart control, inverter technology and smart power supply technology application on renewable energy and new energy vehicles.
Experts from Vishay, Infineon, Linear, Omron, Kemet, Rohm and SAC will interact with 400-500 design engineers from West China.
¡°We will bring first-class solutions from leading suppliers to serve west China market demand.¡± said Dr. Michael Liu, CEO of CNT Networks. www.52solution.com (I love solution website which is part of CNT Networks) will conduct webcast based on the live seminar and share more solutions with design engineers.
CEDA Marches on West China(August 7, 2011)
China Electronics Distribution Alliance (CEDA) is going to have its seconding meeting in Xi¡¯an in August. This is a new move after the establishment of CEDA in March.
The initiative of this meeting is to help franchised distributors to better understand market demand in west China and expand their networks with system manufacturers and research institutes in West China.
This meeting will be co-chaired by CNT Networks, China Electronics Fair organizer and China Outlook Consulting.
ZTE to Set up 10 International Innovation Centers(August 7, 2011)
China's leading telecom equipment manufacturing company ZTE recently announced its plan of setting up 10 international innovation centers with European and American main stream telecommunication operators.
The company's international innovation centers are to develop technologies, product solutions and business operation models targeting the global telecom market. Meanwhile, the company is to join with China's three major telecom operators, China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom to set up a united innovation center.
ZTE is not the only aggressively expanding its business. While ZTE is busy with overseas innovation centers, another leading telecom equipment provider Huawei Technology is busy preparing for its manufacturing bases for making finished products.
SMIC Downgraded by JP Morgan(August 7, 2011)
Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), was downgraded by J.P. Morgan to "underweight" from "neutral" recently and its price target was cut to 0.45 HK dollars from 0.60 HK dollars.
J.P. Morgan pointed out that SMIC is less resilient than the sector leader amid inventory correction that is expected to result in losses for the first half of the year and not to be improved until the second half of 2012. In addition, the company reeled from its chief executive's resignation last week and the death of its chairman last month.
China's home appliance retail sales to slow down(June 11, 2011)
China's biggest home appliance retailers reported slower growth in April, with a year-on-year increase of 18.5%, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).
The growth rate for April was 17.9 percentage points lower than the growth rate posted during the same period last year.Retail sales of home appliances increased by 20.9% over the first four months of 2011, 6.1 percentage points lower than last year's growth during the same period.Taking the first four months together, retail sales of home appliances increased 20.9% in China, 6.1 percentage points lower than sales from the same period last year.
Out of the 20 types of home appliances currently being monitored by the MIIT, only electric fans, drinking water dispensers and gas stoves reported faster growth in April, the statement said. Sales of washing machines, kitchen ventilators, water heaters and air purifiers saw negative growth in April, according to the statement.
China Association of Science and Technology updates(June 11, 2011)
The China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) chose new leaders during its eighth national congress, which concluded on May 30.
Qide Han, vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, or China's top legislature, had his term as chairman of the CAST's national committee renewed after a round of voting during the congress.Han has been chairman of the CAST's national committee since 2006.Sixteen others were elected vice chairmen of the CAST's national committee.Chen Xi was appointed as first secretary of the secretariat of the CAST's eighth national committee, after being nominated by the chairman.
Founded in 1958, the CAST is a national, non-governmental organization of scientific, technological and engineering workers. It has member societies and local branches throughout the country. The CAST's eighth national congress started in Beijing on May 27.
Solar cells exports in Guangdong slow down(June 11, 2011)
Solar cells in Guangdong slowed down in volume but a hike in export price in the first four months of 2011. Experts attributed this to the dwindling demand from Europe market for spreading suspension of subsidies for PV industry in the continent, while upstream raw material saw consistent price hikes.
Statistics by Guangdong Sub-Administration of China Customs, the south China province exported 4.3 million units of solar cells in January-April of 2011, down 46% on year, while export value surged 1.1 folds on year to US$300 million. The average export price of solar cells rose 290% to US$68.7r/unit. Solar cells exports to Europe plunged 65.7% to 584,000 units in the first months, and that to Hong Kong down 20.6% to 2.224 million units, to ASEAN countries down 71.5% to 502,000 units.
The decreases in exports volume is because major member states of European Union have cut subsidies for solar industry for the sake of saving financial expense since the international financial crisis in 2008.Meanwhile, prices of polysilicon, raw material for making solar cells, keep rising, which increased production cost of solar cells and further drive up solar cell price. The polysilicon price peaked US$79/kilogram on March 23.
Chongqing to build Asia's largest laptop base(May 20, 2011)
Chongqing, a major city in Southwest China and one of the country's five municipalities, plans to build the biggest laptop R&D base in Asia and the largest off-shore data center in China. According to Chongqing Development and Reform Commission, the output value of two bases will amount to US$167.4 billion by 2015.
Specifically, the output of laptop base is expected to reach 1 trillion yuan by 2015. Chongqing will encourage PC giants such as Hewlett-Packard, Acer and ASUS to develop complete laptop projects in the city, aiming to increase the laptop output into 100 million units by then. Meanwhile, it will speed up the construction of supporting industries and raw material supply bases to provide 70% to 80% parts and materials for the laptop manufacturing.
Besides, Chongqing will launch a cloud computing industry park, which will be the largest off-shore data center in China with a total output value of US$7.58 billion by 2015. The center, which is to equipped with a capacity of 1 million servers, will attract investments from international corporations, financial giants and securities companies.
China's 12th Five-Year Plan for New Materials Development(May 20, 2011)
China will release the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) for New Materials in August this year, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) .
During the next five year, China will put emphasis on the development of six kinds of new materials, they are: special metal materials, sophisticated metal structure materials, advanced polymeric materials, new inorganic nonmetallic materials, high performance composite materials, and state-of-art materials.
China will establish a policy-supporting system to create a sound development environment for new material industry, including fiscal, financial and taxation support, technology investment, and product promotion.Besides, China will foster a number of backbone new material enterprises with strong innovation ability and core competitiveness.
Actions Semiconductor approve all proposed resolutions at AGM (May 20, 2011)
Actions Semiconductor Co., Ltd., one of China's leading fabless semiconductor companies that provides comprehensive mixed-signal system-on-a-chip (SoC) and multimedia digital signal processing (DSP) solutions for portable consumer electronics, announced the results from its Annual General Meeting (AGM) held on May 10, 2011.
Shareholders approved all of the resolutions proposed in the AGM notice, including the re-election of Class II directors Mr. Shao-Chuan (Shawn) Li and Mr. Jun-Tse (Walter) Huang to serve on the company's Board of Directors for a three-year term, and the adoption of the amended and restated 2007 Equity and Performance Incentive Plan.
SMIC to extend foundry deal with Spansion (May 20, 2011)
The Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. will extend its foundry deal with NOR flash memory vendor Spansion.
Under the agreement, SMIC will expand its existing output capacity of 65 nm products, and 45 nm manufacturing capability will also be added. Spansion will begin transferring its 45 nm flash memory technology this month and volume production is expected to commence in the first half of 2012.Under the terms of the updated agreement, Spansion will prepay SMIC 50 million US dollars against future procurement of wafers.
The prepayment, to be made in three installments over the coming 12 months, will be for SMIC to purchase equipment for producing Spansion semiconductor products. The two sides initiated their cooperation in 2008, when SMIC started to make Spansion's 65 nm flash memory installation.
China to boost IC development(Apr 27, 2011)
China will boost the integrated circuit (IC) sector at a "state strategy" level over the next five years through 2015, according to Xueshan Yang, vice minister of industry and information technology (MIIT).
Yang said that China's relevant departments would support and coordinate IC production with linkages including research, manufacturing and marketing during the 12th Five-Year Program (2011-2015) period.
China's IC sales reached US$21.8 billion in 2010, making up about 8.6% of the global market, according to the MIIT. As the world's largest IC market, China can serve only 20% of its domestic demand with independently designed IC products. China's IC sales revenue expects to reach US$50.54 billion in 2015 to satify 27.5% of domestic demand.
China to levy anti-dumping duties on optical fiber imports(Apr 27, 2011)
China's Ministry of Commerce said that it will impose anti-dumping duties on imports of optical fiber from the United States and the European Union. The duties will go into effect on April 22.
The duty rates, ranging from 4.7% to 29.1%, depend on the dumping margin, or the difference between the average value of the product in the product's country of origin and its export price, the ministry said in a final ruling.
The measure will remain in place for five years, according to the ministry.The optical fiber being levied is largely used in the telecommunications industry.
China to accelerate IOT standard constitution(Apr 27, 2011)
China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) plans to accelerate the constitution of the standard for the Internet of Things (IOT), in a bid to enhance China's international saying in the domain of IOT standard.
Chinese government will offer greater financial support to the establishment of international, national and industrial standards for IOT; encourage companies, universities and research institutions to participate in the constitution of IOT standards, and concentrate on the research of key technical standards.
To fulfill Chinese government's call for nurturing strategic emerging industries, MIIT will also construct IOT intellectual property service platform as well as patent pool with independent intellectual rights, and initiate intellectual right warning program, to ensure healthy development of the domestic IOT industry and related applications. The draft of a five-year plan for the development of IOT in 2011-2015 has been completed, and MIIT will work hard to make breakthroughs in core technologies of IOT, and boost the research, development, application and industrialization of IOT technologies.
COC launched China distribution organization (Mar 9, 2011)
China Outlook Consulting recently launched China Electronics Distributor Alliance(CEDA) along with CNT Networks and China Electronics Appliance Corporation to better serve franchised distributors in China through helping them better connect with their suppliers and customers. 40 executives participated in this founding meeting, including government officials, top executives from International distributors, and local Chinese distributors and some component suppliers.
Founding members include Arrow, Avnet, WPG, Future Electronics, Digi-Key, Mouser, element 14, RS Components, Richardson Electronics, Comtech, SZCEAC, Techtronics, Asiacom, Honestar, Shanghai Linpo, Morusun, Letdo Electronics, Jiangsu Sunlord, CE-Power, Zetron, Alignment, and Interine.
The CEDA organizers have rich resources in the electronics industry community including China Electronics Fairs, the largest professional electronics tradeshow in China, www.cntronics.com, www.52solutions.com, database Internet marketing and market research capacities. It will enable focused services to CEDA members.
China plans to build ¡°Silicon Valley¡± in Beijing (Mar 9, 2011)
China¡¯s State Council has recently approved a Development Plan for the Zhongguancun National Innovation Demonstration Zone (2011-2020) that allows the area to try out new measures and pilot projects, said Zhang Gong, a deputy to the National People's Congress (NPC)
Zhongguancun will be built into an innovation center that would be known internationally, according to the draft plan, the blueprint of China's development in the coming five years, which national legislators are deliberating.
According to the development plan, the total revenue of Zhongguancun is targeted at US$1.5 trillion in 2020.To reach this goal, Beijing's municipal government not only put investment of US$7.46 to fund technology innovation activities in this area and will procure US$4.48 billion products made in this zone in next five years.
The total revenue of nearly 20,000 companies in Zhongguancun was US$231 billion in 2010, up by 20% year on year. The revenue accounted for 19.2% of Beijing's GDP.
China B2B revenue growing 35% (Mar 9, 2011)
Business revenue of China's business-to-business (B2B) enterprises grew 35% year on year to reach US$1.43 billion in 2010
Increasing number of small and medium-sized companies has started to exploit the market via third-party e-commerce platforms, and most B2B market share has been taken by Alibaba.com, , Cn.make-in-china.com, Toocle.cn, Hc360.com, 315.com.cn, Mysteel.com, B2b.cn, and Seller.dhgate.com.
In 2010, some B2B service providers launched mergers and acquisitions to expand their business territory. Alibaba.com acquired the US-based online sellers Vendio Services Inc. and Auctiva.com in succession, and then merged with Chinese B2B export service provider Ydt35.com to integrate the e-commerce industrial chain.
Honeywell and Haier to work together on smart home (Feb 9, 2011)
Honeywell International, In and China's leading household electric appliances manufacturer Haier Group signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in developing and promoting low-emission and high-efficiency solutions. The two sides will collaborate in various aspects, namely household appliances, smart home, civil combustion and control, as well as intelligent building.
Honeywell's research and development center in China will also join hands with Haier's national laboratory, and to support the latter's R & D plan of smart home appliance.
According to Shane Tedjarati, president and CEO of Honeywell China and India, over 50% product portfolio of Honeywell related to energy-saving, its technical advantages in energy-saving materials, intelligent building, and industry control are in accord with Haier's global brand strategy and appeal in energy-saving and environmental protection.
Shariff Kan, president of Haier America, said besides household appliance, Haier would commit itself to develop high-efficiency and energy-saving solutions in smart home, intelligent building and other industries.
ZTE to supply CDMA Technology in Indonesia(Feb 9, 2011)
Technology of code division multiple access (CDMA) for data access in Indonesia is expected to grow significantly, leaving a big opportunity for gadget producers to develop smart phone.
According to Zhao Guang, vice president for CDMA Terminal Product Operation Office of China's ZTE Corporation, there is no CDMA smart phone in Indonesia. Data usage accessed by global system for mobile-communication (GSM) smart phone sometimes is interrupted due to its limited loading capacity. There are too many access attempt by GSM smart phone users as GSM technology is more popular in Indonesia compared to CDMA one. ZTE is going to develop CDMA smart phone business in Indonesian market
Lenovo to Partner with NEC in PC joint venture(Feb 9, 2011)
Lenovo Group is in talks with NEC Corp. for a joint venture in personal computers.
Lenovo Group may take a controlling stake in NEC Personal Products Ltd., NEC's wholly-owned personal computer production and sales subsidiary.As a leading PC maker in Japan, NEC expects to realize scale economy and improve competitiveness by cooperating with Lenovo Group in such fields as R&D, production, procurement.
The two companies may also roll out cooperation in other information technology equipment and services.
Shanghai to get 1.3 million IPTV subscribers(Jan 9, 2011)
The number of subscribers to the Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) service has exceeded 1.3 million in Shanghai.
The Shanghai-based media group, Radio and Television Shanghai, said it has formed a standard IPTV system to provide high-definition digital television service to households through telecommunication networks. The company started a trial project to promote IPTV service in Shanghai and the northeastern city of Harbin after being offered China's first license to run the service in March 2005. The development of IPTV, a rival to traditional television service, has facilitated China's ongoing efforts towards the establishment of a digital TV system and its development of next generation broadcasting in the future, said Zhang Jian, an official with BesTV, a subsidiary company of Radio and Television Shanghai.
Unlike traditional cable or wireless TV, IPTV enables broadband Internet users to access TV broadcasting services on their computers or TV sets with a set-top box. Some advanced mobile phone users can also be IPTV users due to technological advancements.
Lenovo launched LePad at CES(Jan 9, 2011)
The tablet PC will represent about 10% to 15% of the PC market, according to Rory Read, chief operating officer of the Lenovo Group.
The Lenovo Group recently released its first tablet PC based on the Android operating system, the LePad, at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). This represents the Lenovo Group's official entry into the tablet PC market, signaling Lenovo's intention to compete with Apple's iPad. The LePad is priced at about US$500.
Vimicro announces SVAC National Standard(Jan 9, 2011)
Vimicro International Corporation , a leading multimedia semiconductor and solution provider, recently announced that the digital surveillance standard -Surveillance Video and Audio Coding (SVAC), was officially released from the Standardization Administration of China.
The new national standard for China was co-founded by Vimicro and the first Research Institute of Ministry of Public Security, along with contributions from more than 40 scientific research institutes, universities and security industry companies. SVAC is the first technology standard designed to solve the unique needs of the surveillance industry. It has special significance for the establishment of China public security and criminal prevention system. SVAC will be implemented on May 1, 2011 and be the preferred protocol in government contracts and available to all suppliers participating in the surveillance industry.
Geely to partner with Faurecia(Dec 9, 2010)
Faurecia, the world's sixth largest auto parts supplier, recently inked a partnership agreement with China's Geely Auto and Zhejiang Limin, to set up auto parts plants at Geely's five bases in China.
The tripartite cooperation has received go-ahead from the Chinese government. The partners' joint venture firms and plants are expected to be established and developed in the next one or two years. Under the agreement, the designs of Geely brand autos will be comprehensively improved with the help of Faurecia's mature auto parts design and technology, while Geely's strategy of going global will be able to make further headway by taking advantage of Faurecia's network of more than 200 plants worldwide.
Core businesses of the French firm Faurecia, one of the world's Top 500 companies, include automotive seating, emissions control technologies, interior systems and automotive exteriors. Zhejiang Limin has been a core supplier for Geely Auto for years.
Foxconn to set up production and research base in Hunan(Dec 9, 2010)
Foxconn Electronics recently signed an agreement with Hunan Province to set up production and research bases to enjoy the province¡¯s incentives such as land and tax reductions to support Foxconn's business development.It was the first move into Hunan by the world's largest electronics contractor.
Jiang Haoliang, Foxconn's head of high-technology integration, who signed the agreement, said 100,000 of the company's 1 million employees were from Hunan. "Foxconn values the quality of staff from the province," he said.
According to the agreement, the proposed plants and research centers will be located in the provincial capital of Changsha and Hengyang City. Jiang said the company would make hardware and software, and research new products in the integration of telecommunications and cable TV networks and the Internet.
China's rural home appliance sales up 180% (Dec 9, 2010)
China's stimulus program for home appliance purchases in rural areas continued to boost sales in the first 11 months, according to the Ministry of Commerce (MOC).
The subsidy program, aimed at spurring domestic consumption, fueled rural purchases of home appliances, which hit 67.3 million units in the January-November period, an increase of 140% YOY.
Sales of subsidized home appliances in rural areas soared 180% to US$22.62 billion. Of the three top selling items in rural areas, sales of refrigerators is the biggest contributor to the revenue, followed by TV and air conditioners.
China launched the subsidy program in February 2009 to stimulate rural consumption amid the global economic downturn.Under the program, Chinese farmers can receive subsidies equal to 13% of the price of about 20,000 designated types of refrigerators, televisions, washing machines, computers, air conditioners, mobile phones, water heaters, microwave ovens and traditional ovens. Earlier this year, electric bikes, smoke extractors, gas stoves, pressure cookers, electric cookers and DVD players were added to the subsidized list.
China Telecom expects 50% of mobile phones sales to be 3G(July 9, 2010)
China Telecom expects that 3G mobile phones will take up 50% share of all new handset sales by the end of the year.
The Chinese telecom operator sold 16.97 million mobile phones by the end of May, up 51% from 2009, and it is expected to sell about 20 million units in the first half of this year. China Telecom plans to achieve 100 million mobile phone users and sell 50 million CDMA mobile phones by the end of this year, and has reached almost half of this goal at the halfway stage.
By the end of May, China Telecom's CDMA service subscribers had topped 71.5 million. But general manager Xiaochu Wang said the CDMA terminal market still throws up challenges, including insufficient mobile phone models, and a small share of the medium- and low-end handset market. China Telecom expects its sales volume of mid-end smartphones will double to 10 million units, and 60% of the terminal products will be sold via stores.
Great Wall Computer and Gome to develop customized PC products(July 9, 2010)
The China Great Wall Computing Group (Great Wall Computing) and the country's leading household electric appliance retailer Gome have signed a cooperation agreement to improve the custom design and marketing of personal computers and digital products over the next eight years.
According to Gengshen Zhou, president of Great Wall Computing, China's leading computer manufacturer, the firm is capable of manufacturing key computer parts including displays, powers and hard disks, and producing computer products that more closely match consumers requirements with the help of Gome's first-hand market information collected from over 1,200 chain stores. Thus, computer products provided by Great Wall Computing would be characterized by design elements that reflect the customer feedback provided by Gome. The Great Wall Computing's products will enter Gome's marketing channel directly from the factory, reducing costs, and allowing customers to enjoy high-quality products at lower prices.
Moreover, the two sides aim to offer more convenient after-sale services to customers.Gome boasts complete logistics networks covering China's 800 sales outlets, and Great Wall Computing's over 1,000 service offices cover China's more than 300 large- and medium-sized cities.
China extends subsidy program for home electrical appliance replacement to end of 2011(July 9, 2010)
Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology recently announced to extend the Subsidy Program for Replacement of Household Electrical Appliancesto December 31, 2011.
According to the policy, Chinese government will give a subsidy of 10% of new household electrical appliances to registered juridical persons or residents who buy new appliances and at the same time hand back used ones for replacement. But the subsidies are capped at 400 yuan for a television set, 300 yuan for a refrigerator, 250 yuan for a washing machine, 350 yuan for an air conditioner and 400 yuan for a computer.
During the implementation period, the number of new appliances bought by a single resident and company is required to be no more than 5 sets and 50 sets, respectively.Recycling companies and dismantling companies will enjoy freight subsidies and dismantling subsidies in the subsidy program.
China's centrally-administered SOEs report profit increase(July 9, 2010)
The profits of China's centrally-administered state-owned enterprises (SOEs) totaled US$61.9 billion in the January-May period, a rise of 76% from a year ago.The profit increase slowed from the 87% year-on-year growth during the first four months, according to figures released by the State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC).
The sharp profit increase this year was due to last year's lower comparison base when SOEs were hard hit by the global economic recession, according to the SASAC.
Sales revenues for the SOEs totaled 6.27 trillion yuan for the first five months, a rise of nearly 50% from a year ago.There are currently 126 centrally-administered SOEs under the SASAC.
Inverter air conditioners to get 40% market in China(June 4, 2010)
China's sales of inverter air conditioners have increased greatly thanks to the economic stimulation policy. Sales in first-tier cities have now reached 30.38% of all air conditioners sold, and are expected to hit 40% by the end of this year.
A new energy-efficiency standard for air conditioners comes into force on June 1. According to the standard, former fixed-speed air conditioners of and below Grade 3 will no longer be allowed to be sold, and air conditioners of the former Grade 1 category will be lowered to Grade 2, which has helped boost the inverter air conditioner market.
Meanwhile, price cuts of inverter air conditioner also helped the sales growth. The average selling price of inverter air conditioner declined from US$590/unit in 2009 to US$538/unit in the first quarter of 2010.
Smartphone sales exceed 10 million in China at Q1(June 4, 2010)
China's smartphone sales of smartphones reached 10.57 million units in the first three months of this year on domestic market, surging 46.0% over the previous quarter, according to statistics released by IT consulting firm Analysys International.
In the first quarter of this year, China's cell phone market rebounded vigorously, particularly the sales growth of smartphones.
Telecom operators and terminal-device manufacturers rolled out abundant popular and distinctive 3G smartphone models, and adopted more targeted marketing measures. Besides, the popularization of various applications, such as mobile phone reading, mini-blog, SNS, mobile-phone TV and mobile-phone navigation, attracted more mid-end consumers. Sales of 3G cell phones in the first quarter reached 6.11 million units, soaring 65.97% from the final quarter of 2009, greatly helping drive up the sales of smartphones.
Second, the development of mobile Internet market and increased number of cell phone applications make smartphones the top choice of users.
Third, carriers' customization and enhanced competitiveness of smartphones offer more choices to users, and extend the market from high-end users to mid- and low-end user. (XEN)
China's mobile phone users hit 786.5 million in April(June 4, 2010)
China¡¯s mobile phone users reached 786.5 million at the end of April, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
In April, users increased by 9.63 million, growing 1.2 percent month on month, bringing the number of telephone users. The number of Chinese households using fixed line telephones, however, fell by 6.14 million to 307.55 million, the ministry said. About 111 million users had access to broadband Internet services at the end of April.
China-made polysilicon meet PV requirement(June 4, 2010)
High-purity polysilicon produced by China has been able to meet the requirement of PV products.
Diming Qiu, vice general manager of Trina Solar Limited noted that his company mainly buys polysilicon raw materials in domestic market.
China has the world's largest solar cell production capacity, thus creating a huge demand for polysilicon, raw materials for solar cell. In the past years, a huge amount of investment have flooded to the polysilicon production sector nationwide.
According to Yuwen Chao, head of the PV Committee of China Renewable Energy Society, China produced 16,000 tonnes of polysilicon in 2009, but it still need to import a certain volume from abroad.
Chinese PV manufacturers are competitive with foreign rivals in technology, and private companies have achieved rapid development in the PV sector, of which, many have got listed abroad.
Lenovo explores in mobile internet market(May 11, 2010)
Lenovo, China's largest PC maker, eyes on exploring in the mobile internet in China and worldwide.
According to Yuanqing Yang, CEO of the Lenovo, Lenovo will pursue its Internet mobile strategy through merger and acquisition in the overseas market.
Yang noted the HP's acquisition of Palm reflected it is a wise choice for Lenovo to develop mobile internet business, and Lenovo had already taken an advantageous position in this market.
Samsung to set up a quality assurance lab in Tianjin(May 11, 2010)
Samsung Electronics recently has launched a quality assurance laboratory in Tianjin to expedite the product delivery process, by way speeding up the development of new products
The new Samsung Quality Assurance Laboratory will be responsible for ensuring quality control of Samsung products manufactured in China in order to meet the international standards of quality and safety, the company said in a statement.
"We will now be able to monitor and check in real-time our products' quality and safety standards, instead of sending the product back to South Korea for quality assurance processes," said Park Keun-hee Park, head of Samsung China.
Samsung also plans to acquire certifications to prove that its products meet international safety standards in Electromagnetic Interference (EMI), Electromagnetic Susceptibility (EMS), and Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC).
China's Q2 GDP expects to grow by 10.7%(May 11, 2010)
China's GDP growth is expected to reach 10.7% year on year in the second quarter of this year, according to report by the State Information Center (SIC).
SIC also predicts that China's Consumer Price Index (CPI) and Producer Price Index (PPI) will grow 4.2% year on year and 7% year on year in the second quarter.
China's GDP growth hit 11.9% year on year in the first quarter, reflecting China's economy continued strong recovery though part of the growth is a result of relatively low base in the previous year.
China's CPI grew 2.4% year on year in March, lower than the 2.7% growth in February.
China¡¯s electronic industry back to fast growth(May 11, 2010)
China¡¯s electronics industry expects to grow faster in the second half of this year.
During the first quarter of 2010, value-add of China¡¯s electronics industry increased 24% year over year, the growth rate was 4.4 percentage points higher than the average of China's industry.
In January-March, the Fixed asset investment in electronics and IT projects across China rose 28.8% on year to US$11.6 billion. The growth rate is 8.1 percentage points higher than that in the same period of 2009.
Newly added fixed assets amounted to US$4.7 billion in value from January to March, surging 112.7% year on year, and the growth rate was 97.2 percentage points above the first three months of the previous year.
The industry launched 980 new projects in the first quarter.
Toshiba to set up China headquarter in Wuxi(Apr 18, 2010)
Toshiba Semiconductor will set up its China headquarters in Wuxi, Jiangsu province.
Last November, Toshiba Semiconductor partnered with the Nantong Fujitsu Microelectronics Co., Ltd to establish a joint venture which has become the only semiconductor production base in China for Toshiba through large-scale development, design and production of IC and other such products, as well as semiconductor products and camera module.
The former Toshiba Semiconductor (Wuxi) Co retained the production management function to become the China headquarter. Market analysts believe this move to tier two cities is a trend for semiconductor companies to reduce cost and go close to the market.
Huawei wins 63% of China Mobile's IMS bids(Apr 18, 2010)
Huawei Technologies just won 63% of China¡¯s Mobile¡¯s bides for purchasing IP Multimedia Systems(IMS) equipments in recently closed China Mobile¡¯s bids for purchasing IMS equipment. This means that Huawei will construct the IMS networks in 15 provinces and China Mobile's southern base.
Other winners included ZTE Corp., which acquires about 16% share and will be responsible for five provinces' IMS networks; and Nokia-Siemens, Alcatel-Lucent, and Ericsson will share the networks of the rest seven provinces
The IMS networks will be constructed to provide multimedia phone call, united enterprise Centrex, and private ring back tone services to corporate customers, households and individual customers at the beginning. and the equipment providers that had gone through the equipment testing all won some share.
Intel¡¯s fab in Dalian to operation in 2010(Apr 18, 2010)
Intel¡¯s Dalian fab, with US$2.5billion investment, will put into operation in the fourth quarter of this year. This facility is built in the Dalian Economic and Technological Development Zone in northeast China's Liaoning Province, covering 160,000 square meters.
The plant in Dalian was Intel's first chip plant in Asia and had received more investment amid the global downturn. It would begin production in the 44th week of 2010, said Kirby Jefferson, the general manager of the plant.
The plant had been equipped with the most advanced facilities and would employ more than 1,500 people, 60% of whom would be locals.
China¡¯s car sales up 12.92%(Mar 5, 2010)
China's car sales hit 930,300 units in January, up 12.92% month on month,according to the latest statistics released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM).
Shanghai GM topped NO. 1 of Chinese car makers in terms of sales in January 2010. The top 10 car makers are: Shanghai GM, FAW VW, Shanghai VW, BYD Auto, Beijing Hyundai, Dongfeng Nissan, Chery Auto, Geely Auto, Changan Ford and Dongfei Peugeot Citroen. The total sales of the 10 car makers reached 579,600 units in January, taking up 62% of the country's total car sales. China's homegrown car sales totaled 323,000 units in January, accounting for 34.72% of China's total car sales.
China to invest US$2930 billion on rail construction in 2010(Mar 5, 2010)
China will invest US$2930 billion on the traffic infrastructure construction in 2010, similar to the investment in 2009.
The recently built Wuhan-to-Guangzhou high-speed railway, which costs US$17.1 billion and allows trains to race at an average speed of 350 km/h, has made train trips between the cities a breeze. The trip previously took at least 11 hours, now it takes only three. Another high-speed railway from the central city of Zhengzhou to Xi'an in the northwestern Shaanxi Province was also seeing similar attendance rates, according to the Zhengzhou Railway Bureau.
A network of high-speed railways would support a more integrated nationwide market and promote cooperation between the eastern coastal areas and the relatively backward inland regions. Meanwhile, the investment on rail constructions will bring market demand for high performance and high reliable semiconductor and components.
2010 China economic growth targets to 8%(Mar 5, 2010)
2010 China economic growth expects to be 8%, according to Premier Jiabao Wen¡¯s report at the Third Session of the 11th National People's Congress.
Wen mentioned that China is still facing a complicated situation and 2010 is a crucial year for China¡¯s economic development. China will continuously fight against the global financial crisis to maintain a stable and comparatively fast economic growth and to accelerate transformation of growth pattern.
As the first country emerging from the global economic downturn, China's gross domestic product (GDP) rose 8.7% year over year in 2009.
3G handset sales to 11 million in 2009(Mar 5, 2010)
3G handset sales reached 11.22 million in China, according to statistics released by market research firm CCID Consulting.
The sales volume proportions of China's three telecom operators: China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom were respectively 46.9 %, 28.7 % and 24.4 %.
The comparatively low market shares of China Mobile's TD-SCDMA handsets and China Telecom's EV-DO handsets result from their incomplete industry chains, and said the two carriers must put emphasis of the promotion of data cards and fixed wireless phones.
China¡¯s interest rates to increase in March(Feb 3, 2010)
China may increase interest rates or raise the required reserve ratio (RRR) again in March. According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), China's Consumer Price Index (CPI) was down 0.7 % year on year in 2009, and the Producer Price Index (PPI) fell 5.4 % year on year.
In December 2009, the CPI rose 1.9 %, and the PPI increased 1.7 %, turning to positive growth for the first time in 2009 and higher than the market expectations.
Under the rising inflation expectations, the government will take measures to stabilize prices. Market analyst predicts that the central bank may raise the interest rates before the CPI rises to 3 %.
China to Set up National Energy Commission(Feb 3, 2010)
China's State Council recently announced to set up National Energy Commission (NEC) with Premier Wen Jiabao as head to step up strategic policy-making and coordination
Vice Premier Keqiang Li will act as the commission's deputy head, it said. Ping Zhang, head of the National Development and Reform Commission, will work as the head of the general affairs office of NEC, and Guobao Zhang, head of National Energy Administration will serve as the office's deputy head.
The commission will be responsible for drafting national energy development plan, reviewing energy security and major energy issues and coordinating domestic enery development and international cooperation, the circular said.
The NEC committee was composed of 21 members from various government agencies
COC co-organizes West China Electronics Forum in Chengdu(Sept 1, 2009)
China Outlook Consulting(COC) co-organized west China forum with China ComponTech Online and CEF Organizer in Chengdu, Sichuan province, along with the West China Electronics Fair on August 27-28.
This forum includes technical seminars of Circuit Protection and EMI/EMC Solutions, Power Device and Power Module Technology Applications, and West China Market Conference. Over 140 and 130 engineers attended the two seminars respectively.
Distinguished speakers from Murata, Taiyo Yuden, Tyco Electronics, Vishay, Fairchild AEM and other leading suppliers shared latest technology and solutions with engineers from local OEM and research institutes. Leading distributors Avnet, Linpo, Ce-star also explored solutions of serving west China market.
Lenovo explores Malaysia PC market(Sept 1, 2009)
Lenovo saw a significant potential in the personal computer (PC) market in Malaysia.
According to Yong Qi, transactional business manager of Lenovo (Malaysia), Malaysia is one of Lenovo's targeted emerging markets, where more PC penetration could be expected. Qi noted that Malaysia is one of the fast-growing countries in the world.
Lenovo would strive to introduce its successful experience in PC business in China into Malaysia and develop more its channels towards its targeted end users, especially small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the country. SMEs are the important market in Malaysia as 99.2 percent of the enterprises are SMEs in the country
Lenovo's business has grown significantly in Malaysia since its presence in 2005. In July this year, Lenovo opened two new design concept shops at Low Yat Plaza, the key IT mall in Malaysia. At present, Lenovo has four concept shops in Malaysia and other ten Lenovo chain stores in Malaysia.
Lenovo will increase its investments in retailing and channels and introduce high quality and innovative products in Malaysia to ensure its growth.
China to invest US$4 bn on LCD production(Sept 1, 2009)
China will promote the production of liquid crystal display (LCD) based on a new generation Thin Film Transistor (TFT) technology with a total investment of US$4 billion, at Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area.
BOE Technology Group Co., an LCD-making company with patent technology on G8 TFT-LCD production, will establish manufacturing facility by 2011 which to assemble 40-inch LCD TV screens.
"Our products will meet the surging domestic demand for large-sized LCD TV screens with high quality but lower prices," said BOE Chairman Dongsheng Wang at the inauguration ceremony of the factory. Currently, large LCD TV plates in China could only rely on imported products, since no domestic companies have the technology and capability.
To promote the LCD TV industry in China, BOE will lead other 32 companies to construct a Digital TV Industrial Park in the area. The LCD TV Park is expected to attract an additional US$7 billion investment and is expected to create more than 20,000 jobs.
Samsung opens LED factory in Tianjin(May 11, 2009)
Samsung LED(light-emitting diodes) (LED) has set up its first overseas manufacturing base in north China's port city Tianjin.
The base, Tianjin Samsung LED Co., Ltd, was established with a starting capital of US$30 million, the initial investment would reach US$90 million, according to the Tianjin Economic-Technological Development Area (Teda) Administrative Commission.
LEDs are used in a wide range of products such as LCDs, mobile telecommunications devices and lighting equipment.
Samsung has so far invested in 11 manufacturing companies in Teda, with an overall investment of US$1.6 billion. Tianjin takes about one third of the group's investment portfolio in China.
China-made automobile records high in April(May 11, 2009)
Sales of China's domestically made vehicle set a record high of 1.153 million units in April, up 25 percent from a year earlier, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM).
CAAM noted that continuous pick-up in passenger car sales was bolstered by government stimulus policies. China unveiled a support package for the auto industry early this year, cutting purchase taxes for cars with small engine capacities and providing subsidies to rural purchasers.
In the first four months, motor vehicle sales hit 3.832 million units, up 9.4 percent year on year, while a total of 3.725 million units were produced, up 6.4 percent. Passenger car (sedans, SUVs and MPVs) sales in April rose 37.37percent from a year earlier to 831,000 units. The March figure stood at 772,000 units. While commercial vehicles (busses, trucks and pick-ups) fell 4.53 percent from March to 322,100 units in April, but rose 1.38 percent from a year earlier.
Passenger car sales in the first four months climbed 15.09 percent from a year ago to about 2.83 million units. Production totaled more than 2.69 million units, up 9.75 percent year on year.
FAW to establish a plant in Chengdu(May 11, 2009)
China First Automobile Works (FAW) and Europe's auto giant Volkswagen recently announced to jointly invest US$735.3 million to build an auto plant in Chengdu, capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province.
The annual capacity of this plant is to make 150,000 Volkswagen Jetta. Xu Jianyi, FAW's general manager, said the new investment was made in an effort to support reconstruction of Sichuan, which was hit by a strong earthquake on May 12 last year.
Volkswagen China CEO Winfried Vahland said the Chengdu plant would serve as an important production base to achieve its 2-million sales target in China by 2018.
Europe's largest auto producer, Volkswagen, entered China in 1984 and has invested 6 billion euros ( US$ 8 billion) in China so far.The European auto maker has 13 joint ventures in China, including one between FAW and Volkswagen in Changchun, capital of northeastern Jilin Province, which was established in 1990. Volkswagen sold more than 1 million vehicles in China last year.
2.7 million units of home appliance to village sold at Q12009(May 1, 2009)
According to China's Ministry of Commerce, a total of 2.7 million units of "home appliances to village" have been sold in the first quarter of 2009. Of these 2.7 million units, 1.485 million units were sold in March, representing an increase of 70 percent and 72 percent year-on-year, respectively.
This program has stimulated the development of the electronic manufacturing and home appliance industries. It has also boosted the development of various industries, including chemical engineering and mechanical manufacturing of steel, such as sheet steel.
The "home appliances to village" program started back in December 2007. Under the program, farmers who purchased home appliances which were included on the subsidy list received partial financial subsidies. At first, the program was given a trial run in Shandong, Henan and Sichuan provinces as well as in Qingdao. Its scope was then expanded to 14 provinces in 2008.
Alibaba grows 18.6% at Q12009(May 1, 2009)
Alibaba.com Limited, a leading B2B e-commerce company in China, announced that its revenue rose 18.6 percent year on year in the first quarter to US$118.3 million, as more companies resorted to online trading to lower cost at a time of financial crisis.
Statistics showed the company's online market had a total of 40.3 million registered traders both at home and abroad as of March 31, up 36 percent from a year earlier. It increased 6 percent compared with the last quarter in 2008.
However, Alibaba's net profit dropped 15.7 percent year on year in the first three months The company attributed the decline to an enhanced investment in customer service, employee training and technology innovation for market expansion.
The online trader pledged to continue investment in the next several quarters in areas such as the development of new Internet trading platform supporting multiple languages, employee recruitment and global marketing.
Alibaba's combined cash and bank deposit exceeded US$ 1 billion by the end of the first quarter, up 28 percent from a year earlier.
Industrial computer maker to invest overseas(April 17, 2009)
EVOC Intelligent Technology, the largest industrial computer maker in China, recently announced an overseas investment plan.The company said it would establish its German headquarter in Dusseldorf this April and later other technological and service bases in Germany and other European countries.
EVOC is specialized in R&D, production and sales of industrial computers, ranking the third in the world and the first in China. Despite influences from the global financial crisis, the company managed a 170% growth in overseas sales in 2008, according to EVOC general manager Sun Wei.
Embedded industrial computer market has grown rapidly in China in recent years, as demand surges amid boom in telecommunication sector. Embedded intelligent devices will be used on 70% of next-generation telecommunication products.
Industrial computer is expected to grow much faster than traditional computer, with annual growth rate possibly to exceed 20%.
Air-conditioner makers seek international cooperation(April 17, 2009)
China's leading household appliance producer Hisense Kelon Electrical Holdings Co., Ltd. extended its cooperation with Whirlpool on the manufacturing of air conditioners and related modules.
The two parties will also join hands in production management and technology, according to Lin Lan, vice president of Hisense Group, parent of Hisense Kelon.
Chinese air conditioner producers are actively seeking for international cooperation. Midea set up a joint venture with Toshiba Carrier in 2004, and Gree invested 910 million yuan to form joint ventures with DAIKIN for the production of inverter compressor and precision die in February of 2009.
Li Hongqi, professor from Beijing University of Technology, said that inverter air conditioner would become the mainstream production direction in the near future.
Although Midea and Gree had less experience in the field of inverter air conditioner, their cooperation with foreign partners reinforced their research and development ability in this field.
China raises export rebates on 3,800 items(Apri 17, 2009)
China increased export rebate on 3,800 items to maintain growth, according to the Ministry of Finance and the State Administration of Taxation (SAT).
It was the sixth such rise since last August when the government decided to raise the refund to tackle a slumping export amid the global financial crisis. The export rebates for categories including textiles and garments, iron and steel, non-ferrous metals and petrochemicals will be raised as of April 1, according to the two ministries.
Among them, the tax rebate rate for textiles and garments would be 16%, and that for CRT television 17%.
China's exports plummeted 25.7% year-on-year in February, the worst decline in more than a decade, as global demand deteriorated amid the deepening recession.
COC to launch three conferences in 73rd CEF in April, Shenzhen(Apri 1, 2009)
China Outlook Consulting will conduct one purchasing and supply summit and two technical conferences in April during the 73rd China Electronics Fair in Shenzhen, partnered with China ComponTech Online(www.cntronics.com) and China Electronics Fair organizer.
The New Purchasing and Supply Trend Summit will be held on April 9 at the room 312 of Shenzhen exhibition center. Major themes of this summit will be on improving efficiency and reducing cost in particular how to manage purchasing during the R&D period.... Speakers include Government officials, market research firm and industry experts. Audiences are purchasing executives from OEM/EMS companies in China.
The Circuit protection and EMI/EMC solutions conference will have experts from Murata, Taiyo Yuden, AEM, Sunlord and Konka to share with engineers about technology and product solutions and how to improve design efficiency.
The new energy conserving conference will focus on energy conserving through application of power devices, power modules and component selection on electric and industry use. Taiyo Yuden, Vishay, Richardson Electronics, Zetron, Ce-star, Synor and Vicor will share their latest technology and solutions.
The two technical conferences will be conducted on April 10 at room 312 and room 314 of Shenzhen Exhibition and Convention Center respectively. Engineers from OEM/EMS companies are welcome to the two technical conferences. PC manufacturing down 4.3% in 2009 Jan and Feb(Apri 1, 2009)
China made 19.02 million PC in the first two months of 2009, down 4.3% year over year, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. China-based PC makers, including Lenovo, Acer, and Asus, lately noted their losses and mentioned that was caused by global financial crisis.
Early this year, Lenovo took the lead announcing great loss for fiscal Q3 2008 (ended December 31, 2008) .Asus announced profit decline, forecasting net loss between 340-850 million yuan in Q4 2008 as against the previous predicted profit of 1.75 billion yuan. It was the first single season loss occur to Asus since it was founded. Acer announced that its revenue for Q4 2008 would drop by 5-10%, but maintaining quarterly operating profit growth unchanged.
Lenovo said that since it concentrated in the field of commercial exertion, the group was confronted with a difficult time due to significant international consumption drop and sluggish growth on Chinese mainland market. Asus suffered from high inventory and unbeneficial situation since the division of its brand and subcontracting.
Market expert think that Q2 of 2009 will be a better time for PC makers than Q1 of 2009.
China internet users to reach 300 million(April 1, 2009)
China's internet user grew 42% YOY in 2008 to 298 million, 91% had broadband connections, according to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC).
The penetration rate of Internet usage reached 22.6%, exceeding the 21.9-percent world average for the first time. Mobile phone Internet user reached 117 million in December 2008, indicating the popularity of using wireless network.
With the development of the third generation (3G) mobile network, the wireless Internet could see explosive growth in the next few years.The 3G high-speed networks can handle faster data downloads, allowing handset users to make video calls and watch TV programs.
China Mobile, the biggest mobile operator, got a license for the domestically-developed TD-SCDMA standard. It announced to build 60,000 3G base stations in 2009 and cover 70% of the cities under the provincial level with the new network.
China CPI to grow 1% in January(Mar 1, 2009)
China¡¯s consumer price index (CPI) rose 1% year-on-year in January, recording the lowest in last two years, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). In February 2008, CPI peaked 8.7% and inflation was a big concern at that time. However CPI started to fall in May 2008 after Chinese government tightened the monetary policy.
Premier Wen Jiabao recently noted at the World Economic Forum that there were already signs of economy recovery in China. Banks in China lent out US$131 billion in January 2009, over US$100 billion in December 2008 and US$59 billion in November 2008. Continuous massive loans from the State banks are likely to keep the CPI above zero in 2009.
The Chinese Lunar New Year spending pushed up food prices by 4.2 %in January. But non-food products' prices, which comprise about two-thirds of the CPI basket, fell 0.6% year-on-year.
But some analysts worry about a rapid rise in inflation toward the end of this year because the government moves to relax lending and spur investment could help increase prices as the economy recovers.
Lenovo founder back in charge(March 1, 2009)
Lenovo Group, the fourth largest PC maker in the world, recently announced that Mr. Chuanzhi Liu who handed over his job as chairman to Yuanqing Yang in 2005 will return to Lenovo as chairman. Yang will become president and chief executive, replacing Bill Amelio, a former Dell executive whose contracted with Lenovo has expired.
In 2009, Lenovo will focus more on the domestic market; also the company will balance its business in consumer and corporate markets.
"Lenovo has grown successfully on the international stage, but at this important time, we want to pay particular attention to our China business as it represents the foundation of our global business and growth strategy." Said Liu.
The company's PC shipments in the 3rd quarter ending at December 2008 shrank 5% year on year due to a continued decrease in worldwide demand as well as a slump in the Chinese market, according to the company. As Lenovo's largest market, the Chinese mainland contributed 45% of total revenue.
Mainland and Taiwan work on AVS/LED standards(Feb 12, 2009)
The Chinese mainland and Taiwan will hold a forum on information technology (IT) standards in southwest municipality of Chongqing from Feb. 26 to 27, according to a State Council Taiwan Affairs Office official announcement.
Topics of the forum include audio video coding (AVS) standards, third-generation (3G) mobile technology, mobile memory, thin film transistor-liquid crystal display (TFT-LCD), green power, light emitting diode (LED) and Internet Protocol Television (IPTV),
More than 300 entrepreneurs, professionals and scholars across the Taiwan Straits will attend the forum.
Taiwan-invested companies have become an important part of mainland's IT industry. There are more than 3,300 Taiwan electronics and IT enterprises on the mainland, with a total investment of US$36 billion, according to the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office.
Appliance to village: 600 Million Sold by 2012(Feb 12, 2009)
More than 600 million home appliances valued US$234 billion will be sold in rural China by 2012 as government subsidies expand to cover more people and more products to this Appliance to Village program, according to the Ministry of Finance (MOF).
Starting on Feb. 1, 2009, more than 700 million farmers in China became eligible for subsidies and get 13% rebate on designated home appliances.
The subsidy was originally offered in a pilot program in three provinces in 2007. From December 2008, Subsidies were expanded to 12 provinces and four more items were added to the list: motorcycles, personal computers, water heaters and air conditioners. Originally, the subsidies covered such items as color TVs, refrigerators, washing machines and mobile phones.
China is counting on the policy as a major means to stimulate domestic demand as exports weaken amid the financial crisis.
Huawei grows 36% YOY in 2008(Jan 18, 2009)
Huawei Technologies¡¯ sales revenue rose 36% year-on-year(YOY) in 2008 to reach US$17 billion.
The company signed contracts of US$23.3 billion in 2008, up 46% from US$16 billion in 2007. 75% of Huawei's contract sales came from outside of China in 2008, up from 72% in 2007.
Huawei has had particular success selling its products in developing countries, and, while it has struggled in the important U.S. market, it has recently made inroads into other developed countries. On Wednesday, Huawei won a contract to supply equipment for an advanced "fourth-generation" mobile network in Oslo, Norway.
China issues 3G licenses(Jan 18, 2009)
China¡¯s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) recently issued China 3G license for to three state-owned telecom operators: China Mobile received a license for TD-SCDMA, the domestically-developed 3G standard; China Telecom will use the US-developed CDMA2000 and China Unicom will use Europe's WCDMA.
All three standards should allow for faster data downloads, enabling video phone calls and other advanced features.
The MIIT also issued 23 regulations on 3G operational requirements. Market analysts estimate that 3G cell phone sales will bypass US$40 billion in next two years. This is bring market opportunities to some network equipment and handset manufacturers and boost market demand for semiconductors and components.
AUO and CMO to supply China TV vendors(Jan 18, 2009)
Leading Taiwan LCD panel makers AU Optronics (AUO) and Chi Mei Optoelectronics (CMO) have signed a supply agreement for 2009 with nine China TV vendors, including Konka, Hisense, TCL and other 6 major TV manufacturers.
According the agreement, the nine China TV vendors will purchase US$2.19 billion worth of LCD TV panels from AUO and CMO in 2009, and the shipments are estimated to exceed 12 million units, up 29% compared to the shipments in 2008.
China accounted for about 15% of AUO's LCD TV panel shipments and the company expects the ratio to increase to about 20% during the Lunar New Year Holidays, while CMO is supplying 22-inch and 26-inch LCD TV panels for China government subsidy ¡°Home appliance to Village Program.¡±
China to increase export tax rebates(Dec 29, 2008)
China will increase the export tax rebates for some machinery products starting from Jan. 1, 2009. The rebate hikes will involve 553 types of high-tech and high value-added mechanical and electrical products, according to the Ministry of Finance (MOF) and the State Administration of Taxation.
Export tax rebate rates for industrial robots and inertial navigation systems for aviation use will be increased to 17 percent, from 13 percent and 14 percent respectively. The rebate rates for exported motorcycles and sewing machines will rise to 14 percent. Their current rebate rates stand at 11 percent and 13 percent respectively. It was China's fourth rebate hike on exported products this year. The previous three rebates were made in August, November and December respectively .
China's November exports declined 2.2 percent year over year to US$115 billion, which was the first monthly decline since June 2001. Before that, export growth slowed from 21.5 percent in September to 19.2 percent in October.
China to audit government investment(Dec 29, 2008)
China will step up audits of new projects, state-owned companies and financial institutions next year to make its macro-control measures more effective in fighting the financial crisis.
According to Jiayi Liu, head of the National Audit Office (NAO), the newly government investment of US$580 billion will get special attention in 2009. Audit agencies will ensure investment in the new projects is properly used and focus on revealing extravagance, corruption and use in smokestack projects.
More than 104,000 companies and organizations were audited from January to November. The NAO is also responsible to examine the impact of the global financial crisis on Chinese lenders and the economy.
MediaTek supports TD-SCDMA(Dec 29, 2008)
MediaTek will continuously support TD-SCDMA because it believes the Chinese government will continue to push the local standard. As a result, the company will continue its development of TD-SCDMA applications, with plans to introduce 3.5G TD-SCDMA handset chips in the second half of 2009.
MediaTek's TD-SCDMA handset chips has been impacted by China Mobile's delay in its third-stage procurement project for TD-SCDMA handsets and by the fact that some major handset makers, such as TechFaith Wireless and Simcom, are giving up or downsizing their R&D teams for the locally developed standard.
MediaTek's non-operating losses for the fourth quarter are expected to total NT$1-1.5 billion (US$30.3-45.5 million) as it will report losses from inventory and long-term investment in line with new accounting standards to be implemented on January 1, 2009, according to company sources.
China to develop wireless broadband(Dec 2, 2008)
China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) recently announced a list of major projects that will be categorized into a special program for next-generation of broadband and network communications, showing that wireless broadband will be a direction in the future, with 3G technology applications and 4G technology researches.
Next-generation of broadband wireless mobile communication is a telecom technology based on 4G, with wireless broadband network the key feature, and be able to realizes real-time, highly identified, seamless covered, and full-IP multimedia mobile communication services.
This move from NDRC is regarded as Chinese government¡¯s effort to boost domestic demand.
Hua Hong NEC acquires Grace Semiconductor(Dec 2, 2008)
China¡¯s leading IC foundry service provider Hua Hong NEC, a leading Chinese IC foundry may acquire Grace Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. in January 2009.
Up to date, Hong NEC owns two 8-inch fabs with monthly manufacturing capacity of 60,000 pieces while Grace Semiconductor has a capacity of 35,000 pieces a month.
Market analysts think this possible acquisition will be a win-win strategy to reduce costs and optimize use of resources.
China¡¯s export of electromechanical products grow 23.2% (Dec 2, 2008)
China's export of electromechanical products grew 23.2% year over year to reach US$693.14 billion during the first ten months of 2008, according to China¡¯s General Administration of Customs.
This export accounted for 57.6% of China¡¯s total export. Among which, US$288.89 billion is from electrical appliances and electronic products while US$225.63 billion from machineries and equipments.
In the period of Jan to Oct, the EU, the US, and Japan ranked the top three trade partners of China, with trade value reaching US$359.37 billion, US$281.32 billion, and US$225.86 billion respectively, up 25%, 13.6%, and 17.7% correspondingly.
China launches IP&E website during 72nd China Electronics Fair(Nov 11, 2008)
China ComponenTech Online (www.cntronics.com), launched during the 72nd China Electronics Fair, is the first-ever Chinese website with focus on design-in, sourcing and practical design solutions for Interconnection, Passive and Electromechanical (IP& E) products and discrete devices.
According to Michael Liu, CEO of ComponenTech Online, the initiative of developing this IP&E technology and application focused community is to help engineers to get right tools and resources to design new products as well as to find ¡¯right ¡®suppliers with technology and products through timely communicating with them.
Supported by Web 2.0 functionality, IP&E suppliers will have their space to promote their products and technology, to interact with engineers and to advice engineers in terms of selecting ¡®right¡¯ IP&E and discrete products.
EPCOS to launch JV with Anhui Feida(Nov 11, 2008)
EPCOS recently partnered with Anhui Feida Industry Stock Co Ltd, a supplier of power capacitors for AC applications in China, to launch a joint venture _EPCOS (Anhui) Feida Electronics Co Ltd.
This JV will develop and manufacture power capacitors for alternating current (AC) applications in household appliances such as washing machines, dryers and refrigerators and industrial machinery such as air-conditioning systems and pumps. With its capital investment EPCOS owns 60% of the shares in the JV. Anhui Feida is incorporating all of its business activities involving these products as a non-cash contribution. This contribution includes both a modern production facility and the associated local sales network.
EPCOS Feida is expected to start operations at the beginning of 2009.
China¡¯s electronics export and import to grow 18.2%(Nov 11, 2008)
China¡¯s electronics import and export revenue grew 18.2% year over year(YOY) to reach uS$671.9bn from Jan to Sept 2008, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).
Among the total, China¡¯s electronics export revenue reached US$39bn, growing 21.7% YOY. Telecom equipment, computer and home appliance products are major contributors to China¡¯s export revenue. From Jan to Sept 2008, China exported US$64bn telecom equipments, up 20.4% YOY; exported computer product US$160.3bn, up 17.7% YOY; and exported US$60.4bn home appliance products, up 25.7% YOY.
China¡¯s electronics import revenue grew 13.7% YOY to reach US$282.1bn. IC and LCD monitor are major contributors to China¡¯s import business. From Jan to Sept 2008, China imported US$100.3bn IC and US$35.9bn LCD panel display.
China RoHs on progress (Oct 14, 2008)
China just releaseed a regulation on how to develop a managing catalog for controlling pollution caused by electronics information products in China, indicating that China¡¯RoHs is moving forward to the next stage, according to Jianzhong Huang, Director at Energy Conserving and Usage department at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
From March 2007, China RoHs, known as Administration on the Control of Pollution Caused by Electronic Information Products, started implementation. It requires electronics manufacturers to label all electronics products sold in China with the hazardous substances contained in their production. Now, Chinese government will announce the approach and steps of making the managing catalogue. Once a product is listed in the catalog, it will be forbidden to enter into the market.
Mr. Huang mentioned that a product will be listed in the managing catalogue once it has replacement with mature technology and reasonable price. He also mentioned that China will use legislative approach to control pollution caused by electronics information products. Later, China will require only finished products manufacturers to label hazardous substances contained in their production. China will release a regulation soon on controlling environmental pollution by electronics waste and managing electronics recycling and reuse.
China¡¯s electronics export and import to grow 19.44% from Jan to August (Oct 14, 2008)
China¡¯s electronics export and import revenue grew 19.44% year over year(YOY) to reach US$585.4bn, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
Export revenue was US$338.6bn, up 22.53% YOY while import revenue reached US$246.8bn, growing 15.45% YOY.
Major market driver for export growth was demand for telecom equipments and computer products. However, export of electronics materials, devices and instruments sees higher growth during the period of January to August. IC and LCD panels still the major market drivers for import growth.
TBF event in Shenzhen, online trade sees growth (Oct 14, 2008)
The Broke Forum (TBF) recently held its annual event¡ª2008 World Tour in Shenzhen Pavilion Hotel, gathering over 200 participants, 90% of which are TBF members.
During this event, TBF staff introduced its latest service and newest tools to serve its community. Also, they discussed with participants how to deal with payment, return and negotiation issues, how to protect transactions and avoid counterfeit products.
TBF is one of the largest online trading portals exclusively for brokers and distributors in the electronics component industry. It has 60 million line items of inventory, 3,600 brokers and distributors from 60 countries and more than 190,000 part searches every day. It offers online service 24 hours a day in 25 languages.
China Outlook Consulting analysts found that ompared with traditional trade, online trading in China¡¯s electronics component sector sees growth.. For more details about various trading types and opportunities for semiconductors and components, please read the upcoming November China e-Outlook report.
NEC to promote flash MCU in China (Sept 17, 2008)
NEC is going to promote its all flash MCU in 10 major cities of China through conducting a series of technical seminars on NEC¡¯s 8-bit, 16-bit and 32-bit all flash MCU products and applications. The 10 cities are Beijing, Changchun, Hangzhou, Shanghai, Nanjing, Wuhan, Chengdu, Xi¡¯an, Qingdao, Xiamen and Shenzhen.
During seminar, engineers at NEC and from its distributor Secom will introduce the latest technology trends of all flash MCU products, applications and designs solutions on utility meters, chargers, healthcare devices and electronic bicycles. Low power consumption and motor control will be discussed in the seminar.
China Outlook Consulting analysts found that working with distributors is a major strategy for international semiconductor companies to promote their MCU products in China. The reconstruction of Sichuan province after 5.12 earthquake boosted market demand for utility meters and slowed down the demand for handset products.
Xiamen becomes first wireless network city in China (Sept 17, 2008)
Xiamen municipal government and China Mobile (Fujian) branch recently signed a cooperation memorandum named¡± wireless city,¡± aiming to construct wireless network in Xiamen based on TD-SCDMA/HSDPA technology.
The wireless network covers an area of over 800 square km in Xiamen, including main streets, most suburban area and major public buildings. Basic infrastructures and auxiliary facilities are both fully equipped.
This project will be complete before the end of 2008. Till then, people in Xiamen will enjoy the convenience of living in a wireless city, surfing on Internet, consulting information, sending and receiving emails whenever and wherever there is a cell phone or a laptop.
China¡¯s PPI rises 10.1 % in August (Sept 17, 2008)
China's producer price index (PPI) grew by 10.1% in August over the same month last year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The big increase of raw materials and powers are the major drivers for PPI growth.
China's consumer price index (CPI), the main gauge of inflation, was 4.9% up from the same period last year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). This figure was declining and economists expect the trend will sustain in next a few months. China has set an annual CPI target of 4.8 percent this year.
ZTE to establish research and manufacturing center in Xi¡¯an (Sept 9, 2008)
ZTE Corp will invest US$882 to set up a research and manufacturing center in Xi¡¯an, Shannxi province. This center will focus on development of next-generation mobile communication products.
ZTE will work on the home-grown TD-SCDMA (time division-synchronous code division multiple access) and other 3.5G and 4G (fourth generation) technologies and related products at this facility.
ZTE is one of the major equipment vendors for China Mobile's TD-SCDMA network and is bidding to clinch contracts to upgrade the telecom's network and that of China Telecom too. Besides Xi'an facility, ZTE has plants in Tianjin and Shenzhen as well as several research centers nationwide including Shanghai.
COC launches STB market research report (Sept 9, 2008)
China Outlook Consulting recently released its latest STB research: 2008 China STB Research: Product Trends, Market Demand and Major Manufacturers. This report will be very helpful for international semiconductor/component vendors and distributors to understand China¡¯s STB product development trends, design activities, manufacturing capacity of major STB manufacturers as well as to seek new supply opportunities in China.
In this report, COC analysts have tracked major STB manufacturers in China in terms of their shipment in domestic and export markets. Our analysis is based on interviews to STB manufacturers, independent design house (IDH), distributors and suppliers, and the third party data from Chinese government and other market research firms.
Please contact us at info@china-outlook.com for more details. Thanks.
China¡¯s electronics industry grows 19.1% (Aug 29, 2008)
China¡¯s electronics industry sales revenue reached US$335.1bn in the first seven months of 2008, growing 19.1% year over year (YOY), according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. This growth is slower than that for 1H2008 which is 20.7%.
During the first seven of 2008, China¡¯s electronics export grew 23.9% YOY to reach US$291.6bn while import was US$213.3bn, up 17.14% YOY. Export revenue from computer products reached US$121.6bn, up 20.6% YOY; telecom product exported US$47.57bn, up 21.5% YOY. Import revenue from computer products reached US$56.39bn, up 24.54% YOY while telecom imports reached US$10.4%, down 0.25% YOY.
China¡¯s telecom revenue grows 9.1 % YOY (Aug 29, 2008)
China¡¯s telecom revenue of US$67.8 bn in the first seven months of 2008, up 9.1% year on year, according to statistics from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology(MIIT).
Mobile phone users reached 608.38 million by July end of 2008, increasing 61.07 million users while fixed line users reduced 10.58 million to reach 355.06 million.
Broadband users reached 77.8 million with an addition of 11.4 million users. Among this number, xDSL users reached 62.13lion, increasing 9.92 million. Dial-in users continuously showed decrease. By the end of June 2008, total dial-in users were 15.53 million, decreased 3.88 million in the first seven months of 2008.
China to pass new WEEE guidelines (Aug 20, 2008)
China¡¯s State Council recently passed new draft WEEE guidelines on the management of electronic wastes. China¡¯s WEEE, also called as China¡¯s Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) regulation was initially issued in draft form in 2004.
According to the newly passed draft, China is to set up a mechanism to deal with recycling and centralized treatment of electronic waste. Furthermore, China is to establish a special fund in this area. This draft also stipulated the responsibilities of manufacturers, retailers, repair and customer service providers and recycling companies in the process of collection and treatment of electronic waste. Electronic waste included used consumer electronics, computers and industrial equipments.
Sichuan¡¯s Telecom Service Update after Earthquake (Aug 20, 2008) Telecom service suffered serious damage after the 5.12 earthquake. According to Chinese government data, 4457 Mobile phone base stations at China Mobile were damaged; Two 2.5G optical fibers and one 155MHz ATM line belonging to China Telecom were broken which affected 1.8 million subscribers in Sichuan province; 560 KM of the electric power network and 87 power transfer stations were damaged.
Till the August end, 108 towns¡¯ telecom service in Sichuan province got recovery through the recovered and newly established 7464 mobile base stations, 14170 little smart base station and 2.1G optical fibers. 92.5% area that suffered from the earthquake got telecom service recovered.
China to fund small to mid OEM/EMS companies (Aug 20, 2008)
Chinese government is to fund small to mid sized OEM/EMS companies (SME) in China through a special fund of US$509million, according to China¡¯s Ministry of Finance.
China¡¯s central finance has established six special funds to support small to mid sized OEM/EMS companies in China such as technology innovation fund, SME international market development funds, an agricultural science and technology application fund, SME service system special subsidy fund, SME development special funds and the special subsidy fund for the SME platform services system.
Since it¡¯s not easy for SMEs to find guarantors that meet all requirements, Chinese government is going to set up a guarantor mechanism by investing US$29 million to help SMEs to get support from these funds.
China¡¯s electronics industry grows 20.7% during 1H2008(July 28 , 2008)
China¡¯s electronics industry sales revenue reached US$335.1bn in the first half of 2008, growing 20.7% year over year (YOY), according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
During the first half of 2008, China shipped 295 million handset, growing 9.7% YOY. The shipment of LCD TV was 10.3 million units, up 65.8% YOY. While the shipment of LCD TV, notebook computer and digital camera showed continuous growth, shipment of central office exchange, printer and mobile communication base station equipment products showed continuous decrease.
What you need pay attention is that the growth of June is a little bit faster than the previous months of this year. Furthermore, the sales revenue grow faster than the sales volume, showing product development went to more value and more complex, which may bring more market demand for semiconductors and components.
China¡¯s telecom revenue grows 9.2 % YOY by June end(July 28, 2008)
China¡¯s telecom revenue of US$57.8 bn in the first six months of 2008, up 9.2% year on year, according to statistics from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology(MIIT).
Mobile phone users reached 600.76 million by June end of 2008, increasing 53.45 million users while fixed line users reduced 9.3 million to reach 356.32 million.
Broadband users reached 76 million with an addition of 9.6 million users. Among this number, xDSL users reached 60.24 million, increasing 8.02 million. Dial-in users continuously showed decrease. By the end of June 2008, total dial-in users were 15.96 million, decreased 3.44 million in the first six months of 2008.
Foxconn to invest additional US$200 million in China(July 28 , 2008)
The board of Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai Precision Industry) has decided to invest an additional US$200 million in China to ramp up its output of connectors, PC chassis and pressing parts, handset components and calculators.
The company has gradually moved its manufacturing to 13 cities across China to reduce cost and target new customers in inner China.
China Unicom(Henan) to upgrade its GSM network(July 28 , 2008)
China Unicom(Henan) plans to invest another US$434 million to improve its GSM network within Henan province.
Zhengzhou, capital city of Henan, is given the top priority. At present, there are more than 600 newly opened base stations in the city and the number will be increase to 1,700 by the end of 2008. With the completions of these base stations, the network coverage of Henan China Unicom in Zhengzhou will be increased to 40%, which will ensure the high quality and the free flow of communications.
Starting from 2007, Henan China Unicom accelerated the improvement of its GPRS services. By May 2008, its GPRS services, including WAP, Java and MMS, have been opened in all the 17 cities across Henan Province. In addition, its multimedia message service has realized inter-communication with the CDMA network of China Unicom and the GSM network of China Mobile.
China¡¯s electronics industry grows 19.8% by April end(June 7, 2008)
China¡¯s electronics industry sales revenue reached US$209.3bn in the first months of 2008, growing 19.8% year over year (YOY). Electronics export reached US$159.3bn, up 22% YOY while import grew 15.3% YOY to reach US$116.9 million, according to China government data.
From Jan to April, electronics manufacturing has shown better growth if compared with that in Q1. China made 198 million handsets, growing 7.8% YOY; made 45.22 million PC, growing 34.6% YOY; and made 23.4 million digital camera, growing 35.8% YOY. Digital consumer electronics still showed high growth while traditional electronics products like printer, fax machine showed negative growth.
China¡¯s CPI hits 7.7% in May (June 7, 2008)
China's consumer price index (CPI), the main gauge of inflation, was 7.7% up from the same period last year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
This figure was declining if compared with 8.5% in April and 8.7% in February. Economists expect the trend will sustain in next a few months.
The May CPI rose 7.3 percent in urban areas, and 8.5 percent in rural areas. Meat prices increased 37.8%, with pork surging 48% alone. Cooking oil went up 41.4%, with vegetables increasing 10.3%, aquatic products rising 18.3% and grains up 8.6%.
China has set an annual CPI target of 4.8 percent this year.
China¡¯s PPI rises 8.2 % in May (June 7, 2008)
China's producer price index (PPI) grew by 8.2% in Mayover the same month last year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
The growing prices of raw materials, fuel and power have pushed up costs of farm produce, industrial goods, and eventually lead to higher prices of consumer goods and a rising inflation rate .
Factory-gate prices of crude oil surged 30.9% in May over the same period last year, while gasoline was up 11%, diesel 11.8% and kerosene 11.4%. The producer prices of raw coal jumped 24.1%and those of steel products rose between 26.7% and 43.8%. The purchasing prices, or costs, of fuel and power rose 21%, ferrous metals 22.1%, non-ferrous metals 3.4% and chemical raw materials 6.2%. The PPI for manufactured goods was up 7.4 %in the first five months, while the cost of raw materials, fuel and power rose 10.6%.
China to restructure telecom operators(June 7, 2008)
China recently announced a restructuring plan for the country's fixed-line and mobile operators, a final step towards the long-awaited release of 3G (third-generation) mobile licenses.
The plan will merge or split the operations of Chinese carriers, creating three new operators that will have both mobile and fixed-line services. At present, Chinese fixed-line operators -- which are split along geographical lines -- are not permitted to offer mobile services, while mobile operators may not offer fixed-line services.
Under the restructuring plan, fixed-line carrier China Telecommunications (China Telecom) will acquire the CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) mobile network from China Unicom. China Telecom will also acquire China Satcom, which offers satellite-based communications services.
China Unicom will retain its GSM (Global System for Mobile Communication) network and merge with fixed-line operator China Network Communications (China Netcom).
China Mobile Communications, China's largest mobile operator, will merge with China Tietong Telecommunication, which operates a national fixed-line network.
China¡¯s electronics industry grows 18.6% during Q12008(May 7, 2008)
China¡¯s electronics industry sales revenue reached US$151.5bn in the first quarter of 2008, growing 18.6% year over year (YOY). Electronics export reached US$115.9bn, up 20.2% YOY while import grew 14.5% YOY to reach US$85.08 million, according to China government data.
Despite the slow down of the entire industry, China Outlook Consulting analysts defined new demands from the emerging markets and explored how the value-add service from telecom operators and service providers will influence market demand for equipments, semiconductors and components. For details, please read the story of ¡°New Telecom Demand in 2008¡± in the May issue of China e-Outlook.
One important issue you need to pay attention at the Q12008 is that Chinese government restructured its government organizations by forming the MIIT(Ministry of Industry and Information Technology to replace the MII(Ministry of Information Industry), effective in April 2008. The mission of MIIT is to promote electronics and information technology among all industry sectors. How this will bring new market demands for semiconductors and components, please read the story of ¡°Ministry restructuring: Next China Electronics Focuses¡± in the April issue of China e-Outlook.
Wirlpool and Hisense set up JV in China(May 7, 2008)
The world leading white goods maker Whirlpool and China¡¯s leading home appliance manufacturer Hisense Group recently announce to set up a joint venture in Huzhou, Zhejiang, China.
The 50-50 joint venture will invest US$129 million to research, develop and manufacture high-end washing machines and refrigerator products for two famous brands: Hisense and Whirlpool, which will supply both international and domestic markets.
The new company is expected to have manufacturing capacity of 2 million washing machines and 1 million refrigerators.
This cooperation will provide Chinese consumers with leading-edge Whirlpool products, and will enhance the globalcompetitiveness for Hisense products in the global marketplace.
Changhong constructs OLED production line Chengdu(May 7, 2008)
Changhong Group recently starts construction of China's first OLED production line with total investment of US$100 million.
The new facility is expected to be completed and put into operation in the first quarter of 2009. Its annual manufacturing capacity will be 12 million OLED screens which will be used to serve Changhong group as well as other customers in China.
OLED is regarded as the third generation display technology after LCD and PDP. Right now, a number of foreign companies including Samsung, LG and Sony as well as more than 30 institutions of higher learning and research institute in China are working on its development. The new facility is expected to make Changhong a major OLED supplier in China.
MOC to release China¡¯s first online trading regulation(Apr 2, 2008)
The Ministry of Commerce(MOC) plans to publish the ¡°Online Commerce Data Protection Regulation¡± in June 2008, which will be China¡¯s first regulation regarding online trading.
The ¡°Online Commerce Data Protection Regulation¡± is aimed to protect enterprises¡¯ network data security against a background of a fast growing outsourcing sector.
According to Linhai Nie, deputy director of MOC¡¯s Informatization Promotion Department, MOC has finished the drafting of the ¡°Online Commerce Data Protection Regulation¡± and is seeking feedbacks from relevant departments. The regulation will work as a guideline for China¡¯s online trading market.
China¡¯s telecom revenue grows 10.1% YOY(Apr 2, 2008)
China¡¯s telecom revenue of US$17.5bn in the first two months of 2008, up 10.1% year on year, according to statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry.
Mobile phone users reached 565.23 million by Feb end of 2008, increasing 17.94 million users while fixed line users reduced 3.26 million to reach 362.18 million.
Broadband users reached 69.79 million with an addition of 3.3 million users. Among this number, xDSL users reached 55.2 million, increasing 3.19 million. Dial-in users continuously showed decrease. By the end of Feb 2008, total dial-in users were 17.52 million, decreased 1.96 million in the first two months of 2008.
China¡¯s air conditioner sales up 26.7% YOY by Feb end(Apr 2, 2008)
China's total air conditioner sales rose 26.7% year-on-year in the first two months of 2008 to reach 11.343 million units, driven by the strong domestic market demand.
In January and February, domestic air conditioner sales soared to 4.07 million units, up 41.4% YOY. Market analysts expect 2008 Olympic Games will boost the domestic air conditioner sales grow 18% this year.
Because of RMB appreciation, local Chinese air-conditioner manufacturers focused more on exploring China¡¯s domestic market. The energy saving requirements from Chinese government will also bring new market opportunities for international semiconductor and component manufacturers in terms of providing low power consumption and high performance products.
China to start analog-digital converter project in Nanchang(Apr 2, 2008)
A large 6-8-inch analog-to-digital converter (ADC) project will be launched in Nanchang, ,Jiangxi Province with a total investment of US$214 million.
This project, jointly invested by Jiangxi War Industry Asset Management Company and Ningbo Huatai Group¡¯s subsidiary Jiangxi Zhonghong Investment Development Co., Ltd, expect to have manufacturing capacity of 320,000 chips annually upon its put into operation.
ADC chip is a high-tech product mainly applied in supporting IC for high-definition TV, power and electronics devices, supporting IC of mobile phones and special use system IC. It has huge market demand and promising market prospect.
Air-conditioner price raises in China(Mar 14, 2008)
China¡¯s air-conditioner products¡¯ price was raised again in Feb 2008 by 5% due to the price increase of copper.
Leading HEA brands in China including Haier, Midea, Panasonic and AUX have raised their air conditioner products prices by 5% to 7% after the Chinese New Year holiday in February, while more have adjusted up the prices of new products and controlled the supply of low-end goods to raise the price in disguise.
Raw material prices increase and the increased demand for air-conditioner products from tier-two and tier-three cities drove the price rose. In 2007, China made 89.98 million units air conductor products, growing 24.2% YOY. Domestic demand accounted for 65% of the total shipment. The growth in shipment also brought more market demand for Power IC, sensor, IGBT,MOSFET and other components.
Lenovo expands in India market(Mar 14, 2008)
Lenovo Group plans to become the largest PC producer in India within the next three years
According to Jun Liu, senior vice president at Lenovo Group, , ¡°Lenovo will reinforce retail network and improve after-sale services in addition to the launch of new products in India, an important market.¡±
Lenovo just launched new brand portable computer IdeaPad and desktop IdeaCenter in India and plans to wage marketing promotions in April. To enhance its sales in India, Lenovo will open more retails stores in India.
China's PPI up 6.6% in February(Mar 14, 2008)
China's producer price index(PPI), a key inflation indicator, rose 6.6% in Feburary year over year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
The index, which measures the cost of goods when they leave the factory, was announced amid widespread expectations that China's inflation rate will reach another 11-year high after gaining 7.1% in January.
Crude oil prices soared 37.5% in February over the same month last year. The overall costs of raw materials, fuel and power surged 9.7%.
China¡¯s CPI hits high in Feb(Mar 14, 2008)
China's inflation rate has continued to accelerate, with the consumer price index (CPI) up 8.7% year-on-year in February, the biggest jump in nearly 12 years, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
The figure, compared with 7.1% in January, was well above market expectations. For example, the Bank of China, the country's second-largest lender, had predicted a rise of 8.3%.
Food prices surged 23.3% in February, with pork prices up 63.4% and vegetable prices up 46%, contributing more than 80% of the CPI increase.
China¡¯s PPI rose 6.1% in January(Feb 22, 2008)
Surging crude prices pushed up China's producer price index (PPI) by 6.1% in January over the same month last year, the largest monthly rise in three years, According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
The index, which measures the cost of goods when they leave the factory leaped from 2.4% in August last year to the latest 6.1% in five months, indicating an accelerating price pressure. Crude prices rose by 29.9% over January last year.The costs of raw materials, fuel and power rose by 8.9% in January from a year earlier.
Higher prices at the producer level could lead to rising consumer prices as producers might be pressured to increase prices of consumer products to offset rising costs. Analysts believe government price control will take effect when material supply strain will be eased after the worst snow disaster in decades.
The PPI went up by 5.4 in December and 4.6% in November last year. The increase for 2007 was 3.1%, 0.1 percentage points higher than the 2006 figure.
China under inflation pressures(Feb 22, 2008)
China¡¯s Consumer Price Index (CPI), the main gauge of inflation, hits a new high of 7.1% in January, according to the NBS. The new record of CPI increase would trigger the central bank to further raise interest rate in 2008.
Besides, according to central bank, China¡¯s M2, the broad measure of money supply, grew by a 19-month new high of 18.9% on a yearly basis by the end of January, indicating a relatively relaxed currency supply.
According to the General Administration of Customs, the trade surplus in January jumped 22.6% year-on-year to US$19.49 billion, higher than the growth of 21.7% in Dec. 2007.
Analysts noted that demand from both home and abroad still remains robust and the fixed asset investment would be further heated by huge imports of investment products such as raw materials and equipments. As a result, China¡¯s central bank would further lift up the required reserve ratio in the first quarter and the interest rate would not be adjusted until more economic data come out in March.
ZTE GSM business grows fast in 2007(Feb 22, 2008)
ZTE saw its GSM business expand 10% of its occupation on the global GSM market in 2007 and its sales revenue from GSM equipments market reached US$ 208 million.
ZTE sold GSM equipments amounting to 340,000 carrier frequency last year, up 300% year on year, taking up 10% of the newly added market around the world, a big jump compared with 3% one year ago. The fast overseas growth was regarded as a major propeller pushing ZTE 2007 net profit up between 50% and 70%, according to the company.
The global demand for GSM equipment, especially from such emerging markets as south Asia and African, would keep rising till 2010. Besides, China¡¯s upcoming reshuffle of telecom industry may spur a buying spree of GSM equipments.
Though GSM business is developing fast, CDMA business will be decisive to ZTE¡¯s destiny on 3G market, market analysts noted.
Vimicro launches mobile platform Vinno-III-win(Feb 22, 2008)
Vimicro Corporation, a leading fabless semiconductor company, recently announced the release of its mobile platform Vinno-III-win and processor Vinno-III (VC0818) to lower the cost of smart phone and popularize its use.
The mobile platform is based on Microsoft¡¯s Windows Mobile operating system.
Yundong Zhang, Senior Vice President of Vimicro, said Vinno-III is not only a powerful chip but also a flexible platform, based on which the cell phone producer could provide consumers with differentiated products.
Yuanqing Shen, senior supervisor with Strategic Partnership Group of Microsoft China Research & Development Group, noted that Microsoft is pleased that Vimicro¡¯s mobile platform could develop fast on Windows Mobile and the two sides would deepen cooperation.
Lenovo acquires assets from Sanmina-SCI(Feb 22, 2008)
China¡¯s leading PC producer Lenovo Group confirmed that it has entered into a non-binding agreement with Sanmina-SCI to transit responsibility of personal computing operation in Mexico and to buy certain related assets of Sanmina-SCI.
Under the agreement, Lenovo could take advantage of Sanmina-SCI¡¯s production line in Monterrey, Mexico to expand production capacity outside Asia. Last year Lenovo took great efforts to build plants in Mexico and Poland. This acquisition is meaningful for Lenovo to expand in the overseas market and Lenovo¡¯s rivals including Dell and Acer also outsource partial production to the OEMs in China¡¯s mainland, Taiwan, and other regions.
Besides the deal with Lenovo, Sanmina-SCI also signed an agreement with Foxteq Holdings Inc., a member of Foxconn Technology Group, for the sale of certain assets of its personal computing business and associated logistics services located in Hungary, Mexico and the United States.
Changhong acquires Little Swan(Feb 22, 2008)
Sichuan Changhong Electric Co., Ltd, one of China¡¯s leading household electric apparatus producers, recently announced to give up the bid for buying a 24.01% stake in Little Swan for price overvaluation, leaving Midea Electric Appliances alone in the game.
According to the announcement, Changhong got an approval from Wuxi Guolian Development (Group) Co., Ltd., the controller of Little Swan, to take over 87.67 million shares of the washing machine maker at no less than US$229 million. The money was required to be paid in one-time cash, equivalent to US$2.6 per share.
Little Swan A-shares closed at US$ 3 on Jan. 11 2008, the last trading day before suspension for the buy-out deal.
China to fund rural electronics purchase(Feb 14, 2008)
China is giving farmers a 13% subsidy for home appliance purchase in order to stimulate sluggish rural consumption and to reduce the increasing trade surplus. The central and local governments will pay 80% and 20% respectively of the subsidy, according to the Ministry of Finance (MOF).
Recently, a pilot program was initiated in three major agricultural provinces -- eastern Shandong, central Henan and southwestern Sichuan -- where farmers who bought televisions, refrigerators and mobile phones could receive such a subsidy. There are 197 types of appliances under three catagories were available for the subsidies through the end of May for China 800 million farmers.
To date, the government has signed agreements with 15 household appliance makers in terms of providing products for rural areas, including Haier, Hisense and Changhong, and 21 dealers. To know more about the boosted market demand in rural area, please read China e-Outlook Feb report.
SMIC to set up fabs in Shenzhen(Feb 14, 2008)
Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation(SMIC), China's biggest chip manufacturer, announced that it would invest US$1.58 billion to build an IC R&D center and two IC chip production lines in Shenzhen, Guangdong province.
The R&D and production base for the front process of IC will be built in phases in this project and consist of an IC R&D center and two production lines for 8-inch chips and 12-inch chips, respectively. Advanced technology will be introduced from IBM for the 12-inch chip production line. The first-phase construction of the 8-inch production line will be launched in the first half of this year and completed at the end of 2009 and its initial monthly output is estimated at 30,000 to 50,000 chips.
China¡¯s CPI to rise 6.5% in January (Feb 5, 2008)
China¡¯s consumer prices index may grow 6.5% year over year in January, according a State Council press conference.
The recent unexpected storms in south China have had a severe impact on agricultural production. The impact on fresh vegetables was catastrophic in certain areas. By Jan 29, a total of 7 million hectares of farmland was hit by the snow, most of these lands located in the Yangtze River Delta.
China's consumer price index (CPI) rose 4.8% in 2007, with food prices, especially pork, as the major cause of the increase. It¡¯s expected to grow 6.5% in the first quarter of 2008.
China Mobile enhance TD network construction (Feb 5, 2008)
China Mobile is accelerating the construction of the homegrown TD-SCDMA networks in ten cities.
The company will complete the bidding for procurement of TD-SCDMA mobile phones after the Chinese New Year, put 40,000 terminals onto the market in March-April, and launch a large-scale terminal procurement before the 2008 Olympic Games.
At present, the construction of the TD network in Beijing has entered into the network optimization stage, with the deployment of base stations basically completed. And before that, Datang Mobile noted that it had opened all the over 2,000 base stations for the TD network, which means the TD networks in Beijing and Shanghai have completed base station deployment.
China to adjust import tariff on electronic products (Jan 12, 2008)
China has adjusted the temporary import tariffs and tariff items on some consumption-type electronic products, elements and special raw materials for electronic products, and the new import tariffs have come into force as of January 1, 2007.
After the adjustment, China has lowered the import tariffs on multi-crystal silicon, laser video player core precision miniature motor, video components for mobile phones, video camera, video-recorder, digital camera and other spares. However, the import tariff for spares of flat TV sets remains unchanged.
Tariff adjustment by the State this time will help popularize liquid crystal and plasma TV sets nationwide.
China publishes 11th five-year plan on IT (Jan 12, 2008)
China¡¯s Ministry of Information Industry has published the 11th Five-Year Plan (2006-2010) on five IT areas.
The five IT areas are integrated circuit, software, informatization, electronic basic materials and key components, and electronic special-purpose equipment and devices.
The ministry said that the plans are drafted on the basis of a series of research projects, broad discussions and studies.The ministry also published interpretation reports on the outline, targets, major tasks and development priority of the five sectors.
China-made satellite navigation system to serve Olympics (Dec 28, 2007)
A leading engineer for China's indigenous satellite navigation system said the new system would be used in guiding traffic and monitoring sports venues during the Beijing Olympics in summer 2008.
Chengqi Ran, deputy director of China Satellite Navigation Engineering Center, said the Compass Navigation Satellite System, which consists of five positioning satellites orbiting the Earth, will help alleviate traffic problems during the Olympics by providing detailed positioning information to individual drivers.
China had primarily constructed the experimental satellite navigation web by May 2003, via launching three Beidou satellites into space. In February and April 2007, another two satellites were separately sent into orbit. The cluster of five Beidou satellites will be comprised of the main infrastructure of the Chinese satellite navigation network.
China¡¯s new labor law takes effect (Dec 28, 2007)
China new labor contract law will be put into effect on Jan 1 2008, increasing cost of hires and lay-offs in China.
The 98-article law, approved by China's top legislature in June 2007, entitled staff with more than 10 years of service at a company the right to sign contracts protecting them from dismissal without cause. It required employers to contribute to their employees' social security accounts and set wage standards for workers on probation and overtime.
China to encourage listings in China¡¯s stock market(Dec 10, 2007)
China encourages overseas firms and Hong Kong-listed domestic companies to go public in Chinese mainland market, as the country seeks to enlarge the capacity of its capital market.
China has sped up the listing of large state-owned enterprises (SOEs) mainly in oil and chemicals, telecommunications, transportation and metallurgy industries in past few years.
All above shows China¡¯s desire of shaping itself to a multi-tier capital market in the world.
China to produce 500 million mobile phones in 2007 (Dec10, 2007)
China is likely to produce nearly 500 million mobile phones in 2007, according to the Ministry of Information Industry.
Of the total production, around 400 million mobile phones will be exported while the rest of 100 million served the domestic market. Mobile phones made by Chinese manufacturers accounted for 31.8% of the total output. Nokia and Motorola still made most of mobile phones in China.
China¡¯s fixed-line operators to lose subscribers(Nov 28,2007)
Two China¡¯s fixed-line operators are losing subscribers due to free for incoming call packages promoted by mobile operators and other reduced tariff for mobile communications services.
China Telecom noted that it recorded a decrease of 880,000 subscribers in October, marking the third monthly decline in a row. Meanwhile, China Netcom said it lost 370,000 subscribers in October, the fourth decline running.
By the end of October, China Telecom has 222.56 million fixed-line subscribers while the number of fixed-line subscribers with China Netcom is 114.11 million.
Regarding broadband subscribers, they saw net increases of 550,000 and 462,000 respectively in October, with their cumulative subscribers totaling 34.44 million and 18.83 million.
Freescale to explore China¡¯s rail transportation market through CEAC¡¯s assistance(Nov 28,2007)
Freescale Semiconductor recently established a joint lab with Zhuzhou CSR Times Electric Co. Ltd., (China's leading rail transportation company) for microelectronics applications. The Freescale-Times Electric Joint Lab is located in the technical center of Zhuzhou CSR Times Electric, Zhuzhou, Hunan province.
The joint lab is expected to encompass six core technologies, including power conversion, control and diagnosis, safety monitoring, information and communication, power electronics, and test and control. Joint development efforts are expected to focus on the following application systems: AC drive systems, train control and diagnostics, railway safe driving carriers, locomotive and passenger information, passenger train electrics and information, and electric and control systems for engineering mechanics.
This cooperation marked a major milestone in China's rail transportation industry and will help accelerate the development of local technology innovation and applications. Freescale's authorized distributor, China Electronic Appliance Shenzhen Co., Ltd (CEACSZ), has played a pivotal role in organizing this cooperative venture.
Lenovo plans to touch consumer PC market in 2008(Nov 28,2007)
Lenovo Group recently announced plans to enter into the consumer PC market in 2008, and the company is busy seeking manufacturing location.
The desktop manufacturing location has not been decided but the laptop production base is scheduled to stay in China. The spokesman of the German subsidiary of Lenovo recently announced that the company planned to develop a global strategy to enter into the retail sector of consumer PC market.
The location of Lenovo¡¯s manufacturing base is critical to component and semiconductor suppliers because this change will impact the company¡¯s demand for semiconductors and components in China.
China to release new catalogue on foreign investment(Nov 19,2007)
China recently released a new Catalogue of Industrial Guide to Foreign Investment, indicating that China will no longer implement the industrial policy that purely encourages exports.
Approved by the State Council, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) jointly released the new catalogue. This catalogue encourages more foreign investment to modern agriculture, high-tech industry, modern service industry, high-end manufacturing links and infrastructure facilities.The revision has listed all contents concerning access by foreign investment into the catalogue, forming a standardized and transparent access policy for foreign investment.
It will take effect on December 1, 2007.
SMIC starts making TD-SCDMA chips (Nov 19,2007)
Shanghai-based Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC) recently started production of 20,000 TD-SCDMA chips.
The 0.13-mm TD-SCDMA chip was designed by Chongqing Chongyou Information Technology Co., Ltd. With proprietary intellectual right, this type of chips has been applied in terminal producers in Shanghai and Suzhou.
CNC works with Willcom on PHS(Nov 19,2007)
Japanese mobile operator Willcom recently announced that it has reached an agreement with China Network Communications Corporation (CNC) on research and technology cooperation that covers data telecom services in China's market.
CNC is the parent company of China Netcom Group Corporation (Hong Kong) Limited, the second largest fixed operator in China. Willcom is the only PHS service provider in Japan now.
The cooperation will focus on PHS Internet-access service and also involve the new-generation PHS, which is being developed by Willcom. CNC also has a plan to join hands with Willcom in providing PHS roaming service for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.
COC conducts 2007 China Electronics Summit during the 70th China Electronics Fair(Nov 11,2007)
China Outlook Consulting will co-conduct the 2007 China Electronics Summit with China Electronic Exhibition & Information Communication Company on Nov 15 2007 in Shanghai during the 70th China Electronics Fair.
With supports from China's Ministry of Information Industry, China's Electronics Enterprises Association and China Center for Information Industry Development, this summit is to help local Chinese OEMs and component manufacturers to explore their business opportunties and to enhance their cooperations and communications with distributors and other market channels.
Speakers for this summit includes officials from the Ministry of Information Industry, executives from Rochestor Electronics, The Broker Forum, Holystone Electronics and China's top online service provider-- Beijing Zhongfa Group.
Foreign companies in China follow China¡¯s RoHs(Nov 11,2007)
Foreign companies in China have more actively participated China¡¯s RoHs implementation, a regulation of Controlling Pollution of Electronics and Information Products starting from March 1, 2007.
For instance, Sharp, the largest LCD TV producer of Japan has stressed the use of environmental protection material in the panel TV market competition. According to the company, resin has made up about 40% of all materials for its panel TV, much higher than the percentage for CRT TV. The company has also applied a new type of reclaimable resin to some models of LCD TV products, which may reduce the electricity consumption by nearly three-tenth as compared with CRT TV. Matsushita has developed new display tube materials and additive of plasma TV harmless and scraps the use of lead in an all-round way.
Currently, there are only 13 domestic enterprises have participated in the working group of controlling the pollution of electronics and information products organized by the Ministry of Information after the implementation of the Chinese ROHS, while 74 foreign companies including Intel, Sharp, Sony, Nokia and Siemens joined the group.
Intel invests in China¡¯s automation company(Nov 11,2007)
Intel Capital has invested US$10.5 million in a Chinese automation technology company Supcon Group. The investment was channeled into the group's subsidiary Zhejiang Supcon Technology Co., Ltd.
According to a statement announced by the two companies, Supcon will cooperate with Intel in development and promotion of Intel's industrial automation solutions in China. Intel will support Supcon's global productions and sales, and help the latter to expand business outside China.
Based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, the Supcon Group is one of the leading Chinese firms that specialize in distributed control systems (DCS), a manufacturing control system. It has more than 5,000 customers in fields including petrochemical, chemical, power and food processing.
SMIC suffers loss in Q3(Nov 11,2007)
Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), China¡¯s leading semiconductor foundry, recently released its Q3 financial report showing a loss of US$25.6 million.
According to the quarterly financial statistics, 23.6% of the company¡¯s revenue in the third quarter came from DRAM chip business, compared with 28.9% in the quarter.
Richard Chang, Chief Executive Officer of SMIC noted that the company¡¯s business was severely affected by ongoing severe price declines in the DRAM market despite the strength of non-DRAM foundry services. The company forecasts that the forth quarter would see a 2-5% climb in total sales but will still suffer loss in Q4.
China to stop licensing mobile phone manufacturers(Nov 1,2007)
China recently announced to stop the verification mechanism on mobile phone manufacturers, ending the license system in mobile phone manufacturing sector.
Currently, there are about 90 licensed handset manufacturers in China. Based on the verification regulation that started in February 2005, if a company wants to become a licensed handset maker in China, government officials will assess the company to see if its investment, R&D forces, and manufacturing capacities have reached the required level.
China¡¯s mobile phone manufacturing capacity is estimated to exceed 500 million units in 2007. During the first 8 months of 2007, China made 347 million mobile phones, according to statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry (MII).
ZTE to become China's largest CDMA equipment provider(Nov 1,2007)
China's leading telecom equipment provider ZTE will replace Ericsson to provide CDMA base stations and other equipment to China's only CDMA network operator China Unicom in several provinces and cities, according to China Business News.
That will make the company China's largest CDMA equipment provider, with market share exceeding 30%.
According to ZTE, it has seen shares in China Unicom¡¯s bidding for CDMA equipment grow from 7.55% in the first phase to 14.44% in the second phase and 21.23% in the third phase. Thus, after Ericsson¡¯s quitting and ZTE¡¯s taking it over, the status on China's CDMA market will be shown as the following chart.
Freescale expands business in China(Nov 1,2007)
The Freescale, Inc. opened a new design center in Chengdu, Sichuan province recently, indicating the company¡¯s expanding investment in China's market.
Michel Mayer, chairman of the board and CEO of the company, said China has offered a great development opportunity for Freescale. The company¡¯s packaging and testing organ in Tianjin reported a steady growth and its operations in Shanghai has been expanded three times as large as it was founded. Mayer noted Freescale is investing in China's big amount of engineering and business talents, so as to provide service for its potential customers and support its development plan.
Freescale began its business in China in 1992. It also has eight design labs in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai,Suzhou and Chengdu.
China¡¯s industrial added value grows 18.4% (Oct 21,2007)
China¡¯s industrial added value of large companies grew 18.4% in the first eight months of this year, 1.1% higher than the growth in the same period of last year, according to the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).
Price of capital goods rose 1% in August as compared with the previous month; price of raw materials, fuel and power increased 3.8%, up 0.2 percentage points month on month.
China's mobile phone subscribers to reach 515 million(Oct 21,2007)
China's mobile phone users exceeded 515 million by the end of August this year, with a monthly rise of 6.8 million on average, according to statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry (MII). Chinese cell phone users had sent a total of 378.5 billion short text messages by the end of August, up 38.3% year on year.
Since last year, China's rural area has seen a continued demand for cell phones, which also boosted the handset output, the MII said. According to the MII, China produced 347.6 million mobile phones between January and August, up 28% over the same period last year.
China's LCD TV production rises 77% (Oct 21,2007)
China produced 9.4 million liquid crystal display (LCD) TV sets in the first eight months of this year, up 77.1% from a year ago, according to the Ministry of Information Industry.
In the Jan.-August period, one out of five China-made color TV products was an LCD set, while the model accounted for only 10.8% of the total output in the same period of last year.
China¡¯s LCD manufacturing output accounted for more than 50% of the world's total output, making China an important manufacturing base for LCD TV products.
SMIC be weak in performance(Oct 8,2007)
Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation(SMIC) still saw its share price weak on Hongkong stock exchange market, closing at 0.89 HK dollars on September 21, down from the previous close of 0.92 HK dollars.
The weak share price might be related to the increase of the company¡¯s marketing cost and decrease of its product price.
Although SMIC¡¯s H1 sales revenue rose 7% to 763 million US dollars from 712 million in the first half of last year, its marketing cost increased 8.9%, which resulted in the decline of gross margin. Meanwhile, its average price of products dropped 7.5% to 854 US dollars in the first six months of 2007.
The company forecasted that it would achieve better results in 2008 thanks to the advanced 65-nm technology.
China embrace foreign investment(Oct 8,2007)
China welcomes more international hi-tech companies to set up regional headquarters, R&D centers, procurement centers and training centers in China, and encourages domestic enterprises to explore overseas hi-tech markets, according to Xiaoqiang Zhang, vice minister of the National Development and Reform Commission.
Zhang noted China's hi-tech industry had utilized more and more foreign investment over the last two decades and multinational companies had set up more than 1,000 research institutions all over the country.
The hi-tech industry in the three coastal regions of the Yangtze River Delta, the Pearl River Delta and Bohai Bay accounts for more than 80% of the national total in terms of scale of industry. Major industries include bio-medicine, aviation and aerospace, micro-electronics, photoelectron and software.
China plans to focus on nine major special projects in the next few years, including integrated circuit and software, new generation mobile communication, next generation Internet, digital voice and video technologies, advanced computing, biological medicine, commercial airplanes, satellite as well as new materials.
China¡¯s electronics import and export slows down(Oct 8, 2007)
China¡¯s import and export value of electronic and information products reached US$490.16 billion in the first eight months of this year, up 23.5% year on year, according to the Ministry of Information Industry.
The growth rate was down 12.8 percentage points from the same period of last year, and also 0.5 percentage point lower than that of the nation¡¯s total import and export in the first eight months of this year.
The eight-month export value of electronics and information products came to 276.37 billion US dollars, up 26.2% year on year. The growth rate was 11.7 percentage points lower than that for the same period of last year and also 1.5 percentage points lower than that of the nation¡¯s total export in the first eight months of this year. The export accounted for 36.1% of the nation¡¯s total export and contributed 9.6 percentage points to the nation¡¯s 27.7% export growth in January-August.
Foreign investment in China rises 12.8%(Sept 17,2007)
China actually used US$41.9 foreign direct investment, in the first eight months this year, up 12.8% YOY, according to the Ministry of Commerce.
China approved the establishment of 24,848 foreign-funded companies in the same period, down 5.26% YOY. In August, the establishment of 3,150 foreign-funded firms were approved, down 8.83% YOY, while the actual use of foreign investment went up 11.87% to US$5.02bn.
Currently, more than 28 million people, or about 10% of the employed population in cities and towns of the country, work for foreign-funded companies.
China¡¯s computer and home appliances profitable at 1H2007(Sept 17,2007)
China's computer and home electrical appliances sectors recorded an impressive growth in profits during the first half of 2007, according to the Ministry of Information Industry.
Computer sector managed sales revenue of US$15.2bn, growing 14% year over year(YOY); profits from computer sector hit US$360 million, growing 600% YOY. Home appliance sector gained US$33.28bn sales revenue with annual growth of 12%. Profits from this sector reached US$480 million, up 513% YOY.
Intel starts building chip plant in China(Sept 17,2007)
Intel Corp. started building its first chipset plant in Asia, which involves US$2.5 bn in the first stage investment. The new factory, dubbed "Fab 68", will use 90-nanometer technology, the most advanced technology that the U.S. government has licensed for export.
Intel Chairman Craig Barrett attended the ground breaking ceremony of the plant, which is located in the Dalian Economic and Technological Development Zone in northeast China. Barrett said at the ceremony that Intel chose Dalian because it is a perfectly suitable location for the plant. "Intel will use its advanced equipment and technology to build an environment-friendly computer chip factory in the city, and promote the semiconductor manufacturing industry in China," he said.
Steel structures and other framework works have been in place at the factory covering 160,000 square meters. The project will go into production in 2010.
China's electronics export hits US$235.32bn(Sept 7,2007)
China's electronics export hit US$235.32bn in the first seven month of 2007, grew 25.9% year on year(YOY). This accounted for 36% of China's total export, according to statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry. Export from wholly foreign owned companies in China grew 26.9% to reach US$158.65bn during this period of time, accounting for 67.4% of China's total electronics export.
China's electronics import grew 19.3% YOY to reach US$182.09bn, accounting for 35.2% of China's total import.
Changhong works with 081 Electric Group(Sept 7,2007)
China's leading home appliance maker Changhong Electric Co., Ltd recently signed a strategic agreement with a military industrial company named 081 Electric Group, and the government of TGuangyuan city, Sichuan province.
Meanwhile, Changhong launched the Changhong Xinrui power supply project in Guangyuan Economic Development Zone as the first project for its wholly funded Changhong 081 industrial park.
Changhong expects the park to become a large research, product development and manufacturing base for both military use and civil use in Southwest China.
Qimonda expands foundry service with SMIC(Sept 7,2007)
Qimonda AG and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Cor.(SMIC) signed an agreement to expand their existing cooperation on the production of DRAMs.
Based on the agreement, Qimonda will transfer its 80nm DRAM trench technology to SMIC's 300nm facility in Beijing and SMIC will make DRAMs for computer products by using this technology exclusively for Qimonda. Futhermore, this agreement also includes the option to transfer Qimonda's 75nm technology to SMIC in the future.
Qimonda is a leading global memory supplier with a broad diversified DRAM product portfolio. The company carved from Infineon Technologies which is customer of SMIC. UP to date, Infineon holds an 86% stake of Qimonda.
China Mobile to complete TD-SCDMA base station(Aug 12, 2007)
China Mobile just completed TD-SCDMA base station in Qinghuangdao. This network is expected to cover the urban city, primarily focusing on tourism locations and hotels for Olympics 2008, suburb still excluded.
Qinghuangdao was planned as the first city to build China Mobile¡¯s TD-SCDMA base station More than 300 cell sites were laid in the city zone, while macro cell sites were constructed in the suburbs, and each cell site could accommodate about 300 terminals. All of these cell sites bring the total accommodation of TD-SCDMA network in Qinghuangdao up to 450,000 users.
At present, TD-SCDMA network is under optimization, through which, the network parameter could be fine-tuned, deviations of network plan be corrected, and thus providing data reference for the future network plan.
Lenovo to serve rural market(Aug 12, 2007)
Lenovo Group served China¡¯s rural market by providing PC priced at US$199. The company announced to establish 5,000 new marketing agencies to provide after-sales services to a maximum of 300,000 administrative villages. Meanwhile, the company would carry out promotional campaigns in townships.
"We have offered rural distributors products priced between US$199 and US$399," said Shaopeng Chen, president of Lenovo Greater China, adding that new software developed to cultivate rural customers' computer literacy was part of the PC products. "We continue to invest in the rural market because it helps us achieve a growth rate double the market average," Chen said.
Three years ago, Lenovo released computers priced at US$399 to cultivate what it termed the "frozen earth" in rural regions. Its rivals had to match the price in order to continue their expansion into the rural market.
Changhong builds automotive electronics manufacturing base in Changchun(Aug 12, 2007)
Sichuan Changhong Electronic, one of the largest TV makers in China, announced to build an industrial park in Changchu, Jiling province to make automotive electronics products.
Changhong Changchun Industrial Park will focus on manufacturing automotive electronics products and digital home appliances such as GPS navigation systems and car television.
This park expects to start production in Jan 2008. The initiative of establishing this industrial park is to explore North China market as well as the markets of Russian, North Korean and Mongolian. This park expects to have 5 billion RMB sales revenue in 2012.
Foxconn set up a new industrial park(Aug 2, 2007)
Foxconn announced to invest US$1 billion to set up a new industrial park in Qinghuangdao, Hebei province. This park will host plants that manufacture electronics products including printed circuit boards and signal transmitters as well as nano-technology research and development centers.
This plan can be regarded as Foxconn¡¯s strategic move from east cost area to the North part of China to avoid increased cost of land and labors and to satisfy the new market demand from North part of China. Early in Feb this year, Foxconn also invested US$99 million dollars in Langfang , Hebei province to establish manufacturing facility to make handset for international handset OEMs like Nokia.
China¡¯s broadband users hit nearly 60 million(Aug 2, 2007)
China¡¯s broadband users hit nearly 59.43 million while dial-in users dropped to 21.61 million according the Ministry of Information industry.
The 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, governmental digitalization plan, increase of PC for education and family use are three major market drivers to boost the market.
China Telecom and Netcom are the major operators to provide broadband service in China. Details please see the August report of China e-Outlook.
Auto-used MCU in demand in China(Aug 2, 2007)
China¡¯s market demand for auto-used MCU has been boosted driven by China¡¯s increasing automobile output. In 2006, China¡¯s automobile output reached 7.3 million units and will expect to grow 30% in 2007.
Airbags, ABS and TPMS are major products to consume auto-used MCU in China. Major MCU suppliers in China are Infineon, Freescale, STMicroelectronics and Renesas. For details about how airbags created market demand for MCUs and know China¡¯s major airbag manufactuers please read China e-Outlook August report.
China to coperate with ITU(July 24, 2007)
China will cooperate will the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) regarding radio frequency and satellite orbit resources and the development of global telecommunication standards.
Peiyan Zeng, vice premier of China, recently met with ITU Secretary General Hamadoun Toure and noted that China is ready to enhance cooperation with ITU.
In response, Toure appreciated China's support for ITU over the years, expressing his hope to enhance cooperation with China and further promote the development of global information and communication technologies and bridge digital divide.ITU, founded in 1865, is a United Nations agency for telecommunications with 191 member states. China joined the ITU in 1920.
China sells over 200 million handsets at 1H2007 in China(July 24, 2007)
China's domestic handset shipment hit 266.8 million units during the first six months of 2007, growing 33.4% year-on-year(YOY), according to the Ministry of Information Industry (MII).Sales revenue hit US$21.2 billion, up 29.6% YOY.
Nokia still topped No.1 by serving 35% of the total domestic GSM handset market through targeting both high-end and low-end customers.
Thomson works with Jiuzhou on DTV production(July 3, 2007)
France-based Thomson recently announced to work together with tSichuan Jiuzhou Electric Group Co., Ltd. on digital TV production.
Being one of the largest high-tech electronics company and one of the most famous transnational group companies in the world, Thomoson can share with Jiuzhou their technology development in DTV area.
Sichuan Jiuzhou Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. is one of the largest industrial companies and the best profit-making companies in Sichuan, dealing with research & development and production of digital TV equipment, broadband network equipment and satellite TV receiving equipment.
Vimicro to release web camera processing chip(July 3, 2007)
Vimicro Corporation, a leading semiconductor company in China, released a high-performance web camera processing chip VC0336 recently, marking the startup of Internet video applications in Web 2.0.
The VC0336 is mainly used in attachable web cameras and laptop-embedded cameras and enjoys a string of functions such as high-definition video recording, audio recording, auto focus, and audio noise cancellation.
It is equipped with two quality audio channels, which allow PC cameras to record two streams of audio signals from two different microphones simultaneously. At present, some leading web camera and notebook producers of the world have already employed the VC0336.
Lenovo eyes on consumer market (July 3, 2007)
Lenovo Group try to improve the weight of sales from consumer market in 2007, said Yang Yuanqing, board chairman of Lenovo.
Currently, 90% of Lenovo¡¯s sales come from business-use market, and 10% from consumer market. Notebook business will be a focal point.
Lenovo achieved the first-ever profitability in North America since it acquired the PC unit of IBM for the fourth quarter of its 2006/07 fiscal year.
Microsoft launches Chongqing Technical center(July 3, 2007)
Microsoft (China) Co. Ltd and Chongqing Municipal Government recently signed a memorandum of understanding on jointly launching ¡°Chongqing Microsoft Technical Center¡±.
According to the memorandum of understanding, the two parties will use the center to promote R&D software products, construct e-administration and software personnel training in Chongqing. Meanwhile, Microsoft will cooperate with telecom operators in constructing an information service platform catering to small and medium-sized companies.
The two parties aim to expand their cooperation and enhance the software information service level in Chongqing
China Mobile starts TD-SCDMA network construction in eight cities(June 3, 2007)
China Mobile starts the construction of TD-SCDMA networks in eight Chinese cities at the end of May. The construction project is predicted to take six months and will be finished by October this year, which will ultimately produce 13,000 base stations.
China Mobile has authorized China International Telecommunication Construction Corporation, a subsidiary of China P&T Appliances, to undertake the project.
According to Haofei Chen, Secretary General of TD-SCDMA Forum, the purchase of TD-SCDMA mobile terminals will be started in October this year, after the construction of 3G networks in ten Chinese cities is completed.
China Telecom, SMG and Yongle to expand Shanghai IPTV market (June 3, 2007)
China Telecom, Shanghai Media Group(SMG) and household appliances retailer Yongle will work together to popularize IPTV (Internet protocol television) in Shanghai.
Based on their announcement, Yongle will act as the exclusive channel of IPTV in Shanghai to accept applications for opening IPTV service in all its chain shops. China Telecom will provide operation supports in their cooperation, while SMG will provide video contents.
China Telecom has kept expanding its investment in IPTV since last September. The company is trying to make Shanghai the largest IPTV service subscriber city in China.
LG to volumn manufacture PDP monitor in China(June 3, 2007)
LG Electronics plans to batch production of 32-inch PDP monitor in China in June despite its loss in the Q12007.
A senior official with LG said the batch production of 32-inch PDP monitor would be at LG¡¯s Nanjing facilities. Nanjing is capital of east China¡¯s Jiangsu Province.
Industrial professional said that 32-inch PDP monitor has price advantage compared with the same size LCD monitor.
Lenovo¡¯s efforts overseas paying off(June 3, 2007)
Lenovo Group for the first time posted an all-round profitability from its major operating areas, including North America, where the Chinese PC giant has been struggling since it acquired IBM¡¯s PC unit in 2005.
PC shipments in the Americas grew 9% in the fiscal Q4 ended on March 31, reversing the declining trend in the previous quarters. Business turnover in the region hit US$997 million at Q12007, accounting for 29% of the group¡¯s total, and marking a turnaround from loss to profit for the first time. Together with revenue of 731 million dollars from Europe, Middle East and Africa, the combined turnover accounted for 50% of the total, which indicated that the Chinese PC maker is no longer relying solely on the robust domestic market and its efforts overseas are paying off.
Through sponsoring sports activities and cutting payrolls, gross margin of the company set a record high of 14% for the 2006-2007 fiscal year, and PC shipment increased 12% year on year, higher than the industry¡¯s growth of 10% on average.
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