Chunghwa Picture Tubes to set up PDP venture in China

Taipei, Jan. 24, 2005 (CENS)--Chunghwa Picture Tubes, Ltd. (CPT), the No. 3 maker of large-sized thin film transistor-liquid crystal display (TFT-LCD) panels in Taiwan, has decided to invest US$22 million in Digital Display Manufacturing Co. (DDMC), a new maker of plasma display panel (PDP) products.

CPT will have an 8% stake in the PDP venture and will provide needed techniques, R&D staff, land and capitals to the PDP venture on the other side of the Taiwan Strait.

Industry sources said that DDMC would recruit retired PDP talents from AU Optronics Corp. (AUO), Taiwan's No. 1 large-sized TFT-LCD panel maker, and other professionals in Taiwan to form an R&D team for the new venture.

DDMC would be initially capitalized at NT$10 billion (US$312.5 million), in which many local venture capital firms have promised to contribute capital, and is scheduled to begin mass production in the first quarter of 2006.

Tseng Tsung-lin, former senior financial vice president of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. (TSMC), the world's largest dedicated semiconductor foundry, and CPT's former PDP business vice president Chen Kung-lang reportedly would be DDMC's CEO and chief technology officer (CTO), respectively.

Industry sources said that CPT's board of directors endorsed the DDMC investment project, indicating that CPT may drop its original project of setting up a second PDP plant in Taiwan.