cens logo

Taiwan's LED Makers Upbeat About 2014 on Strong March Sales

2014/04/24 | By Ken Liu

Citing strong sales in March, Taiwan's LED makers predict their sales for the rest of this year to stay brisk.

Unity Opto Technology Co., Ltd. chairman Alpha Wu says the island's LED makers face clear sailing in sales over six months and their sales will rise monthly at least until the third quarter.

He says that all of the company's shipments had doubled after all of its products had been shown to comply with the U.S. Energy Star standard. Currently, the company's main products are LED packages for lighting and backlight applications.

The company has reportedly been contracted to supply packages to Sharp's wider color gamma (WCG) TVs., which are well received in the market. Based on the orders, industry executives project the company's revenue for March to rise at least 20% from February, to over NT$720 million (US$24 million), and its monthly revenue to likely surpass the historical high of NT$900 million (US$30 million) in the third quarter.

Chipmaker Formosa Epitaxy Inc. (FOREPI) projects its revenue to begin climbing in March for it had completed initial adjustment of its production capacity and products in addition to increased orders from America and Europe. Company president F.R. Chien predicts sales from lighting chips to increase to constitute over 40% of the company's revenue by the end of this year due to increased orders from American and European lighting-fixture makers.

Everlight Electronics Co., Ltd., a LED packager, saw revenue for this March rise 20.66% from a month earlier, to NT$2.2 billion (US$74.4 million).

Epistar Corp., the world's No.1 LED chipmaker by volume, predicts production to run at full capacity in the second quarter and gross margin for the same quarter to rise sharply. The company had consolidated revenue of NT$3.8 billion (US$129 million) in the first two months, up 48.29% YoY.

Industry executives believes the company's Q1 revenue will slip 5% from the fourth quarter of 2013 due to higher base period in the fourth quarter than in the first quarter, but predicting  the company's Q2 revenue to rise double-digits from the last quarter.

Single Well Industrial Co., Ltd., a maker of LED-manufacturing equipment and molds, says that its Q1 revenue and undelivered orders combined near NT$387 million (US$12.9 million) it had throughout last year thanks to increased investments by LED makers. (KL)