Dec. 10, 2001

Taiwan's major industrial workstation manufacturers, most of them prominent exhibitors either at CeBIT Hannover or Hannover Messe ( Hannover Industrial Fair ) forecast optimistic developments against the general economic trends, as local sources report.

Both Advantech Corp. And ICP Electronics Inc., two leading makers, claimed last week that Taiwan's industrial PC industry will enjoy booming sales next year, with turnover growing by 30% to 40%.

Much the same as the PC industry, makers of industrial PC products have suffered somewhat due to the prolonged economic downturn since early this year. The island's industrial PC industry is expected to post revenue of 9 billion Taiwan dollars
( 1 US$ = approx. NT$ 34,5 ) this year, about the same figure as that of 2000, with the opportunity to surpass the 10 billion mark to hit 12 to 13 billion in 2002.

The chairman of Advantech, Liu Ke-cheng, said that the industrial PC market has already recovered from the sales slump recently. Mr. Kou Po-ta, chairman of ICP shared the same view, saying that the island's industrial PC industry will eventually recorder from the economic downturn.

Over the past few years, Taiwan's leading industrial PC makers have diversified their product lines. In example, ICP has already ventured into the research and development of NAS network drivers for the use in the ADSL and broadband market. Meanwhile, ICP Electronics is now negotiating with Toshiba for sales of its industrial PCs to the Japanese electronic giant. Toshiba expects to place such orders in the first quarter of 2002, but details are not yet available. The company will also increase investment in the SoC ( system on a single chip ) product by injecting NT$150 million during the initial period. The company has scheduled to invest another NT$200 million in 2002 to establish a new plant in Kunshan in the Jiangsu Provice of China.