Taipei, May 9, 2003

The Market Intelligence Center (MIC) under Taiwan`s think tank Institute for Information Industry reported a total of 27.25 million digital still cameras to have been shipped out in 2002, exceeding the shipments of conventional photp cameras for the first time.

The Institute added that this year the number would increase to 33 million thanks to lower prices and t he devices`popularity among users and predicted that cameras with resolutions of higher than 4 MegaPixels would become the mainstream in the market next year.

The MIC said that this year cameras with a 3.3 million pixel resolution would be the biggest selling item, while those with resultions of 4 million pixels and above would become the mainstream next year, after prices drop to below US$ 400.

Lai Yu-chang, the MIC`s analyst commented on the craze to higher resolutions that Japanese companies are now making cameras with a resolution of 7 million pixels support by more advanced CCD sensor technology, rather than COMS sensors.
"The Japanese are doing that despite the fact that human eyes cannot even tell the difference between pictures with 3.3 million pixels and 7 million pixels," he said.

In related news, Taiwan giant BenQ projects its digital still camera shipments will grow seven-fold to reach one million units this year for an about 3% world market share. A BenQ spokesman said that the company launced a 4 MegPixel model early this year and will launch nine more models throughout this year, with the majority being 2- and 3 MegaPixel DSCs.

BenQ vice president William Wang also said that his company hopes its market share will double to 7% or 8% next year and aims to achieve a 15% share in the next two to three years.

Under the impression of buyers interest at CeBIT Hannover, BenQ's C.E.O. made an immediate commitment to double the company`s exhibition space for 2004.

In related business news, Taiwan`s major digital camera makers such as Primax Electronics, Altek and Aiptek all posted new high revenues on the year, despite the traditional off sales season in the second quarter, industry source said.