Mitac Holdings is expanding its capex for 2021 to get the company ready for the next-phase of revenue growth, according to company president Billy Ho.
Despite the existing component shortages, Mitac is set to increase its investments in the US, China and Taiwan, and will also seek partners in India to establish joint ventures locally after the pandemic there begins easing.
Although Taiwan currently sees water and electricity shortages and a rise in COVID-19 infections, Ho believes his company's plants in Taiwan are unlikely to be impacted.
Mitac has around 15% of its overall shipments handled by plants in Taiwan and will be able to shift the production to its plants in China and the US, Ho said. The company's automotive electronics subsidiary Mitac Digital Technology is mainly manufacturing products in Taiwan for the US market and shipments are still limited at the moment.
Subsidiary Mitac Computing Technology that focuses on servers currently contributes 82.8% of the Mitac Group's total revenues, while Mitac Digital accounts for 9.6%. In the first quarter, Mitac Computer saw its supply fall short of demand by 20-30%, due to shortages of ICs, and is currently pushing to minimize the impact from the short supply.
Mitac Digital's operation is also being undermined by the component shortages and has seen lead time extend from 90 days originally to 150 days.
Mitac Holdings reported consolidated revenues of NT$11.43 billion (US$405.6 million) for the first quarter, up 13.97% sequentially and 31.6% on year, but gross margin was only 9.15% due to increased costs from components.
Mitac president Billy Ho
Photo: Shihmin Fu, Digitimes, May 2021
