The wafer foundry, fab tools and component distribution industry sectors all seem to consist of specialized companies in the field of semiconductors, and it is difficult to do cross-domain operations. News in the electronics industry is meant for the right audience, and "segmentation" has become an important concept.
The traditional media in Taiwan reports semiconductor news every day, but if they really knew the industry, they wouldn't be doing almost the same things as one another's. I can't see any different positioning between the state-funded Public Broadcasting Group and Central News Agency. Business operators must have certain principles and strategies concerning the positioning of their businesses.
The predicament of the media business is that most of them can't get out of the trap of the times. How many of them understand their own situations? If you don't, you wouldn't fare any better getting a job in an IT company where you'd be expected to devise its PR strategy.
Is DIGITIMES a part of the electronics industry? I think so. If I were to run the company in a media business model, I would have to eliminate a lot of competitors to go from having 1% to 2% of Taiwan's overall media revenue. Even if I could do it, it wouldn't mean much! The combined revenue of all listed companies in Taiwan's electronics industry may exceed US$1 trillion in 2022, and if my company got 0.01% of that, that would be US$100 million.
If company operates in different ways and are very different from one another, then there will be less competition and more room for cooperation. When I started my business, someone asked why I wouldn't learn from my friend Jan Hung-tze's IT Home, whose print versions were available at convenience stores, or from the influential all-digital Tomorrow Times.
I replied that IT Home adopted a bottom-up business model from the application side, while DIGITIMES focused on the supply chain. A few years ago we expanded our focus to the application side, but still the emphasis has remained on the needs of the tech industry.
A few months before COVID broke out, I talked to Jan Hung-tze at a gathering. I told him that he was the "master" who had been able to impress people for everything he had done and every investment he had made, and that I was less capable, and could only focus on one or two areas.
We have embraced different ways, and there may be opportunities for us to work together in a complementary way. Hung-tze told me to count him in my next project - if I have one. For me there are a lot of leverages and diverse development models; there will only be partners in the business journey, not "tough" competitors. And this is the best reason why I like the IT industry.
There are more possibilities in the electronics industry than in other industries, so why should I complain about it?
