Taiwan's presence in the global handset market continues to shrink. Its share of global shipments is expected to drop below 2% in the first quarter of 2017.
The notebook market has been showing signs of recovery, with Taiwan makers seeing their first on-year shipment growth since first-quarter 2012 in fourth-quarter 2016.
Digitimes Research expects global application processor (AP) shipments to increase more than 8% in 2017 and surpass the 1.9 billion mark, with smartphones remaining the main application. After slumping in 2015, Qualcomm returned to form in 2016 and will continue leading the market in 2017, as other players continue playing catch up and scramble for funds to invest in more diverse applications such as IoT and other smart end-device applications.
Taiwan handset makers had a disappointing third quarter in 2016 as a result of decreased ODM orders and low-than-expected performances of Taiwan's brand vendors.
Taiwan-based notebook makers saw significant increases in their shipments in the third quarter of 2016, as clients prepared for the year-end holiday shopping season. The fourth quarter will also mark the first time they have seen on-year shipment growth in four years.
Notebook brand vendors started replenishing their stocks in the second quarter after digesting their inventory in the previous quarter. The replenishment demand boosted their Taiwan-based ODM partners' shipments.
Taiwan's handset brand vendors and ODMs both saw sharp declines in their shipments in the first quarter of 2016. The brand vendors' shipments will improve in the second quarter due to launches of new models, but the ODM shipments will drop further.
The global notebook market continued to slump in the first quarter, with shipments going down. Vendors were less interested in boosting shipment volume than in improving their profitability by focusing more on midrange and high-end models.
Taiwan's handset ODMs all saw significant decreases in their shipments in the fourth quarter of 2015, as clients reduced orders. Its handset brand vendors saw better results, but the increases in their shipments were hardly enough to offset the ODMs' poor results.
