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Motherboard Makers to Suffer Sales Downturn for Desktop PCs

2008/11/12 | By Quincy Liang

Taipei, Nov. 12, 2008 (CENS)--Global shipments of notebook PCs have been growing rapidly in recent years to exceed those of desktop PCs as market mainstay in the third quarter, boding a possible shipment decrease for the first time of the latter in 2009, according to Intel's central- processor shipment report.

Some of Taiwan's motherboard makers have continuously streamlined their workforce to counter the market changes, according to industry sources.

Even Asustek Computer Inc., the world's largest supplier of computer motherboards, recently reported that its fourth-quarter revenue might drop by 10% from the third quarter. It's estimated that the global sales of desktop PCs in 2009 would shrink by 5% to 10%, further aggravating impacts on motherboard makers.

Intel's third-quarter shipment report showed that notebook PC shipment for the quarter already exceeded that of desktop PCs, and the sales gap would widen at a fast pace. Industry sources estimated that the global desktop PC shipments would stay at the level of 150 million units this year, similar to that in 2007, but might decline by 5% to 10% next year.

Some major motherboard makers, including Giga-Byte Technology Co., Ltd. and Micro-Star International Co. (MSI), have reportedly cut their workforces. Pegatron Corp., a spin-off from Asustek for PC-related manufacturing, is also reportedly to freeze personnel recruitment to cut operating costs.

Almost all major motherboard makers have diversified their product lines into notebook PC market. In addition to the long-cultivated Asustek, Elitegroup Computer Systems Co., Ltd. (ECS) has acquired notebook PC maker Uniwill Polytech Inc.; MSI expects to ship about 2.5 million units of own-brand notebook PCs; Giga-Byte has been actively developing business deployments in both notebook PC and module interconnect device (MID) markets.