Global shipments of tablets are estimated to grow 7.8% sequentially to 45.58 million units in the fourth quarter of 2017 due mainly to brisk market demand for entry-level branded tablets, according to Digitimes Research.The research report showed that global tablet shipments, including brand and white-box models, came to 42.29 million units in the third quarter of 2017, higher than market expectations due to seasonal factors. With the robust performance in the third and fourth quarters, the annual shrinkage of global tablet shipments is expected to narrow significantly in 2017, and a stable shipment performance is projected for 2018.Driven by their promotional campaigns, global brand vendors saw their total tablet shipments soar 16.3% sequentially to 29.99 million units in the third quarter of 2017. Among them, Apple witnessed its entry-level iPad, launched in early 2017 with a price tag of US$329, sustain booming sales momentum in the third quarter, making it enjoy higher shipment volume in the quarter than seen a year earlier. Amazon also saw its tablet shipments perform better than expected due to its Prime Day promotional campaigns.Global shipments of white-box tablets amounted to 12.30 million units in the third quarter, showing a whopping 61.8% growth over a quarter earlier. But squeezed by the low-priced branded models and affected by Google's increasingly strict validation on white-box tablets, smaller white-box makers have seen their shipments undermined significantly and total global white-box tablet shipments for the third quarter still represented a sharp annual fall of 22.2% as a result.Brand tablet vendors are maintaining their growth momentum in the fourth quarter due to year-end buying season, with their aggregate shipments estimated to rise 13% on quarter to reach over 33 million units. But shipment momentum of white-box tablets is expected to be squeezed down in the fourth quarter as a number of clients already required advanced shipments a quarter earlier.

Global server shipments are estimated to surge 7.1% on year to 12.65 million units in 2017 and post a higher growth of 8.5% in 2018, due mainly to expanding demand for datacenter servers and significant growth momentum expected in the China market, according to Digitimes Research.The report said that aggregate revenues scored by Taiwan makers of servers, server motherboards, storage devices and related system network equipment are estimated to soar 15.4% on year to NT$676.2 billion (US$22.38 billion) in 2017, and further shoot up 16% in 2018.Combined server shipments by Taiwan makers are projected at 11.6 million units in 2017 in an annual growth of 15.8%, and are expected to see another 10% annual increase in 2018. Their combined share of the global server market is likely to trend upward thanks to increasing orders from datacenters and the decreasing server shipments by EMS (electronic manufacturing service) firms.Among major Taiwan server suppliers, Inventec and Wistron (including Wiwynn) will each see their annual shipments reach 2.6 million units in 2017, and they will both challenge the goal of three million units in 2018, Digitimes Research estimates.Server shipments are expected to grow in 2018Photo: Digitimes file photo

Singapore-based Sesto Robotics is an automated guided vehicle (AGV) and intelligent mobile robot (IMR) developer that recently participated in Semicon Taiwan 2017 to push its products into the Taiwan market.The company's CEO Michael Leong pointed out that Sesto's AGV products are mainly targeting the semiconductor industry as the company has been spending most of its effort studying semiconductor manufacturing processes and procedures for 3-4 years in order to enable its AGVs to coordinate with the transportation processes of the semiconductor industry.The studying is an ongoing process and Sesto intends to continue the work so it is able to provide its latest innovations to customers, Leong noted."We are also working with our clients to customize software pre-installed in our AGVs for them to coordinate with the clients' existing manufacturing equipment," said Leong, adding that the AGVs also feature a system to track all the movements to prevent erroneous deliveries that can significantly raise costs.Sesto's IMRs are capable of supporting robotic arms from major suppliers such as Yamaha's Scara series and can support both 4-axis and 7-axis arms.The company also obtains orders from cargo delivery service providers, hospitals and manufacturing factories, but semiconductor companies are still the major sources of its orders and its R&D plan is also mainly focusing on the area.In the past, most companies would put strips on the ground at their facilities to help guide robots to reach their destinations, but Sesto is using a high-precision laser-based navigation system to assist AGVs' movements. The AGVs' laser is able to detect the surrounding environment and then use the gathered data to compare with its internal maps to identify its location and plan the moving route. The AGVs also feature support for Internet of Things (IoT) functionality in order to interact with other automation equipment.For the IoT support, Sesto's software is capable of communicating with automatic doors and elevators if clients have demand. The company can basically customize its software to satisfy most of its clients' demand. Demand for the elevator control is more commonly seen from clients with smaller production bases that need extra floors to create space and Sesto's AGVs are able to easily adapt to such requirements due to their flexible design.Compared to an one-floor building, to serve in a factory with multiple floors, the AGVs require extra technologies as their internal maps need to be switched based on what floor they are on. Sesto has already been developing the technology for quite a while and with continued improvement of the related processes, it allows the company to be completely capable of handling the issue, Leong stated.Currently, Sesto has a R&D team composed of 40 engineers and technicians in Singapore responsible for creating and updating the Sesto AGVs' software and systems.Prior to the entry to the Taiwan market, Singapore is Sesto's main market, but after entering Taiwan, the company has found that demands from Taiwan's clients are much different from those of its clients in Singapore. However, Leong believes the differences may not be a drawback for its business and expects its partnerships with Taiwan-based clients to provide experience for the company to grow and build new technologies.Sesto is currently partnering with Taiwan-based Happy Pole for product distribution in the Taiwan market and has already established some partnerships with semiconductor players in China.Sesto CEO Michael Leong.Photo: Joseph Tsai, Digitimes, October 2017

2017 is definitely a highly volatile year for PV industry in terms of technology advancement, market demand, and international trade barrier. At 2017 PV Taiwan held recently, Andreas Liebheit, the President of Heraeus Photovoltaics, broadly talked about the issues of technology trend, market competition, as well as how Heraeus maintains its leading edge at the rapidly evolving PV market, in an interview with Digitimes."First, from supply side, we've seen very strong business growth this year," Liebheit said. "Take China's golden week holiday in early October as an example, we received rush orders and decided to cancel vacations to meet customers' demands. In September alone, our paste shipment has increased 50% compared to that of last month, and we have 50% YoY sales growth rate as of today. Rush orders and the last minute change reflect the dynamics of the market. For us, we need to be very flexible to satisfy customers' requirements quickly."Battle between mono and poly continues, but mono will surpass poly next yearAt the technology side, Liebheit called it "almost crazy" to describe the rapid emergence of diamond-wire-cut (DWC) multicrystaline solar cells this year. The trend also tests Heraeus' capability of delivering new products in large volumes in a short time.Heraeus announced the introduction of a new paste specifically designed for DWC multicrystaline solar cells at PV Taiwan. The SOL9651D series front-side silver paste can help solar cell companies improve cell efficiency, address costs and stay ahead of rapid technology developments. "For the various DWC multi cell processes, including additive/MCCE/RIE-texturing, our new product can all support. Due to different ingredients, a DWC paste product actually means three products. Meeting the diverse requirements is a proof of our development capability," he said.From the perspective of technology competition, it is expected that the battle between poly and mono cell technologies will continue and change rapidly. Just two months ago, mono seems to be prevailing; however, with the quick rise of DWC technology, poly makes a strong comeback again.According to Liebheit, mono technology is mainly used in the high efficiency markets such as Japan and Europe, and strong in the rooftop market in China, while the US market has both of them. But at present, Europe market is weak. For example, Germany is waiting for the finalizing of energy policy for next year. At the same time, the maturity of DWC technology has brought new opportunity for multicrystaline cells to further improve efficiency. As a result, the market changes very quickly in a short time. As the paste required for these two technologies are different, this makes Heraeus very busy to keep up with the trend.He pointed out that now companies have stronger incentives to invest in technology development because large-scale companies have more resources than before and it is clear that high-efficiency product can have much better price in the market. As a result, PV technology is advancing at an even quicker pace than before.In a long term, cell efficiency will keep improving. It's now the stage of PERC 1.0 and the industry is heading towards PERC 2.0, as we've seen there is still lots of room to improve in terms of material and process for PERC. Also, we've seen the new comeback of MWT technology. Mono cell efficiency could further be increased by combing MWT with PERC.At present, several companies are developing PERC 2.0 technology. It's expected that PERC mono products with efficiency over 22% will be launched next year, and 23% products are to be seen two years later. Meanwhile, N-Type technology keeps progressing. The industry is vibrant with research and development energy.Though DWC is coming on strong, Liebheit believed that mono can secure its advantage in high-efficiency market and expands around 10% of market share every year. Mono accounts for 45% share this year, and it is expected that it will surpass poly and increase to 55% next year and 65% the following year. But poly products won't be disappeared from the market, which will still have advantage in low-cost applications. In a long term, share ratio of mono and poly may maintain at 7:3.Advanced technologies always drive the development of PV industryThe merger of three major Taiwan PV cell makers, Gintech, Solartech, and Neo Solar Power attracted lots of attention at PV Taiwan.The positive effect of this merger is that the newly merged company should invest more in new technology development after they gain government fund. In the past, Taiwan makers had technology advantages over those in China. However, the advantages are disappearing, and there are no obvious differences between them.As PV industry accelerates the pace of developing new technology, Taiwan makers should embrace for new opportunities and dare to invest in important new technologies such as N-type and HJT. In particular, Taiwan is a powerhouse in worldwide semiconductor industry. Companies should leverage related technologies to move into HJT market to gain footholds in the specific market.On the other hand, the merger also shows that Taiwan companies are willing to talk to each other, working out solutions together. As the domestic market is growing, it is expected to bring new opportunities for Taiwan makers. Of course, there are still challenges ahead, but it's a definitely positive development for Taiwan's PV industry.Keep the leading edge with technology innovationLiebheit doesn't think that pursing economic scale is the best policy for the industry, so he is not interested in acquiring competitors in the paste market, given the fact that one plus one may not be bigger than two.When talking about market competition, he said, "Though we are the market leader, we never ignore our competitors. What makes us stand out in the market is that we are the only paste company that develops and produces glass, the key ingredient in paste, on our own. Other companies buy glass from third-party vendors, so that they can't differentiate their products.""We have seen many Chinese paste makers rise and decline quickly. Some companies that prospered once are now in financial difficulties. This is because that they gained shares quickly after its single product was adopted, but was eliminated in half year for losing shares again. At Heraeus, we not only improve our product efficiency every half year, but also keep abreast of the diverse and rapid-evolving technology requirements. This is a high barrier for other companies to overcome.""Today's market is very different from that of three years ago. It's getting more difficult to keep technology innovation. Moreover, every customer may have different process requirements. We need to have even stronger resources to meet customers' custom demands, and we are far leading to our competitors in terms of the scale of our sales and technical support team."Achieve 100 ton locally produced silver paste shipment in TaiwanAnother important news that Heraeus announced at PV Taiwan is that, after establishing operations in Taiwan in Nov, 2015, the company recently achieved a milestone by shipping its one-hundredth ton of locally produced silver paste in the Taiwan this year.Liebheit believes the company's growth and success in Taiwan is directly related to strategic investments made in Taiwan during the past few years. He points to the Applications Engineering Center and R&D facility as two critical collaboration platforms to deliver high-performance silver paste faster to its Taiwan customers.Providing customized paste services for customers for many years. Heraeus has accumulated rich and in-depth process experiences. After one-year of preparation, it officially established consulting business in April this year to help customers further improve cell efficiency."By providing free analysis for customers first, we found that almost 70% of them still have room to improve their product efficiency, and will then commit to customers how we can help them. We have done ten consulting cases in China and Taiwan this year with excellent results. So we will try to expand the business and reach more customers."Liebheit stressed that Heraeus setup a dedicated team to provide consulting service and is the only company in the paste market to do this. Even if competitors would like to follow suit, Heraeus still leads them by one year. This fully reflects Heraeus'long-term policy, "always one year ahead", to maintain its leading position in the market.Heraeus recently achieved a milestone by shipping its one-hundredth ton of locally produced silver paste in Taiwan this year.Heraeus announced the introduction of a new paste specifically designed for DWC multicrystaline solar cells at PV Taiwan. The SOL9651D series front-side silver paste can help solar cell companies improve cell efficiency, address costs and stay ahead of rapid technology developments.

Taiwan-based makers shipped 21.051 million LCD monitors in third-quarter 2017, increasing 5.1% sequentially and 1.0% on year to take up 67.0% of the global total. The shipment value totaled US$2.313 billion, up 2.4% sequentially and 8.8% on year, according to Digitimes Research.Of the Taiwan makers' third-quarter shipments, 22-inch and above models accounted for 52.5%; and 18-inch to below 22-inch 43.8%, Digitimes Research indicated.TPV Technology was the largest maker accounting for over 50% of the shipments, followed by Qisda, Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai) and Wistron.Global shipments from all makers in 2017 are projected at 120.025 million units, slipping 3.4% on year, and will keep dropping at 2.2% CAGR during 2017-2022.

Global shipments of notebooks (excluding detachable 2-in-1 models) declined 4.2% on year to 40.79 million units in the third quarter of 2017 as weakening demand in the consumer sector and a corporate reorganization at Asustek Computer offset gains resulting from better-than-expected Chromebook sales and brisk sales of gaming models in China, according to Digitimes Research.Notebook shipments are expected to see a boost in the fourth quarter as it is traditionally a peak season, fueled by year-end holiday sales and Double Eleven online shopping day in China. Google is gearing up efforts to promote Chromebooks in the consumer market, and Microsoft and other brands are promoting notebook sales, including leasing, in the business sector.Global notebook shipments are expected to reach 41.72 million units in the fourth quarter, up 2.3% on quarter and 0.5% from a year earlier, Digitimes Research estimates. The slow pace of the shipment growth for the fourth quarter indicates that the current rebound in the notebook market is coming to an end.For individual brands, HP will maintain its leading market position and see its shipments reach a new high in the fourth quarter, powered by brisk sales both in the consumer and business sectors. Lenovo will rank second as its shipments will resume momentum following the completion of its recent management reshuffle.Dell will take third position as the vendor currently ships over 60% of its products to the business segment, where the sector growth is lower than that for the consumer market. Apple alone will see its shipments decline in the fourth quarter due to the absence of new models and the squeeze effects caused by the availability of iPhone X.Asustek Computer will see shipments rebound in the fourth quarter, outracing Acer to capture fifth position. Xiaomi Technology has been performing steadily and will outperform Japan-based vendors to become number nine.Among Taiwan-based ODMs, Compal Electronics and Pegatron will perform relatively strong in the fourth quarter. Compal's fourth-quarter shipments are likely to grow 30% sequentially, buoyed by increasing orders from Acer and HP. Meanwhile, Pegatron will manage to lower its shipment gap against Wistron thanks to increasing orders from brand clients.

The development of on-device edge computing technology is heating up as related makers are seeking technology breakthroughs to address the concerns of privacy and protection of sensitive date when applying deep learning under cloud applications and to lower costs for enterprises to adjust its internal IT infrastructure to cope with cloud environments; or to challenge the restrictions caused by latency, Internet bandwidth limits and insufficient network infrastructure for development of smart applications such as computer vision (CV) and self-driving automobiles.In consideration of power consumption and performance, deep learning attached to end devices currently focuses on inference, which is normally done by embedding a training model in the form of chip into terminal-end devices. However, Google has been implementing its Federated Learning as a decentralized data training architecture, so that terminal devices will be no longer working mainly on deep learning inference.Federated Learning also allows end devices to perform small-scale data training reducing bandwidth demand and the burden of cloud servers, while protecting privacy and sensitive data. It also helps improve the efficiency and speed of the circulation from training to inference, and therefore enhancing edge computing.While Qualcomm has rolled out its neural process engine (NPE) to enable AI on smartphones via heterogeneous computing, the incorporation of AI chips into system on chip (SoC) products has become a prevailing trend. The introduction of integrated AI chips on application processors by Apple and Huawei will encourage other chipmakers including Qualcomm and MediaTek to follow suit, Digitimes Research believes.Meanwhile, a number of IP providers including Synopsys, CEVA, Cadence, Verisilicon all have come out with DSP (digital signal processor)-based embedded solutions, which some of them are made of a 16nm process, for the CV market, where they will meet competition from Intel and Nvidia, especially after Intel has acquired Mobileye and Movidius to cross into autonomous driving and image recognition sectors.

Japan-based Nichia recorded the highest revenues among all main LED packaging service providers worldwide in first-half 2017, with sales reaching JPY132.79 billion (US$1.142 billion), up 4.9% on year, according to Digitimes Research.Germany-based Osram Opto Semiconductors ranked second with US$463.5 million, up 11.1% on year. Third-place Korea-based Seoul Semiconductor had US$442.1 million, up 12.1%, followed by Taiwan's Everlight Electronics with US$427.7 million, down 2.8%.The other major players' revenues for the period were: China-based MLS, US$415.6 million, up 66.3%; Korea-based LG Innotek, US$291.0 million, down 4.1%; US-based Cree, 274.7 million, down 11.2%; China-based Foshan Nationstar Optoelectronics, US$202.7 million, up 50.0%; Taiwan's Lextar Electronics, US$192.7 million, down 11.7%; and China's Hongli Zhihui, US$169.1 million, up 65.4%.The China-based makers' significant revenue growths were driven by major production capacity expansions.

Developments of the optical lens industry have always been in close connection with those in end application markets, advancing from digital cameras and projectors in the early years to smartphones in recent years. Taiwan has formed a complete industry cluster supplying upstream blank glass, midstream lenses and downstream camera modules. With dual cameras and 3D sensing in smartphones becoming the trend in addition to burgeoning applications such as automotive cameras, virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), robot vision and drones, the optical lens industry is looking forward to a bright future.Envisioning booming opportunities, optical lens producers are all looking to increase production capacity. As they tend to develop their own production equipment through independent research by their automation teams for protection of their trade secret, rather than purchasing equipment from suppliers, to increase capacity, they need to think of ways to enhance the equipment's ability to respond to quick production line changes and fully satisfy precision control requirements. Camera modules have diverse configurations and require precise assembly work. Without careful calculations on the positions and bonding angles between lenses, there may be optical axis misalignment resulting in blurry images and poor picture quality.Synchronous action across control cards is key to boosting production capacityUnder the circumstances, optical lens producers face the same challenge of how to implement synchronous motion control on the production line to achieve high-performance and high-precision control. Most manufacturers are used to satisfying their production needs by expanding motion control cards. The increase in the number of motion control cards means there are more axes that need to be controlled. Therefore, synchronous action across axes (cards) holds the key to increasing capacity, which is unlikely to happen due to limitation of the traditional architecture.Furthermore, with a limited number of I/O slots, industrial computers can hardly support continuing motion control card expansions. As a result, vendors have no choice but to keep buying more industrial computers, which imposes burden in terms of both costs and space. This is another challenge for the optical lens industry.Chia-Wei Yang, market development manager, automation business center, ADLINK, commented optical lens producers are phasing in EtherCAT solutions to overcome the above-mentioned challenges and enhance production flexibility. They hope to use "out-of-box" control and connect all EtherCAT masters and slaves with the same Ethernet cable so different axes under the control of different motion control cards have a chance to move in synchronization. Moreover, with the same Ethernet cable, optical lens producers can add new slave equipment at any time to address the needs for capacity expansion. Taking ADLINK's EtherCAT solution for example, up to 64 axes can operate in synchronization and the availability of 10,000 DI/O and 2,500 AI/O allows ample expandability.Using machine vision to guarantee reliable defect inspectionSome users may wonder that although capacity increase relies on hardware expansion, software changes are also required. This is ADLINK's strength, creating customer trust. ADLINK provides APS Function Library so customers can reuse existing software packages while also customizing some functions available from APS, such as redefining speed and loop and helical interpolation to accelerate software packaging or enrich software features. On the APS basis, customers can easily and flexibly keep up with evolving operation needs whether by expanding control cards or modifying software programs.Yang pointed out ADLINK is able to come out ahead in optical lens producers' selection process because its solution not only provides excellent compatibility with third-party EtherCAT equipment (e.g. motors) but also enables a greater advantage by integrating machine vision. After a work piece enters the assembly line, a typical production flow includes the steps of alignment, processing, compiling production history and finally defect inspection. Machine vision is used for inspection during the whole process, including simple alignment check and complicated AOI defect check. ADLINK has accumulated 16 years of experience in machine vision technologies and offers complete products including capture cards and compact vision systems which have passed meticulous testing to guarantee compatibility with ADLINK Talos EtherCAT master controllers and a high level of integration.It should also be mentioned that in-house optical production lines undergo constant changes to accommodate diverse production tasks for different devices. Vendors generally desire equipment with smaller footprint to save space as well as wiring costs. Seeing that industrial computers are generally too bulky, ADLINK especially introduces the new Talos-2000 controller featuring compact footprint, highly integrated machine vision and compatibility with third-party EtherCAT equipment. Many optical lens producers are enthusiastically embracing Talos-2000 as it enables precise motion control through highly synchronized actions, supports optimal flexibility and adapts to quick production line changes.ADLINK stays on top of customer to keep improving product usability and thereby develops new functions in the APS Function Library for customers to make use of. It will soon add a new function to support flexible editing of EtherCAT slave stations. If customers need to change their EtherCAT topology and correspondingly modify the software programs in the future, they can do so at the slave stations without any problem.Please visit ADLINK for more information.ADLINK hopes to use "out-of-box" control and connect all EtherCAT masters and slaves with the same Ethernet cable so different axes under the control of different motion control cards have a chance to move in synchronization.

With regard to the development of smartphone-use panels, Taiwan's top-three TFT LCD panel makers all have been focusing on all-screen displays with an 18:9 aspect ratio recently. The new 6G LTPS fabs of AU Optronics (AUO) and Innolux in Taiwan have entered volume production recently, and a new 6G line of Chunghua Picture Tubes (CPT) in China is expected to come online shortly. CPT's 6G line also plans to develop IGZO panels later.In terms of technology development, Taiwan's major flat panel players are eyeing flexible panels, with AUO being able to roll out prototypes of 4mm radius curved displays enabling to be flexed continuously for over one million times.The development of 18:9 handset-use panels comes as smartphone clients are shifting to focus on all-screen models. The current mainstream all-screen panels rolled out by Taiwan makers include 5.7- and 5.99-inch sizes, which are the extended 18:9 versions of traditional 5.2- and 5.5-inch 16:9 panels. Meanwhile, the all-screen panels are available mainly in FHD+ (2,160 by 1,080 pixels) and HD+ (1,440 by 720 pixels) resolutions.Both AUO and Innolux have been focusing on producing FHD+ all-screen panels from their 6G LTPS lines, while CPT is rolling out HD+ 18:9 panels using a-Si TFT LCD process.While the adoption of polyimide (PI) substrates has also become a mainstream for the development of flexible display technology, major players have also continued their efforts to advance their thin-film packaging technology to enhance the bendability and practicality of their flexible panels.