Taiwan panel makers' large-size (9-inch and above) shipments in the fourth quarter of 2013 reached 64.3 million, down 0.4% on quarter, according to Digitimes Research.

Shipments of tablet-use application processors in China grew 8.3% on quarter and 19.5% on year in the fourth quarter of 2013, driven by the launch of new chips for tablet vendors to roll out new models during the year-end holiday season, according to Digitimes Research.

China-based Xiaomi has announced that the company plans to ship 40 million smartphones in 2014. But Digitimes Research believes the vendor is unlikely to achieve the goal as many of its competitors have started establishing online shopping operations to sell their own-brand products with impressive hardware specifications at low prices - a business model similar to Xiaomi's.

Taiwan-based ODMs/OEMs will ship 34.623 million notebooks for a global market share of 85% during the first quarter of 2014, with shipments decreasing 11.2% on quarter and 4.3% on year, according to Digitimes Research.

Asustek Computer unveiled three ZenFone-series smartphones at CES 2014 and will initially launch the models in the Taiwan, China and Southeast Asia markets in March with prices comparable to low-cost models offered by China-based Xiaomi Technology and Huawai...

China white-box players have not been able to lower their Wi-Fi-based tablets' prices since the third quarter of 2013 because there is no room for further reductions in their BOM costs.

Shipments of application processors for smartphone applications to China grew 2.4% sequentially and 20.8% on year in the fourth quarter of 2013, according to data compiled by Digitimes Research.

Because of Intel's low-price processor solutions and increased demand from both the consumer and enterprise markets, Global notebook shipments in the fourth quarter of 2013 rose 4.1% sequentially, but dropped 5.9% on year, better than Digitimes Research's original forecast.

Thanks to falling prices and satisfactory functionalities, entry-level tablets from brand vendors has been undermining demand for mid-range and high-end models, and they formed a main driver of the tablet market during the year-end shopping season in 2013...

The global IC foundry sector is forecast to increase almost 9% in output value in 2014, while output value for the overall semiconductor industry will grow by a smaller 5.2%, according to Digitimes Research.