Posted on Tuesday, September 07 2004 @ 21:29 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
Taiwan's biggest motherboard maker Asus has big plans to conquer the mobile phone market. A company executive said that they plan to capture a 10% share of the handset market within 15 months after gaining a foothold in the consumer sector.
"We hope to attain one of the top five positions in the home market next year by boosting our product portfolio," Benson Lin, general manager of Asustek's Asia-Pacific division, said yesterday.
"As we have successfully expanded into the laptop computer sector, we believe we can repeat that success," Lin said.
Asustek rolled out its second mobile phone under its own brandname, the J101, in early June after unveiling the J100 in December. Within three months of the launch, Lin said, the company had already sold 30,000 units of the J101, a clamshell phone equipped with a 0.3 megapixel camera.
"The market demand has exceeded our expectations," he said.
By the end of this year Asus plans to release at least three new models, including one with a 1 megapixel camera.
In addition to its own brand, Asustek has recently started making phones for Chinese home-appliance giant Haier Group
Asustek said it shipped a combined 100,000 handsets in the first eight months of the year. The company hopes to sell a total of 250,000 units this year and at least 1 million next year, Lin said. This excludes its original-equipment manufacturing business.
More info and some opinions from market analysts at
Taipeitimes