Mediatek - Running out of steam
Mediatek will likely report revenues of only NT$2.1bn in May, down over 20% MoM. The drop, mainly due to cancelled orders of DVD-ROM and CD-ROM chipsets, has been sparked by weak seasonal demand. The expected revenues to remain sluggish throughout June and anticipate 2Q revenues to be flat QoQ (vs original market expectations of 10-15% growth).
Although 3Q of 2002 revenues will likely rebound after the seasonal lull tapers off, coupled with increasing shipments for combo (CD-RW + DVD-ROM) chipsets and slim form factor DVD-ROM chipsets, there are remaining concernes about gross margin compression on CD-RW and DVD-ROM chipsets in 2H02. Note that VIA and ALi are slated to launch their own CD-RW and DVD-ROM chipsets in 2H02 which could ignite a price war on these products...