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nni.nikkei.co.jp
Sunday, June 10, 2001
Sharp To Shift Receiver Production To China To cut Costs
OSAKA (Nikkei)--Sharp Corp. (6753) plans to shift production of receivers mounted in satellite broadcasting tuners, televisions and VCRs to China in a bid to boost its cost-competitiveness, company sources said Saturday.
The company will raise output capacity by 80% at its joint venture in the country to compensate for the closure of two domestic plants and its Taiwan subsidiary.
Sharp aims to prepare for a further decline in prices of receivers. The price of a digital receiver is now just over 2,000 yen, down nearly half from a year earlier. The company plans to cut costs by 20-30% by shifting production to China.
The joint venture in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, started operating last year a production line of receiver/amplifier units, called RF front ends, with output reaching 1.1 million units a month. The company hopes to raise that figure to 1.6 million units a month by autumn and 2 million units by March 2002 by transferring production facilities from the Taiwan subsidiary and increasing the capacity utilization rate.
The Taiwan unit had turned out 500,000 analog receivers a month before stopping production in spring. It now assembles LCD panels.
The two domestic plants, in Mie Prefecture, had a combined monthly output of 500,000 receivers for use in analog and digital satellite broadcasting, which they produced on consignment from Sharp. The plants will from August produce only experimental products.
Through the consolidation, Sharp hopes to improve productivity by 20%. It also plans to increase local procurement of parts and materials by shifting design and development of commodity-grade products to China.
Investment associated with the production overhaul is estimated at just under 1 billion yen.
(The Nihon Keizai Shimbun Sunday edition) |
