Hon Hai Precision announced strong profit growth for the second consecutive quarter. Lucrative sales of artificial intelligence hardware helped offset the impact of weak demand for iPhones and electronic products.
The world's largest Apple iPhone assembler announced that in the fourth quarter ending December, net profit increased 33% to NT$53.2 billion (US$1.7 billion). Analysts estimated an average of 43.8 billion NTD.
The company's stock price has risen by more than 15% this year, and investors' optimism that Hon Hai will benefit from artificial intelligence servers and hardware is heating up. Hon Hai was not among the first companies to benefit from the AI boom, but investors and analysts believe the company could gain more and more market share in such businesses. Earlier, it was reported that HPE would hand over to long-term partner Hon Hai to be responsible for the OEM AI server order.
Hon Hai expects the AI server business to grow by more than 40% this year. Liu Yangwei, chairman of Hon Hai, said during the earnings call that Hon Hai's AI server market share target is 40%. Hon Hai expects a year-on-year decline in revenue for the first quarter, a year-on-year increase in revenue for the 2024 fiscal year, and expects chip business sales to exceed NT$100 billion in 2024.