Tag: Stan Shih

Acer turns in big loss

acer-w3Taiwanese PC maker Acer said that it lost $274 million in the fourth quarter of 2013.

That includes a chunk of money set aside to pay for depreciated stock as well as a provision of money to lay off seven percent of its staff worldwide. Executives will have to endure a 30 percent reduction in their salaries from now on.

Acer has brought in retired founder Stan Shih in a bid to turn the company around – its sales fell by 16.2 percent in 2013 compared to the year before.

Most of its woes are caused by the decline in PC sales, and it appears from the stock write-off that applies to Windows based touch notebooks.

Acer turns to cloud for inspiration

acer-logo-ceTroubled Taiwanese PC manufacturer Acer believes its future lies in the cloud.

Acer has been hit by the general decline of PC sales and recently Stan Shih, its founder, was hauled out of retirement while a number of senior executives clocked out of the operation.

According to Taiwanese wires, Acer’s spanking new CEO, Jason Chen, told journos at a press conference that it would concentrate on a concept called “Build your own Cloud”.

That, according to Acer, is different from private clouds which use public clouds, really.

Acer will weld the build your own cloud concept to tablets, to PCs and and to notebooks.

And, this is not an April Fool’s joke, it will raise salaries on the 1st of April and give year end bonuses but not performance bonuses, said Digitimes.

Acer takes axe to management

acer-logo-ceStan Shih, who came out of retirement to rescue Acer from its parlous state, has apparently been busy since his return.

Smartphone supremo Chen Guowei has apparently left Acer to spend more time with his family.  Guowei was in charge of Acer’s business unit in mainland China.

And the net has spread wider, according to Taiwanese wire Digitimes, the head of EMEA operations, Walter Deppeler, is set to leave the company too.

The company plans to cut as many as seven percent of its global workforce.  Like other PC manufacturers, Acer has been hit by a drop in demand for X86 based systems and a widespread move to smartphones and tablets that aren’t Acer tablets.

Stan Shih returns in Acer reshuffle

Acer's Stan ShihThe founder of Acer – Stan Shih – has returned to the company he founded as chairman and interim president.

That follows CEO and chairman JT Wang stepping down, along with president Jim Wong.

Acer has been particularly hard hit by the slump in PC sales over several quarters and we guess the return of Shih is seen by the board as giving the company’s fortunes a blip.

Shih saw Acer’s fortunes rise during the 1990s as he turned the company from yet another PC manufacturer to become a global player competing with the likes of Dell, HP and Lenovo.

He retired some years ago and observers see little respite in PC performance as people move away from notebooks to tablets and smartphones.

Acer’s Shih declares doom for Wintel alliance

shihceAcer founder Stan Shih has turned on the Microsoft-Intel alliance, claiming that its PC empire will eventually fail because management is too greedy.

Speaking at a Taipei media conference, Shih said Wintel is doomed because both Microsoft and Intel keep too high a share of the profits for themselves, leading other players towards emerging rivals like Google’s ecosystem.

Shih claimed the Wintel alliance is no longer profitable for partners, and IT players are increasingly turning elsewhere. He said it wasn’t Google’s open platform driving companies to its ecosystem, suggesting instead it was a systemic flaw with Microsoft and Intel themselves.

He compared Google’s platform to Linux. Although the latter is open, it has not been driving similar adoption rates. The key here is profit, which Google understands.

For Taiwan’s technology sector, Shih believes that more investment needs to go into arts, software and technologies, to keep one of the country’s top economic drivers healthy.

Microsoft’s Nokia buy could have been the correct choice, Shih added, as long as the deal leads to value for companies, shareholders, consumers and partners. He refused to comment on rumours that Acer may be for sale, although earlier he admitted he’s neutral about the idea, Digitimes reports.