iPad銷量大幅下滑 中國工廠倒閉

Coretronic Corp, a Taiwan-based company that manufactures panels for United States tech giant Apple Inc, is halting production at one of its mainland factories due to dwindling iPad sales.

中強光電是臺灣一家爲美國技術大亨——蘋果公司生產鑲嵌板的企業。近日，由於iPad銷量不佳，導致該公司內地一家工廠閉門停產。

The plant, located in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, has stopped operations and filed applications to liquidate its assets, the National Business Daily said on Tuesday.

每日經濟新聞報週二稱，坐落在江蘇省南京市的工廠現在已經停產，正在存檔清算資產。

The factory produces liquid crystal display backlight modules for iPads. It has more than 1,500 employees, and churned out 1 million units a month at its peak. It was set up in 2005 by Coretronic (Nanjing) Co Ltd.

這家工廠在2005年時由中強光有限公司建設，爲iPad生產液晶顯示器背光模塊。該廠有1500名員工，最高記錄每月能夠生產一百萬個零件。

The National Business Daily said the factory has no orders to process after it manufactured the last batch of products earlier this month. It is expected to complete liquidation by the end of this year, the report said.

每日經濟新聞報稱，在這月月初完成生產最後一筆訂單後，該廠便再沒有了生產任務。據預測，在今年底之前，清算工作即可完成。

A human resources official at the Nanjing plant confirmed to China Daily the factory had gone out of business, but declined to offer more details, like whether its workers will be laid off.

南京工廠的人力資源部門向中國日報證實工廠確實已經沒有訂單，但是拒絕透露更多細節，例如是否員工將會被解僱。

Coretronic was not immediately available for comment. The company is one of the top three panel manufacturers in the world. Specializing in making LCD backlight modules and optical devices, it also runs at least six other production bases in the mainland, including in Shanghai and Guangzhou.

中強光電沒有立即給出解釋。該公司是世界上生產鑲嵌板的三巨頭之一，其特長領域是背光模組和光學器件。其在內地還有至少六家生產基地，包括上海和廣州。

The closure comes amid weakening global demand for iPads. Data from research firm International Data Corporation show that in the second quarter of this year, iPad sales dropped by 17.9 percent to about 10 million units, marking the sixth straight quarterly decline for Apple's tablet business.

此次工廠關閉的直接原因是iPad銷量下滑。國際數據公司的資料顯示今年的第二季度，iPad銷量下滑了17.9%，只售出了一千萬件，標誌着蘋果的平板電腦業務連續第六個季度下滑。

Gene Cao, a senior analyst at market research firm Forrester Research Inc, said the poor performance of iPads will continue in the upcoming quarters.

曹金妮是市場研究公司—福雷斯特研究公司的資深研究員，她認爲，蘋果iPad銷量下滑將會持續到下個季度。

"When Apple released bigger-screen smartphones such as iPhone Plus, it was fully aware of the possible encroachment on iPads," Cao said. "After all, when handsets with large screens are good enough to meet consumer demand for entertainment, why would they need a tablet?"

“當蘋果公司發佈如iPhone Plus大屏智能手機的時候，就應該認識到這會衝擊到iPad的銷量”。曹金妮說。“畢竟，當手持大屏電子設備已經能夠滿足娛樂需要的時候，誰還會需要平板設備呢？”

What further hurts the sales of iPads is that customers rarely renew their tablets. It is normal for users to buy a new smartphone within a year, but they are less willing to change their current iPads for a newer version, experts said.

專家認爲，已持有平板設備的消費者遲遲不換新設備同樣給iPad的銷量帶來衝擊。對於用戶來說，一年換一個手機很正常，但是他們很少會每年換最新版的iPad。

To breathe new life into its iPad business, Apple launched iPad Pro in September. It is a bigger version of iPad with a 12.9 inch screen. The product, equipped with a smart keyboard and a stylus, is designed to perform like a desktop computer.

爲了給iPad注入生機，蘋果公司在九月份發佈了iPad Pro。這是比iPad更大的版本，屏幕有12.9英寸。此產品配備智能鍵盤和智能筆，像一臺電腦一樣。

"iPad Pro may be a major growth driver for Apple's tablet lineup in the next year, but it is targeting corporate clients, which means the demand will be far smaller than that for iPads, which is positioned as a consumer electronics product," Cao said.

曹金妮說：“iPad Pro將會是明年蘋果公司平板產品線的主力軍，但是它只針對公司客戶，這也就以爲着它的需求度比iPad要小的多，定位爲電子消費產品。”