The latest report from J.P. Morgan Securities has upgraded HTC’s stock to a “neutral” rating based on positive news regarding the supply chain for the HTC One. The report claims that supply issues “have significantly improved in the last two weeks,” and J.P. Morgan expects the production of the HTC One to increase to 1.2 million units in April and over 2 million units in May, a significant boost from the 300,000 estimated units produced in March. If HTC One production capacity continues in the same trajectory, HTC should be able to manufacture 3-4 million units per month by mid-summer.
“New vendor qualification, technology transfer and volume increase” are attributed as being the main factors in the production increases for the HTC One, leading us to believe that HTC has started sourcing its custom-built UltraPixel camera module from more than one supplier.
There’s no doubt that the delayed global launch of the HTC One significantly hurt HTC’s chances to gain market share ahead of the Samsung Galaxy S 4 launch. It’s still too early to predict how successful the HTC One will be, but we’re hoping that HTC’s new marketing strategy will bolster demand and show consumers that there’s an amazing alternative to Samsung and Apple’s flagship devices.
Source: Focus Taiwan
