HTC forecasts stormy future, laments Apple S3 defeat

Taiwan smartphone maker HTC has written off any hopes for sales growth this quarter citing cooling demand in a weakened global economy and fierce competition from rivals. At the same time, HTC confirmed it is re-evaluating its acquisition of S3 Graphics from VIA after the graphics biz lost a patent dispute against Apple this …

[Christopher Rogers]

Bloody yanks

You'd expect them to side with Apple.

[Giles Jones]

They're well within their rights to sue in other countries they compete in.

[Anonymous Coward]

Formosa Plastics

Can someone explain please. VIA and HTC are owned by the same company – Formosa Plastics. as far as I can make out

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only the same company

But the same family! The wife of VIA Technologies’ CEO is Ms. Cher Wang, chairperson and co-founder of HTC. Plenty of political connections too.

It's all just paper games.

[Babai]

Suing an American company in American soil :)

That's bound to happen, when you sue a home grown company in its own country.

I won't blame ITC (predominantly an American lobby), if they rejected a foreign lawsuit ...

[Anonymous Coward]

HTC lost its focus

HTC used to make the boldest, most "underdog-desirable" kit. Sure, a lot of them had their niggling faults, but stuff like the original venerable Diamond was Windows Mobile's going away with style.

Nowadays they have a certain design "language", and the build quality is among the best. Their Android Sense thing, like it or hate it, is the most advanced, thought out and coherent overlay out there.

But none of the new stuff is exciting, or "shiny" enough anymore. Consumers are fickle. The "Sensation" is anything but sensational, for instance. Respectable yes, sensational, no. Sure it's good and all that, but the battery (a frequent Achilles' Heel of HTC handsets), the recent lack of real geek-cred-worthiness makes it shadowed by the all-plastic SGS2.

The Beats Audio publicity stunt for instance was, in my opinion, was not too well thought out. Before you "pimp it up", you gotta take care of the battery, the performance, the camera.

I would have expected the Note being developed by HTC. Not Samsung.

Too many misses makes for competitiveness. HTC grew too big too fast, and I hope it hasn't lost it's edge.

I expect them to regroup. Either that, or Asus and Samsung will eat its pie.