US-sanctioned Apple supplier Wingtech shifts focus to chips, citing geopolitics

The Shanghai-listed company says it will sell its consumer-electronics contract manufacturing business to focus on semiconductors

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US-blacklisted Apple supplier Wingtech has agreed to sell nine wholly owned subsidiaries to a competitor. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 7:00pm, 31 Dec 2024Updated: 10:09pm, 31 Dec 2024

Wingtech Technology, one of Apple’s suppliers in China, plans to divest its consumer-electronics contract manufacturing business and focus on semiconductors due to “changes in the geopolitical environment”, weeks after it was added to a trade blacklist by the US.

The Shanghai-listed company has agreed to sell nine wholly owned subsidiaries in relation to its product integration business – covering the production of smartphones, tablets, laptops and other electronics devices – to the parent company of Luxshare Precision Industry, another Chinese Apple supplier, Wingtech said in a filing on Monday.

The move was “based on changes in the geopolitical environment and the business development needs of the company”, Wingtech said.

Wingtech was the world’s third-largest smartphone original design manufacturer in 2023, accounting for 20.6 per cent of the total outsourced handset volume, according to Counterpoint Research.

The Chinese firm’s smartphone shipments grew 7 per cent that year, thanks to new orders from Xiaomi, Samsung Electronics and Huawei Technologies spin-off Honor, Counterpoint said.

After the divestment, Wingtech would sharpen its focus on the chip business, with the aim of becoming one of the top players in the global power-semiconductor industry, the company said.