Hon Hai reports highest-ever Q3 net profit

Taipei, Nov. 14 (CNA) Taiwan-based manufacturing giant Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. on Thursday reported its highest-ever third-quarter net profit amid the ongoing artificial intelligence boom.

iPhone assembler Hon Hai, which also rolls out AI servers, said in a statement that it posted NT$49.33 billion (US$1.52 billion) in net profit, up 41 percent from a quarter earlier and 14 percent from a year earlier. Consolidated sales also hit a new high of NT$1.85 trillion for the July-September period.

Furthermore, Hon Hai's third quarter's earnings per share (EPS) stood at NT$3.55, compared to NT$2.53 in the second quarter and NT$3.11 in the same period last year, the company said.

Hon Hai added that its gross margin -- the difference between revenue and cost of goods sold -- reached 6.19 percent in the third quarter, down from 6.42 percent in the second quarter and 6.66 percent a year earlier.

The company's operating margin -- the difference between sales, the cost of goods sold and operating expenses -- increased to 2.95 percent in the third quarter from 2.88 percent a quarter earlier, but fell from 2.99 percent a year earlier, Hon Hai said.

In the third quarter, Hon Hai said, its net margin -- the difference between gross profit and total expenses including interest payments and taxes -- stood at 2.66 percent, up from 2.26 percent in the second quarter, but was down from 2.79 percent a year earlier.

Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn on the global markets, said the smart consumer electronics division accounted for 45 percent of its total revenue in the third quarter, the cloud and networking division made up 32 percent. Meanwhile, the computing division represented 17 percent and the electronics component division comprised about 6 percent.

In the first nine months of this year, Hon Hai raked in NT$106.38 billion in net profit, up 19.6 percent from a year earlier with EPS at NT$7.67, compared with NT$6.42 over the same period last year.