Lower Ultrabook Costs Intel Eyes on Shell Mold

Reluctant to relax on the processor and chipset quotes, how does Ultrabook's cost decrease? According to sources from the PC supply chain, Intel has recently begun large-scale cooperation with notebook shell mold suppliers, hoping to take the price of the Ultrabook down to less than US$1,000.

Sources said that Intel certainly understands that price will become the key to the future of Ultrabook. Therefore, it has decided to work directly with upstream suppliers to reduce the cost of parts and components.

Sources pointed out that magnesium alloy shell is still the preferred Ultrabook notebook, but its limited supply, the price is high, resulting in most manufacturers can not reach the target price of 1,000 US dollars, Acer, Lenovo, Toshiba has released three models The final retail price will exceed $1,000.

For this reason, Intel is currently working to promote plastic and glass fiber hybrid molds in the new Ultrabook notebooks. At a recent supply chain meeting, Intel invited Mitac Technology, a manufacturer of fiberglass molds, and even invited its executives to explain the technology. Most suppliers also believe that notebook manufacturers will generally adopt this technology. shell.

Shentong claims that the surface of the glass fiber casing can be processed using in-mold transfer (IMR), spray painting, etc., and is more flexible than the anodizing process used in the metal casing, and the cost will be 50% lower than that of the magnesium alloy casing.

The news that Shentong has already got orders from Acer, Asus and Lenovo will begin in the fourth quarter of this year, but Shentong declined to comment on this.