Acer founder Stan Shih announced a few days ago that he was open to the idea of having his company taken over by another one, which led to many people talking about a potential merger between Acer and ASUS. It makes a lot of sense on the surface, considering how both of them are based in Taiwan and compete in many of the same industries, not to mention the fact that ASUS has been more successful in almost every regard. However, Acer CEO Jason Chen was quick to point out that a merger between the two companies would grant them a combined market share of 70% in Taiwan, which would violate the country’s Fair Trade laws.
During IFA 2015, we’ve heard quite a bit about from both Acer and ASUS. While much of this has been on the Windows 10 and Laptop side of things, both Acer and ASUS have their feet wet in the Android world. ASUS focuses more on budget-minded Android tablets, while Acer is pushing affordable smartphones in emerging markets and parts of Europe. The latter surprised us all this past week with the shock announcement of the Predator 6 gaming smartphone, which we’re told will make its proper debut during CES next year. For a little while now, there’s been talk of the two companies merging to form one giant Taiwanese tech giant. Acer’s CEO Jason Chen has come out and put water over the fire caused by analysts and onlookers, stating that it would simply be impossible. Not only would it be difficult to form a single company out of two that compete fiercely together, it would be against Fair Trade Law in Taiwan as the two of them control around 70% of the local market between them. not to mention that despite the two similar product lines from the both of them, the two cultures from each firm are very different and wouldn’t necessarily work well together.
