Taiwan's strongest local brands: TSMC and PX Mart continue their rise

TSMC was this year's top choice when Taiwan's consumers were asked to name the strongest local brands in a question that's part of Campaign Asia-Pacific's Asia's Top 1000 Brands research.  

From 2019 to 2021, two brands have continually risen in the Top 10 of Taiwan’s local brands list. TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) went from fourth in 2019 to number one this year. The other, PX Mart, has moved up from number 10 to seventh place in the same period. 

It's interesting how high a B2B supplier like TSMC has risen in a consumer survey, yet the global crisis over chip supplies after the pandemic has put the brand in the spotlight. The Economist said that TSMC controls 84% of the computer chip market. From Apple in America to Alibaba in China, the world's large technology brands all rely on TSMC. 

But for supermarket chain PX Mart, how can it achieve continuous growth amid fierce competition? The secret lies in the innovative and comprehensive approach towards lifestyle and changing shopping habits before and after the pandemic, say observers. 

Before the pandemic, OOSGA Taipei specialist Jacky Chen analysed the reasons why PX Mart transformed from a chain of grocery stores to become a retail giant in Taiwan, surpassing multinational companies such as Carrefour. Its down-to-earth local approach of marketing for products and services combines customer experience, local culture and social-media interaction, Chen says. 

What’s more, because of the pandemic and the competitiveness of Taiwan's retail market, PX Mart experienced a profound digital transformation by launching PX Pay, starting online service PX Go and adopting an OMO (online-merge-offline) business model. Building the payment system and e-commerce platform were just the initial steps. PX Mart went further. With OMO, the brand offered seamless shopping experiences for customers from brick-and-mortar stores to e-commerce platforms. 

Last but not least, PX Mart, from the very beginning positioned itself as a mid-level supermarket chain, aiming for the large market opportunity between convenience stores and hypermarkets. In Taiwan, it successfully differentiated itself from 7-Eleven run by Uni-President, FamilyMart, Carrefour and Costco, becoming a local favourite supermarket brand. 

This year, it is also worth noting that the restaurant chain operator Wowprime leapt into the Top 10. Its popular Wangsteak brand made a sharp increase on the Taiwan top 100 brands list, jumping 39 places to 38th overall. 

According to media coverage in Taiwan, Wowprime encountered difficulties because of the pandemic, but revenues still grew in the first three quarters this year. 

Though the company closed several stores over the past few months, the brand has relied on opening new Hot Pot buffet stores, home delivery service, offering coupons, and IT upgrades to survive the difficult times. 

In 2021, another significant change is that Asus slipped from being the top local brand overall into third place. However, on the Top 100 brands in Taiwan, Asus made a great leap, going all the way from 160 to 46. In early 2021, Asus fell out of the Top 10 mobile brands in the Taiwan local market. HTC, another local consumer electronics brand, slumped both in terms of market share and rankings. 

When it comes to laptop market share, ASUS continues to dominate the Taiwan esports laptop market in the first half of this year, capturing nearly 40% of the market share, with a sales increase by 53%.

Asus local competitor Acer’s ranking has dropped again this year to 10th. Based on Gartner’s data, Taiwan media have reported how their global market share fell, losing market share to Apple, Dell, Levono and HP. Analysts say Asus and Acer have lost market share because they sell mainly to consumers rather than to enterprises or government.

Finally, it's worth noting that Chunghwa Telecom has entered the Top 10 local brands in 2021, even though its Top 100 ranking dropped 3 places to 33 while competitor Taiwan Mobile rose to 52(+8).  Chunghwa Telecom has been the first telecommunication operator in Taiwan to offer 5G service since July 2020. Taiwan media has quoted a speedtest by Ookla Data that Chunghwa Telecom won the title of "No. 1 in 5G Network Speed" and "No. 1 in Mobile Network Coverage" in Taiwan this year.