Taiwanese LED manufacturer Everlight has issued a statement Thursday rebutting a DIGITIMES report released a day before claiming it has forced employees to take one week unpaid leave in November.
Citing an unnamed industry source, the DIGITIMES report claimed Everlight implemented the policy to reduce operating costs and inventory buildup.
Everlight has vehemently denied these claims, saying the report had misrepresented a company employee benefit and vacation scheme as leave without pay.
One of the company benefits implemented over the past 20 years, has been the “golden week vacation,” where employees are entitled to one week break, the company stated. It has organized one company trip in June 2015, and issued travel compensation worth NT $3,000 (US $92.41) on July 10, 2015 to employees. Everlight plans to organize a second company trip which will take place from November 2-6, 2015, and allocate another NT $5,500 travel allowance to employees. Employees that have been on board prior to Aug. 1, 2015 are entitled to the vacation benefits, the company stated.
Everlight’s share values declined about 5.63% from NT$ 50.60 on Tuesday to NT $47.75 Wednesday afternoon after the misleading report was released. Company share values has rebounded about 0.31% to NT$48 as of Oct. 22, 2015 after it released the latest statement.
Even though Everlight recognized the Taiwanese media company committed a careless mistake of not verifying its source, the LED company shareholders have been enraged by the misleading report. Everlight announced it reserves the right to take legal action against DIGITIMES.
Although, the Taiwanese LED industry has been affected by anemic market demands in September, not all companies are underperforming. Everlight has delivered a solid performance during first half of 2015 with EPS reaching NT$2.06, and is one of the best performing LED package companies in the country.
The company acquired Ritek’s factory in Miaoli during second quarter of 2015, and plans to start reconstructing the factory into a new SMD production line, which it plans to complete by end of October in 2016.
This is not the first time that the Taiwanese media company has misreported. In December 2014, Everlight issued a statement refuting a DIGITIMES report claiming it had acquired LED orders from Philips.
(Author: Ivan Lin, Head of Content, LEDinsidehttp:// Translation and Edits: Judy Lin, Chief Editor, LEDinside)