22 | FORBES ASIA OCTOBER 2018J
ason Chen had spent 23 years in
big global tech, but when Acer’s
board of directors asked him how
he would turn the ailing Ta i w a n
icon around, he paused. “I said,
‘I’ve never done that,’ and the next ques-
tion was, ‘How are you going to do it?’ ”
Chen recalls.
Chen landed the job and over four
years has turned the company around.
Recent quarters have seen sizable jumps
in revenue and proitability, to levels
not seen since the PC maker was mak-
ing Forbes Asia’s Fab 50 list of best com-
panies in 201 0. (In recent years it hasn’t
even qualiied for our Global 2000
ranking of biggest irms.)
Chen, 5 6, has accomplished this
largely by getting Acer back to what
made its name: personal computers.
Yo u know, those boxes you thought had
been supplanted by smartphones. And
he’s done it not by trying to undersell the
many bottom ishers in the sector—Acer
had acquired a rap as a low-cost brand—
but by developing technology that ap-
peals foremost to the most critical mar-
ket for high-end hardware: gamers.
Chen came on as corporate president
and CEO in 201 4. He had just inished
nine years as corporate development
vice president at Ta i w a n Semiconduc-tor, following 14 in sales and marketing
jobs at Intel. Acer had lost money since
2011 as global PC sales slowed and Ital-
ian-born CEO Gianfranco Lanci sud-
denly quit over internal discord. Rev-
enues in 2013 came to $ 11 .8 billion,
down 1 6% over the previous year, and
net losses totaled $370 million. Acer
founder Stan Shih, whose family owns a
5 % stake in the company, called 2013 a
year of “business underperformance.”
Shih now consults with Chen and
backs what he’s doing. he irm dropped
its smartphone line two years ago be-
cause it was losing money. From 2014
Acer had peddled Iconia-brand phones,
including a $270 handset designed for
serial travelers with space for three SIM
cards.
Part of the shit was refocusing staf.
he other was repositioning in the mar-
ketplace. “he irst thing I believed
when I came in was to advocate a clear
direction,” Ta i w a n-born and -bred Chen
says in luent English at the company’s
suburban Ta ip e i headquarters. “he
biggest problem at the time that I saw
was our brand position.”
Vying for the cheapest PC prices
simply felt “che ap,” Chen says. “It was
the result of the overemphasis on mar-
ket share. Yo u focus on market shareand you just go lower, lower and lower.
Innovation needs money, R&D, and
we’re cheaper and cheaper until no-
body’s making money. Who sufers?
Users sufer, and the industry sufers.”
Chen has pushed particularly to de-
velop the Predator and Nitro lines of
gaming PCs, including the world’s most
expensive made-for-gamers notebook:
the $9,000 Predator 2 1X. It weighs 8.8
kilograms and comes with a suitcase.
Gaming PCs worldwide will be worth
$32.9 billion this year, market intelli-
gence irm Newzoo forecasts, as players
spend 1 3% more—that’s $ 138 billion—
than last year.
Predator machines, the CEO says,
exemplify Acer’s postreform focus on
proprietary technology. Some use metal
fans instead of old-style plastic ones to
improve ventilation. Acer has grabbed
300 patents for its own “thermal tech-
nology” to cool processors without
slowing them down, Chen adds. Desk-
tops use EMI shielding technology to
stop components inside a PC from in-
terfering with other devices or endan-
gering a user’s health.
Acer’s PC unit is growing, and gam-
ing units make up a “high teen” share of
the company’s gross margin, Chen says.
he company won’t say how much gam-Get in the Game
FORBES ASIA
ACERJason Chen has Acer refocused on PCs but
aimed at consumers of higher-end hardware.
BY RALPH JENNINGS