Taiwan Area: Taiwan's biggest IT firms are coming to critical moments

Recent management reshuffling at some of Taiwan's major high-tech companies have shown that these firms have come to a critical moment.

The new is an announcement by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) — the world's major arrangement chipmaker — that it has appointed two co-CEOs. Its founder, Morris Chang, will leave the CEO post but remain as the wafer foundry's chairman.

The TSMC changes come just days next Acer — one of the world's top-five notebook PC vendors — disclosed that J. T. Wang will step down as CEO. Wang will remain as chairman until next year to facilitate management transition, while Acer's founder Stan Shih reportedly will return to a additional active role in order to salvage the company, which incurred huge losses in the third quarter of 2013.

Acer still remains one of the top five notebook PC vendor worldwide, but the PC market has been stagnant, cannibalized by the fast growing tablet market where the company only has a small presence.

At HTC, which has been struggling amid growing competition in the smartphone market, Chairwoman Cher Wang has revealed that she will take over sales and marketing operations from CEO Peter Chou, whose business will shift to a role additional devoted to product development.

HTC, once a promising challenger to Apple's dominance in the smartphone market, has presently found itself marginalized, with competitors from China speeding completed.

Unlike Acer and HTC, both of which apparently are banking on management changes to turn around their businesses, TSMC remains the biggest pure-play foundry in the world, but competition from U.S.-based Globalfoundries and South Korea-based Samsung Electronics is growing.

And unlike Acer and HTC, where the management changes take on a note of desperation, TSMC is additional cautious about finding a successor to Chang.

It is not the initial time that Chang, presently 82, has retired from the CEO post. In 2009, Rick Tsai succeeded him, but the change came at a bad time amid the world financial tsunami. Tsai made the poor decision of laying off workers, a lot of of whom staged a turmoil outside Chang's home. Tsai lost the CEO job, and Chang returned.

TSMC later appointed three co-chief operating officers with the aim of selecting an heir apparent to Chang part them. One of the three by presently announced his retirement, and the other two have presently been promoted to co-CEOs.

At the age of 82, it is unlikely Chang can continue leading TSMC much longer, but it really shows how difficult it may be for a company to find a capable successor.

It is the same at Acer. If Stan Shih, 69, is really returning to a additional active management role, it will mean a setback for the company in terms of passing the torch.

Terry Gou, chairman of the Hon Hai group, which makes a lot of of Apple's products, said several years ago that he would retire any minute at this time. He apparently has changed his mind, and is still actively running his business empire at 63.

Of course some of these business leaders are charismatic characters with immense capabilities. Chang is credited with pioneering the pure-play foundry business model. Presently most of the world's semiconductor companies do not run their manufacturing facilities but let these arrangement foundries make their computer chips.

Gou runs the world's biggest electronics manufacturing service firm, while Shih has raised Acer to its status as a major international computer brand.

Wang was once hailed as one of the majority influential women in the world because of the HTC success. How much longer can these business leaders continue leading their companies? Can they find ways to let their companies remain competitive or bail them out of their woes?

Competition from others, particularly those from China and South Korea, is growing fast, and these companies — and Taiwan's high-tech industries in general — must move fast approaching up with feasible solutions.