Hon Hai's foray into the notebook PC manufacturing industry has already constituted enormous pressure on existing makers in the line, especially when the EMS provider has reportedly outbid Wistron Corp., the world's third-largest supplier of notebook PCs, to win the aforementioned big order from Dell.

Besides, Hon Hai has also planned to garner a couple of HP's contract orders for notebook PCs in 2011, threatening HP's existing suppliers, including Quanta Computer Inc. and Inventec Corp., the No. 1 and No. 4 notebook PC maker, respectively, in the world. Meanwhile, Compal Electronics Inc., the second-largest, has also squared off Hon Hai's challenge in 2010.

Despite industry insiders' leeriness, Terry Gou, chairman of Hon Hai Group, ambitiously announced his group's plan to venture into the notebook PC manufacturing industry early this year. Therefore, institutional investors noted, the group's success of winning Dell's big order has effectively proved its competitiveness to those doubters in the line.

In fact, it is unsurprising to see Hon Hai outdo Wistron in the race for Dell's order for commercial notebook PCs, mainly because the former bought out Dell's manufacturing factory located in Poland late last year, securing the client's orders for PCs and notebook models for sale in Europe and further consolidating cooperation between the two sides.

Witnessing the rise of Hon Hai, who is also noted for moving to partner HP in building a notebook PC manufacturing base in China, Ray Chen, president of Compal, acknowledged that the group's increasing influence in the line has been too significant to be neglected, and projected the rival's shipment at between 20 million and 25 million units for 2010, accounting for an 8-10% share of the total in the world. Of those, up to four million units will go to Dell in the year.