Taiwan's computer giant Acer Inc on Thursday welcomed the European Commission's approval of its bid to acquire Dutch personal computer maker Packard Bell BV, according to dpa. "Last October Acer acquired Gateway of the United States, which boosted Acer's presence in the US. Our taking over Packard Bell will strengthen Acer's presence in Europe," an Acer public relations officer said, asking not to be named. European Commission regulators on Wednesday gave Acer the go-ahead for the purchase, following a month-long review which concluded that the takeover would not cause competition concerns as the combined company would still face competition from large industry players like Lenovo, Sony or Dell. Neither Acer nor Packard Bell has announced EU's approval of the merger, but Acer announced in January that it was seeking to buy 75 per cent stake in Packard Bell for 45.8 million US dollars. In the fourth quarter of 2007, Acer replaced Dell as the world's number two notebook computer maker and surpassed Lenovo as world's number three personal computer maker. Founded in 1976, Acer employs 5,300 people in more than 100 countries. Revenues in 2006 reached 11.32 billion US dollars. Two-thirds of the computers produced by Acer are notebook computers, while one-third are desktop computers. Acer's 2007 operating income reached 10.2 billion Taiwan dollars (319 million US dollars), up 30 per cent from 2006, and represents 80 per cent of profits after tax which was 12.9 billion Taiwan dollars (403 million US dollars). In its 2007 year-end report, Acer said expected its notebook computer deliveries to grow by 40 per cent and total shipments of personal computers to grow 30-35 per cent year-on-year.
