MStar GPS chips have positioning issues, sources claim

An estimated 100,000 GPS devices built around an MStar Semiconductor solution and shipped to Taiwan, China, and North America shut down at zero o'clock on June 14 (GMT time), which has impacted products from such makers as Japan's Panasonic, Taiwan's Supa Technology and Globalsat Technology, and China's Newsmy, Quanzhou Truest Communication, and Mesada, according to market sources.

MStar officials were unavailable for comments.

The sources claimed that a computing mistake in the GPS chip caused positioning issues for the devices running on it. Affected products include GPS PNDs, GPS trackers and GPS recorders, and some makers, including Supa, have already offered customers free repair services.

MStar, which started shipping GPS chips less than two years ago, has cut into supply chains of second-tier vendors in Taiwan and China, and is actively soliciting orders from first-tier vendors, the sources said.