Micro-Star International (MSI) is set to return as the world's third largest motherboard brand vendor in 2014, surpassing the current number-three ASRock, according to sources from the motherboard industry reports Digitimes. The sources pointed out that MSI still has strong R&D capabilities, but because its project management failed to coordinate with marketing and sales, the company seen development lag seriously behind its competitors'.

MSI shipped about five million branded motherboards in 2012, lower than ASRock's 7.7 million units, and in China, although the two had similar shipment performance at around 1.8 million units in 2012, they were still far behind Asustek Computer's nine million units and Gigabyte Technology's 6.8 million units.

However, MSI has recently started adjusting its strategies and is currently targeting ASRock as its major competitor.

In the first half of 2013, MSI shipped 1-1.1 million motherboards in China, up from 800,000 units during the same period a year ago, and also higher than ASRock's 920,000 units.

As for global shipments, MSI shipped about 2.8-3 million units in the first half. Although the volume was still lower than ASRock's 3.7 million units, the gap has shrunk. With Intel's entry-level and mid-range Haswell processors to arrive in the second half, MSI is expected to see its motherboard shipments return 6-7 million units in 2013.

ASRock is expected to ship 4.3 million motherboards in the second half and achieve total shipments of eight million units for 2013. -[Digitimes]

MSI fights to return to top-3 in motherboard market