More than 100 workers of the state-run Tang Eng Iron Works Co (唐榮) pleaded with the Ministry of Economic Affairs yesterday to do all it can to save the debt-ridden company.
The economics ministry announced earlier this month that it will shut down the iron works if it fails to be fully privatized by the end of August.
The 61-year-old iron works is among the more than 10 state enterprises in the ministry's privatization scheme, which began in 1985.
Between 1994 and 1997, China Petrochemical Development Corp (
On the other hand, the authorities have had difficulty meeting the implementation schedule of 10 other national enterprises. Taking Tang Eng as an example, even though the economics ministry rescheduled the timetable twice, no settlement has been reached.
With the deadline only weeks away and a remote possibility of being fully privatized, the 177 employees of the iron works are starting to wonder how long they will keep their jobs.
A representative of the Tang Eng workers union said that the union has presented the ministry with a proposal regarding pension payments, on-the-job training and other guarantees to the workers as well as the union's participation in outlining job functions and specifications under new management.
Tang Eng will need NT$3.7 billion this year to settle pension payments to its employees, a report from the Council of Economic Planning and Development indicates.
He said that Wu Fong-sheng (吳豐盛), executive director of the Commission of National Corporations under the economics ministry, told them that the proposal will be submitted to the Executive Yuan, because the commission is not in the position to make such decisions.
The Tang Eng workers union had hoped that China Steel, which was privatized in April 1995, would take over Tang Eng's steel production facilities. However, China Steel only promised to make an assessment. Tang Eng's stainless steel plant in Kaohsiung, southern Taiwan, has an annual production capacity of melting 300,000 tonnes and hot/cold rolling 200,000 tonnes of products.
In addition to Tang Eng, the ministry had set a timetable for the privatization of another nine subordinate enterprises, including Taiwan Power Co (台電), Chinese Petroleum Corp (中油), China Shipbuilding Corp (中船), Aerospace Industrial Development (漢翔), Taiwan Salt Industrial Corp (台鹽), Taiwan Agricultural and Industrial Development Corp (台灣農林), Taiwan Machinery, and Taiwan Chung Hsing Paper Corp (中興紙業).
It remains to be seen whether the privatization of eight of 10 enterprises -- scheduled for completion at the end of July by the ministry -- will actually take place.
The government has been dragging its feet on privatization due to an unwillingness by politicians to address tough questions of employee layoffs and company closures.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to