As long as the production lines keep on running, Taiwan's export industries will only feel a limited impact from the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak, although the atypical pneumonia has seriously disturbed cross-Taiwan Strait economic activities, a financial official said yesterday.
The official said that in the first three months of this year, Hong Kong and mainland China respectively imported 22.5 percent and 10.5 percent of Taiwan's export products. Taiwan's export structure is not likely to have too drastic a change in the short run, he said.
However, the official would not rule out the possibility that Taiwan's foreign trade might be affected by the SARS outbreak in case of a shrinkage of direct foreign investments and domestic investments in mainland China.
On the other hand, Taiwan's industrial sector in general is more pessimistic about the developments. A survey conducted by the Taipei Computer Association April 7 through April 14 among executives of computer firms showed 65 percent said that they do not believe that the epidemic can be fully controlled before the end of June, while 90 percent said that SARS has already adversely affected Taiwan's economic development.
While only 12 percent of those responding said that the US-led war against Iraq has affected the world economy, 45 percent suggested that SARS is having a more serious economic impact.
Another survey conducted by the Federation of Industrial Associations April 14 through April 21 indicated that dwindling economic activities on both sides of the Taiwan Strait have already damaged the business of certain manufacturing industries. Shoe manufacturers in Taiwan said that over the past few weeks, orders from the US and Europe dropped by 20 percent to 30 percent, as some traders canceled their purchasing tours to this part of the world due to SARS.
Yeh Yung-lung, deputy director of the Small and Medium Business Department under the Ministry of Economic Affairs, said Sunday that Taiwan's economy will inevitably be affected by the economic situation in mainland China. A deterioration of the mainland's economic situation will damage Taiwan's economy, in view of the growing interdependence.
He said that government sponsored trade promotion fairs scheduled for September and October may also be affected if the epidemic cannot be fully controlled within the next few months.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
MAJOR BENEFICIARY: The company benefits from TSMC’s advanced packaging scarcity, given robust demand for Nvidia AI chips, analysts said ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packaging and testing service provider, yesterday said it is raising its equipment capital expenditure budget by 10 percent this year to expand leading-edge and advanced packing and testing capacity amid strong artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing chip demand. This is on top of the 40 to 50 percent annual increase in its capital spending budget to more than the US$1.7 billion to announced in February. About half of the equipment capital expenditure would be spent on leading-edge and advanced packaging and testing technology, the company said. ASE is considered by analysts