■ Trade
Taiwan gives work to China
Companies in Taiwan took almost a quarter of export orders received last month to their overseas factories for production, a Chinese-language newspaper reported, citing an unidentified Ministry of Economic Affairs official. Manufacturers are meeting 24.4 percent of the orders last month, a record-high level, from their overseas plants where production costs are lower than in Taiwan, the paper said. That compares with 23.9 percent in July. The government also found some major Taiwanese communications equipment companies have moved almost all their production units to China, the report said. Taiwan's export orders -- indicative of shipments in one to three months -- rose 11 percent from a year earlier to US$14.4 billion after climbing 15 percent in July, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said earlier this month. Factory production last month rose by 5.3 percent from a year earlier.
■ Labor
Chinese workers protest
More than 100 retired factory workers staged a silent protest outside Communist Party headquarters in Beijing yesterday, complaining about a sudden unexpected reduction in their benefits. The retirees, former employees of Beijing Synthetic Fiber Experimental Factory, have been congreg-ating at the party building every day for more than two weeks, and plan to continue doing so until their pleas are heard. "We will gather here every day," said Sun Zeshan, 60, one of the protesters. "So far, there hasn't been any response." The protesters, representing 1,645 retired workers from the factory, started assembling at the party headquarters on Sept. 11, and numbered more than 300 at the height of the protest, participants said. The protest was triggered after the factory declared bankruptcy, cutting retirement benefits by 120 yuan (US$14) a month, representing a 16 percent cut in benefits, according to the protesters.
■ Airlines
Qantas grounds two 747s
Qantas said yesterday it has grounded two 747 jets after a crack was found in the fuselage of one of its aircraft during a regular inspection check. A Qantas spokes-woman said the airline was working with manufacturer Boeing to determine the extent of the damage. "As part of a regular heavy maintenance check we discovered some low-level damage to the fuselage of a 747-400 aircraft,'' the Qantas spokeswoman said. Qantas has 29 747-400 aircraft in service, the biggest number of jets in its fleet. Each can carry between 358 and 394 passengers. The spokes-woman did not say how many others, if any, of the 29 could be affected by future groundings due to the crack.
■ IPR protection
Man fined for `Hulk' posting
A New Jersey man who released a bootleg version of the movie The Hulk on the Internet before it opened in theaters, violating copyright law and costing Universal Pictures what it estimated to be millions of dollars in lost ticket sales, was sentenced Friday to probation and ordered to pay fines and restitution. The man, Kerry Gonzalez, of Hamilton, New Jersey, apologized in court for the misdeed, which will cost him US$5,000 in restitution to Universal, US$2,000 in fines and six months of home confinement, with three years on probation. Gonzalez, 24, pleaded guilty in June to one count of copyright infringe-ment. The tape that Gonzalez uploaded into an Internet chat room in early June was intended for use at an advertising agency.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six