The head of the state-owned China Shipbuilding Corp (
China Shipbuilding chairman Hsu Chiang (
"[I wish to resign] for the simple reasons that I have high blood pressure and have accomplished my mission at this stage," Hsu said, referring to his part in bringing the company's revenue from red into the black, as well as his hand in helping with the company's approaching goal of privatization.
Hsu denied reports that he was bailing out of the company or that there were political considerations behind his decision.
He was responding to reports speculating that as a second-generation mainland Chinese, he is worried about having to take sides in next year's presidential election.
A Chinese-language newspaper also claimed that a policy to build submarines for the nation's military -- which has not received clear support from the government -- coupled with an as-yet-realized promise by the Executive Yuan to appropriate NT$2 billion (US$59.3 million) to improve the financial structure of the China Shipbuilding have also contributed to discouraging Hsu and making him want to return to teaching.
The reports noted that the China Shipbuilding is being privatized and is scheduled to sell its Keelung and Kaohsiung plants, and that MPH, a consortium of arms manufacturers in the US, is interested in bidding for the Kaohsiung plant and is sending an official to Taiwan this week to discuss the matter with the China Shipbuilding.
Hsu said that this May he had been extremely busy and that he was preoccupied with communications with the MPH and other parties interested in investing in the China Shipbuilding. Because of time zone differences, he often had to work at night, which caused his blood pressure to shoot up dramatically.
Vice Premier Lin Hsin-i (
Last year, the shipbuilder was involved in a fraud scandal that led then-chairman Yu Chen-nan (
Statistics provided by the Commission of National Corporations show that the accumulated losses of the China Shipbuilding reached NT$11 billion at one time and the company was on the brink of bankruptcy in 2001. After the implementation of a rejuvenation plan, the China Shipbuilding turned the corner last year, recording pre-tax profits of NT$350 million.
Since international shipping is on the rebound, the China Shipbuilding has earned profits of nearly NT$300 million in the first eight months of this year, and is forecast to record profits of NT$360 million for the whole year.
Orders for new vessels have reached more than 40, which will keep the company fully booked until 2007.
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],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained