More Chinese workers okayed
The government plans to allow increased employment of Chinese high-tech workers both by local companies and foreign firms operating here, a Mainland Affairs Council official said yesterday.
The Cabinet recently instructed government agencies to work on the liberalization in response to growing demand in the technology industry for high-quality and low-cost workers, the official said.
Separately, a Chinese-language newspaper said the authorities plan to remove current regulations which limit private firms to hiring no more than 20 percent of their research and development personnel from China.
In addition, companies would be permitted to recruit Chinese professionals directly from China rather than only from those living abroad, the newspaper said, adding that the easing of the rules is expected next month.
Rivals grabbing market share
China's Ningbo Bird Co (波導) and Sewon Telecom Ltd of South Korea are threatening to take more business from Taiwanese rivals after winning orders from Siemens AG to make mobile phones, a Chinese-language newspaper reported, without saying where it obtained the information.
Taiwanese companies such as BenQ Corp (明基), which makes handsets for Motorola Inc, and Arima Computer Corp (華宇), which supplies Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB, may lose profit margins that are as high as 20 percent now that more competition is coming from outside the country, the paper said.
Chinese and South Korean companies have narrowed the gap with their Taiwanese rivals as innovation in the mobile phone business slows and South Korean companies offer handsets that are more attractive than those most Taiwanese companies can design, it said.
Biotech park set for Pingtung
The first agricultural biotechnology park in Asia will be established in Pingtung and become operational by the end of next year.
Council of Agriculture Chairman Lee Chin-lung (李金龍) said Sunday that the 350-hectare park will be able to accommodate 120 investors.
It is aimed at modernizing and promoting agricultural production. Park output is expected to reach NT$20 billion (US$598 million) in 10 years.
New chips on the way
Transmeta Corp and Via Technologies Inc (威盛) plan to announce new microprocessor chips this week to target portable computers, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing the companies at a technical conference in Silicon Valley.
Transmeta and Via Technologies aim to compete with Intel, which provides more than 80 percent of personal computers with chips, the Journal said.
TSEC in pact with Luxembourg
Taiwan Stock Exchange Corp (TSEC) and Luxembourg Stock Exchange have signed a memorandum of understanding on information sharing, TSEC said Monday.
The agreement was forged by TSEC chairman Sean Chen (陳沖) and Luxembourg Stock Exchange president and chief executive Michel Maquil in New York, a TSEC statement said.
Taiwanese companies have issued 31 global depositary receipts and 105 corporate bonds on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange and the accord will strengthen market management and relations, according to the statement.
NT dollar gains ground
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday traded higher against its US counterpart, rising NT$0.033 to close at NT$33.710 on the Taipei Foreign Exchange.
Turnover was US$788 million.
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
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
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