■ Unfazed by high oil prices
Ministry of Economic Affairs officials were optimistic yesterday about the nation's economic growth, despite a sharp rise in US oil prices, which have soared 23 percent to US$44 per barrel since late last year. Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Steve Chen (陳瑞隆) said he expects little impact from the soaring oil prices on the economy, as the dependence of the country's gross domestic product on the petrochemical industry is declining every year. The government's low-oil-price policy has also helped moderate the impact, Chen said. Compared with the 23 percent hike in US oil prices, local prices have only risen 9 percent during the same period, he said. "Oil prices in Taiwan are the lowest among the four Asian dragons," Chen said, pointing out that gasoline prices per liter are NT$2.3 (US$0.067) lower than those of South Korea, while diesel is NT$3 cheaper.
■ Nokia tapped for 3G network
Nokia Oyj, the world's largest mobile phone maker, said yesterday it had contracted with Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) to build the second phase of its next-generation 3G mobile phone network in Taiwan. No financial details were disclosed, but Helsinki-based telecom analysts said that the deal was likely to be worth around 100 million euros (US$120 million). Chunghwa has already set up its 3G network in the nation's core areas, and the new equipment from Nokia will allow it to expand its next-generation WCDMA network to the most populated areas on the east and west coasts, the Finnish group said. Included in the deal are indoor and outdoor base stations, connecting handsets through radio transmissions to the network's fixed parts, as well as core infrastructure elements routing calls on the net, Nokia said.
■ VIA, MediaTek bury hatchet
VIA Technologies Inc (威盛電子) and its subsidiary VIA Optical Inc (威騰光電) have settled legal disputes with rival MediaTek Inc (聯發科技), VIA Technologies said in a statement issued on Tuesday. MediaTek filed lawsuits against both VIA Technologies and VIA Optical six years ago in both this country and the US over a series of patent, copyright and trade secret disputes relating to chipsets and firmware for optical storage devices. Under the terms of settlement, VIA agreed to pay MediaTek a royalty of US$25 million upon execution and US$5 million per year in each of the following five years. In return, MediaTek agreed to grant VIA a perpetual license to any of its copyrights and trade secrets as well as a five-year license to any of its existing intellectual property that is currently implemented in a VIA storage product, according to the statement.
■ Tatung to invest in wafers
Tatung Co (大同), one of the nation's largest home appliance makers, said yesterday that it plans to invest NT$250 million to get a slice of the world's US$2 billion solar-grade silicon wafer market. Green Energy Inc (綠能科技), a fully-owned unit of Tatung, is scheduled to produce such wafers starting in the second quarter of next year, with technology support from GT Equipment Technologies Inc of the US, the company said in a statement released yesterday. The investment in the new business will increase to a total of NT$1 billion in 2006, said Hurlon Lin (林和龍), a Tatung public relations executive. The chips are mostly used in solar generators.
■ NT dollar down
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday traded lower against its US counterpart, falling NT$0.073 to close at NT$34.173 on the Taipei foreign exchange market. Turnover was US$515 million.
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