■ Optoelectronics value up
The output value of the nation's optoelectronics industry will hit NT$1.02 trillion this year, a 38 percent jump from last year, the Opto-Electronics and Systems (OES) Laboratories of the semi-official Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) said during a press conference yesterday in Tainan.
The OES Lab further predicted that the figure will keep climbing to NT$1.25 trillion next year and NT$1.62 trillion in 2006.
Currently, the optoelectronics industry focuses on exploiting the business potential of liquid crystal displays, while the demand for optical storage will gradually rise and become another promising sector that enjoys production value of over NT$1 trillion by 2008, the institute said.
The OES Lab made the forecast yesterday at the Southern Taiwan Science Park's incubator center in which it unveiled 20 different advanced technologies, such as those used in the inkjet printing process, that the OES Lab has developed in recent years.
■ New adviser for brokerage
President Securities Corp (統一證券), a brokerage controlled by the nation's largest food company, said it hired Pricewaterhouse Coopers International Ltd to advise on strategy, such as mergers and acquisitions, signaling a change in its expansion plans.
President Securities, a Taipei-based company controlled by Uni-President Enterprises Corp (統一企業), in November had ruled out acquisition targets and looking for a bigger rival for a takeover.
Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金控), Yuanta Core Pacific Securities Co (元大京華證券) and Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) hope to acquire President Securities, a Chinese-language newspaper reported yesterday.
■ Knowledge sector growing
The country is making strides as a knowledge-based economy with output of knowledge-intensive industries already contributing 29 percent of the country's GDP, Ministry of Economic Affairs officials said yesterday.
The officials were citing a report released by the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research on Taiwan's global competitiveness in research and innovation.
While the nation's total investment in research and development amounted to 2.3 percent of GDP in 2002, which was the world's 11th-highest, the contribution of knowledge-intensive industries to GDP was 29 percent in 2002, following closely after Luxembourg, Switzerland, Germany and the US, according to the report.
In 2002, the investment by the information technology sector alone amounted to 22.2 percent of the total, compared with 18.2 percent in 2001, the report says.
■ Taiwan to sell Trust stake
The government plans to start selling a 25 percent stake in state-owned Central Trust of China (中央信託局) next year, a Chinese-language newspaper reported, citing the bank's Chairman Shea Jia-dong (許嘉棟).
Shea also said a number of issues must be resolved before Central Trust's proposed merger with Land Bank of Taiwan (土地銀行) can proceed, the newspaper said.
These include how to deal with Central Trust's non-financial operations, the report said. Land Bank approved the merger plan in early March.
Central Trust, in addition to banking and insurance, is also involved in trade and warehousing. The lender is currently 100 percent owned by the government.
■ NT dollar slightly up
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday maintained strength against its US counterpart, advancing NT$0.009 to close at NT$34.179 on the Taipei foreign exchange market.
Turnover was US$464 million.
WEAKER ACTIVITY: The sharpest deterioration was seen in the electronics and optical components sector, with the production index falling 13.2 points to 44.5 Taiwan’s manufacturing sector last month contracted for a second consecutive month, with the purchasing managers’ index (PMI) slipping to 48, reflecting ongoing caution over trade uncertainties, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The decline reflects growing caution among companies amid uncertainty surrounding US tariffs, semiconductor duties and automotive import levies, and it is also likely linked to fading front-loading activity, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said. “Some clients have started shifting orders to Southeast Asian countries where tariff regimes are already clear,” Lien told a news conference. Firms across the supply chain are also lowering stock levels to mitigate
IN THE AIR: While most companies said they were committed to North American operations, some added that production and costs would depend on the outcome of a US trade probe Leading local contract electronics makers Wistron Corp (緯創), Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), Inventec Corp (英業達) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶) are to maintain their North American expansion plans, despite Washington’s 20 percent tariff on Taiwanese goods. Wistron said it has long maintained a presence in the US, while distributing production across Taiwan, North America, Southeast Asia and Europe. The company is in talks with customers to align capacity with their site preferences, a company official told the Taipei Times by telephone on Friday. The company is still in talks with clients over who would bear the tariff costs, with the outcome pending further
Six Taiwanese companies, including contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), made the 2025 Fortune Global 500 list of the world’s largest firms by revenue. In a report published by New York-based Fortune magazine on Tuesday, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), ranked highest among Taiwanese firms, placing 28th with revenue of US$213.69 billion. Up 60 spots from last year, TSMC rose to No. 126 with US$90.16 billion in revenue, followed by Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) at 348th, Pegatron Corp (和碩) at 461st, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) at 494th and Wistron Corp (緯創) at
NEGOTIATIONS: Semiconductors play an outsized role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development and are a major driver of the Taiwan-US trade imbalance With US President Donald Trump threatening to impose tariffs on semiconductors, Taiwan is expected to face a significant challenge, as information and communications technology (ICT) products account for more than 70 percent of its exports to the US, Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said on Friday. Compared with other countries, semiconductors play a disproportionately large role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development, Lien said. As the sixth-largest contributor to the US trade deficit, Taiwan recorded a US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US last year — up from US$47.8 billion in 2023 — driven by strong