■ Privatizaition
State-run firms on sale list
Shares of Mega Financial Holding Co (兆豐金控), Taiwan's second-largest financial company, and Chang Hwa Commercial Bank (彰化銀行) are on the government's sale list, according to the Taiwan Stock Exchange Web site. The Ministry of Finance plans to sell 52.8 million shares in Mega Financial and 68.2 million shares in Chang Hwa Commercial Bank, the exchange said. Chang Hwa is Taiwan's sixth-biggest lender by assets. The ministry's holding in Mega Financial will fall to 9.4 percent from 10.1 percent after the sale, and its stake in Chang Hwa will drop to 15.7 percent from 16.8 percent, according to the Commercial Times newspaper.
■ Mobile phones
Panasonic cuts orders
Panasonic Mobile Communications Co of Japan is reducing its orders to Taiwanese mobile phone makers Quanta Computer Inc and Compal Communications Inc on lackluster mobile phone business, the Commercial Times reported, without saying where it obtained the information. Quanta Computer's mobile-phone shipments will decrease by more than 25 percent in the fourth quarter, the Taipei-based paper said. Panasonic accounts for 70 percent of sales of Quanta Computer's mobile phone division, according to the paper. Compal Communications, which gets 30 percent of its revenue from Panasonic, will be under pressure to cut prices, the paper said. Quanta Computer and Compal Communications spokesmen did not answer phone calls for comments yesterday.
■ Microchips
Judge refuses AMD request
A US federal judge on Thursday refused a request by chip maker Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) to order its larger rival Intel Corp to turn over company documents to the European Commission. The commission, a regulatory board that enforces EU antitrust laws, is investigating a complaint filed by AMD alleging that Intel improperly used its industry dominance to keep other companies from winning market share in Europe. As part of that ongoing probe, AMD sought a federal court order in 2001 forcing Intel to hand over thousands of pages of company documents to the foreign board, even though lawyers for the board itself later told the Supreme Court it did not want the records and argued that US courts should not be involved in a European regulatory matter. Intel released the written ruling on Friday after receiving it late Thursday.
■ Software
Microsoft plays hard to get
Under a judge's orders to disclose sensitive details about some of its software, Microsoft Corp wants to publish the information in a protected electronic format that is awkward to use and can be viewed only using Microsoft's own Web browser software, the US government complained in court papers on Friday. The Justice Department and 17 states that negotiated a landmark antitrust deal with Microsoft said the company's current plan "significantly limits the practical usability" of the information Microsoft was compelled to reveal to its competitors. Microsoft said it was cooperating to resolve such concerns within the next 60 days, adding it believes it needs to keep the sensitive information from falling into the hands of companies that haven't agreed to license its technology. Friday's legal papers were the latest among periodic reports by the government to the trial judge monitoring Microsoft's behavior under the settlement.
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