Lantern Festival touted
To promote the Taipei Lantern Festival scheduled from Feb. 19 and Feb. 27, the Taipei City Government is working with an online travel agency to introduce domestic group tours, in hopes of attracting people from central and southern Taiwan to participate in this international gala.
The programs, covering one-day and two-day tours in Taipei, feature trips to the festival in the Xinyi district, the Miramar Entertainment Park (美麗華百樂園) and Dadaocheng Wharf. Discount prices are available now from Star Travel Corp (燦星旅遊網).
The government hopes to increase the number of festival visitors from last year's 4.8 million to 6 million this year.
China investment rises 47%
The nation's corporate investments in China rose 47 percent last month from a year earlier, the Ministry of Economic Affairs' Investment Commission said on its Web site.
Approved investment rose to US$777 million from US$529 million a year earlier. Last year, Taiwan's approved investment in China rose 51 percent to US$6.94 billion from the previous year.
Foreign direct investment in Taiwan rose 10 percent to US$654 million last month from US$595 million a year earlier.
China's chip spending may fall
China's spending for equipment used to make semiconductors may fall by a third this year as the global chip industry slumps, an analyst said.
"Equipment sales will drop 33.6 percent to US$1.88 billion," Information Network analyst Robert Castellano said in an e-mailed report.
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has appointed Rose Castanares, executive vice president of TSMC Arizona, as president of the subsidiary, which is responsible for carrying out massive investments by the Taiwanese tech giant in the US state, the company said in a statement yesterday. Castanares will succeed Brian Harrison as president of the Arizona subsidiary on Oct. 1 after the incumbent president steps down from the position with a transfer to the Arizona CEO office to serve as an advisor to TSMC Arizona’s chairman, the statement said. According to TSMC, Harrison is scheduled to retire on Dec. 31. Castanares joined TSMC in
EUROPE ON HOLD: Among a flurry of announcements, Intel said it would postpone new factories in Germany and Poland, but remains committed to its US expansion Intel Corp chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger has landed Amazon.com Inc’s Amazon Web Services (AWS) as a customer for the company’s manufacturing business, potentially bringing work to new plants under construction in the US and boosting his efforts to turn around the embattled chipmaker. Intel and AWS are to coinvest in a custom semiconductor for artificial intelligence computing — what is known as a fabric chip — in a “multiyear, multibillion-dollar framework,” Intel said in a statement on Monday. The work would rely on Intel’s 18A process, an advanced chipmaking technology. Intel shares rose more than 8 percent in late trading after the
FACTORY SHIFT: While Taiwan produces most of the world’s AI servers, firms are under pressure to move manufacturing amid geopolitical tensions Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) started building artificial intelligence (AI) servers in India’s south, the latest boon for the rapidly growing country’s push to become a high-tech powerhouse. The company yesterday said it has started making the large, powerful computers in Pondicherry, southeastern India, moving beyond products such as laptops and smartphones. The Chinese company would also build out its facilities in the Bangalore region, including a research lab with a focus on AI. Lenovo’s plans mark another win for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who tries to attract more technology investment into the country. While India’s tense relationship with China has suffered setbacks