■ Internet
Google offers free wireless
Google ended months of speculation late Friday afternoon by submitting a proposal to offer a free wireless Internet service to the city of San Francisco. The proposal, which is one of a range of proposals being submitted both by large communications firms and small start-ups, is in response to a TechConnect program proposed by the city's mayor, Gavin Newsom, this year. Newsom has positioned the program as a way to offer universal and affordable broadband Internet access to the city's residents and businesses. In recent months, speculation about Google's plans as an Internet service provider has reached a fevered pitch. However, the company said on Friday that it did not yet have plans to roll out free nationwide Internet services. Instead, it called its proposal to San Francisco an opportunity to learn about offering a range of location-based services.
■ Textiles
Brazil, China fail to agree
Negotiations between Brazil and China about the restriction of Chinese exports to Latin America's largest country ended without any agreements, Brazilian Trade and Development Minister Luiz Furlan said on Friday. The talks took place in Beijing but Furlan left the Chinese capital after saying the negotiations hit a last-minute impasse, Brazil's Agencia Estado news agency reported. Brazil, which has been hit by a flood of cheap Chinese imports, earlier this year proposed that China limit exports on some products. Such a move would prevent the possibility of Brazil hiking tariffs on import tariffs for Chinese goods. Furlan was quoted by Agencia Estado as saying that "an accord was 99 percent closed" when the Chinese introduced last-minute changes. Both countries left open the possibility of renewed talks, the news agency reported. The talks focused on Chinese exports of textiles, shoes, toys, tires and auto parts.
■ Banking
Italian governor probed
Prosecutors have notified the embattled governor of the Bank of Italy that he is under investigation for his role in a takeover battle between two banks, and that they plan to question him, his lawyer said on Friday. Governor Antonio Fazio was formally notified on Friday, lawyer Franco Coppi said, partly confirming several days of news reports based on anonymous sources. Coppi said, however, that he would advise Fazio to think carefully about whether to answer prosecutors' questions, given what he said was the recent spate of leaks and unconfirmed reports that appeared in the media concerning the case. "The only way to avoid all of this is to keep quiet," Coppi told reporters. The lawyer declined to say what exactly Fazio was suspected of, although Italian news agencies had reported that the central banker was being investigated for abuse of power.
■ Auto industry
EU ends exclusive contracts
EU rules ending exclusive contracts between carmakers and dealers went into effect yesterday, allowing dealers to set up shop anywhere in Europe. The EU head office said many carmakers had already eliminated location clauses from distribution agreements with dealers that had restricted where the dealers could do business. Firms that have not done so now risk antitrust charges from the EU or national regulators. Car prices vary widely across Europe. For example, German buyers pay 30 percent -- or 2,700 euros (US$3,250) -- pretax more on average than Finns for one of Europe's most popular cars, the Fiat Punto.
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