Tatung Co (
"Customers prefer to browse through merchandise in spacious, comfortable showrooms with well-trained staff tending to their needs," Larry Hsiao (蕭綮鞍), president of Tatung's marketing arm, Tatung Consumer Products Taiwan Co (大同綜合訊電), told reporters on the sidelines of a product launch.
To offer customers a brand new shopping experience, Tatung will renovate its 200 retail outlets nationwide within three years, he said.
Many of the stores will be upgraded into flagship showrooms by next April, and will take up around NT$50 million of the total NT$270 million budget, he said.
The facelifts have already borne fruit, as Tatung's first flagship showroom reported a record increase in business during the first month, reaping in sales of NT$8 million compared to NT$2.5 million before the renovation, he said.
Located near the intersection of Zhongxiao E Road and Fuxing S Road, the company's first flagship showroom opened on July 7, occupying 180 ping (596m2) over two floors.
There will be a second flagship showroom ready in Jhonghe (中和), Taipei County, by the end of this month, covering an area of 80 ping, according to Hsiao.
With steady sales reported from products such as air conditioners and liquid-crystal-display (LCD) televisions, Tatung Consumer Products is set to book net income of NT$60 million and sales of NT$8 billion this year.
Net income and sales for the first seven months hit NT$38 million and NT$4.5 billion respectively, the company said.
While launching its new 32 and 37-inch LCD TV models, Tatung said it has sold 38,000 LCD televisions during the January to July period, and the figure will top 85,000 by the end of the year. This will give it a foothold in the local market, which will amount to 500,000 LCD TVs this year, according to Hsiao.
To reflect the fall in panel prices, rival Taiwan Kolin Co (
Prices of Kolin's 20-inch, 23-inch, 42-inch and 47-inch LCD models will be reduced by between NT$2,000 and NT$30,000.
However, Hsiao said consumers should not expect further price cuts in LCD televisions.
"LCD panel prices have hit bottom and television prices should maintain their current level for now," he added.
Tatung's shares closed down 2.17 percent at NT$11.25 on the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
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
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
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],”