The Taiwan-China routes that have helped local airlines earn record revenues and profits in the past year will continue to be the major profit engine for the local airline industry this year, according to market analysts.
Bruce Tsao (曹伯瑄), a Taipei-based analyst for Capital Securities (群益證券), recently told Central News Agency that Chinese tourists taking direct flights to Taiwan would become the most important source of passengers on routes across the Taiwan Strait.
The routes benefit only Taiwanese and Chinese carriers because they are not open to airlines based in other countries.
CHINESE VISITORS
Mandarin Airlines (華信航空) president Harris Wang (王華宇) also cited the continued growth in Chinese visitors to Taiwan as one of the factors expected to help the industry this year.
The optimism of industry insiders was buoyed after the two countries decided in a round of trade talks held late last year to raise the ceiling on the number of Chinese nationals allowed to visit Taiwan per day from 3,000 to 4,000, a change which came into effect on Saturday.
INDEPENDENT TRAVELERS
Both sides also agreed to allow Chinese citizens to travel to Taiwan independently without being confined to tour groups starting sometime in the first half of this year.
Meanwhile, local airlines also believed business charter flights between Taiwan and China would have considerable potential if allowed and would help attract multinational companies to set up regional offices in Taiwan.
Civil aviation officials from Taiwan and China held talks late last month and local airline -companies are reportedly likely to begin offering business chartered flights between the two countries sometime in the first half of this year.
SAVINGS
The business-oriented service would also increase the profits of local airlines, such as China Airlines Ltd (中華航空) and EVA Airways (長榮航空), by helping them save between 20 percent and 50 percent on fuel costs, according to E. Sun Securities Co’s (玉山證券) estimates.
END TO SPECULATION: The hotel’s management contract has been extended, despite reports that it wanted to end its alliance with Hyatt Hotels over a deal with Riant Capital Singapore-based Hong Leong Hotel Development Ltd (豐隆大飯店股份) yesterday said it has extended a management contract to ensure the continued presence of the Grand Hyatt brand in Taipei, ending rumors that the two sides were parting ways. “We are pleased Hyatt is able to come to terms on the extension of the management contract of Grand Hyatt Taipei,” said Kwek Leng Beng (郭令明), executive chairman of City Developments Ltd (城市發展) and Millennium & Copthorne Hotels Ltd (千禧國敦酒店). Hong Leong Hotel Development is a subsidiary of Millennium, and both fall under the Hong Leong Group (豐隆集團). The Grand Hyatt Taipei (台北君悅大飯店), owned and built by
’WHITE BOX’: The open platform would give local firms access to Cisco’s cloud-based mobile network to develop 5G telecom equipment and tap into the global market The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) yesterday introduced a new 5G “open lab” in collaboration with US-based information technology and networking giant Cisco Systems Inc to address the rapidly growing “white box” 5G networking equipment market. The open lab will be a platform where Taiwanese manufacturers can access Cisco’s cloud-based mobile network to develop their own 5G telecom equipment, such as small-cell base stations, network switches, modems and Internet of things (IoT) devices, a ministry statement said. The open platform would allow Taiwanese manufacturers to tap into the lucrative 5G telecom equipment market, which was previously monopolized by Nokia Oyj, Ericsson AB
Nintendo Co is raising its target for Switch production to about 25 million units this fiscal year, people familiar with the matter said, as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic keeps lifting demand and component shortages ease. The Kyoto, Japan-based company, which in April hiked orders to 22 million units by March next year, is asking partners to tack on another few million units, said the people, who did not want to be identified discussing internal goals. Assembly partners plan to work at maximum capacity through December. The new production target suggests that Nintendo is likely to outperform its Switch sales forecast of 19 million
‘BIG LOSS’: This year might see the last generation of Huawei’s Kirin chips, as their production would stop next month because they are made using US technology Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies Co (華為) is running out of processor chips to make smartphones due to US sanctions and would be forced to stop production of its own most advanced chips, a company executive has said, in a sign of growing damage to Huawei’s business from US pressure. Huawei, one of the biggest producers of smartphones and network equipment, is at the center of US-Chinese tension over technology and security. Washington last year cut off Huawei’s access to US components and technology, and those penalties were tightened in May, when the White House barred vendors worldwide from using US
RSS