Taipei Financial Center Corp (台北金融大樓公司), owner of the world’s second-tallest building, expects to report a profit this year as Chinese tenants and tourists help boost sales.
Net income may reach NT$300 million (US$10.4 million) this year, from last year’s NT$280 million, the company’s spokesman Michael Liu (劉家豪) told reporters in Taipei yesterday. Sales could rise to NT$9.5 billion from almost NT$9 billion last year, he said.
Chinese companies and visitors are increasing their presence in Taiwan, while Chinese companies including Bank of Communications (交通銀行) and Sinochem Group (中國中化) have set up offices in Taipei 101.
“We look forward to more mainland companies moving in,” Liu said.
The number of Chinese tenants in Taipei 101’s office tower has increased to 10 from three a year earlier, he said. Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想), China’s biggest maker of personal computers, and Sinosteel Corp (中國中鋼) have offices in the building, according to Liu.
The 508m Taipei 101, completed in 2004, ceded its position as the world’s tallest building to Burj Khalifa in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, last year. More than 10,000 people work in its offices and it also has a shopping mall.
Taipei 101 targets 95 percent occupancy rate for its office tower next year, from about 85 percent currently and 80 percent a year earlier, Liu said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
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
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