Yang Ming Marine Transport Corp’s (陽明海運) board of directors yesterday approved plans to order new vessels capable of carrying 8,000 twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU) and issue new debts, but failed to reach a conclusion on the potential order of mega--container ships.
Yang Ming chairman Frank Lu (盧峰海) said on the sidelines of a legislative session on Thursday last week that he planned to submit a proposal to the company’s board this week to order five ships capable of carrying up to 16,000 TEU containers.
Analysts have said the company must double the capacity of its current 8,000-TEU vessels to maintain its market position in the increasingly competitive Asia-Europe trade route.
However, the board of Taiwan’s second-largest container shipping firm yesterday did not reach a decision on the exact number of ships to be ordered, when to place an order, how to obtain the ships or even the size of the vessels.
“The board has shown support for the plan after hearing our briefing on shipbuilding trends and the competitive advantage of mega-container ships,” company chief financial officer Vincent Lin (林文博) told a media briefing.
However, the company is in no rush to reach a conclusion on the potential order as it still needs some time to research and observe the market, Lin said. Moreover, the company does not expect any major fluctuations in the pricing of ships next year, he added.
The board yesterday approved a plan to spend NT$591.6 million (US$19.65 million) on five new 8,000-TEU container ships, previously ordered by its subsidiary All Oceans Transportation Inc (全洋海運).
The five ships are expected to be delivered in the next two years and will be registered as national ships, the company said.
In addition, the company’s board also agreed to sell three 3,600-TEU vessels, possibly next year, while approving a plan for Yang Ming to issue a total of NT$7 billion in new debts for paying back old debts.
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
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
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last