United Microelectronics Co (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 2 contract chipmaker, yesterday obtained its long-awaited approval from the government to buy about a 52 percent stake in Chinese chipmaker HeJian Technology (Suzhou) Co Ltd (和艦科技) for US$157 million.
The Investment Commission yesterday gave the go-ahead to seven China-bound investment projects totaling US$780 million including the one from UMC, a US$56 million venture from Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd (鴻海精密) and a US$317 million project by Bank SinoPac (永豐銀行) to set up a Chinese subsidiary.
The approval will help UMC obtain a “manufacturing base in China,” UMC spokesman Liu Chi-tung (劉啟東) said by telephone.
“We will continue to increase our holdings of HeJian to 100 percent as planned,” Liu said.
The move would see UMC’s holdings in HeJian increase to 87.59 percent after obtaining 35.7 percent of the Chinese chipmaker in an earlier approval.
UMC would be able to make 8-inch wafers and solar cells through HeJian, the Investment Commission said in a statement released yesterday.
UMC currently operates seven 8-inch wafer factories, two 12-inch factories and one 6-inch factory.
The commission yesterday also approved six investment projects from overseas, totaling US$433 million.
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
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],”
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Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day