INTERNET
Microsoft denies filtering
Microsoft Corp denied yesterday that it was omitting Web sites from its Bing search engine results for users outside China after a Chinese rights group said the US firm was censoring material the government deems politically sensitive. GreatFire.org, a China-based freedom of speech advocacy group, said in a statement on Tuesday that Bing was filtering out English and Chinese-language search results for terms such as “Dalai Lama,” the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader whom Beijing brands as a violence-seeking separatist, charges he denies. Microsoft, responding to the rights group’s allegations, said a system fault had removed some search results for users outside China.
MANUFACTURING
Core orders fall in Japan
Japan’s core machine orders fell in December the most since 1998, signaling business investment growth could slow in coming months and weigh on a recovery in the world’s third-biggest economy. Core orders fell 15.7 percent from the previous month, the Japanese Cabinet Office said in Tokyo yesterday, compared with the median estimate of a 4 percent decline in a Bloomberg survey of 31 economists. The fall partly reflected a pullback from a gain in November, when there was a big order that exceeded ¥10 billion (US$97.6 million), according to the office. With a sales-tax increase in April forecast to trigger an economic contraction in the second quarter, weakness in private capital expenditure would add to headwinds for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as he tries to drive a sustained recovery from 15 years of deflation.
AUTOMAKERS
Toyota recalls Priuses
Toyota yesterday announced a global recall of 1.9 million Prius hybrid cars because of a fault that could cause the vehicle to slow down suddenly, in the latest safety blow to the Japanese auto giant. The company said it decided on the call-back — the biggest for the eco-friendly vehicle — after the discovery of problems with software used to control a power converter that posed a risk to drivers. “Because, in the worst case, the car could stop while driving, we do consider this a potential safety issue and that’s the reason why we are implementing this recall,” a Tokyo-based company spokesman said. No accidents have been reported as a result of the defect, the world’s biggest automaker added. In most cases the defect could set off a vehicle’s warning lights and “probably” cause it to enter “failsafe mode,” in which the car can still be driven, but with reduced power, it said.
WELFARE
Xinjiang funds announced
The Chinese government will pump 61.66 billion yuan (US$10.17 billion) in extra funds into the restive far western region of Xinjiang this year to improve housing and employment, Chinese state media said yesterday. Xinjiang, home to the Muslim Uighur people and strategically located on the borders of central Asia, has been beset by violence for years, blamed by the Chinese government on Islamist militants and separatists who want to establish an independent state called East Turkestan. However, the government has begun to recognize the economic roots of some of the upheaval, especially underdevelopment and lack of job opportunities in heavily Uighur areas like rural southern Xinjiang, and has poured money in to rectify the problem. The Xinhua news agency said the new funds would be used to build 259,600 houses, generate 450,000 jobs and improve healthcare for residents.
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
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six