TransAsia Airways Corp (復興航空) yesterday announced plans to increase its number of flights to Osaka, Japan, beginning on April 10, eyeing strong demand from passengers.
The carrier is adding its second daily flight from Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport to Kansai International Airport, with the total number of flights increasing to 14 per week.
In addition, Taiwanese blockbuster movie Kano, released last month, may benefit the carrier’s sales through higher passenger traffic to Osaka, with travel agency Legend Travel Service Ltd (龍騰旅行社) having launched a movie-related tour package.
The film about a Taiwanese high-school baseball team coming second in Japan’s prestigious national high-school baseball championship at Osaka’s Hanshin Koshien Stadium in 1931 may raise interest in visiting the stadium and boost passenger numbers for TransAsia’s new flights, the firm said.
Meanwhile, Hawaiian Airlines yesterday announced the suspension next month of its Honolulu-Taipei service due to disappointing passenger numbers.
“The increase in travelers we expected when the US’ visa waiver program was extended to additional countries has not materialized in Taiwan and it became evident very quickly that there is insufficient awareness of Hawaii among residents of Taiwan for nonstop service to be successful,” Hawaiian Airlines president Mark Dunkerley said in a statement.
Hawaiian Airlines launched a regular service between Taipei and Honolulu in July last year with three flights per week, aiming for an average passenger load of 85 percent.
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