PHARMACEUTICALS
FamilyMart eyes pharmacies
Taiwan FamilyMart Co (全家便利商店), the nation’s No. 2 convenience store chain, yesterday said that it plans to provide pharmacy services and organic farming products to meet demand. Taiwan FamilyMart chairman and chief executive officer Yeh Jung-ting (葉榮廷) said at a news conference that the company has decided to team up with Great Tree Pharmacy chain (大樹連鎖藥局) and foods supplier Tanhou (天和鮮物) to provide the new services in selective stores. Yeh said demand for the “large-format convenience store” is rising and that Taiwan FamilyMart would keep looking for potential partners to expand this new business.
AUTOMAKERS
Mazda cuts parts prices
Mazda Motor Corp yesterday lowered prices of imported auto parts and components, such as headlights, windshields and bumpers used for the CX-5 and Mazda 6 models, by up to 50 percent for local consumers after taking over its component supply business from its former partner Ford Distribution Taiwan Ltd (品爵汽車). The announcement comes a year after the Japanese automaker set up its local subsidiary, Mazda Motor Taiwan, to sell its cars. The company had cooperated with Ford Lio Ho Motor Co (福特六和) in selling Mazda cars for 15 years.
RENEWABLE ENERGY
Eversol to aid Green Energy
Solar wafer maker Green Energy Technology Inc (綠能科技) yesterday said it had signed an outsourcing agreement with smaller wafer supplier Eversol Corp (旭晶能源) to cope with rising demand for high-end wafer products. Green Energy said the manufacturing agreement for ingot growth and wafer slicing with Eversol is part of its expansion plan, which is to bring its total multi-crystalline wafer capacity to more than 3 gigawatts (GW) from 2GW, making it among the world’s top three multi-crystalline wafer suppliers. The deal is also expected to increase bargaining power for raw materials, Green Energy said in a statement.
BANKING
Asset quality healthy: FSC
Taiwanese banks’ average non-performing loan ratio stayed unchanged at 0.26 percent at the end of May, reflecting healthy asset quality for the 39 domestic lenders, the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) said on Tuesday. Meanwhile, the coverage ratio — loans covered by banks’ provisions and a gauge indicating the sufficiency of bad loan reserves — rose 3.52 percentage points to 490.55 percent in May, the commission said. Total outstanding loans at domestic banks stood at NT$25.23 trillion (US$811.25 billion) in May, an increase of NT$48.9 billion from April, while bad loans totaled NT$64.9 billion, a decrease of NT$300 million from the previous month’s NT$65.2 billion, the commission said.
MANUFACTURING
FPG to raise wages
Formosa Plastics Group (FPG, 台塑集團), the nation’s largest industrial group, on Tuesday said it had decided to raise wages for its employees by about 4.52 percent following negotiations with its labor union. The hike includes a 3.5 percent raise in monthly salaries and NT$6,000 in allowances for the entire year, which represents a 4.52 percent increase in monthly pay for employees. The union said that although the hike was lower than it had asked for, the amount remained acceptable. The union had demanded a 4 percent raise in wages and a NT$10,000 increase in allowances.
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
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],”