COMPUTERS
No comment on Chang claim
Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) yesterday declined to comment on reports that late chief financial officer David Chang (張偉明), who passed away last week at the age of 50, committed suicide. Both the Chinese-language China Times and the Apple Daily yesterday reported on their Web sites that Chang committed suicide at a hotel in Taipei’s Dazhi area (大直) last week after suffering from depression. Asustek spokesman Nick Wu (吳長榮) said by telephone that the company would not comment on the private lives of its employees, which is an invasion of privacy. The company is still looking for an appropriate candidate to serve as chief financial officer. Chang, who worked at the PC company for nearly 21 years, played a key role in driving Asustek’s smartphone business as its PC business weakens.
INVESTMENT
Outbound deals approved
The Investment Commission yesterday said it approved three outbound investments by Taiwanese firms last month totaling US$2.77 billion, including Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) request to wire US$2 billion to TSMC Global Ltd. “TSMC’s investment is one of the firm’s measures to prevent losses from foreign-exchange volatility,” Investment Commission Acting Executive Secretary Emile Chang (張銘斌) said by telephone. The commission also approved Fubon Life Insurance Co’s (富邦人壽) request to invest US$538.1 million to purchase a plot of land in London from British company Sir Mtl Ltd and Cathay Life Insurance Co’s (國泰人壽) application to invest US$240 million in US-based Conning Holdings Corp, Chang said.
FOOTWEAR
Pou Chen shares surge
Shares of footwear supplier Pou Chen Corp (寶成工業) surged 4.18 percent yesterday as investors expect the company to obtain an influx of orders amid an international outsourcing trend. Pou Chen, which supplies footwear products to global vendors including Under Armour Inc and Adidas AG, has seen its shares rise 8.84 percent since the beginning of the year, compared with the TAIEX’s 5.8 percent decline over the same period. “Both companies’ [Under Armour and Adidas] margins are under pressure as they fight for market share and top line, so the need for outsourcing will become stronger,” JPMorgan Securities Ltd said in a note on Friday last week. Other local companies with business exposure to Under Armour and Adidas include Eclat Textile Co (儒鴻), Makalot Industrial Co (聚陽) and Taiwan Paiho Ltd (台灣百和). Feng Tay Enterprise Co (豐泰鞋業), which provides athletic footwear to Nike Inc, is expected to face a similar growth trend, JPMorgan said.
FINANCIAL SERVICES
Offer price set at NT$14.7
State-run First Financial Holding Co (第一金控) has set the price for its issuance of 1.6 billion new common shares at NT$14.7, according to a company filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange on Friday last week. The price implies a 14.44 percent discount to the the company’s ex-dividend stock price of NT$17.18, 5.9 percent below its book value per share of NT$15.62 last quarter, according to Morgan Stanley estimates. The company is to issue the new shares next month to raise NT$23.52 billion, with the proceeds to be used to reinvest in its banking subsidiary, First Commercial Bank (第一銀行) and boost the company’s capital adequacy ratio. It expects to complete the fund raising in the middle of September.
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],”
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
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained