BIOMEDICINE
Lite-on has Singapore plans
Lite-On Group (光寶集團) yesterday announced that it is to set up its first overseas biomedical research and development center in Singapore as part of the company’s efforts to expand the reach of its biomedical business. The firm said in a statement that the center aims to leverage on Singapore’s clinical strengths and medical research professionals and Lite-On’s extensive expertise in system design and manufacturing innovative point-of-care medical devices to fulfill unmet market needs in emergency care, telemedicine and decentralized healthcare service.
SMARTPHONES
Samsung tops sales list
Samsung Electronics Co of South Korea sold the most smartphones of any brand in Taiwan in January, followed by US consumer electronics giant Apple Inc and Taiwan’s Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) and HTC Corp (宏達電), industry sources said. A total of 728,000 mobile phones were sold in the nation in January, down 1 percent from the previous month, the sources said. In terms of sales volume, Samsung had a 20.5 percent share of the market for the month, the highest of any brand, followed by Apple at 19.4 percent, Asustek at 16.7 percent, HTC at 16.4 percent and Japan’s Sony Corp at 8.8 percent, they said.
FINANCE
Inflows reach US$1.48bn
Foreign institutional investors registered net fund inflows of US$1.48 billion into the nation last month, stopping a three-month streak of net outflows, the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) said. Market analysts said that foreign institutional investors moved funds into the nation, boosting liquidity levels in the local equity market and driving up the weighted index on the Taiwan Stock Exchange. On the back of the foreign fund inflows, the weighted index rose 3.27 percent last month, outperforming the major equity markets of the world, which had been affected by worries over a global economic slowdown and falling crude oil prices. Last month, the Dow Jones Industrial Average on Wall Street only rose 0.3 percent, while the Nikkei 225 in Tokyo fell 8.52 percent and the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong dropped 3.38 percent. The data compiled by the FSC showed that foreign institutional investors posted US$1.02 billion in net fund outflows in January, after posting net fund outflows of US$634 million in December and US$420 million in November. In October last year, foreign institutional investors recorded US$1.53 billion in net fund inflows.
TRADE
WTCC group visits Brussels
Nearly 30 members of the World Taiwanese Chambers of Commerce (WTCC) have arrived in Brussels, where they are to visit the European Parliament, the Federal Parliament of Belgium and the EuroChambers to promote trade and economic cooperation between Taiwan and the EU. WTCC president Lee Yao-hsiung (李耀熊), who is heading the delegation, said upon arrival in Belgium on Tuesday that he hopes the EU can open talks with Taiwan on a bilateral investment agreement as soon as possible. He said such an accord would help create the best investment environment and common benefits for both Taiwanese and European enterprises. To Taiwanese investors, Europe is an important investment destination and a market they are keen to enter, Lee said. For that reason, the WTCC organized the visit to the EU before its annual meeting in Madrid, hoping to create opportunities for the promotion of Taiwan-EU cooperation, he said.
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