ELECTRONICS
HTC shares up 10 percent
HTC Corp (宏達電) shares resumed trading yesterday and rose by the maximum daily limit on the back of a deal with Google announced on Thursday. The shares gained 10 percent to close at NT$76.2 as investors reacted positively to the deal in which HTC agreed to sell a portion of its smartphone assets to Google for US$1.1 billion. While investors expect the large injection of funds to improve HTC’s operations, HSBC Securities (Taiwan) Corp said the scale of the company’s smartphone business remains key to its future profitability and Daiwa Capital Markets Inc warned the deal is not enough for HTC to deliver sustainable turnaround.
TECHNOLOGY
Science parks’ revenue up
The nation’s three science parks recorded total revenue of NT$1.1521 trillion (US$38.2 billion) in the first half of the year, an increase of 6.87 percent year-on-year, the Ministry of Science and Technology said on Thursday. The figure was the highest first-half revenue ever recorded by the science parks, the ministry said, attributing the strong performance to the global economic recovery. Total exports from the Hsinchu Science Park (新竹科學園區), the Central Taiwan Science Park (中部科學園區) and the Southern Taiwan Science Park (南部科學園區) reached a record NT$787.3 billion in the first six months, which was also a 6.87 percent increase from the same period last year, the ministry said.
SEMICONDUCTORS
Weakest billings posted
North America-based semiconductor equipment manufacturers posted their weakest billings in four months at US$$2.18 billion for last month as demand faltered, Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI) said in a statement yesterday. That represented a contraction of 4 percent from billings of US$2.27 billion in July. On an annual basis, the billings grew 27.7 percent from US$1.71 billion, SEMI said. SEMI president and chief executive Ajit Manocha said in a statement that the monthly decline in equipment billings signaled a pause in this year’s extraordinary growth.
INSURANCE
Nan Shan to list shares
Nan Shan Life Insurance Co (南山人壽) on Thursday announced that its board of directors has approved plans to list the company’s shares on the Taipei Exchange’s Emerging Stock Board. The move represents the company’s progress toward ensuring its long-term prospects, as well as fulfilling its ambition to allow ordinary members of the public to purchase its shares, it said. The insurer posted net income of NT$11.46 billion in the first eight months of this year, down 19.35 percent from the previous year.
PHARMACEUTICALS
S Korea approves Onivyde
PharmaEngine Inc (智擎) on Thursday said that the South Korean Ministry of Food and Drug Safety had given the green light for its pancreatic cancer drug, Onivyde, to go on sale in the nation. The drug is cleared to be administered to pancreatic cancer patients who have gone through gemcitabine-based therapy, the company said. The company is due to collect US$25 million in licensing fees from French pharmaceutical company Ipsen SA, whose South Korean subsidiary is overseeing sales in the nation, PharmaEngine said. Ipsen in January acquired the rights to commercialize Onivyde from US-based Merrimack Pharmaceuticals Inc — a licensing partner of PharmaEngine — along with all other obligations to the company.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
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
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last