WATER
Supplies constrained: WRA
The Water Resources Agency (WRA) yesterday said it would switch the water supply indicator in Taoyuan and Tainan from “blue” — which indicates sufficient supply — to “green” — which indicates slightly constrained supply — on Sunday given the limited rainfall across the nation since the beginning of last month. The water level at Taoyuan’s Shihmen Reservoir (石門水庫), which supplies water to Taoyuan and western parts of New Taipei City, was 126.07 million tonnes of water, or 63 percent of its total capacity, the agency said in a statement. Tainan’s Wushantou Reservoir (烏山頭水庫) has 391.54 million tonnes of water, or 72 percent of its capacity, the agency added.
ELECTRICITY
Consumption surges in heat
Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) said maximum electricity consumption reached 36.41 gigawatts (GW) at 1:43pm yesterday as temperatures reached 38.6°C in Taipei and 37.8°C in New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋), the second-highest daily maximum power consumption in the nation’s history. The highest was recorded on Aug. 15 — 36.45GW of power consumption, the state-run utility said in a statement. The high usage left an operating capacity of 1.31GW, or a operating reserve of 3.61 percent, it said.
RETAIL
Momo to hire 350 staff
Television and online retailer Momo.com Inc (富邦媒體) yesterday said its newly built automated logistics center in Taoyuan is expected to become operational this week, and it plans to hire 350 employees by the end of this year. It is looking to hire people to work in digital marketing, product development, information technology and logistics, Momo.com said in a statement. Momo.com, a subsidiary of the nation’s second-largest telecom operator, Taiwan Mobile Co (台灣大哥大), said it forecast its monthly revenues could reach a record high of NT$2.8 billion (US$92.4 million) before the end of the year, on the back of its increasing operational scale.
STOCK EXCHANGE
Taiwanese shares rebound
Local shares yesterday staged a comeback, prompted by Apple Inc concept stocks, to end above 10,300 points on the Taiwan Stock Exchange. The TAIEX rose 69.66 points, or 0.68 percent, to close at 10,326.68, on turnover of NT$108.16 billion. Market analysts forecast that sales of the premium iPhone X could hit 40 million to 50 million units after pre-order sales begin late next month and that shipments of related components would begin to grow by that time. Among the Apple concept stocks, smartphone camera lens supplier Largan Precision Co (大立光) finished at NT$5,400, gaining NT$285 from the previous session. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the most heavily weighted stock in the local market, gained NT$1 to end at NT$215.
TECHNOLOGY
Lite-On to build in China
The Lite-On Technology Corp (光寶科技) board yesterday approved a US$35 million investment to set up a new subsidiary in Changzhou, China, to expand the firm’s automotive components production capacity, Lite-On said in a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange. It also approved a US$45 million increase at its plant in Suzhou, China, to grow storage production capacity as part of the company’s strategy to expand its cloud-computing business, the company said in a separate filing.
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],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
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