TECHNOLOGY
Huawei to cut US jobs
Huawei Technologies Co (華為) is planning extensive layoffs in the US as the Chinese company grapples with its US blacklisting, the Wall Street Journal has reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The layoffs are expected to affect jobs at Huawei’s US-based research and development subsidiary, Futurewei Technologies Inc, which employs about 850 people, the Journal said. The layoffs could be in the hundreds, one person told the Journal.
BANKING
FSC confirms bank layoffs
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) on Tuesday last week confirmed that the Taipei branches of BNP Paribas Securities (Taiwan) Co Ltd (法國巴黎證券投顧) and Deutsche Securities Asia Ltd (德意志證券亞洲) have each dismissed employees to match their headquarters’ streamlining efforts. However, the two companies have no plans to close their operations and leave Taiwan, Securities and Futures Bureau Deputy Director Sam Chang (張振山) said. BNP and Deutsche each have 20 employees in Taiwan. Each firm plans to lay off two equity researchers and close their research departments, Chang said.
SEMICONDUCTORS
TSMC sets payout eligibility
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) on Tuesday last week said that its board of directors has set Sept. 25 as the date of record for common stock shareholders seeking eligibility to participate in the first-quarter distribution, which is to be a cash dividend of NT$2 per share. The board set the ex-dividend date for TSMC common shares for Sept. 19 and shareholders are to receive the dividend on Oct. 17, the first distribution of a quarterly cash dividend in the company’s history.
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
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
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],”
MAJOR BENEFICIARY: The company benefits from TSMC’s advanced packaging scarcity, given robust demand for Nvidia AI chips, analysts said ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packaging and testing service provider, yesterday said it is raising its equipment capital expenditure budget by 10 percent this year to expand leading-edge and advanced packing and testing capacity amid strong artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing chip demand. This is on top of the 40 to 50 percent annual increase in its capital spending budget to more than the US$1.7 billion to announced in February. About half of the equipment capital expenditure would be spent on leading-edge and advanced packaging and testing technology, the company said. ASE is considered by analysts