Taiwanese companies have reduced their investments in China by more than half since January, indicating declining interest in investing in the country amid a spiraling US-China trade spat, the Investment Commission said yesterday.
The number of applications to invest in China declined 12.6 percent year-on-year, while the monetary amount dropped 55.45 percent to US$2.33 billion, the commission said in a report that compiled data from the first seven months of this year.
Chinese investment in Taiwan dropped 59.33 percent year-on-year to US$60.43 million in the period, which the commission attributed to a high comparison base last year, when China-based Foxconn Industrial Internet Co Ltd (富士康工業互聯網) invested US$75.22 million in Taiwan through its subsidiary, Ingrasys (Singapore) Pte Ltd.
The number of applications by Chinese firms to invest in Taiwan increased 6.25 percent in the period, it said.
Meanwhile, the number of applications by foreign nationals and overseas Chinese to invest in Taiwan increased by a slight 1.08 percent, with the monetary amount declining 33.69 percent, which the commission attributed to a high comparison base last year, when Micron Technology BV and Eastern Danube Investment SARL invested about US$2.8 billion.
The commission said that it expects foreign investment to further increase by the end of the year, as it is reviewing applications from semiconductor companies to invest more than US$2 billion.
Furthermore, investment from Southeast Asian, South Asian and Australasian nations targeted by the government’s New Southbound Policy soared 439.37 percent year-on-year to US$766.59 million in the period on the back of investments from Australia and Singapore, the data showed.
Taiwanese investment in those regions rose 7.56 percent to US$1.64 billion in the period, particularly to Singapore, the commission said.
However, the nation’s overall overseas investment declined 37.91 percent in the seven-month period due to a high comparison base last year, the commission said.
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