BANKING
Citibank fined for data error
The Financial Supervisory Commission yesterday fined Citibank Taiwan Ltd (台灣花旗) NT$5 million (US$162,967) for a malfunction of its information system in January that caused incorrect account balances to be displayed, inconveniencing more than 10,000 clients. As it was the second time that Citibank Taiwan’s information system has had a major problem — following a logic error that allowed a cardholder to spend more than his credit limit, which resulted in a fine to the bank in November last year — the commission has ordered it to review the systems used by its local operations and at its regional headquarters in Singapore, Banking Bureau Deputy Director-General Huang Kuang-hsi (黃光熙) told a news conference in New Taipei City.
INNOVATION
SMEA launches start-up hub
The Small and Medium Enterprise Administration (SMEA) yesterday launched the Start-up Terrace, home to the nation’s innovative businesses in New Taipei City’s Linkou District (林口). Based in what was the athlete’s village for the 2017 Taipei Summer Universiade, the Start-up Terrace houses 132 international and local start-ups and accelerators specializing in various domains. It provides offices, housing, coworking spaces, an exhibition center and other facilities over 59,382m2, SMEA said. The site also provides financial and legal counseling services, as well as access to international mentors, as it aims to become one of the most important start-up hubs in Asia, it said.
REAL ESTATE
Yulon halts development
Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車) yesterday said that its board of directors has approved suspending construction of a residential compound in New Taipei City’s Sindian District (新店), as well as reducing the scale of a commercial area in the project. However, it would continue a partnership with Eslite Bookstore (誠品) and Vieshow Cinemas (威秀影城) to develop the commercial area, it said in a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange. Yulon said that it could restart development of the residential compound depending on market conditions.
TELECOMS
Far EasTone to offer jobs
Far EasTone Telecommunications Co (遠傳電信) plans to offer about 100 positions in Taipei’s Neihu District (內湖) at a job fair today organized by the Taipei City Government, the company said yesterday. About 40 percent of the job opportunities, including application engineers and cloud-related service developers, would be created to cope with a growing demand for information technology services, the company said. About 30 percent of the positions aim to tackle rising e-commerce business, with the remaining 30 percent for salespersons and retail channel analysts, Far EasTone said.
HEALTHCARE
FDA probing Ispect Biotech
Ispect Biotech Ltd (艾思博生物科技), which makes a plate and screw implant for broken bones, is under investigation for allegedly supplying hospitals with falsely certified products, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said on Wednesday. The firm is suspected of falsifying the serial numbers on its products, allegedly using the Good Manufacturing Practice serial numbers of other companies, FDA Director-General Wu Shou-mei (吳秀梅) said. From January to July, 80 hospitals had procured the uncertified implants, which were used on about 70,000 patients, Wu 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],”
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