A local consortium is to take over development of the Twin Towers project near Taipei Railway Station after the original winner of the contract was removed due to national security concerns, the Taipei City Government said yesterday.
The local group — consisting of contract computer maker Clevo Co (藍天電腦) and its property development affiliate Hongwell Group (宏匯集團) — would take over the contract after meeting certain requirements, including submitting NT$1.9 billion (US$62.07 million), it said.
The consortium lost a contest in December last year to another consortium led by Hong Kong-based Nan Hai Development Ltd (南海發展) and Malaysian property developer Malton Berhad.
However, the Investment Commission in July revoked the approval, citing national security concerns.
Nan Hai Development is a unit of Nan Hai Holding Co (南海金控) that owns businesses in China, Hong Kong, North America, Europe and Australia in the culture and media sectors, property development and IT application services.
Nan Hai chairman Yu Pun-hoi (于品海) called the decision unfair and legally shaky, but failed in an attempt to appeal the decision in court.
The Taipei City Government said it would press ahead with the project after it had given Nan Hai sufficient time to submit its appeal.
The city government had previously been unsuccessful in its attempts to find developers for the project valued at NT$60 billion, which has been at the center of a series of bribery scandals over the past 20 years.
The local team welcomed the invitation, saying it has been ready since announcing its decision to enter the bidding last year.
Hongwell earlier said that it would work with US architecture and engineering firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP to build the complex.
The US firm is known for designing iconic buildings, with its portfolio including the One World Trade Center in New York and the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Hongwell said.
Clevo chairman and head of the consortium Kent Hsu (許坤泰) said that 16 local lenders had agreed to provide loans for 60 percent of the construction costs and his own companies would provide the remaining 40 percent.
Hsu added that he has previously made several property investments in conjunction with railway lines and Mass Rapid Transit systems.
The group is responsible for three such projects in Taipei’s Neihu District (內湖) and New Taipei City’s Sinjhuang District (新莊).
The Twin Towers complex would add more than 60,000 ping (198,347m2) of commercial space to the area and create thousands of job opportunities.
“We want to roll up our sleeves and start construction right away,” Hsu said in a statement.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) last week recorded an increase in the number of shareholders to the highest in almost eight months, despite its share price falling 3.38 percent from the previous week, Taiwan Stock Exchange data released on Saturday showed. As of Friday, TSMC had 1.88 million shareholders, the most since the week of April 25 and an increase of 31,870 from the previous week, the data showed. The number of shareholders jumped despite a drop of NT$50 (US$1.59), or 3.38 percent, in TSMC’s share price from a week earlier to NT$1,430, as investors took profits from their earlier gains
In a high-security Shenzhen laboratory, Chinese scientists have built what Washington has spent years trying to prevent: a prototype of a machine capable of producing the cutting-edge semiconductor chips that power artificial intelligence (AI), smartphones and weapons central to Western military dominance, Reuters has learned. Completed early this year and undergoing testing, the prototype fills nearly an entire factory floor. It was built by a team of former engineers from Dutch semiconductor giant ASML who reverse-engineered the company’s extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines, according to two people with knowledge of the project. EUV machines sit at the heart of a technological Cold
Taiwan’s long-term economic competitiveness will hinge not only on national champions like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC, 台積電) but also on the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies, a US-based scholar has said. At a lecture in Taipei on Tuesday, Jeffrey Ding, assistant professor of political science at the George Washington University and author of "Technology and the Rise of Great Powers," argued that historical experience shows that general-purpose technologies (GPTs) — such as electricity, computers and now AI — shape long-term economic advantages through their diffusion across the broader economy. "What really matters is not who pioneers
TAIWAN VALUE CHAIN: Foxtron is to fully own Luxgen following the transaction and it plans to launch a new electric model, the Foxtron Bria, in Taiwan next year Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車) yesterday said that its board of directors approved the disposal of its electric vehicle (EV) unit, Luxgen Motor Co (納智捷汽車), to Foxtron Vehicle Technologies Co (鴻華先進) for NT$787.6 million (US$24.98 million). Foxtron, a half-half joint venture between Yulon affiliate Hua-Chuang Automobile Information Technical Center Co (華創車電) and Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), expects to wrap up the deal in the first quarter of next year. Foxtron would fully own Luxgen following the transaction, including five car distributing companies, outlets and all employees. The deal is subject to the approval of the Fair Trade Commission, Foxtron said. “Foxtron will be
RSS