AUTOMAKERS
Yulon posts decline
Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車) yesterday posted a second consecutive quarterly loss for last quarter of NT$279.63 million (US$9.14 million) and a net nonoperating decline of NT$521.09 million. That led the firm to report net losses of NT$1.57 billion for the third quarter, with losses of NT$1.05 a share. Revenue rose to NT$21.58 billion, from NT$21.02 billion the previous quarter and NT$20.22 billion a year earlier, company data showed. In the first three quarters of this year, Yulon reported net losses of NT$2.51 billion, compared with a net profit of NT$1.62 billion a year earlier, or losses of NT$1.7 per share.
MANUFACTURING
YFY profits jump 48.7%
Papermaking conglomerate YFY Inc (永豐餘控股) yesterday reported net profit climbed 48.7 percent to NT$1.18 billion from a year earlier, which it attributed to nonoperating gains of NT$857.79 million. Earnings per share increased from NT$0.48 to NT$0.71, while gross margin grew from 15.59 percent to 16.24 percent. However, third-quarter revenue fell 4.47 percent to NT$19.095 billion on falling global pulp prices and the low cost of recycled paper, YFY said. In the first three quarters of this year, net profit totaled NT$1.84 billion, up 37.2 percent from NT$1.34 billion a year earlier, with earnings per share of NT$1.11.
MANUFACTURING
Union plans Tatung protest
The labor union of Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd (CPT, 華映) yesterday said it plans a sit-in at parent company Tatung Co’s (大同) headquarters in Taipei, to urge it to pay wages owed by its flat-panel manufacturing arm. About 1,900 former CPT employees have not received salaries since they were laid off in August, the union said. Tatung holds a 40 percent stake in CPT, which has filed for bankruptcy protection. The Ministry of Labor is paying the laid-off workers part of the debt through a repayment fund for arrears wage debts.
TELECOMS
Chunghwa boosts pay
Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) on Wednesday said it approved a 3 percent averaged pay raise for employees in a bid to recruit and retain talent ahead of the launch of 5G services next year. Employees with special skills and technological capabilities might see their salaries increase more than 5 percent year-on-year, the company said in a statement. The pay hikes take effect on Jan. 1.
CHIPMAKERS
TSMC issues dividend
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) on Tuesday approved to issue a cash dividend of NT$2.5 per share on its earnings per share NT$3.9 for the third quarter. The dividends would be distributed on April 16, the firm said. The board also approved a proposal to assign a capital budget of NT$199.8 billion for new production lines, the installation of advanced technology production equipment, and R&D spending, TSMC said.
GOVERNMENT
Lottery app expands
The Taxation Administration yesterday said that digital receipt holders would be able to claim NT$500 e-receipts in the September-October uniform invoice lottery draw through its mobile app on Android and iOS platforms. The system is currently limited to winnings of NT$1,000 and NT$200, an official said. The agency is to draw the winning numbers for the September-October uniform invoice lottery on Nov. 25.
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