Opening the semiconductor industry to Chinese investment without adequate safeguards would deepen Chinese influence and lead to a hollowing out of the industry, several academics said yesterday.
“China holds a knife in one hand and money in the other and then says to us: ‘You are my person and would you like money? Because otherwise I’ll knife you,’” Chang Shun-chih (張順志), a professor of electronics engineering at National Cheng Kung University. “However, many people only see the money and do not see the knife.”
Chang made the remarks at a joint press conference by several academics and the Economic Democracy Union to protest Minister of Economic Affairs John Deng’s (鄧振中) statement late last month that President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) government intends to open the sector to Chinese investment before his term expires in the May.
Photo: Lin Cheng-kung, Taipei Times
His remarks were followed last week by the announcement that China’s Tsinghua Unigroup would seek to purchase stakes in Siliconware Precision Industries Co and MediaTek — two key semiconductor firms.
Chang said that IC designer MediaTek faces substantial pressure to agree to Chinese investment because of its exposure to the Chinese market, making it vulnerable to sanctions by the Beijing government, such as forbidding Chinese phone makers from using the Taiwanese company’s chips.
While Deng has said the government would implement safeguards to protect business secrets and prevent the local industry from being undermined if the investment ban is dropped, such promises are “wishful thinking,” with the government failing to provide specific measures of how they would be implemented, Chang said.
“The Chinese are not interested in playing a ‘win-win’ game with us in the IC sector. They are seeking to use the Chinese market to force us to allow them to invest. They will continue to use the same means to gradually take control of IC design companies to gain access to our technology,” he said, adding that Taiwanese firms would be hollowed out and cast aside as soon as Chinese investors master their technology.
“If they get a hold of operating authority, there is nothing you can do,” he said.
Economic Democracy Union convener Lai Chung-chiang (賴中強) said that if Chinese firms were allowed to purchase stakes in IC companies, there would be no way to prevent “technological dialogue” between the firms, with Taiwanese firms likely to be required to provide training to Chinese workers.
Deng’s statements reflected overly broad executive discretion over the bounds of Chinese investment, he said, calling for the passage of a law similar to the Statute for Investment by Foreign Nationals (外國人投資條例) that requires major changes to receive legislative approval. Currently opening new sectors can be determined by executive fiat, he said.
A petition opposing the opening of the sector had attracted 246 signatures as of noon yesterday, including 80 from professors of electrical engineering or information related fields, the group said.
The manufacture of the remaining 28 M1A2T Abrams tanks Taiwan purchased from the US has recently been completed, and they are expected to be delivered within the next one to two months, a source said yesterday. The Ministry of National Defense is arranging cargo ships to transport the tanks to Taiwan as soon as possible, said the source, who is familiar with the matter. The estimated arrival time ranges from late this month to early next month, the source said. The 28 Abrams tanks make up the third and final batch of a total of 108 tanks, valued at about NT$40.5 billion
A group from the Taiwanese Designers in Australia association yesterday represented Taiwan at the Midsumma Pride March in Melbourne. The march, held in the St. Kilda suburb, is the city’s largest LGBTQIA+ parade and the flagship event of the annual Midsumma Festival. It attracted more than 45,000 spectators who supported the 400 groups and 10,000 marchers that participated this year, the association said. Taiwanese Designers said they organized a team to march for Taiwan this year, joining politicians, government agencies, professionals and community organizations in showing support for LGBTQIA+ people and diverse communities. As the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex
MOTIVES QUESTIONED The PLA considers Xi’s policies toward Taiwan to be driven by personal considerations rather than military assessment, the Epoch Times reports Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) latest purge of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) leadership might have been prompted by the military’s opposition to plans of invading Taiwan, the Epoch Times said. The Chinese military opposes waging war against Taiwan by a large consensus, putting it at odds with Xi’s vision, the Falun Gong-affiliated daily said in a report on Thursday, citing anonymous sources with insight into the PLA’s inner workings. The opposition is not the opinion of a few generals, but a widely shared view among the PLA cadre, the Epoch Times cited them as saying. “Chinese forces know full well that
Travel agencies in Taiwan are working to secure alternative flights for travelers bound for New Zealand for the Lunar New Year holiday, as Air New Zealand workers are set to strike next week. The airline said that it has confirmed that the planned industrial action by its international wide-body cabin crew would go ahead on Thursday and Friday next week. While the Auckland-based carrier pledged to take reasonable measures to mitigate the impact of the workers’ strike, an Air New Zealand flight arriving at Taipei from Auckland on Thursday and another flight departing from Taipei for Auckland on Saturday would have to
RSS