■ IT industry
Public sector boosts techs
Electronic Data Systems Corp, Hewlett-Packard Co, IBM Corp and other information technology providers may gain from public-sector demand in Europe for online services, the Wall Street Journal reported today, citing companies. Public-sector budgets to put services such as driving-license applications online are growing at 10 percent a year, compared with 2 percent growth for the European IT market overall, the newspaper said. Hewlett-Packard, for instance, has more than 200 government projects in Italy, the paper said. "There's a huge potential as government follows its customers," the Journal cited Bill Sweeney, EDS's vice president for global government affairs, as saying yesterday at a conference on e-government in Como, Italy.
■ Debt
SK creditors want split-up
Overseas creditors of SK Global Co reckon they can get about US$216 million more by liquidating the South Korean trading company's offshore units than by accepting the cash payout on offer, people familiar with the proposal said. Standard Chartered Plc, and other overseas creditors have rejected an offer of 40 percent of the 910 billion won (US$770 million) they are owed. The offer underestimates the value of the overseas units of SK Global, said the people, who asked not to be identified. The breakup value is closer to 68 percent, they said. Overseas creditors are threatening to wreck a debt workout on 10 trillion won owed by SK Global, the distribution arm of Korea's biggest oil refiner and mobile phone company.
■ IPR protection
Sony to sue Chinese firm
Consumer electronics giant Sony will file a lawsuit Tuesday against Chinese battery maker BYD, accusing the firm of infringing two of its battery-related patents in Japan. "We have been investigating the case for some time and now have the evidence to bring a lawsuit," said Sony Corp spokes-woman Harumi Asai. The firm claims it spotted BYD Co at a consumer electronics exhibition in Japan last September, displaying a range of battery products containing the Sony-patent and distributing pamphlets. Although there was no evidence BYD had begun selling the items in Japan, Sony felt the fact they had held an exhibition and compiled a catalog meant there was a high chance this would happen in future, said Asai.
■ Airlines
UAL strives to keep experts
United Airlines parent UAL Corp asked a bankruptcy judge to let it pay up to US$9.5 million in bonuses to as many as 600 computer programmers and analysts to keep them from leaving the carrier. The world's second largest airline said in court papers the bonuses are needed to reduce turnover among the computer workers, which rose from an average 5 percent a year before UAL's December bankruptcy filing to 16 percent between January and last month. The airline's flight attendants, who earlier this year agreed to a 9 percent pay cut, said they object to the retention plan. The proposed bonuses will help the Chicago-based carrier stem a "brain drain" of employees who are essential to its operation and recovery, said UAL spokesman Jeff Green. UAL this year negotiated US$2.56 billion in annual labor savings, and the airline hopes to exit Chapter 11 bankruptcy as early as the fourth quarter of this year.
Agencies
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) on Wednesday said that a new chip manufacturing technology called “A16” is to enter production in the second half of 2026, setting up a showdown with longtime rival Intel over who can make the fastest chips. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract manufacturer of advanced computing chips and a key supplier to Nvidia and Apple, announced the news at a conference in Santa Clara, California, where TSMC executives said that makers of artificial intelligence (AI) chips will likely be the first adopters of the technology rather than a smartphone maker. Analysts said that the technologies announced on
NO RECIPROCITY: Taipei has called for cross-strait group travel to resume fully, but Beijing is only allowing people from its Fujian Province to travel to Matsu, the MAC said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday criticized an announcement by the Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism that it would lift a travel ban to Taiwan only for residents of China’s Fujian Province, saying that the policy does not meet the principles of reciprocity and openness. Chinese Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism Rao Quan (饒權) yesterday morning told a delegation of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers in a meeting in Beijing that the ministry would first allow Fujian residents to visit Lienchiang County (Matsu), adding that they would be able to travel to Taiwan proper directly once express ferry
CALL FOR DIALOGUE: The president-elect urged Beijing to engage with Taiwan’s ‘democratically elected and legitimate government’ to promote peace President-elect William Lai (賴清德) yesterday named the new heads of security and cross-strait affairs to take office after his inauguration on May 20, including National Security Council (NSC) Secretary-General Wellington Koo (顧立雄) to be the new defense minister and former Taichung mayor Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) as minister of foreign affairs. While Koo is to head the Ministry of National Defense and presidential aide Lin is to take over as minister of foreign affairs, Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) would be retained as the nation’s intelligence chief, continuing to serve as director-general of the National Security Bureau, Lai told a news conference in Taipei. Koo,
MANAGING DIFFERENCES: In a meeting days after the US president signed a massive foreign aid bill, Antony Blinken raised concerns with the Chinese president about Taiwan US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday met with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and senior Chinese officials, stressing the importance of “responsibly managing” the differences between the US and China as the two sides butt heads over a number of contentious bilateral, regional and global issues, including Taiwan and the South China Sea. Talks between the two sides have increased over the past few months, even as differences have grown. Blinken said he raised concerns with Xi about Taiwan and the South China Sea, along with China’s support for Russia and its invasion of Ukraine, as well as other issues