■Electronics
Toshiba alters production
Toshiba Corp, the top seller of DVD players in the US last year, will double production capacity of DVD recorders as it prepares to introduce its first major model outside Japan. "We will raise monthly production capacity to 100,000 units" from 50,000, Yosuke Goto, a senior manager in the planning division for Tokyo-based Toshiba's digital audio visual products, said. The new model will be in stores for the Christmas holiday shopping season. Toshiba, along with rivals such as Matsushita Electric Industrial Co and Pioneer Corp, is shifting from DVD players to DVD recorders to escape price competition with Chinese manufacturers. "We have to aim at where it's difficult for Chinese companies to compete with us," Goto said. In the US, the least expensive DVD players are priced below US$50.
■ Internet
Google spurs competition
Google Inc's success with its online search engine and the access this gives to shopping via the Internet is prompting Microsoft Corp, Yahoo Inc and Amazon.com Inc and others to offer rival products, the Wall Street Journal said, citing Microsoft, a venture capitalist and an analyst. Microsoft has a "long-term project" to develop its own search engine, the paper cited Lisa Gurry, group product manager at its MSN unit, as saying. Yahoo said yesterday it would buy Overture Services Inc for US$1.63 billion to increase its revenue from Web searching. Of about 4 billion Internet searches in May, 32 percent were made via Google, 25 percent with Yahoo and 19 percent with AOL Time Warner Inc's America Online service, the paper said. Closely held Google Inc is based in Mountain View, California.
■ Electronics
Hughes offers Boeing cash
Hughes Electronics Corp, owner of the DirecTV satellite-television service, agreed to pay Boeing Co US$360 million in cash to resolve a dispute over the price Boeing paid for Hughes's satellite-making business in 2000. Hughes's second-quarter earnings were reduced by about US$8 million because of the agreement, said Richard Dore, a spokesman for El Segundo, California-based Hughes. Results for the period will be released tomorrow, he said. Boeing acquired Hughes's satellite-systems manufacturing businesses for US$3.75 billion in October 2000. In 2001, Boeing claimed that Hughes had overvalued the assets sold to Boeing by US$1.3 billion and the companies entered into negotiations. Boeing officials didn't return a message for comment. Boeing today said it will record a US$1.1 billion charge in the second quarter, partly because of cost overruns to rework satellites.
■ Retail sales
US' sales figures rising
US retail sales rose 0.5 percent last month, a sign of strong demand by US consumers despite a drop in automobile sales, the government said Tuesday. The US Department of Commerce said auto sales fell 0.1 percent in the month but that excluding auto sales, retail sales rose 0.7 percent in the month. In addition to the weak auto sales, weak sales of electronics and appliances, which fell 0.1 percent in the month, brought down the overall figure. Excluding gasoline, retail sales rose 0.5 percent in the month. Excluding both autos and gasoline, retail sales rose 0.7 percent last month. Furniture sales rose 0.5 percent in the month after rising 1.2 percent in May.
Agencies
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique