■ Production
Plasma displays in demand
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co will start making plasma display panels for TVs two months earlier than planned to meet growing demand in north America, the Nihon Keizai newspaper reported. Osaka-based Matsushita plans to start the panel production at its plant in Amagasaki in the western prefecture of Hyogo in September, the newspaper said without citing source of its information. Previously it planned to start in Novem-ber. Together with Matsu-shita's existing three plasma-panel display plants, the company plans to raise annual production to 3.3 million units later this year, from 1.8 million units now, the report said.
■ Legal Issues
Deutsche Telekom to pay
Deutsche Telekom has agreed to pay US$120 million to US plaintiffs alleging the company gave misleading information surrounding its June 2000 public share offering. The company said in a statement released late Friday it was not conceding any wrongdoing in the agreement, which still has to be approved by a US District court in New York. No one was immediately available for comment at Deutsche Telekom on Saturday. "No inference of accounting errors or disclosure viola-tions may be drawn from the fact of or terms of the agreement," the statement said. Deutsche Telekom faces similar lawsuits in German courts brought about by shareholders charging the company covered up risks and sold the stock at too high a price during the same June 2000 offering. Those proceedings are to resume in June.
■ Software
Windows XP changes in EU
Microsoft Corp has agreed to find another name for the stripped-down version of the operating system it was ordered to sell in Europe and had labeled "Windows XP Reduced Media Edition." Industry analysts thought the name would discourage sales of the antitrust-driven European version. But the company says it was simply intended to distinguish clearly between the full-fledged operating system and the version the EU's antitrust ruling requires -- without Windows Media Player and related functions. The EC asked the company to change the name, Microsoft spokeswoman Stacy Drake said on Friday. The Reduced Media Edition name "was descriptive of the product and reduced potential confusion in the market-place," Drake said. "How-ever, in the spirit of com-promise, we have agreed to make the change." A new name has not yet been chosen.
■ Airlines
Virgin rejects takeover
British billionaire Richard Branson's Virgin Group yesterday rejected a A$1.99 billion (US$1.54 billion) takeover offer by ports conglomerate Patrick Corp for the no-frills Australian airline Virgin Blue. Patrick, which holds a 45.95 percent stake in the carrier esta-blished by Branson in 2000, launched a surprise take-over bid on Friday, offering A$1.90 per share in cash for the shares it does not already own. But minority stockholder Virgin Group said the offer was too low, and that its Swiss invest-ment arm, Cricket SA, bought 5.1 million more Virgin Blue shares on Friday at an average price of A$2.04 "It is Virgin Group's view that Virgin Blue Holdings has much greater value than that indicated in the price being offered by Patrick Corp," Virgin Group said in a statement. Cricket SA's purchase brought Virgin's stake in the discount carrier to 25.1 percent.
‘NO SECURITY RISK’: The Railway Bureau reassured the public that the technicians’ activities were limited to technical guidance and did not involve sensitive systems The Railway Bureau yesterday said it had invited eight Chinese technicians to assist with an airport MRT construction project. The bureau issued the confirmation after an Internet user said Chinese nationals had entered the construction zone of Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport’s Terminal 3 project. They asked why “individuals from an enemy state” were allowed access to such a major national infrastructure project, which raised serious concerns over Taiwan’s industrial safety, sensitive systems and information security. The bureau’s Northern Region Engineering Branch Office said subcontractor Taiwan Handle Industrial Co (台灣手把工業) of the Taoyuan airport MRT’s “Contract No. CU05 Project A14 Station Civil, MEP &
The National Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology yesterday showcased its locally developed variants of the Vision 60 robotic patrol dog, which it plans to deploy on the nation’s outlying territories in the South China Sea. The variants were produced under the Joint Lab project — created by the institute and domestic companies — and assembled with domestically produced motors, lenses and artificial intelligence (AI) systems alongside licensed tech from the US, Missile and Rocket Systems Research Division deputy director Jen Kuo-kang (任國光) told the media event at a military base in Taipei’s Dazhi (大直) area. Taiwan has built up its strengths
NOT IMMEDIATE: Taiwan has a chance to appeal the proposed 10 percent tariff before it starts, while other countries face a 12.5 percent tariff from the trade office Taiwan is among 60 economies determined by the US to have failed to impose or enforce a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor, according to a notice released on Tuesday by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), which proposed imposing an additional 10 percent or more tariff on them. The USTR in a statement said that following an investigation, it had determined under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 that the failure of the 60 economies to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor is
RIGHT DIRECTION: Taiwan’s efforts to prevent forced labor include a proposal to ‘fully prohibit’ employers from withholding workers’ documents, an official said Taiwan is to establish a mechanism to restrict imports of goods linked to forced labor, the Executive Yuan said yesterday, after the US proposed imposing additional tariffs on Taiwanese goods over labor concerns. “The Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Economic Affairs are to establish an interministerial review procedure,” Executive Yuan spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “The government is to use the Foreign Trade Act [貿易法] as the legal basis to restrict imports of goods produced with forced labor” and bring its supply chain governance more in line with international standards on human rights, resilience
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