■ Electronics
EA to release phone games
California-based computer game maker Electronic Arts will soon begin offering games for mobile phones. Among the titles in planning are "FIFA 06" soccer and "SimCity," the company announced recently. Additional games to be made compatible with mobile phones are "Need for Speed Most Wanted" and "The Sims 2." These games are expected to be released by the end of the year. The service providers will likely follow. Each game title will likely cost about US$5.
■ Hospitality
Luxury hampers on offer
A five-star hotel in Hong Kong was yesterday offering what may be the world's most expensive Christmas hamper with a HK$1 million (US$129,000) price tag. The hamper offered by the Ritz-Carlton includes champagne, caviar, cigars, diamond jewellery, vouchers for a stay in the hotel's presidential suite and a flight by a Gulfstream jet to Bali. The hamper is believed to be the most expensive ever offered in Hong Kong -- where the top-priced hamper last year was a US$48,888 offering from Sogo. It may also be the most expensive commercial hamper anywhere, although there is no such category in the Guinness Book of World Records. The basic ingredients of the Ritz-Carlton hamper are Krug champagne, caviar and Cuban cigars, along with vouchers for a three-day, two-night stay at the Ritz-Carlton's presidential suite. Buyers will have exclusive use of a Rolls Royce limousine and a gourmet dinner for six on the final night.
■ Electronics
Hitachi plans India offices
Hitachi Ltd, Japan's largest electronics maker, will open outsourcing centers in India to provide software development and system support services to Japanese clients in the US and Europe, the Nikkei English News reported yesterday. The Tokyo-based company will partner with Satyam Computer Services Ltd and Intelligroup Inc to open offices in Bangalore and Hyderabad, with 200 employees, the report said, citing company officials it didn't identify. The company expects to hire up to 1,000 employees in two years, it said. Hitachi plans to increase the share of overseas revenue in its information and communications business to 40 percent by 2007, according to the report.
■ Auto industry
Toyota profits to hit record
Toyota Motor Corp's net profit for the year to March next year is expected to hit a record US$10.4 billion thanks to brisk sales and a weak yen, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported yesterday. Toyota is scheduled to announced its interim earnings report on Friday. The company is likely to report a group net profit of ¥1.2 trillion (US$10.4 billion), an all-time high for the fourth consecutive year, up 2 percent from the previous year, the paper said. Operating profit is expected to increase 5 percent to a record ¥1.75 trillion for the year on sales seen to gain 8 percent to about ¥20 trillion, the business daily said. The exchange rate is currently running around ¥115 to the dollar, against the company's assumed rate of ¥105. If the current rate continues until year's end, Toyota is expected to enjoy a foreign exchange gain of some ¥100 billion, it said.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
RESTAURANT POISONING? Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang at a press conference last night said this was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan An autopsy discovered bongkrekic acid in a specimen collected from a person who died from food poisoning after dining at the Malaysian restaurant chain Polam Kopitiam, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said at a news conference last night. It was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan, Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝) said. The testing conducted by forensic specialists at National Taiwan University was facilitated after a hospital voluntarily offered standard samples it had in stock that are required to test for bongkrekic acid, he said. Wang told the news conference that testing would continue despite
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)