■ Chipmaking
Hynix inks SanDisk deal
South Korea's Hynix Semiconductor, the world's second-largest memory chipmaker, said yesterday that it had forged a patent cross-licensing and product supply deal with US-based SanDisk. Hynix said the agreement would help it settle patent suits in the US. It follows a similar alliance announced on Tuesday between the South Korean firm and Japanese rival Toshiba, which also settled a patent dispute. It said it also agreed to set up a joint venture with SanDisk to make memory components and sell NAND memory system solutions. SanDisk is the world's largest supplier of flash data storage card products.
■ Banking
HSBC goes local in PRC
HSBC, Standard Chartered Bank, Bank of East Asia and Citigroup have won approval to incorporate locally in China, making them eligible to launch full yuan services, state media reported yesterday. As locally incorporated companies, the four lenders can provide yuan and foreign exchange services for Chinese citizens after completing the commercial registration process, probably by next month, the China Daily said. They would be no longer confined to taking only deposits larger than 1 million yuan (US$128,000) per client, a limit applied to foreign banks who choose not to take on local status. All four banks said they expected to start operations soon.
■ Telephony
Skype turns to PayPal
Skype said on Tuesday that users of its Internet telephone service will soon be able to transfer money to each other using PayPal. Skype and online financial transaction service PayPal, both owned by California-based Internet auction firm eBay, expected to formally announce the new service by the end of next month. Skype was bought by eBay in October of 2004 and uses a peer-to-peer network to enable users to make free Internet telephone calls to each other on computers. Skype reportedly ended last year with more than 150 million users. Skype users will need to have PayPal accounts to transfer money to each other.
■ Publishing
Cellphone comics planned
Japanese publisher Shinchosha will soon launch what it calls the country's first digital subscription magazine, an online comic regularly transmitted to mobile phones, a news report said yesterday. Com2 will contain about 200 pages of cartoons and is geared toward cellphones so readers in tech-savvy, comic-book-crazy Japan can keep up with their favorites on the go. The new service will be launched tomorrow. It will originally have cartoons in Japanese only, but Shinchosha plans to add English and Chinese.
■ Petroleum
Police question Total boss
The head of French oil group Total, Christophe de Margerie, was called in for questioning yesterday by police probing suspected corruption in Iran and Cameroon, a source close to the matter said. Margerie was to be questioned on suspicions of corruption to win a gas contract in 1997 with the Iranian national oil company NIOC to operate a gas field called South Pars. The investigation was being conducted by the police finance squad, the source said, after a report that Margerie was to be questioned appeared in the French regional newspaper Est Republicain.
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