■ Sugar supplies stable
Sugar supplies in the domestic market will remain normal through the Lunar New Year holiday season, according to a spokesman for the Taiwan Sugar Corp (Taisugar, 台糖).
With only five days left before Lunar New Year's Day, which falls on Jan. 22 this year, sufficient supplies of the staple commodity in Taiwan have been secured, the Taisugar official said Thursday.
According to the official, Taisugar has supplied about 18,144 tonnes of sugar to meet local demand, which has been estimated at 22,680 tonnes, in the run-up to the Lunar New Year holidays. With the approximately 13,608 tonnes of sugar already imported by the private sector, supplies will be able to meet demand, the official said.
■ China Shipbuilding gets order
The state-run China Shipbuilding Corp (中船) received an order Thursday from All Oceans Transportation Inc (全洋海運) to build eight container ships.
China Shipbuilding general manager Fan Kuang-nan (范光男) and All Oceans general manager Liu Chi-hsiung (劉吉雄) signed the agreement at China Shipbuilding's headquarters in Kaohsiung. Wu Fong-sheng (吳豐盛), executive director of the Commission of National Corporations, attended the signing ceremony.
The eight vessels will be customized to meet All Oceans' demands, Fan said, adding that ships presently leased by All Oceans to ply its Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia routes will be replaced by the new vessels as they are completed. All Oceans, flagged in Liberia, is a spin-off business of Yangming Marine Transport Corp (陽明海運), which is based in Keelung.
■ Uni-President to spend more
Uni-President Enterprises Corp (統企業), that nation's biggest food company, plans to double spending this year in Taiwan to about NT$3 billion (US$89 million) to upgrade plants, spokesman Simon Hung (洪世民) said.
The upgrades will allow the company to use fewer workers in Taiwan, where Uni-President is seeking to trim its workforce by as much as 5 percent annually by offering early retirement and not replacing people who leave, Hung said. Uni-President has about 5,000 workers in Taiwan.
Two-thirds of Uni-President's assets are comprised of investments such as overseas instant noodle factories and convenience stores. The company is focusing on strengthening its brands of instant noodles, milk, bread and other foods, and divesting peripheral businesses.
The company is trying to pare costs by teaming up with competitors to expand sales.
■ Lite-On in China handset market
Local computer and computer equipment manufacturer Lite-On Group (光寶集團) plans to enter the Chinese mobile phone handset market, local Chinese-language media quoted the company's board of directors as saying yesterday.
The company announced on Thursday that it had invested US$3.5 million in a factory in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, and a further US$13 million in a subsidiary company that plans to manufacture and sell mobile phone handsets to Chinese consumers.
"In the past we worked with local companies to manufacture handsets for the Chinese market, but from now on we will do it by ourselves, from research and development to finished products," Lite-On chief executive Song Kung-yuan (宋恭源) told reporters on Thursday.
■ NT dollar higher
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday traded higher against its US counterpart, rising NT$0.015 to close at NT$33.685 on the Taipei foreign exchange market.
Turnover was US$572 million.
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