To forge a name for a successful branded business, Taiwanese companies should continue its lookout for global talent and innovative ideas, an industry watcher said yesterday.
"In this era where specialized division of labor counts, Tai-wanese firms should change their mindset to recruit more global talents for both local and overseas offices," said Cynthia Chyn (秦素霞), deputy general director of the Taipei-based researcher Market Intelligence Center (市場情報中心).
She talked with the Taipei Times after delivering a presentation at the third Annual Global Connect Meeting and Partnering Forum yesterday.
According to Chyn, Taiwanese firms are well known for their ability in integrating applications and putting them into commercialization, a niche which helped make a name for the nation in the global contract-manufacturing scene for the past 20 years.
However, as more firms are turning into brandname business for higher margins and international visibility, they should beef up their international talent pool as foreign expertise in branding is key to success, she said.
"Taiwanese vendors are good at meeting clients' requirements for product manufacturing. But they should expand their market reach to segments such as after-sales or customer service," she said.
This will enable them to understand real customer needs, which will in turn stimulate creativity and increase profitability in the long run, she said.
According to Chyn, moving production offshore to China will definitely expand the landscape to a larger extent.
Taiwanese firms, however, are gradually losing their cultural-proximity advantage in China, she said, so they should run businesses there and amend strategies proactively based on domestic conditions.
"Overseas investments in China have marginal profit margins with an annual growth of only 0.7 percent to 1 percent," Chyn said, adding that this is a result of identical cost structures which makes most companies lose their competitiveness.
Higher rates for bank loans, rising oil prices and soaring raw material costs have burdened overseas firms investing in China, as they will need to market their products at a cheaper price in emerging countries, she said.
Meanwhile, more investments in the form of venture capital are expected to flood into China in the near term, said Michael Kang (康中邁), a director at the consultant firm Zero2IPO Co (清科信息).
However, companies should be cautious as such investments have not performed up to expectations so far due to poor management capability and failure in technology development, he said.
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
CROSS-STRAIT TENSIONS: The US company could switch orders from TSMC to alternative suppliers, but that would lower chip quality, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), whose products have become the hottest commodity in the technology world, on Wednesday said that the scramble for a limited amount of supply has frustrated some customers and raised tensions. “The demand on it is so great, and everyone wants to be first and everyone wants to be most,” he told the audience at a Goldman Sachs Group Inc technology conference in San Francisco. “We probably have more emotional customers today. Deservedly so. It’s tense. We’re trying to do the best we can.” Huang’s company is experiencing strong demand for its latest generation of chips, called
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure
RSS