Chunghwa Telecom Co (
Chunghwa Telecom's move came in the wake of the National Communications Commission's (NCC) completion on Thursday of a new pricing formula imposing controls on mobile tariffs.
Under the new rules, local mobile operators have to slash rates for second-generation (2G) services by 4.88 percent per annum to boost market competition and safeguard consumer's interests.
As a whole, tariffs should be cut by 14.64 percent within three years, the NCC ruled.
"The price control measures are unreasonable and against the free competition mechanism. The price adjustment will affect our revenues and profits," Chunghwa Telecom spokesman Hank Wang (
Wang declined to give details on how the measures would adversely impact on the company's bottom line.
In an attempt to get more leeway before the new rules go into effect in April, Chunghwa Telecom said it would make an appeal within two weeks. The service operator added that the rate cuts are coming amid falling revenues and regular price reduction because of stiff competition.
Chunghwa Telecom chairman Hochen Tan (
The company forecast that its annual earnings would fall 7 percent to NT$44.24 billion (US$1.36 billion) on flat revenues of NT$184.2 billion this year.
Chunghwa Telecom also hoped that the commission would limit the rate cut to a year, instead of three, as an incentive for local telecom companies to speed up investment in next-generation technologies and equipment upgrade, it said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Far EasTone Tel-ecommunications Co (遠傳電信) and Taiwan Mobile Co (台灣大哥大) are seeking help from the Taiwan Telecommunications Industry Development Association (台灣電信產業協會) to persuade the government to adjust the pricing rules.
"We deeply regret the NCC's decision," the association's spokeswoman Rachel Liu (劉莉秋) said. "We will represent local telecom companies in communicating with the government. They did not include some important [capital] spending when they set the pricing rules."
As part of the new price limitation rules, the NCC also requested that local broadband network operators slash leasing rates by 5.35 percent per annum for three years or a total of 16.5 percent.
Chunghwa Telecom, which has over 4 million ADSL subscribers, is the nation's largest broadband service provider.
Shares of Chunghwa Telecom dropped 0.83 percent to NT$59.5 yesterday, while those of Far Eas-Tone and Taiwan Mobile were unchanged at NT$36.8 and NT$32.4, respectively.
HORMUZ ISSUE: The US president said he expected crude prices to drop at the end of the war, which he called a ‘minor excursion’ that could continue ‘for a little while’ The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Kuwait started reducing oil production, as the near-closure of the crucial Strait of Hormuz ripples through energy markets and affects global supply. Abu Dhabi National Oil Co (ADNOC) is “managing offshore production levels to address storage requirements,” the company said in a statement, without giving details. Kuwait Petroleum Corp said it was lowering production at its oil fields and refineries after “Iranian threats against safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz.” The war in the Middle East has all but closed Hormuz, the narrow waterway linking the Persian Gulf to the open seas,
RATIONING: The proposal would give the Trump administration ample leverage to negotiate investments in the US as it decides how many chips to give each country US officials are debating a new regulatory framework for exporting artificial intelligence (AI) chips and are considering requiring foreign nations to invest in US AI data centers or security guarantees as a condition for granting exports of 200,000 chips or more, according to a document seen by Reuters. The rules are not yet final and could change. They would be the first attempt to regulate the flow of AI chips to US allies and partners since US President Donald Trump’s administration said it rescinded its predecessor’s so-called AI diffusion rules. Those rules sought to keep a significant amount of AI
Apple Inc increased iPhone production in India by about 53 percent last year and now makes a quarter of its marquee devices there, reflecting the US company’s efforts to avoid tariffs on China. The company assembled about 55 million iPhones in India last year, up from 36 million a year earlier, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be named because the numbers aren’t public. Apple makes about 220 million to 230 million iPhones a year globally, with India’s share of the total increasing rapidly. Apple has accelerated its expansion in the world’s most populous country in recent years, bolstered
HEADWINDS: The company said it expects its computer business, as well as consumer electronics and communications segments to see revenue declines due to seasonality Pegatron Corp (和碩) yesterday said it aims to grow its artificial intelligence (AI) server revenue more than 10-fold this year from last year, driven by orders from neocloud solutions clients and large cloud service providers. The electronics manufacturing service provider said AI server revenue growth would be driven primarily by the Nvidia Corp GB300 server platform. Server shipments are expected to increase each quarter this year, with the second half likely to outperform the first half, it said. The AI server market is expected to broaden this year as more inference applications emerge, which would drive demand for system-on-chip, application-specific integrated circuits
RSS