Shares of BenQ Corp (
The company's stock fell 3.9 percent to close at NT$12.50 on the Taiwan Stock Exchange, the lowest since Jan. 6, 1997.
The Economic Daily News, a Chinese-language newspaper, reported yesterday that Martin Prager, the insolvency administrator of German unit BenQ Mobile, will soon file the claim to the parent company.
The report raised concerns that the mobile-phone unit BenQ bought in 2005 from Siemens AG may further erode earnings after driving the Taiwanese parent to a record loss last year. The German handset maker, once the industry's third-largest producer, is being liquidated after losing market share to larger rivals such as Nokia Oyj and Motorola Inc.
"BenQ won't be able afford to pay all this debt if this becomes a reality," Arthur Hsieh (
BenQ hasn't received any claims from the German subsidiary or the insolvency administrator so far, Jean Hsu (
About 4,350 creditors of BenQ Mobile, the German unit, have registered total debt claims of 1.2 billion euros, or quadruple the estimated value of its assets, the Central News Agency reported on Thursday, citing Prager.
Creditors of the insolvent company include Brazilian soccer star Ronaldo, the report said.
BenQ had hired the three-time soccer player of the year to feature in commercials for BenQ Mobile, which in 2005 was the sponsor for Spain's Real Madrid, Ronaldo's team at the time.
BenQ reported a record annual loss of NT$27.61 billion (US$836 million) earlier this week after its purchase of the German unit failed to raise profit or sales. The deficit wiped out any profit the company had made since 1999.
Liquidation proceedings for BenQ Mobile began in January after a three-month search for a new investor ended without success.
The bankruptcy affects more than 3,000 workers in Germany and has hurt suppliers from chipmaker Infineon Technologies AG to phone parts makers Perlos Oyj and Balda AG.
Yesterday's drop drove the stock below the previous 10-year low set last week after Taiwanese prosecutors investigated possible insider trading by BenQ officials.
Cairo’s new monorail slices across the city skyline, running above the familiar chaos of blaring horns and aging buses’ exhaust fumes that mark rush hour below. The US$4.5 billion monorail, opened this month, is among Egypt’s most prominent new transport projects, part of a debt-funded infrastructure drive criticized for sapping state finances while bringing limited benefits to most of the country’s 109 million people. “It feels like you’re in a different country,” said Ramy Sayed, a restaurant manager, aboard a driverless Innovia 300 train. “No noise, no traffic, we’re not used to this.” The eastern line runs 56km from the bustling middle-class
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
RSS