Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC, 台灣高鐵) will postpone the construction of three new high-speed railway stations to keep operating costs under control and avoid further losses, THSRC chairman Ou Chin-der (歐晉德) said yesterday.
Construction of the three planned stations in the counties of Miaoli, Changhua and Yunlin was scheduled to begin next July.
Ou, who took over as THSRC chairman on Tuesday, said the company’s top priority at the moment is to address its financial woes and now is not the right time to build new stations.
THSRC has been running at a loss, weighed down by interest payments and depreciation. Since beginning operations in January 2007, it has accumulated losses of NT$70 billion (US$2.15 billion) as of the end of June — about 66 percent of its paid-in capital of NT$105.3 billion — and total debts of NT$400 billion.
An agreement reached between THSRC and the Ministry of Transportation and Communications’ Bureau of High Speed Rail (BHSR) requires the three stations to be completed within 66 months of the start of construction, but no exact timetable detailing their planned completion dates are available, BHSR Director Chu Hsu (朱旭) said.
Work has not begun on any of the three sites.
The high-speed rail system currently has eight stations, which were constructed by THSRC after acquiring land from the central government.
The company decided to build the three additional stations at the request of local residents after the three county governments offered TSHRC the land required.
Charming US President Donald Trump one week, angering China the next, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has had a busy start and is riding high in the polls, all on a few hours of sleep a night. However, the honeymoon might end soon for the Margaret Thatcher-admiring leader if a spat with China escalates further and she fails to keep inflation in check. “I believe Prime Minister Takaichi will surely do what she needs to do, so I trust her,” Kozue Otsuka, 50, told reporters at a festival this week for business owners seeking good fortune. While buying a lucky kumade rake featuring
TECH TITANS: Amazon’s latest chip joins Google in competing for the 90 percent market share held by Nvidia, which claims it is ‘a generation ahead of the industry’ Amazon Web Services (AWS) on Tuesday launched its in-house-built Trainium3 artificial intelligence (AI) chip, marking a significant push to compete with Nvidia Corp in the lucrative market for AI computing power. The move intensifies competition in the AI chip market, where Nvidia dominates with an estimated 80 to 90 percent market share for products used in training large language models that power the likes of ChatGPT. Google last week caused tremors in the industry when it was reported that Facebook-parent Meta Platforms Inc would employ Google AI chips in data centers, signaling new competition for Nvidia. This followed the release last month of
INSULATED: The company said it is less exposed to global complications, as it has built a strong footprint worldwide, and has multiple sources of rare earths and raw minerals Merck Group yesterday said it would ramp up production next year at its new flagship facility in Kaohsiung’s Lujhu District (路竹) to satisfy growing demand for advanced semiconductor materials and specialty gases, and to address supply resilience issues amid mounting geopolitical risks. Merck made the remarks during a news conference before the inauguration of its 500 million euros (US$582.1 million) facility, which is also to supply other markets in the Asia-Pacific region, it said. Merck executive board deputy chair and electronics CEO Kai Beckmann told reporters the company adopted a “local-for-local” strategy about seven years ago to address the cycle time of
Two companies wholly owned by the daughter of the founder of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) on Monday reported to the Taiwan Stock Exchange that they would dispose of all of the Hon Hai shares they hold. In filings with the exchange, Hong Wei Investment Co (鋐維) said it would sell the 2.771 million Hon Hai shares it holds and Frontier Investment Corp (承鋒投資) said it would sell its 2.409 million Hon Hai shares from tomorrow until Jan. 3 next year. The two companies are wholly owned and chaired by Shirley Gou (郭曉玲), the eldest daughter of Hon Hai founder Terry
RSS