China’s largest video-on-demand provider, iQiyi (愛奇藝), a subsidiary of Internet search engine Baidu Inc (百度), yesterday launched its online video-streaming services in Taiwan.
iQiyi is not the first foreign over-the-top (OTT) service provider that plans to gain a foothold in Taiwan, as Taiwanese consumers are spending more time watching online video streaming than the global average.
In January, the US’ biggest online video-on-demand provider Netflix Inc launched its services in Taiwan as part of its expansion to Asia.
French online video-on-demand provider Dailymotion SA is following suit and is scheduled to launch its services in Taiwan tomorrow.
Taiwanese spent 7.8 hours per week watching video-on-demand on the Internet, 1.8 hours higher than the global average, according to an Ericsson report issued in November last year.
“Taiwan is our first market outside China,” iQiyi founder and chief executive officer Gong Yu (龔宇) told a press conference in Taipei yesterday.
“For iQiyi, Taiwan is the second-biggest Chinese-speaking market other than China as our big data analysis shows,” Gong said.
To provide localized content, the Beijing-based company plans to deepen its collaboration with Taiwanese talent, movie directors and producers to create original content for Chinese-speaking subscribers, Gong said.
iQiyi operates 11 categories of video-on-demand content including movies, soap operas, animation, documentaries and original programs produced by iQiyi. In total, the company offers 125 soap operas made in Taiwan, 80 variety shows from Taiwan and more than 2,000 Hollywood movies.
Subscribers will be able to access iQiyi’s videos on the company’s Web sites via computers or through the company’s mobile application, the company said, adding that it is preparing to deliver its content on tablet devices as well.
Last week, movie distributor and producer Catchplay Inc (威望國際) expanded to the OTT market by launching its video-on-demand service.
The company said the service is streaming content from NBC Universal, Warner Brothers Entertainment and independent studios.
Catchplay said it plans to expand to Singapore and Indonesia soon.
Local telecom companies are also gearing up for providing OTT services. Far EasTone Telecommunications Co (遠傳電信) plans to spend as much as NT$20 million (US$611,714) this year to acquire the rights to English-language movies, as well as Chinese, South Korean and Japanese soap operas.
The budget is 50 percent higher than last year, Far EasTone said, while expecting its OTT subscribers to increase to 500,000 this year.
Far EasTone president Yvonne Li (李彬) said that she considers iQiyi to be a serious competitor, as they have similar target demographics.
Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) said it aims to grow its streaming video-on-demand subscribers to 700,000 this year from last year’s 520,000.
The company aims to have 210,000 subscribers to its OTT services by the end of this year.
Shares of contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) came under pressure yesterday after a report that Apple Inc is looking to shift some orders from the Taiwanese company to Intel Corp. TSMC shares fell NT$55, or 2.4 percent, to close at NT$2,235 on the local main board, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed. Despite the losses, TSMC is expected to continue to benefit from sound fundamentals, as it maintains a lead over its peers in high-end process development, analysts said. “The selling was a knee-jerk reaction to an Intel-Apple report over the weekend,” Mega International Investment Services Corp (兆豐國際投顧) analyst Alex Huang
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is expected to remain Apple Inc’s primary chip manufacturing partner despite reports that Apple could shift some orders to Intel Corp, industry experts said yesterday. The comments came after The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Apple and Intel had reached a preliminary agreement following more than a year of negotiations for Intel to manufacture some chips for Apple devices. Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (台灣經濟研究院) economist Arisa Liu (劉佩真) said TSMC’s advanced packaging technologies, including integrated fan-out and chip-on-wafer-on-substrate, remain critical to the performance of Apple’s A-series and M-series chips. She said Intel and Samsung
TRANSITION: With the closure, the company would reorganize its Taiwanese unit to a sales and service-focused model, Bridgestone said Bridgestone Corp yesterday announced it would cease manufacturing operations at its tire plant in Hsinchu County’s Hukou Township (湖口), affecting more than 500 workers. Bridgestone Taiwan Co (台灣普利司通) said in a statement that the decision was based on the Tokyo-based tire maker’s adjustments to its global operational strategy and long-term market development considerations. The Taiwanese unit would be reorganized as part of the closure, effective yesterday, and all related production activities would be concluded, the statement said. Under the plan, Bridgestone would continue to deepen its presence in the Taiwanese market, while transitioning to a sales and service-focused business model, it added. The Hsinchu
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has approved a capital budget of US$31.28 billion for production expansion to meet long-term development needs during the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. The company’s board meeting yesterday approved the capital appropriation plan for purposes such as the installation of advanced technology capacity and fab construction, the world’s largest contract chipmaker said in a statement. At an earnings conference last month, TSMC forecast that its capital expenditure for this year would be at the higher end of the US$52 billion to US$56 billion range it forecast in January in response to robust demand for 5G, AI and
RSS