Eslite Spectrum Corp (誠品生活), which runs the Eslite bookstore chain (誠品書局) and other businesses at home and abroad, is mulling opening new outlets in Southeast Asia, although bookstore operations remain unprofitable, chairwoman Mercy Wu (吳旻潔) said yesterday.
The Taipei-based conglomerate is studying the possibility of making inroads in Southeast Asia in line with plans to strengthen its cultural innovation business, including 50 bookstores in Taiwan, Hong Kong, China and Japan, Wu said.
“Today, profitability continues to pose the biggest challenge for Eslite as it turns 30 years old this year,” Wu told a news conference in Taipei, while announcing the bookstore chain’s annual report on reading behaviors and market trends.
Photo: CNA
Wu, who took over the company’s reins in 2017 after the sudden death of her father, Robert Wu (吳清友), said that the bookstores had to increase capital by NT$2 billion (US$65.56 million) over the years to stay in business.
The company has identified 100 sources of losses, but has yet to find a profitable business model, she said, adding that no enterprise in the world can live off running bookstores as its core operation.
Eslite Spectrum also runs department stores and restaurants, and sells appliances and equipment for hotels, restaurants, kitchens and wine cellars.
Malaysia appears the most likely venue, as 25 percent of its population is ethnic Chinese, making expansion easier, Mercy Wu said.
Hopefully, the bookstore chain can cast off its “unprofitable” shackles to prolong its existence, Mercy Wu said, adding that she is to keep the passion for cultural business alive.
Eslite Spectrum reported that consolidated revenue increased 18.14 percent year-on-year to NT$4.31 billion in the first 10 months of this year.
In the first three quarters, net income fell 29.31 percent to NT$184.01 million, or earnings per share of NT$3.88, company data showed.
CONSIDERATIONS: The NSTC instructed the park to assist laid-off workers and urge companies to use furlough programs to ease the effects of falling demand Firms in the Hsinchu Science Park (新竹科學園區), which houses major tech companies, reported laying off 496 employees last month amid weakened global demand, Hsinchu Science Park Bureau director-general Wayne Wang (王永壯) said yesterday. Wang told a news conference that 48 companies in the science park laid off employees last month, including one hard disk supplier which let go 241 employees as part of a plant closure due to falling demand. Other companies reported sporadic layoffs as they adjusted to weakening demand, he said. Wang made the remarks after local media reported the layoffs over the weekend. Although the global economy is struggling with high
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and German Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action Robert Habeck have promised to solve investment subsidy issues for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and Intel Corp, despite the country’s budget woes. Uncertainty over the funding to TSMC and Intel has arisen after a ruling by the German Federal Constitutional Court, which cast doubt over subsidies for construction of local semiconductor chip plants. On Nov. 15, the court ruled that the German government’s decision last year to reallocate 60 billion euros (US$65.74 billion) of unused funding from COVID-19 pandemic support measures to its Climate and Transformation Fund
LONG ROAD AHEAD: The US is somewhere between one and two decades away from achieving the Biden administration’s goal to achieve chip autonomy, Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), who runs the semiconductor industry’s most valuable company, said the US is as much as 20 years away from breaking its dependence on overseas chipmaking. Huang, speaking at the New York Times’ DealBook conference in New York on Wednesday, explained how his company’s products rely on myriad components that come from different parts of the world — not just Taiwan, where the most important elements are manufactured. “We are somewhere between a decade and two decades away from supply chain independence,” he said. “It’s not a really practical thing for a decade or two.” The outlook suggests
GREEN SOLUTIONS: The company said that it is set to become one of the very few suppliers of low-carbon emissions cement, which would give it a competitive edge Taiwan Cement Corp (台灣水泥) plans to spend up to 770 million euros (US$843.5 million) to boost its holdings in two cement ventures in Turkey and Portugal as demand for low-carbon emissions cement rises in Europe, the company said on Monday. Taiwan Cement’s board of directors has approved a plan to lift the company’s stake in OYAK Denizli Cimento, a joint venture with Turkey’s OYAK Group, to 60 percent from 40 percent and to increase its stake in Cimpor Portugal Holdings SGPS SA, a Portuguese cement joint venture with OYAK, to 100 percent from 40 percent, it said in a statement. “Through increased