E-commerce Web site Taobao Taiwan (淘寶台灣) is under investigation by the Investment Commission, which on Sunday said that it received a report that a Chinese investor holds a more than 30 percent stake in the company, in contravention of Taiwanese law.
Taobao Taiwan was launched last year by Claddagh Venture Investment Co (克雷達投資), which is registered in the UK and reportedly linked to China’s Taobao Marketplace (淘寶), which is run by e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴).
According to the complaint, Taobao Taiwan shares a platform with Taobao Marketplace, which means there is technically no independence, an Investment Commission official said.
Furthermore, the two Taobaos have a common privacy policy, prompting concerns over the privacy and security of the personal information of Taiwanese, the official said, citing the complaint.
The commission, in collaboration with the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), has been gathering data and information in a probe into the matters and the issue of Taobao Taiwan’s ownership, the official said.
Under Taiwan’s law, Chinese investors must obtain permission from the government to directly or indirectly acquire a stake of more than 30 percent in any Taiwanese company, the official said.
Taobao Taiwan spokesman Ko Chung-ning (柯中甯) denied the allegations that Taobao Taiwan and Taobao Marketplace share a platform and privacy agreement.
The two companies have different platforms and people who register on Taobao Taiwan do not need to sign a privacy agreement with Taobao Marketplace in China, Ko said.
Some products on Taobao Taiwan are sold by overseas suppliers and the privacy agreement is aimed at regulating those companies and ensuring the quality of their products sold to Taiwanese, he said.
The terms of the agreement apply mainly to overseas suppliers, not to shoppers in Taiwan, he said.
Taobao Taiwan sells a wide selection of products, ranging from clothing and stationery to kitchenware and home appliances.
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
A new worry has been rippling across the stock market lately: Entire businesses, not just their employees, might be thrown out of work. While most economists say fears of an artificial intelligence (AI) job apocalypse are overblown, seismic shifts have happened in the past after big tech breakthroughs. The IT revolution of the 1990s led to a surge in productivity that sped up the US economy for several years. It also rendered companies or even industries largely redundant — from travel agents and stockbrokers to classified advertising and newspapers, or video rental stores. Economists expect AI would deliver higher productivity,
RSS