TECHNOLOGY
Science parks get tenants
Well Shine Biotechnology Development Co (偉翔生技開發), Neuchips Corp (創鑫智慧) and Alteam Inc (亞立田) were yesterday granted approval by the Ministry of Science and Technology’s science park review committee to invest a combined NT$198 million (US$6.79 million) in the Hsinchu Science Park (新竹科學園區), while Mycenax Biotech Inc (永昕生物醫藥) secured permission to invest NT$130 million toward expanding its facilities at the Hsinchu Biomedical Science Park (新竹生醫園區). The committee said that as of yesterday, the Hsinchu Science Park had attracted new investment from 34 companies this year, compared with 28 last year and 32 in 2018.
SEMICONDUCTORS
Winway applies for listing
Winway Technology Co Ltd (穎崴科技), which makes and supplies IC testing interfaces, has submitted an application to be listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange, the exchange said yesterday. The Kaohsiung-based company reported cumulative revenue of NT$2.07 billion in the first eight months of this year, up 7.02 percent from a year earlier. Its net income was NT$256.3 million in the first half of this year, up from NT$239.44 million a year earlier, with earnings per share of NT$8.43. Ten local firms this year have submitted applications to be listed on the exchange, it said.
TECHNOLOGY
AVerMedia income up 41%
AVerMedia Technologies Inc (圓剛科技), which provides hardware and software for image capturing and video transmission solutions, yesterday said that net income last month increased 41.16 percent to NT$253 million from a year earlier, or earnings per share of NT$1.31. Revenue last month increased 280.57 percent year-on-year to NT$1.01 billion. The firm attributed the robust growth to work-from-home and distance learning trends, as well as new product launches. In the first eight months of this year, net income totaled NT$621 million, or earnings per share of NT$3.23, while cumulative revenue increased 84.8 percent to NT$3.597 billion, it said.
ENTERTAINMENT
New Year fireworks ‘a go’
The New Year’s Eve countdown and fireworks show at Taipei 101 this year is to be held despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the building’s owner, Taipei Financial Center Corp (台北金融大樓), said on Monday. Taiwan is successfully managing the pandemic, so the fireworks show is to be held as usual and last for five minutes, although specific details are still being worked out, the company said. Last year’s show featured about 16,000 fireworks, as well as animations on the building’s giant T-Pad wall, which is composed of 140,000 LED bulbs and covers one side from the 35th to 90th floors.
BEVERAGES
Buckskin beers win awards
Beers produced by the domestic brand Buckskin (柏克金) took home awards in two categories at the World Beer Awards held earlier this month, the brewery said in a statement yesterday. The company said that its Buckskin Altbier was named the World’s Best Dark Altbier for a second consecutive year, while its Buckskin Dortmunder Export won World’s Best Lager Dortmunder. Buckskin’s two beers were the only local ones to be honored this year, it said. The World Beer Awards are hosted by British Web site TheDrinksReport.com. Buckskin is a subsidiary of King Car Group (金車集團), which also owns Kavalan Whisky and the coffee chain Mr Brown Cafe (伯朗咖啡).
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
Nvidia Corp’s demand for advanced packaging from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) remains strong though the kind of technology it needs is changing, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday, after he was asked whether the company was cutting orders. Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Blackwell, consists of multiple chips glued together using a complex chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) advanced packaging technology offered by TSMC, Nvidia’s main contract chipmaker. “As we move into Blackwell, we will use largely CoWoS-L. Of course, we’re still manufacturing Hopper, and Hopper will use CowoS-S. We will also transition the CoWoS-S capacity to CoWos-L,” Huang said
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
INDUSTRY LEADER: TSMC aims to continue outperforming the industry’s growth and makes 2025 another strong growth year, chairman and CEO C.C. Wei says Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday said it aims to grow revenue by about 25 percent this year, driven by robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips. That means TSMC would continue to outpace the foundry industry’s 10 percent annual growth this year based on the chipmaker’s estimate. The chipmaker expects revenue from AI-related chips to double this year, extending a three-fold increase last year. The growth would quicken over the next five years at a compound annual growth rate of 45 percent, fueled by strong demand for the high-performance computing
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