E-commerce site Taobao Taiwan (淘寶台灣) yesterday announced that it would leave the Taiwanese market at the end of this year, after being told by the Investment Commission to register as a Chinese entity.
It made the “tough decision” to leave Taiwan, effective Jan. 1 next year, due to “market uncertainties” and was in talks with its employees over a redundancy scheme, the company said in a statement.
It would also help sellers on its site complete their outstanding deals to protect their rights and those of the buyers, it said.
Photo: CNA
The company said that it had decided to stop taking new orders before noon yesterday ahead of going offline on Dec. 31, and had also closed down some other functions on its Web site, which was launched in September last year.
The Investment Commission on Aug. 24 declared the site’s operator — UK-registered Claddagh Venture Investment Ltd — to be a Chinese investment and ordered Claddagh to rectify the issue within six months or withdraw its investment.
It also fined Claddagh NT$410,000 for contravening the law on Chinese investments.
A company is deemed to have Chinese investment if more than 30 percent of its shares are held by a Chinese entity or if it is in effect controlled by a Chinese entity, and the commission found that China’s Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴), which operates the Taobao e-commerce site in China, held a 28.77 percent stake in Claddagh.
Although that amount is under the legal limit, the commission decided that the company was effectively controlled by Alibaba, based on a number of factors, including that Claddagh could not hold shareholder or board meetings without the consent of Alibaba, due to the size of the stake held by the Chinese firm, and that Claddagh relied heavily on Alibaba to run Taobao Taiwan.
Taobao Taiwan’s user agreement and privacy policy is linked to Alibaba’s agreements for global users of Taobao, which grants Alibaba access to the information of Taobao Taiwan’s users and thus poses a security threat, the commission said.
Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Lin Chuan-neng (林全能) said that Taobao Taiwan had broken the law concerning Chinese investment and the commission’s decision to fine Claddagh followed regulations.
Executive Yuan spokesman Ting Yi-ming (丁怡銘) said that the government would not allow Chinese companies that want to enter the Taiwanese market to use indirect methods to bypass the law and it has stepped up its investigations into suspect operations.
Additional reporting by AFP
Three cases of Candida auris, a fungus that can cause a yeast infection known as candidiasis in humans, have been reported in Taiwan over the past few years, but they did not display drug resistance, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said yesterday. Lo made the statement at a news conference in Taipei, one day after the Washington Post reported that the potentially deadly fungus is spreading in US hospitals. The fungus was first discovered in Japan in 2009 and poses a danger to immunocompromised people, with an estimated mortality rate of 30 to 60 percent, Lo
‘DIRE’: Taiwan would not engage in ‘dollar diplomacy,’ the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, after China reportedly offered Honduras up to US$3 billion to establish relations The government yesterday recalled its ambassador to Honduras after the Central American nation sent its foreign minister to China, signaling that it would sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan. Suspicions concerning ties with Honduras are rife after Honduran President Xiomara Castro on Tuesday last week wrote on Twitter that her country would pursue diplomatic ties with China. Honduran Minister of Foreign Affairs Eduardo Enrique Reina traveled to China on Wednesday “to promote efforts for the establishment of diplomatic relations” on instructions from Castro, Reuters yesterday quoted Honduran presidential spokesman Ivis Alvarado as saying. The government “has decided to immediately recall the ambassador to Honduras
SWITCH TO BEIJING: The government severed diplomatic relations about an hour after Honduras announced the move, saying that no semi-official ties would be maintained Taiwan severed diplomatic ties with Honduras and ended all cooperation with the Central American country, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday, about an hour and a half after the Honduran Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Twitter at 8am Taiwan time that the nation would cut its ties with Taiwan. Honduran President Xiomara Castro on Wednesday sent Honduran Minister of Foreign Affairs Eduardo Enrique Reina to Beijing to negotiate the establishment of diplomatic relations. She announced the plan on March 14 on Twitter. “To safeguard Taiwan’s sovereignty and dignity, Taiwan is terminating diplomatic ties with Honduras with immediate effect” after communication with
MEDIA, SOCIETY FOCUS: Doublethink Lab said that Beijing is trying to coerce countries that rely on China economically to pursue policies in its favor China has stronger influence over Taiwan’s media and society than any other country, the Taipei-based Doublethink Lab think tank said yesterday, as it announced its China Index gauging Beijing’s global influence. Taiwan ranked 11th overall among 82 countries assessed, but first in terms of social and media influence, Doublethink Lab chairman Puma Shen (沈伯洋) told a news conference in Taipei. More than 200 experts and academics participated in the project, including some highly influential figures, Shen said. The index collects information from countries worldwide to gauge China’s influence and assess how Chinese policies affect them, Shen said. In terms of Chinese