Meta Platforms Inc yesterday launched Asia’s first physical hub for extended reality (XR) research in Taiwan, as Facebook’s parent company seeks to promote the immersive technologies.
At the “Meta XR Hub Taiwan” launch ceremony in Taipei, Meta head of agency for greater China Stephanie Chu (朱怡靜) described Taiwanese partners as an important cornerstone of technological development.
“Today marks another milestone of Meta’s establishment in Taiwan, and [the company] will work with Taiwanese partners to create the next generation of social technology,” Chu said.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Taiwan is to play a huge part in the metaverse, Meta chief product officer Chris Cox said in a video presentation at the event.
Taiwan’s ability to build hardware and establish public infrastructure is unparalleled, and it has many outstanding creators, artists, researchers and developers engaged in the development of technologies and applications, he said.
As augmented reality and virtual reality flourish, Taiwan would not only become an important stronghold for the metaverse team, but also a key hub for driving global innovations, he added.
American Institute in Taiwan Director Sandra Oudkirk said that by establishing the XR Hub in Taipei, “Meta is demonstrating its belief that Taiwan will play a key role in the rapidly evolving metaverse industry.”
“Taiwan is a central node of the globe’s semiconductor ecosystem and a cutting-edge pioneer on emerging technologies like hardware-software integration, chipsets, processors, 5G and Wi-Fi 6,” Oudkirk said.
Taiwanese developers and artists have also won global awards for creating virtual reality content, she said, and “these are all essential elements in the metaverse.”
The XR hub in Taiwan is to collaborate with Taiwantrade to establish a platform in which people can digitally engage with each other, so that trade exhibitions would not be just limited to a physical or online event.
Taiwantrade is an interactive electronic business portal operated by the government-sponsored Taiwan External Trade Development Council.
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said at the ceremony that the government would work hard to build a better environment for the development of the digital economy and expressed hope that Meta can continue to expand its investments in Taiwan.
Tsai said that the metaverse taking root in Taiwan would help drive local communication technology development and innovative applications, and prompt more companies to accelerate their participation in the metaverse.
The US Department of State yesterday criticized Beijing over its misrepresentation of the US’ “one China” policy in the latest diplomatic salvo between the two countries over a bid by Taiwan to regain its observer status at the World Health Assembly, the decisionmaking body of the WHO. “The PRC [People’s Republic of China] continues to publicly misrepresent U.S. policy,” Department of State spokesman Ned Price wrote on Twitter. “The United States does not subscribe to the PRC’s ‘one China principle’ — we remain committed to our longstanding, bipartisan one China policy, guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, Three Joint Communiques, and
FATES LINKED: The US president said that sanctions on Russia over Ukraine must exact a ‘long-term price,’ because otherwise ‘what signal does that send to China?’ US President Joe Biden yesterday vowed that US forces would defend Taiwan militarily in the event of a Chinese attack in his strongest statement to date on the issue. Beijing is already “flirting with danger,” Biden said following talks with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in Tokyo, in which the pair agreed to monitor Chinese naval activity and joint Chinese-Russian exercises. Asked if Washington was willing to get involved militarily to defend Taiwan, he replied: “Yes.” “That’s the commitment we made,” Biden said. “We agreed with the ‘one China’ policy, we signed on to it ... but the idea that it can be
INFORMATION LEAKED: Documents from Xinjiang purportedly showed top leaders in Beijing calling for a forceful crackdown and even orders to shoot to kill Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday held a videoconference with UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet as she visited Xinjiang during a mission overshadowed by fresh allegations of Uighur abuses and fears she is being used as a public relations tool. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been accused of detaining more than 1 million Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in the region as part of a years-long crackdown the US and lawmakers in other Western nations have labeled a “genocide.” China denies the allegations. Bachelet was expected to visit the cities of Urumqi and Kashgar on a six-day tour. The US
SUBTLE? While Biden said the US policy of ‘strategic ambiguity’ on Taiwan had not changed, the group targeted China and Russia without naming them Leaders of Australia, India, Japan and the US yesterday warned against attempts to “change the status quo by force,” as concerns grow about whether China could invade Taiwan. The issue of Taiwan loomed over a leadership meeting in Tokyo of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) nations — the US, Japan, Australia and India — who stressed their determination to ensure a free and open Indo-Pacific region in the face of an increasingly assertive China, although Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said the group was not targeting any one country. The four leaders said in a joint statement issued after their talks
RSS