About 92 percent of foreign companies said they plan to maintain or increase investment in Taiwan this year, with the majority saying they remain confident about the local market despite ongoing geopolitical uncertainties and tariff-related risks, the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) in Taiwan said in a survey released yesterday.
About 82 percent said they are optimistic about Taiwan’s economic outlook over the next 12 months, citing last year’s strong growth driven by artificial intelligence (AI) demand, which boosted investment in servers and advanced chip production, AmCham Taiwan’s Business Climate Survey said.
However, as a growing share of Taiwan’s exports is driven by AI-related hardware, the gains have remained uneven, with traditional industries exposed to US tariffs and China’s oversupply continuing to struggle, the chamber said.
Photo: Ben Blanchard, Reuters
More foreign firms in Taiwan are preparing emergency plans as security concerns rise, but actual disruption from tensions with China is very low, the survey showed.
About 46 percent of respondents said they were revising business continuity plans to “bolster resilience,” compared with 40 percent last year, it said.
This year, national security topped the list of foreign companies’ perceived risk to business operations, although only 7 percent reported significant disruptions last year from tensions in the Taiwan Strait, it said.
Personal anxiety about increased military activities remained unchanged at three, on a scale of up to five.
“Companies choose to stay in Taiwan despite these geopolitical concerns and it’s not because things are easy, it’s because companies are getting better at managing these risks with resilience planning and business operation planning,” AmCham Taiwan chairperson Anita Chen (陳幼臻) told reporters in Taipei.
AmCham Taiwan said that 206 of its 411 eligible members responded to the survey conducted shortly before China’s most recent war games. The group serves as an important conduit between the foreign, especially US, business community in Taiwan and policymakers in Taipei and Washington.
Taiwan has repeatedly called for the swift passage of an agreement to avoid double taxation, currently stalled in the US Senate, saying it would encourage more bilateral investment.
AmCham Taiwan president Carl Wegner said that from speaking to people in Washington, this year looked like a “good year with positive potential” for that deal to be approved.
“We speak about it with all the delegations that come here, they bring that message back” to Washington, he added.
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