President Chen Shui-bian (
When the high-speed railway is opened to traffic in October next year, it will serve as a lifeline connecting the three science parks, helping these production strongholds to achieve industrial synergy and usher high-tech industries into a new era, Chen said.
He made the remarks when addressing a ground-breaking ceremony at the Southern Taiwan Science-based Industrial Park for the building of a new manufacturing affiliate of Allied Material Technology Corp (AMTC), a major producer of color filters for thin film transistor-liquid crystal display (TFT-LCD) panels.
AMTC is investing NT$15 billion (US$442 million) to build a new manufacturing plant in the southern park, expecting to produce 6th-generation color filters for large-sized TFT-LCD panels.
Addressing the ceremony, Chen said that AMTC, with a workforce of 730 researchers and skilled workers, has been an unsung hero, just like a number of others who have been working industriously in the TFT-LCD industry -- a new industry poised to become another NT$2 trillion industry in Taiwan behind the semiconductor industry.
Taiwan's TFT-LCD production soared to become the world's second largest last year, behind only South Korea's, Chen said, adding that production is expected to further surge this year to gain 40.6 percent of global market share and surpass South Korea.
Meanwhile, Chen said, the southern park, already the locomotive of industrial development in the south, is becoming one of the driving forces pushing the nation's overall economic growth to a new high.
The park, Chen said, is forecast to have a workforce of 100,000, who will create NT$1 trillion worth of production and services by 2009.
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