Four companies from Taiwan have made it onto Forbes’ list of Asia’s Fab 50, one fewer than last year after Hon Hai Precision Industry failed to make the grade because of labor problems at its factories in southern China.
Taiwan’s four entries in the Fab 50, which was released earlier this week, were two companies on last year’s list, Acer Inc and HTC Corp, and two newcomers, China Life Insurance Co and MediaTek Inc.
Two Taiwanese-invested companies in China — Want Want Group and Ting Yi Holdings — also made the list, which was compiled from a short-list of 936 Asian companies with revenues or market capitalization of at least US$3 billion.
China Life Insurance was the only life insurance company and Taiwan’s only financial institution among the top 50.
The other three were from the high-tech sector. Acer Inc, the world’s No. 2 personal computer vendor, has made the list every year since it was launched in 2005 except for 2006, Forbes said.
Smartphone maker HTC Corp, Taiwan’s largest mobile phone maker, has been a Fab 50 company for three straight years, while MediaTek, Taiwan’s largest fabless chip designer, returned to the list after a two-year absence.
However, Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn, fell out of the top 50 for the first time since the list was first compiled.
Forbes said that Hon Hai, the world’s largest contract electronics manufacturer, had stumbled on labor issues, including employee suicides at its factories in China.
The two other Taiwanese companies dropping out of the top 50 this year were notebook computer maker Wistron Corp and chip packager and tester Siliconware Precision Industries Co.
This year’s group reflected the growing influence of Chinese and Indian enterprises, with 32 of the 50 companies on the list coming from the two countries. Hong Kong and Taiwan tied this year for third place with four representatives each, while South Korea had three and Australia and Japan had two each.
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