A new artificial intelligence (AI) industrial park to be built in Tainan would be at the foundation of Taiwan’s development of AI as an industry and its application to other sectors, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said on Saturday.
During a visit to Tainan, Cho toured the site of the Shalun Smart Green Energy Science City project and said the first two parts of the project that are built — the CyberSecurity and Smart Technology R&D Building, and the Shalun Green Energy Technology Demonstration Site — represent the starting point for the science city’s AI development.
The new AI park is to extend out from those two areas, he said.
Photo: Wu Chun-feng, Taipei Times
The National Science Technology Council one of the agencies overseeing the park, said it would house data centers, and other sections are planned for zero-carbon technologies, quantum science, smart agriculture, smart transportation and smart medicine.
Cho said the park was being established to carry out President William Lai’s (賴清德) policy of supporting “Five Trusted Industry Sectors” — semiconductors, AI, defense, security and surveillance, and next-generation communications.
Major tech companies such as Nvidia and AMD have plans to further their bases in Taiwan, and the government has the responsibility to provide good infrastructure to facilitate their investment, he said.
The industrial park would be another base connecting with northern Kaohsiung to form a “southern smart corridor,” he said.
Northern Kaohsiung is emerging as a site for high-tech parks, including the Northern Kaohsiung Industrial Park project that broke ground last year, and the Ciaotou Science Park aimed at attracting semiconductor, smart machinery, and space-related companies.
Also sprouting up is the Nanzih Technology Industrial Park, where Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co is building a fab that would produce advanced 2-nanometer wafers.
Council head Wu Cheng-wen (吳誠文) said his agency would accelerate the building of data centers and work with top international enterprises to turn Shalun into an AI R&D stronghold in the Asia-Pacific region.
Tainan Mayor Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) said the AI park could benefit from the presence of AI research institutes at National Cheng Kung University and National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University’s Tainan Campus and would also eventually benefit other southern cities.
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