■ Telephony
AT&T could cut 10,000 jobs
AT&T Inc plans to cut up to 10,000 jobs, mostly through normal turnover, if its US$67 billion purchase of BellSouth Corp is approved by shareholders and regulators, AT&T's chief financial officer said. The work force reduction would take place over three years, AT&T's Rick Lindner said on Monday. Before the cuts, the combined company would have around 316,000 employees, including Cingular Wireless LLC, which is now an AT&T-BellSouth joint venture. The new company would be the US' largest phone company -- with nearly half of all lines. It would also be the largest cellphone carrier and the largest provider of broadband Internet service.
■ Telephony
Cingular offers video clips
Cingular Wireless LLC, the biggest US mobile-phone service provider, will begin providing sports and entertainment video clips to handset users. Viewers will be able to watch three- to five-minute clips from media companies including Fox News, ESPN and HBO, said Jim Ryan, a Cingular vice president. The service is available to subscribers who pay US$20 or more a month for broadband services. Carriers are racing to make viewing videos on handsets as easy as watching television. Verizon Wireless, the second-largest US carrier, began V-Cast for videos last year.
■ Computers
Sun sues Hynix
Sun Microsystems Inc, the world's fourth-largest maker of server computers, sued Hynix Semiconductor Inc over antitrust claims after four Hynix executives agreed to plead guilty to US criminal charges. The lawsuit, filed on March 2 in San Jose, California, claims Hynix, the world's second-largest maker of memory chips, and five other companies colluded to fix prices. A day earlier, the four Hynix executives agreed to serve prison sentences and pay fines of US$250,000 each in the US Justice Department probe of a conspiracy to set prices in the US$25.3 billion-a-year dynamic random access memory market.
■ Banking
UK card fraud down
Credit and debit card fraud fell significantly for the first time in 10 years last year in part due to the introduction of the chip and pin technology, figures showed yesterday. Total card fraud losses fell by 13 percent, from £504.8 million (US$886.3 million) in 2004 to £439.4 million (US$771.5) last year, according to figures from APACS, the UK payments association. "Seeing card fraud losses come down is cast-iron proof that chip and pin is doing its job," Sandra Quinn of APACS said in a statement. Chip and pin technology was introduced in 2003 and UK consumers are now no longer able to sign when paying with their cards but have to key in the four-digit pin.
■ Electronics
Hitachi plans robot
Hitachi is working on an R2D2-like security robot on wheels that can map out its surroundings using infrared sensors and a camera to detect missing items, suspicious packages and intruders. The 57cm tall robot, which looks like a trash can and is reminiscent of the small, beeping robot in Star Wars, has a swiveling camera that protrudes like a periscope, enabling it to watch for suspicious changes in the landscape and send photos to a guard, Hitachi said yesterday.
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
SILICON VALLEY HUB: The office would showcase Taiwan’s strengths in semiconductors and artificial intelligence, and help Taiwanese start-ups connect with global opportunities Taiwan has established an office in Palo Alto, one of the principal cities of Silicon Valley in California, aimed at helping Taiwanese technology start-ups gain global visibility, the National Development Council said yesterday. The “Startup Island Taiwan Silicon Valley hub” at No. 299 California Avenue is focused on “supporting start-ups and innovators by providing professional consulting, co-working spaces, and community platforms,” the council said in a post on its Web site. The office is the second overseas start-up hub established by the council, after a similar site was set up in Tokyo in September last year. Representatives from Taiwanese start-ups, local businesses and
‘DETERRENT’: US national security adviser-designate Mike Waltz said that he wants to speed up deliveries of weapons purchased by Taiwan to deter threats from China US president-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, affirmed his commitment to peace in the Taiwan Strait during his confirmation hearing in Washington on Tuesday. Hegseth called China “the most comprehensive and serious challenge to US national security” and said that he would aim to limit Beijing’s expansion in the Indo-Pacific region, Voice of America reported. He would also adhere to long-standing policies to prevent miscalculations, Hegseth added. The US Senate Armed Services Committee hearing was the first for a nominee of Trump’s incoming Cabinet, and questions mostly focused on whether he was fit for the
IDENTITY: Compared with other platforms, TikTok’s algorithm pushes a ‘disproportionately high ratio’ of pro-China content, a study has found Young Taiwanese are increasingly consuming Chinese content on TikTok, which is changing their views on identity and making them less resistant toward China, researchers and politicians were cited as saying by foreign media. Asked to suggest the best survival strategy for a small country facing a powerful neighbor, students at National Chia-Yi Girls’ Senior High School said “Taiwan must do everything to avoid provoking China into attacking it,” the Financial Times wrote on Friday. Young Taiwanese between the ages of 20 and 24 in the past were the group who most strongly espoused a Taiwanese identity, but that is no longer
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