■ Aviation
Airbus to reduce suppliers
Airbus is to cut the number of its suppliers by more than 80 percent as part of its restructuring program, a spokeswoman confirmed on Monday, but the European aircraft maker gave no further details of the planned cuts. The number of suppliers will be reduced "from 3,000 to 500," Airbus spokeswoman Marcella Muratore said. No further information was available on which suppliers would be dropped or the timetable for the cuts, she said. Airbus' comment confirmed a report in the German Financial Times Deutschland on Monday that Airbus planned to cut procurement costs by 350 million euros (US$445 million) by 2010 and raise the amount of components made in low-wage by 50 percent.
■ Automobiles
Toyota's profits up 36%
Toyota Motor Corp yesterday said its group net profit for the fiscal half-year surged 36.2 percent, driven by robust sales in North America and Europe. Toyota, on pace to overtake General Motors Corp to become the world's No. 1 automaker, also raised its earnings forecast for the full year through March to ¥1.55 trillion (US$13.14 billion) from an earlier projection of ¥1.31 trillion. Japan's largest automaker said net profit for the April-September period was ¥777.2 billion, up from ¥570.5 billion posted for the same period last year.
■ Mobile devices
NTP sues Palm
NTP, the US firm specializing in licensing patented technology, said on Monday it had filed a patent-infringement suit against Treo-maker Palm. NTP announced that it had filed the complaint in a US court in Virginia and demanded that Palm be stopped from using the technology and be ordered to pay cash damages. NTP claimed it had tried in vain to resolve the situation with Palm to avoid litigation, which it described as a "waste of time and money." In March NTP won a high-profile legal victory over Research In Motion, a Canadian firm it accused of violating its patented technology with its popular BlackBerry handheld devices.
■ Internet
PayPal to offer cash rebates
PayPal, the payment-service company owned by online auction site eBay Inc, said on Monday it would launch an incentive program, allowing customers who subscribe to the service to receive cash rebates of up to US$20 on several thousand merchants' sites in North America. In a release, PayPal said that the cash rebate programs, valued at US$100 million, would be available to consumers from Nov. 23 through May 15. Free shipping promotions will be available beginning Nov. 23. Some of the merchants' sites in addition to eBay that will offer PayPal customers cash rebate offers are cooking.com, starbucks.com, walgreens.com and buy.com, according to Amanda Pires, a PayPal spokeswoman.
■ Semiconductors
Intel's investment approved
Intel Corp, the world's largest chipmaker, has received permission to increase its initial investment in Vietnam from US$300 million to up to US$1 billion, a Vietnamese official said yesterday. Intel is constructing a US$300 million chip assembly and testing plant in Ho Chi Minh City. Its initial investment license, granted in February, gave the firm permission to invest up to US$605 million. The government has amended the license, allowing Intel to invest up to US$1 billion to raise its production capacity, said Nguyen Anh Tuan, director of the Information Technology Industry.
THREATS: Naval facilities have been built in Shanghai and Zhejiang, while airbases have been expanded in Xiamen, Fuzhou and Zhangpu, across the Strait from Taiwan The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is building large-scale military infrastructure at five sites along the eastern coast of China, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said in a recent report. The latest issue of the council’s Mainland China Situation Quarterly said satellite photos showed military infrastructure such as air force and naval bases being constructed along the eastern coast of China. That means the CCP might be preparing for potential conflict in Taiwan, it said, adding that there are five such construction sites from north to south. A naval base has been built in Shanghai’s Pudong New Area, with underground oil storage tanks, railway
MILESTONE: The foreign minister called the signing ‘a major step forward in US-Taiwan relations,’ while the Presidential Office said it was a symbol of the nations’ shared values US President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed into law the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, which requires the US Department of State to regularly review and update guidelines governing official US interactions with Taiwan. The new law is an amendment to the Taiwan Assurance Act of 2020 focused on reviewing guidelines on US interactions with Taiwan. Previously, the state department was required to conduct a one-time review of its guidance governing relations with Taiwan, but under the new bill, the agency must conduct a review “not less than every five years.” It must then submit an updated report based on its findings “not later
A trial run of the north concourse of Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport’s new Terminal 3 is to commence today, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications said yesterday. The eight additional boarding gates would allow for more aircraft parking spaces that are expected to boost the airport’s capacity by 5.8 million passengers annually, Deputy Minister of Transportation and Communications Lin Kuo-shian (林國顯) said. The concourse, designed by a team led by British architect Richard Rogers, provides a refreshing space, Lin said, adding that travelers would enjoy the tall and transparent design that allows sunshine to stream into the concourse through glass curtain walls. The
The Presidential Office today thanked the US for enacting the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, which requires the US Department of State to regularly review and update guidelines governing official US interactions with Taiwan. The new law, signed by US President Donald Trump yesterday, is an amendment to the Taiwan Assurance Act of 2020 focused on reviewing guidelines on US interactions with Taiwan. Previously, the department was required to conduct a one-time review of its guidance governing relations with Taiwan, but under the new bill, the agency must conduct such a review "not less than every five years." It must then submit an updated
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