Mitsukoshi sets sales target
Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Department Store Co Ltd (新光三越百貨) yesterday said its three department stores on Nanjing W Road in Taipei are targeted to generate total sales of NT$2.26 billion (US$75 million) during the 18-day anniversary sales beginning on Thursday next week and ending on Oct. 12. That would represent an increase of 5 percent from last year’s annual sales event.
Revenue generated from the annual event accounts for more than 20 percent of the sales of the three stores, which reported that total revenue for the first eight months of the year rose 7 percent from the same period last year, Shin Kong Mitsukoshi said.
Cree sues Harvatek
US-based Cree Inc has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Harvatek Corp (宏齊), claiming the Taiwanese LED chipmaker infringed on six of its patents.
Harvatek said in a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange that it expects no major financial impact from the lawsuit, since most of its products are shipped to Asian markets.
Only a small portion of its chips are involved in the patent-infringement disputes, Harvatek said yesterday, adding that it has not received any formal notification from the US district court in Wisconsin.
Acer to issue restricted shares
Acer Inc (宏碁) said on Tuesday it planned to issue 50 million new restricted shares to award high-ranking managers in four years, as the company boosts its efforts to retain talent and increase its revenue and profit.
The NT$1.16 billion restricted shares will be the first of its kind for Acer.
Last month, the company granted the first batch of restricted shares to several executives, including chairman George Huang (黃少華), cofounder Stan Shih (施振榮) and chief executive Jason Chen (陳俊聖), with 480,000 shares each.
Acer said executives would receive the restricted shares only after the company hits the annual revenue or profit goals set a year ago.
Communications output rising
Output by Taiwan’s communications sector is expected to rise by an annual 9.9 percent to NT$2.82 trillion next year as international brands launch new models, the Market Intelligence and Consulting Institute (資策會) said on Tuesday.
Welber Chang (張奇), a research manager and senior industry analyst at the center, said that Taiwan’s projected output growth could outstrip the global industry’s forecast growth of 7.9 percent to US$500 billion next year, from an estimated US$463.2 billion this year.
Chang said Taiwan’s communications device suppliers are likely to benefit from China’s efforts to develop its long-term evolution (LTE) services, while an acceleration of the construction of wireless local area networks (WLAN) and small cells globally is likely to further boost Taiwan’s communications output.
Taipei, Manila to discuss FTA
Taiwan and the Philippines are likely to exchange ideas regarding a free-trade agreement (FTA) during their annual ministerial-level meeting on economic cooperation scheduled to take place on Oct. 23 and 24 in Taipei, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said on Monday.
However, there is no timetable for negotiations on the proposed trade agreement, as a full report of the feasibility study has not yet been completed, the ministry said, after the Philippine Institute for Development Studies submitted the outline of a feasibility study of a proposed bilateral economic cooperation agreement to the Philippine government on Monday for further discussion.
TECH BOOST: New TSMC wafer fabs in Arizona are to dramatically improve US advanced chip production, a report by market research firm TrendForce said With Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) pouring large funds into Arizona, the US is expected to see an improvement in its status to become the second-largest maker of advanced semiconductors in 2027, Taipei-based market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said in a report last week. TrendForce estimates the US would account for a 21 percent share in the global advanced integrated circuit (IC) production market by 2027, sharply up from the current 9 percent, as TSMC is investing US$65 billion to build three wafer fabs in Arizona, the report said. TrendForce defined the advanced chipmaking processes as the 7-nanometer process or more
China’s Huawei Technologies Co (華為) plans to start mass-producing its most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip in the first quarter of next year, even as it struggles to make enough chips due to US restrictions, two people familiar with the matter said. The telecoms conglomerate has sent samples of the Ascend 910C — its newest chip, meant to rival those made by US chipmaker Nvidia Corp — to some technology firms and started taking orders, the sources told Reuters. The 910C is being made by top Chinese contract chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯) on its N+2 process, but a lack
Who would not want a social media audience that grows without new content? During the three years she paused production of her short do-it-yourself (DIY) farmer’s lifestyle videos, Chinese vlogger Li Ziqi (李子柒), 34, has seen her YouTube subscribers increase to 20.2 million from about 14 million. While YouTube is banned in China, her fan base there — although not the size of YouTube’s MrBeast, who has 330 million subscribers — is close to 100 million across the country’s social media platforms Douyin (抖音), Sina Weibo (新浪微博) and Xiaohongshu (小紅書). When Li finally released new videos last week — ending what has
NVIDIA PLATFORM: Hon Hai’s Mexican facility is to begin production early next year and a Taiwan site is to enter production next month, Nvidia wrote on its blog Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), the world’s biggest electronics manufacturer, yesterday said it is expanding production capacity of artificial intelligence (AI) servers based on Nvidia Corp’s Blackwell chips in Taiwan, the US and Mexico to cope with rising demand. Hon Hai’s new AI-enabled factories are to use Nvidia’s Omnivores platform to create 3D digital twins to plan and simulate automated production lines at a factory in Hsinchu, the company said in a statement. Nvidia’s Omnivores platform is for developing industrial AI simulation applications and helps bring facilities online faster. Hon Hai’s Mexican facility is to begin production early next year and the
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