The long-term care industry and virtual reality (VR) applications for the entertainment industry are among the key sectors being targeted by Acer Inc (宏碁) as the PC brand continues its business transformation.
“The direction of corporate transformation has become clearer in that we are going to enter the long-term care and VR industries,” Acer chief executive Jason Chen (陳俊聖) told President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday in a briefing after the opening ceremony of the Computex Taipei at Taipei’s Nangang Exhibition Hall.
Acer has been investing in some new areas as the company is looking for long-term business opportunities rather than one-time hardware sales. In March, it acquired a 48.98 percent stake in US tablet maker grandPad Inc for US$11.04 million, aiming to provide solutions specifically designed for senior citizens.
Photo: Sam Yeh, AFP
Chen said the company in April also inked a strategic alliance with US-based Comfort Keepers, which is a leading provider of in-home care for senior citizens and adults who need help performing daily activities.
Together with Comfort Keepers and grandPad, Acer aims to expand its reach in the long-term care industry in the US, Chen said, adding that the company would invest more money in the long-term care sector.
In an effort to tap the VR entertainment industry, Acer is to form a joint venture with Stockholm-based game developer Starbreeze Studios and cooperate with movie company IMAX Corp to provide location-based entertainment, Chen said.
However, he declined to comment on the performance of the PC business, saying only that “it is challenging for worldwide PC companies, but our business has stabilized.”
Meanwhile, Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) chairman Jonney Shih (施崇棠) yesterday demonstrated the company’s first domestic robot, Zenbo, to Tsai at the company’s booth at Computex Taipei.
The voice-controlled Zenbo is an affordable US$599 and is equipped with many functions that make it a “smart home manager,” Shih said.
Zenbo can sense if senior citizens need medical help and make emergency calls for them, Shih said.
During the demonstration, Tsai activated Zenbo and successfully asked it to play music for her.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US. Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it. TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer
GREAT SUCCESS: Republican Senator Todd Young expressed surprise at Trump’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running US lawmakers who helped secure billions of dollars in subsidies for domestic semiconductor manufacturing rejected US President Donald Trump’s call to revoke the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, signaling that any repeal effort in the US Congress would fall short. US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who negotiated the law, on Wednesday said that Trump’s demand would fail, while a top Republican proponent, US Senator Todd Young, expressed surprise at the president’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running. The CHIPS Act is “essential for America leading the world in tech, leading the world in AI [artificial
REACTIONS: While most analysts were positive about TSMC’s investment, one said the US expansion could disrupt the company’s supply-demand balance Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) new US$100 billion investment in the US would exert a positive effect on the chipmaker’s revenue in the medium term on the back of booming artificial intelligence (AI) chip demand from US chip designers, an International Data Corp (IDC) analyst said yesterday. “This is good for TSMC in terms of business expansion, as its major clients for advanced chips are US chip designers,” IDC senior semiconductor research manager Galen Zeng (曾冠瑋) said by telephone yesterday. “Besides, those US companies all consider supply chain resilience a business imperative,” Zeng said. That meant local supply would
Servers that might contain artificial intelligence (AI)-powering Nvidia Corp chips shipped from the US to Singapore ended up in Malaysia, but their actual final destination remains a mystery, Singaporean Minister for Home Affairs and Law K Shanmugam said yesterday. The US is cracking down on exports of advanced semiconductors to China, seeking to retain a competitive edge over the technology. However, Bloomberg News reported in late January that US officials were probing whether Chinese AI firm DeepSeek (深度求索) bought advanced Nvidia semiconductors through third parties in Singapore, skirting Washington’s restrictions. Shanmugam said the route of the chips emerged in the course of an
RSS