Tingyi (Cayman Islands) Holding Corp’s (康師傅控股) Taiwan depositary receipts (TDR) yesterday slid 0.51 percent to NT$19.40 in Taipei trading after the company — the parent of China-based Master Kong Holdings (康師傅) — on Monday confirmed that it was dissolving its Taiwan operations.
Ting Hsin International Group (頂新集團), which was involved in a series of food scandals in 2014 and 2015, was in charge of Master Kong’s instant noodle business in Taiwan.
The group’s board of directors has approved a plan to completely withdraw from the Taiwanese market, Ting Hsin’s vice president for public affairs Chia Hsien-der (賈先德) told reporters on Monday.
The dissolution would not affect the company’s TDR trading on the Taiwan Stock Exchange, Chia said.
Master Kong still needs to finish liquidating its assets and to submit an investment withdrawal application to the Investment Commission to complete its dissolution, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said.
A company official, who declined to be named, yesterday said that the China-based instant noodle brand had terminated its production contract with the group’s Wei Chuan Foods Corp (味全食品) after a series of oil safety scandals that sparked a boycott of Ting Hsin food products.
Master Kong stopped distributing its instant noodles in Taiwan in 2015, the official said by telephone.
“Master Kong has no plans to step into the Taiwanese market again in the near term,” he said, citing fierce market competition.
As for its China business, the official said that the company is also facing tough challenges because of weakening demand for instant noodles.
In the first three quarters of last year, Master Kong’s revenue fell 9.44 percent to US$6.91 billion from a year ago and its net profit plunged 37.85 percent to US$213 million.
The Chinese instant noodle industry’s revenue is estimated to have declined by 2 to 3 percent last year, the official said.
Intel Corp chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) is expected to meet with Taiwanese suppliers next month in conjunction with the opening of the Computex Taipei trade show, supply chain sources said on Monday. The visit, the first for Tan to Taiwan since assuming his new post last month, would be aimed at enhancing Intel’s ties with suppliers in Taiwan as he attempts to help turn around the struggling US chipmaker, the sources said. Tan is to hold a banquet to celebrate Intel’s 40-year presence in Taiwan before Computex opens on May 20 and invite dozens of Taiwanese suppliers to exchange views
Application-specific integrated circuit designer Faraday Technology Corp (智原) yesterday said that although revenue this quarter would decline 30 percent from last quarter, it retained its full-year forecast of revenue growth of 100 percent. The company attributed the quarterly drop to a slowdown in customers’ production of chips using Faraday’s advanced packaging technology. The company is still confident about its revenue growth this year, given its strong “design-win” — or the projects it won to help customers design their chips, Faraday president Steve Wang (王國雍) told an online earnings conference. “The design-win this year is better than we expected. We believe we will win
Chizuko Kimura has become the first female sushi chef in the world to win a Michelin star, fulfilling a promise she made to her dying husband to continue his legacy. The 54-year-old Japanese chef regained the Michelin star her late husband, Shunei Kimura, won three years ago for their Sushi Shunei restaurant in Paris. For Shunei Kimura, the star was a dream come true. However, the joy was short-lived. He died from cancer just three months later in June 2022. He was 65. The following year, the restaurant in the heart of Montmartre lost its star rating. Chizuko Kimura insisted that the new star is still down
While China’s leaders use their economic and political might to fight US President Donald Trump’s trade war “to the end,” its army of social media soldiers are embarking on a more humorous campaign online. Trump’s tariff blitz has seen Washington and Beijing impose eye-watering duties on imports from the other, fanning a standoff between the economic superpowers that has sparked global recession fears and sent markets into a tailspin. Trump says his policy is a response to years of being “ripped off” by other countries and aims to bring manufacturing to the US, forcing companies to employ US workers. However, China’s online warriors