Taiwan Land Development Corp (TLDC, 台灣土地開發) plans to auction off land in Taipei’s Shilin District (士林) next quarter as part of a plan to revitalize idle assets and boost financial performance, company chairman Chiu Fu-sheng (邱復生) told a media briefing on Friday.
The sale, slated for next month or October, is part of the Taipei-based company’s bid to transform and diversify its income sources, Chiu said.
The 485.46 ping (1,604.83m2) plot on Zhishan Road, which would be ideal to develop into a mixed-used complex to capitalize on its proximity to the Chinese Culture and Movie Center and National Palace Museum, used to be a photography studio, Chiu said.
The company, which is known as Taikai Group (台開集團) overseas, has not yet set a price for the plot, as it is still being evaluated, he said.
TLDC last month acquired regulatory approval to turn a hillside in Hsinchu County’s Sinpu Township (新埔) into a tourist farm.
In January, it finished construction on a Taoist temple in the complex, the first phase of a venture that is to include hotel rooms, retail space, villas and serviced apartments.
Chiu said the company also plans to build medical facilities focused on treating liver diseases at the complex, as well as at its development projects in Nantou and Hualien counties.
A former liver cancer patient, Chiu said he has learned the importance of health and aims to build environmentally friendly communities where Taiwan’s fast-growing population of older people can enjoy their retirement.
The company’s net profit attributable to the parent company in the first half of the year fell 52.95 percent to NT$147.41 million (US$4.79 million) from a year earlier, with earnings per share of NT$0.2, compared with NT$0.42 in the same period last year, while revenue declined 68.5 percent to NT$199.68 million, the company reported earlier this month.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
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Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day