Wang Yung-ching (王永慶), who died on Wednesday at the age of 91, is considered one of the most influential entrepreneurs in Taiwan. For many Taiwanese, he was a successful businessman who built his fortune from scratch.
Wang’s death caused fears that Formosa Plastics Group’s (台塑集團) business plans and operations would decline without its spiritual leader. It also brought about a feeling of loss for a legendary businessman who may have no equal in Taiwan, now or in the future.
Share prices of the group’s 10 subsidiaries listed on the nation’s main bourse all plunged by their daily limit on Thursday, indicating the lack of confidence of investors after Wang’s death. Those shares recouped most of their losses in Friday trading, but uncertainty will remain as long as the issue of Wang’s successor is unsettled.
Forbes magazine in June rated Wang the nation’s second-wealthiest person with a fortune of US$6.8 billion. Many in Taiwan credit the deceased businessman simply for being a household name.
Wang was a straightforward man who was known to take risks. Paying their last respects, mourners praised the tycoon for his clear-cut decision-making and emphasis on operational efficiency. They also credited his pragmatism and farsighted business initiatives.
The establishment of Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑) in 1954 and of Chang Gung Memorial Hospital (長庚醫院) — the nation’s largest and most profitable hospital chain — in 1976 are two of his most conspicuous accomplishments. His leadership of the two groups earned Wang the nickname “god of management.”
Wang was a human being, however, and did make mistakes over the decades, especially in a televised debate with then-Ilan County commissioner Chen Ding-nan (陳定南) in 1987, when he argued for the establishment of the Sixth Naphtha Cracker plant in the county’s Lize Industrial Park (利澤工業區).
Straightforward but not as eloquent as Chen, Wang lost the debate over environmental protection and economic growth. Formosa Plastics was forced to search for other sites to build the naphtha cracker and finally found one in Mailiao Township (麥寮), Yunlin County, in 1991.
Wang also experienced disappointing results from investments in automobile manufacturing and plasma-display panel making. He closed Formosa Automobile Corp last year after shutting down Formosa Plasma Display Corp in 2005.
But it was his secret meeting with Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平) in 1989 in Beijing and his criticism of former president Lee Teng-hui’s (李登輝) “no haste, be patient” trade policy toward China that raised eyebrows across the Taiwan Strait — after he was forced to give up on a proposed petrochemical project in Fujian Province in 1992. To this day, Taiwanese debate Wang’s backing of a closer relationship with China and his acceptance of Beijing’s “one China” policy.
To many Taiwanese, Wang’s legacy not only stems from the Formosa Plastics Group, but also from his straightforward attitude and his concern for corporate responsibility toward employees and shareholders.
His lifelong commitment to hard work and thrift is respectable. His passing away on a business trip to the US, even though he had retired in 2006, reflects his devotion to work — until the very end.
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
I have heard people equate the government’s stance on resisting forced unification with China or the conditional reinstatement of the military court system with the rise of the Nazis before World War II. The comparison is absurd. There is no meaningful parallel between the government and Nazi Germany, nor does such a mindset exist within the general public in Taiwan. It is important to remember that the German public bore some responsibility for the horrors of the Holocaust. Post-World War II Germany’s transitional justice efforts were rooted in a national reckoning and introspection. Many Jews were sent to concentration camps not
RSS