Tue, Nov 04, 2003 page11

• Business Briefs

  • STAFF WRITER WITH AGENCIES
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  Handset subsidies planned

  Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), Taiwan's dominant phone company, plans to offer NT$4 billion (US$118 million) handset subsidies next year to bolster market share on an island, where there are more cell phones than people.

  Chunghwa Telecom, the nation's No. 2 mobile-phone service company, denied an

  The company expects to offer an average NT$2,000 discount per handset to 2 million customers, including existing subscribers whose two-year contracts expire next year, spokeswoman Shen Fu-fu (沈馥馥) said.

  The company, which receives about 37 percent of revenue from mobile phone services, had about 8 million mobile-phone customers last month, Shen said. "The amount of subsidy won't vary too much from this year's," she said.

  Chunghwa Telecom's third-quarter profit rose 4.5 percent to NT$12.5 billion from NT$12.0 billion a year earlier. Sales rose 1 percent to NT$45.9 billion.

  Semiconductor packagers rise

  Daniel Heyler, an analyst at Merrill Lynch, said companies in the computer-chip packaging business will probably post stronger earnings in the next few quarters.

  The shares of chip packagers such as Advanced Semiconductor Engineering Inc (日月光) and rivals rose after Heyler upgraded the chip assembly industry to "buy" from "neutral" on Friday.

  Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, the world's No. 2 packager of computer chips, climbed NT$1.00, or 3.2 percent, to NT$32.50. Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品), the third largest, surged NT$2.20, or 6.8 percent, to NT$34.70.

  Companies in the business will probably post stronger earnings in the next few quarters, Heyler said.

  Chip packagers cut silicon wafers into chips, attach conductive wiring to the silicon, and encase the assembled product in insulating materials such as plastic.

  New virus alert

  Computer users need to aware of W32.Mimail.C@mm, as Symantec Corp, a anti-virus software maker, has received 38 submissions from its customers regarding the affection of the computer virus, a company statement said yesterday.

  W32.Mimail.C@mm is a variant of W32.Mimail.A@mm, which spreads by email and steals information from infected computers via Windows operation system and was first discovered on Aug. 4 this year, the statement said. Besides theft of information, the variant worm will further launch attack to certain websites and perform a Denial of Service, the statement said.

  To prevent from the infection, Symantec suggested personal and corporate computer users to apply a patch from Microsoft website, or download the most recent virus definitions.

  HSBC expands in China

  HSBC Holdings Plc, the world's second-largest lender by market value, said one of its Hong Kong commercial banking units won approval from Chinese authorities to expand its yuan currency business to three more Chinese cities.

  HSBC, which has been offering local currency services in Shanghai since 1997 and Shenzhen since 1998, can now offer yuan services in Qingdao, Tianjin and Guangzhou through its Hongkong & Shanghai Banking Corp unit, the bank said in a statement. Those are the only five cities open to overseas banks.

  NT dollar falls

  The New Taiwan dollar yesterday traded lower against its US counterpart, declining NT$0.045 to finish at NT$34.025 on the Taiwan foreign exchange market.

  Turnover was US$430 million.
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