The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM) began at the Taipei International Convention Center yesterday with the theme “Communications for Human and Machine Intelligence,” as many of the 73 participating companies focused on 5G, artificial intelligence, big data, edge computing, the Internet of Things and e-medicine.
The four-day GLOBECOM is the flagship event of the IEEE, the largest professional electronics association in the world, and this year’s chairman, Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) chief executive of mobile services Tu Yuan-kuang (涂元光), marked the significance of the occasion at a news conference in Taipei on Monday.
“The holding of GLOBECOM 2020 in Taipei is important for Taiwan,” Tu said. “It’s time to shake off the ‘contract manufacturer’ label with cutting-edge research.”
Photo: CNA
“The ability for 5G technology to dramatically increase the amount of data we can transfer will open up brand new possibilities for applications,” Department of Industrial Technology Director-General Chiou Chyou-huey (邱求慧) said at the conference yesterday.
By working with the industry and nonprofit organizations, the department has developed more than 650 potential applications, some of which are being showcased at the department’s booth at the conference, Chiou said.
One application is a remote monitoring system conveying real-time data from a factory to off-site professionals, he said.
“The workers on the floor might not be able to tell anything is wrong, but off-site engineers can immediately detect problems,” Chiou said. “This would not have been possible using 4G because of the volume of data and the time lag.”
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) is participating at GLOBECOM for the first time, presenting a live demonstration of its 5G open radio access network solutions, with low latency and download speeds of 1 gigabyte per second.
Cisco Systems Inc is showcasing its collaboration with Japan’s Rakuten Inc to deliver the world’s first 5G cloud-native mobile network.
The US company’s experience with Rakuten would provide Taiwanese telecoms with a “strong reference” for accomplishing something similar, Cisco said.
Cisco greater China managing director and Taiwan general manager George Chen (陳志惟) said in a press release that the company is partnering with the government and industry in Taiwan to “create more possibilities” for 5G technology.
The decision to hold this year’s GLOBECOM in Taipei was made before the COVID-19 pandemic. The previous event to be held in Taipei had been in 2002.
While the nation’s successful COVID-19 prevention efforts meant that the event was able to go ahead, not all of the participants could attend and for the first time GLOBECOM this year is an online-offline event.
“Taiwan has attracted the attention of the world for our successful handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, but what is more important is seizing upon the technical advancements and opportunities afforded by the crisis,” Chiou said. “If we can develop more 5G applications, it shows that Taiwan can help, and not just when it comes to virus prevention.”
GLOBECOM continues until Friday, while access to the virtual platform is available until the end of the year.
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
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
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
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained