Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) on Friday reopened its production base in Vietnam’s northern Bac Giang Province after a vaccination program eased concerns over COVID-19 infections.
The vaccination program targets workers in the province’s four major industrial parks and the Hon Hai plant has been listed as a model in COVID-19 prevention measures, Vietnam News Agency reported on Thursday.
The provincial government in the middle of this month ordered factories in the industrial parks closed after a new wave of COVID-19 infections emerged in Vietnam late last month, spreading across 30 provinces and cities, with Bac Giang one of the most seriously affected.
Photo: CNA
The shutdown in Bac Giang affected thousands of factories run by local and foreign firms, as well as more than 130,000 workers, the VnExpress news site reported.
The province has 178 foreign investors, including iPhone assembler Hon Hai, known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團) outside of Taiwan, runs four factories there through a subsidiary, VnExpress reported, citing provincial authorities.
Hon Hai also runs a production base in the northern Bac Ninh Province, where a vaccination program has also been launched.
Hon Hai and its subsidiaries in Vietnam have said they would make donations to help with virus prevention in the neighborhoods close to its production bases, vowing to follow the Vietnamese authorities’ directions to adjust its virus prevention policy.
Vietnam has become one of Hon Hai’s most important production bases outside of China. According to Apple Inc’s latest supplier list, Hon Hai’s Bac Giang complex is among the US company’s suppliers.
Hon Hai’s subsidiaries have also set up footholds in Vietnam.
Among them, Foxconn Interconnect Technology Ltd (鴻騰精密), a connector maker, and integrated circuit packaging and testing firm ShunSin Technology Holdings Ltd (訊芯科技) have also established production lines in Bac Giang.
Vietnam had initially succeeded in containing the virus. Early this month, it had recorded just more than 3,100 confirmed cases and 35 deaths since the start of the pandemic.
However, over the past few weeks, Vietnam has confirmed more than 3,500 new cases and 12 deaths, increasing the death toll to 47.
Most of the new transmissions were found in Bac Ninh and Bac Giang, two provinces with dense industrial zones where hundreds of thousands of people work for major companies including Hon Hai, Samsung Electronics Co, Canon Inc and Luxshare Precision Industry Co (立訊精密), a Chinese supplier to Apple.
Despite strict health regulations, a company in Bac Giang discovered that one-fifth of its 4,800 workers had tested positive for the virus.
Separately, Hon Hai founder Terry Gou (郭台銘) said in a statement on Saturday that his charity Yonglin Foundation plans to apply for 5 million doses of the BioNTech SE COVID-19 vaccine made and packaged in Germany to be imported into Taiwan.
The shots would be airlifted from Germany to Taiwan without going through any intermediaries, he added.
Additional reporting by AP and Reuters
Semiconductor shares in China surged yesterday after Reuters reported the US had ordered chipmaking giant Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to halt shipments of advanced chips to Chinese customers, which investors believe could accelerate Beijing’s self-reliance efforts. TSMC yesterday started to suspend shipments of certain sophisticated chips to some Chinese clients after receiving a letter from the US Department of Commerce imposing export restrictions on those products, Reuters reported on Sunday, citing an unnamed source. The US imposed export restrictions on TSMC’s 7-nanometer or more advanced designs, Reuters reported. Investors figured that would encourage authorities to support China’s industry and bought shares
TECH WAR CONTINUES: The suspension of TSMC AI chips and GPUs would be a heavy blow to China’s chip designers and would affect its competitive edge Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, is reportedly to halt supply of artificial intelligence (AI) chips and graphics processing units (GPUs) made on 7-nanometer or more advanced process technologies from next week in order to comply with US Department of Commerce rules. TSMC has sent e-mails to its Chinese AI customers, informing them about the suspension starting on Monday, Chinese online news outlet Ijiwei.com (愛集微) reported yesterday. The US Department of Commerce has not formally unveiled further semiconductor measures against China yet. “TSMC does not comment on market rumors. TSMC is a law-abiding company and we are
FLEXIBLE: Taiwan can develop its own ground station equipment, and has highly competitive manufacturers and suppliers with diversified production, the MOEA said The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) yesterday disputed reports that suppliers to US-based Space Exploration Technologies Corp (SpaceX) had been asked to move production out of Taiwan. Reuters had reported on Tuesday last week that Elon Musk-owned SpaceX had asked their manufacturers to produce outside of Taiwan given geopolitical risks and that at least one Taiwanese supplier had been pushed to relocate production to Vietnam. SpaceX’s requests place a renewed focus on the contentious relationship Musk has had with Taiwan, especially after he said last year that Taiwan is an “integral part” of China, sparking sharp criticism from Taiwanese authorities. The ministry said
US President Joe Biden’s administration is racing to complete CHIPS and Science Act agreements with companies such as Intel Corp and Samsung Electronics Co, aiming to shore up one of its signature initiatives before US president-elect Donald Trump enters the White House. The US Department of Commerce has allocated more than 90 percent of the US$39 billion in grants under the act, a landmark law enacted in 2022 designed to rebuild the domestic chip industry. However, the agency has only announced one binding agreement so far. The next two months would prove critical for more than 20 companies still in the process
RSS