It is “still too soon to tell” whether power shortages in China would lead to a wave of reshoring by Taiwanese manufacturers, Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua (王美花) said yesterday.
Wang’s remarks came in response to Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Cheng Yun-peng (鄭運鵬), who during a meeting of the legislature’s Economics Committee inquired whether any Taiwanese firms have yet made the announcement to “come home” amid power rationing in China.
“All this just happened and manufacturers are dealing with it by switching production to existing manufacturing facilities outside of China,” Wang said. “However, most firms have a wait-and-see attitude toward long-term investment decisions.”
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
Taiwanese manufacturers that have retained domestic production facilities are better able to weather the unexpected shortages, while firms that exclusively produce in China would inevitably be affected, she said.
“It is inevitable that firms that only manufacture in China will take longer to deliver their orders, leading ultimately to lower volumes,” she added.
DPP Legislator Chiu Yi-ying (邱議瑩) asked whether Taiwan has enough electricity generation capacity to supply industrial users, especially if more manufacturers return.
Wang said that Taiwan has mainly secured its energy needs through long-term contracts and is therefore less exposed to an ongoing global energy crunch.
About 70 percent of Taiwan’s liquefied natural gas and 75 percent of its coal come from long-term supply agreements, she said.
“We are prepared,” Wang said, adding that Taiwan has a 30-day supply of coal, as opposed to about 10 days in India or China.
Separately, Minister Without Portfolio John Deng (鄧振中) said that Taiwan’s bid to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) has been “well-received” by Japan, Canada, New Zealand and Australia.
“You can describe the responses to Taiwan’s application as encouraging,” Deng told political commentator Frances Huang (黃光芹) in an interview.
After China’s surprise bid to join the regional trade pact on Sept. 16, Taiwan swiftly followed suit and sent its membership application a week later, worried that China’s membership might derail its long-planned attempt to join the bloc.
“A lot of countries were taken by surprise by China’s bid,” Deng said. “As long as more than half of China’s GDP is generated by state-owned enterprises, it will be hard for the country to meet the CPTPP’s tough requirements.”
Describing China’s bid as a “sneak attack,” Deng said that Taiwan, which “pre-paved” its bid, is more “welcomed internationally.”
“No one is throwing cold water on our bid,” he said, describing Taiwan’s chances as “good.”
China’s Huawei Technologies Co (華為) plans to start mass-producing its most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip in the first quarter of next year, even as it struggles to make enough chips due to US restrictions, two people familiar with the matter said. The telecoms conglomerate has sent samples of the Ascend 910C — its newest chip, meant to rival those made by US chipmaker Nvidia Corp — to some technology firms and started taking orders, the sources told Reuters. The 910C is being made by top Chinese contract chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯) on its N+2 process, but a lack
NVIDIA PLATFORM: Hon Hai’s Mexican facility is to begin production early next year and a Taiwan site is to enter production next month, Nvidia wrote on its blog Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), the world’s biggest electronics manufacturer, yesterday said it is expanding production capacity of artificial intelligence (AI) servers based on Nvidia Corp’s Blackwell chips in Taiwan, the US and Mexico to cope with rising demand. Hon Hai’s new AI-enabled factories are to use Nvidia’s Omnivores platform to create 3D digital twins to plan and simulate automated production lines at a factory in Hsinchu, the company said in a statement. Nvidia’s Omnivores platform is for developing industrial AI simulation applications and helps bring facilities online faster. Hon Hai’s Mexican facility is to begin production early next year and the
Who would not want a social media audience that grows without new content? During the three years she paused production of her short do-it-yourself (DIY) farmer’s lifestyle videos, Chinese vlogger Li Ziqi (李子柒), 34, has seen her YouTube subscribers increase to 20.2 million from about 14 million. While YouTube is banned in China, her fan base there — although not the size of YouTube’s MrBeast, who has 330 million subscribers — is close to 100 million across the country’s social media platforms Douyin (抖音), Sina Weibo (新浪微博) and Xiaohongshu (小紅書). When Li finally released new videos last week — ending what has
AVIATION BOOM: CAL is to renew its passenger and cargo fleets starting next year on record profits as aviation continues to return to pre-pandemic levels China Airlines Ltd (CAL, 中華航空) yesterday said it is optimistic about next year’s business outlook, as the airline continues to renew its fleet on expectations that global passenger traffic would maintain steady growth and air cargo demand would remain strong. From next year to 2028, the airline is to welcome a new Boeing Co 787 fleet — 18 787-9 and six 787-10 passenger aircraft — to cover regional and medium to long-haul destinations, CAL chairman Hsieh Shih-chien (謝世謙) said at an investors’ conference in Taipei. The airline would also continue to introduce Airbus SE 321neo passenger planes and Boeing 777F cargo jets,
RSS