Two Taiwanese start-ups won top prizes at the SelectUSA Tech competition in Maryland last week, while another local firm placed second in its category, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said on Saturday.
Fourteen start-ups from Taiwan competed in seven major categories against 100 finalists from around the world in the SelectUSA Tech, which is part of the SelectUSA Investment Summit held from June 26 to Wednesday last week, the ministry said in a statement.
Among the Taiwanese contenders, Astron MedTech Co (艾斯創生醫), established by Taiwan Accelerator Plus (TAcc+), won in the MedTech Software category, while Lydsec Digital Technology Co (來毅數位科技) took the top prize in the Cybersecurity category, the ministry said.
Photo courtesy of the Ministry of Economic Affairs
A third Taiwanese start-up, CancerFree Biotec Ltd (精拓生技), took second prize in the MedTech Software category, it said.
The other major categories were CleanTech, eCommerce & Retail Tech, FinTech and a general category called Other.
At the summit, Small and Medium Enterprise Administration Director-General Ho Chin-tsang (何晉滄) met with Maryland Department of Commerce Director Jessica Reynolds to discuss establishing a start-up exchange platform between Taiwan and the state, the ministry said.
Ho and Reynolds agreed that Taiwan’s Startup Terrace village in New Taipei City, the Asia New Bay Area 5G AIoT Innovation Park in Kaohsiung and TAcc+ should work with innovation accelerators in Maryland to help more start-ups, the ministry said.
After the SelectUSA Summit, Ho and representatives of 23 Taiwanese start-ups were invited by the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) to visit California’s Silicon Valley to seek potential investors, as part of an effort to boost the visibility of Taiwanese start-ups in the US market, it said.
The Taiwanese representatives also attended a NextGen Telecom roundtable hosted by the AIT, it added.
The SelectUSA Summit, an annual event sponsored by the US Department of Commerce, focuses on facilitating job-creating investments in the US.
This year, National Development Council Minister Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫) led a 41-member delegation to the meeting, aiming to increase exchanges in the tech sector — in particular, semiconductors, artificial intelligence, telecoms and space exploration.
Start-ups from Hungary, the Netherlands, Israel and Portugal were among the winners this year.
MULTIFACETED: A task force has analyzed possible scenarios and created responses to assist domestic industries in dealing with US tariffs, the economics minister said The Executive Yuan is tomorrow to announce countermeasures to US President Donald Trump’s planned reciprocal tariffs, although the details of the plan would not be made public until Monday next week, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. The Cabinet established an economic and trade task force in November last year to deal with US trade and tariff related issues, Kuo told reporters outside the legislature in Taipei. The task force has been analyzing and evaluating all kinds of scenarios to identify suitable responses and determine how best to assist domestic industries in managing the effects of Trump’s tariffs, he
TIGHT-LIPPED: UMC said it had no merger plans at the moment, after Nikkei Asia reported that the firm and GlobalFoundries were considering restarting merger talks United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 4 contract chipmaker, yesterday launched a new US$5 billion 12-inch chip factory in Singapore as part of its latest effort to diversify its manufacturing footprint amid growing geopolitical risks. The new factory, adjacent to UMC’s existing Singapore fab in the Pasir Res Wafer Fab Park, is scheduled to enter volume production next year, utilizing mature 22-nanometer and 28-nanometer process technologies, UMC said in a statement. The company plans to invest US$5 billion during the first phase of the new fab, which would have an installed capacity of 30,000 12-inch wafers per month, it said. The
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
RSS