Eslite Spectrum Corp (誠品生活) yesterday held a grand opening for a new department store in New Taipei City’s Sindian District (新店) that is the largest in Asia by floor space and would help the leisure lifestyle services provider swing into profit next year.
The new outlet, Eslite Spectrum Sindian, has almost 20,000 ping (66,000m2) of floor space that might generate annual revenue of NT$4 billion to NT$5 billion (US$123.96 million to US$154.95 million) by housing 250 retail brands including 20 themed restaurants to meet the entertainment needs of people in neighboring areas, Eslite Spectrum chairwoman Mercy Wu (吳旻潔) said.
The number of visits turned out higher than expected during the soft opening, giving Eslite Spectrum the confidence to aim high, Wu said.
Photo: CNA
Eslite Spectrum, which operates Eslite Bookstore (誠品書局) and Eslite Hotel (誠品行旅), as well as supplies kitchen equipment and wines, has not yet emerged from COVID-19 pandemic-related losses.
Things should improve next quarter and turn a new page next year with help of the Sindian property and forthcoming outlets in Kaohsiung and Taichung, Wu told reporters.
The Sindian branch takes up partial floors of Yes, Life Yulon City (裕隆城), a mixed-use complex owned by Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車).
Photo: CNA
Wu said Yulon invited Eslite to help convert the massive plot of land into a mixed-use complex in 2013, and she was in talks with more than 2,000 retail brands and restaurants to make a presence in the property.
The department store’s location in New Taipei City made luxury brands impractical partners, and Eslite Spectrum had to focus on community-minded shops and eateries instead, Wu said.
“We have to adjust and drop our past preference for lesser-known brands and collaborate with Uniqlo, Niko, Nike and other popular fashion and sports brands to satisfy the needs of different customer groups,” Wu said.
Toward the end, the company also believed there must be sufficient dining options that could account for up to 40 percent of the space, she said.
Still, Eslite Spectrum has set aside generous space for book collections that are as large and diverse as in the Eslite bookstore across from National Taiwan University, Wu said, adding that the bookstore would organize exhibitions and events to entertain customers.
In addition, Vieshow movie theaters are occupying the sixth to eighth floors and could seat 2400 people, according to Yes, Life Yulon City data.
The Yulon Group is seeking to add high-rise residential buildings in the complex to make the best use of its space.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) last week recorded an increase in the number of shareholders to the highest in almost eight months, despite its share price falling 3.38 percent from the previous week, Taiwan Stock Exchange data released on Saturday showed. As of Friday, TSMC had 1.88 million shareholders, the most since the week of April 25 and an increase of 31,870 from the previous week, the data showed. The number of shareholders jumped despite a drop of NT$50 (US$1.59), or 3.38 percent, in TSMC’s share price from a week earlier to NT$1,430, as investors took profits from their earlier gains
In a high-security Shenzhen laboratory, Chinese scientists have built what Washington has spent years trying to prevent: a prototype of a machine capable of producing the cutting-edge semiconductor chips that power artificial intelligence (AI), smartphones and weapons central to Western military dominance, Reuters has learned. Completed early this year and undergoing testing, the prototype fills nearly an entire factory floor. It was built by a team of former engineers from Dutch semiconductor giant ASML who reverse-engineered the company’s extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines, according to two people with knowledge of the project. EUV machines sit at the heart of a technological Cold
Taiwan’s long-term economic competitiveness will hinge not only on national champions like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC, 台積電) but also on the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies, a US-based scholar has said. At a lecture in Taipei on Tuesday, Jeffrey Ding, assistant professor of political science at the George Washington University and author of "Technology and the Rise of Great Powers," argued that historical experience shows that general-purpose technologies (GPTs) — such as electricity, computers and now AI — shape long-term economic advantages through their diffusion across the broader economy. "What really matters is not who pioneers
TAIWAN VALUE CHAIN: Foxtron is to fully own Luxgen following the transaction and it plans to launch a new electric model, the Foxtron Bria, in Taiwan next year Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車) yesterday said that its board of directors approved the disposal of its electric vehicle (EV) unit, Luxgen Motor Co (納智捷汽車), to Foxtron Vehicle Technologies Co (鴻華先進) for NT$787.6 million (US$24.98 million). Foxtron, a half-half joint venture between Yulon affiliate Hua-Chuang Automobile Information Technical Center Co (華創車電) and Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), expects to wrap up the deal in the first quarter of next year. Foxtron would fully own Luxgen following the transaction, including five car distributing companies, outlets and all employees. The deal is subject to the approval of the Fair Trade Commission, Foxtron said. “Foxtron will be
RSS