Computex Taipei 2024, organized by the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA), started on Tuesday last week.
The event had 4,500 booths and attracted 1,500 companies, more than 13,000 international professionals and nine technology giants — including Intel Corp, Qualcomm Inc, Ammann Group Holding and other major companies. Among the companies, there is competition and more cooperation. The event also attracted more than 1,000 news reporters from around the world.
AMD chairwoman and CEO Lisa Su (蘇姿丰), dubbed the “Queen of Semiconductors,” began the show with a keynote speech on “High Performance Computing in the AI [artificial intelligence] Era,” showing that this year’s focus was on AI technology.
Meanwhile, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), called the “Godfather of AI,” visited Taiwan for the fifth time within a year.
He came a week in advance to host banquets and meet with Nvidia’s Taiwanese partners, and to give a speech at National Taiwan University on the eve of Computex. His friendly and humble demeanor has once again caused a “Jensen Huang fever,” and his praise of Taiwan was a testament to his sense of home.
Supermicro founder and CEO Charles Liang (梁見後), whose company stock price surged nearly tenfold within a year, also returned to his alma mater, the Taipei National University of Technology, to give a speech.
They were great inspirations for Taiwan.
Huang spoke highly of Taiwan’s information and communications technology industry to the media, listing 43 Taiwanese companies he has worked with in the AI field.
Such a fairly complete AI supply chain led to a rise in their stock prices the following day.
Huang even went as far as to say that “Taiwan is one of the most important countries” and a pillar of the world.
Although he was referring to the Taiwanese tech industry, is it not also true that Taiwan, which has been a global focal point due to the Chinese military threat, has an important strategic role geopolitically?
China’s political fanatics known as “xiaofenhong” (小粉紅), literally “Little Pinks,” were stomping their feet with rage after hearing this.
However, the Chinese Communist Party’s mouthpieces were silent, because Computex began on June 4, and the term “June 4” is banned in China.
Given Taiwanese laws, it is also difficult for China to send companies to the show, with the exception of Lenovo Group Ltd, which opened a branch in Taiwan two decades ago.
However, Beijing would surely have sent spies to gather tech information.
What is certain is that China could hardly prevent such a large number of international professionals from coming to Taiwan to take part in the show, and it could not sell the “one China” principle at the event, or bully Taiwan by threatening to crush it into pieces just for claiming its own sovereignty.
While the new industrial revolution is in full swing, China is still indulging in its millennia-old culture and how it has been “since ancient times,” which is sad for national rejuvenation.
Taiwan’s economic prosperity contrasts sharply with China’s economic downturn.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) asked enterprises at a forum: “What’s the reason for the decline in the number of new ‘unicorn enterprises’ [a start-up valued at US$1 billion or more] in our country?”
However, Xi himself might be the murderer of unicorns.
Paul Lin is a political commentator.
Translated by Eddy Chang
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of
RSS