BUSINESS DAY: A business matching event between 12 US companies and 108 local suppliers led to US$168.3 million in new business opportunities, the trade body said

Taipei Times
Date: Oct 05, 2018
By: Ted Chen  /  Staff reporter

Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA, 外貿協會) Vice Chairman Chuang

Suo-hang (莊碩漢) yesterday said that now is the time to pursue a bilateral trade agreement with the US as a new paradigm in global commerce emerges.

The global landscape has shifted rapidly under US President Donald Trump’s administration and Taiwan is prepared to prosper alongside its second-largest trade partner, Chuang said at the launch of the seventh annual US Business Day to promote and support bilateral business cooperation.

The event facilitates business matches between 12 companies from six US states and 108 Taiwanese suppliers.

A majority of the visiting US companies are in the manufacturing business, including hand tool maker Stanley Black & Decker Inc, underlining Taiwan’s strategic position in Trump’s push for US-made products and preference for bilateral trade deals, Chuang said.
[FULL  STORY]

Company gets high marks for environmental, social and governance criteria

Taiwan News 
Date: 2018/10/03
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Taiwanese computer giant Acer Inc. (宏碁) has been chosen to feature on the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices for the fifth year running, reports said Wednesday.

The company said that the move showed its long-term efforts in favor of environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria were attracting positive international attention, the Liberty Times reported.

In addition, Acer was also listed on the FTSE4Good Emerging Index for the third year in a row, and on the FTSE4Good TIP Taiwan ESG Index.

The company said the listings would encourage it to focus not only on its own development and innovation, but also on its social responsibility.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/10/03
By: Pan Chi-yi and Flor Wang

Taipei, Oct. 3 (CNA) Siemens Gamesa, a Spanish company that provides renewable energy solutions worldwide, on Wednesday signed two separate deals with Taiwanese companies to procure components for a wind power project in Taiwan.

Under the first deal, Swancor Renewable Energy Co. agreed to supply resin to Siemens Gamesa, one of three foreign companies among the seven contracted by the Taiwan government to build 10 offshore wind power farms.

The agreement was signed at a press conference by Andreas Nauen, CEO of the Offshore Business Unit of Siemens Gamesa, and Robert Tsai (蔡朝陽), chairman of Swancor Renewable Energy.

At the signing, Nauen said he hoped the deal would help make Taiwan a bigger player in the supply chain of the global offshore wind power industry and boost its chances of becoming a hub of the industry in the Asia-Pacific region.    [FULL  STORY]

Mitsui Outlet Park Taichung will host 170 brands from clothing to restaurants

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/10/02
By: Sophia Yang, Taiwan News, Staff Reporter

The 3D illustration of the shopping outlet center (Source of the image: epa.gov.tw)
TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – The highly anticipated shopping outlet center in Taichung City is slated to open on December 12 this year, and is set to become the largest of its kind in Central Taiwan, after 16 months of construction.

Located adjacent to the Port of Taichung (台中港), Mitsui Outlet Park Taichung will contain a mix of 170 shops and restaurants offering a variety of international and local brands.

The construction of the two-story, 44-acre shopping mall began in late August 2017, and is near completion. The building is completely owned and run by the real estate company Mitsui & Co. Taiwan Ltd., an overseas affiliated company of Japan-based Mitsui & Co.

The new shopping mall will offer clothing, books, restaurants and cafes. A number of renowned Japanese restaurant chains have announced they are choosing this location for their first stores in Taiwan, including Japan’s gourmet French toast restaurant Invorish, Ginzakagari ramen, BBQ chains Kintan Buffet, Bulls, Momiji Chaya, and British tea shop Whittard,     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/10/02
By: Tien Yu-pin and Elizabeth Hsu

Taipei, Oct. 2 (CNA) CTBC Bank, a subsidiary of CTBC Financial Holding Co., Ltd., has

upgraded thousands of its automatic teller machines (ATMs) around Taiwan to provide customers services in six different languages, including Thai and Vietnamese, the bank said Tuesday.

More than 5,500 CTBC Bank ATMs across the country now offer services in Chinese, English, Japanese, Korean, Thai and Vietnamese, the bank said, touting the upgrade as designed to appeal to the increasing number of foreign visitors to Taiwan.

According to Tourism Bureau statistics, the number of foreign visitors arriving in Taiwan passed 6 million last year, representing year-on-year growth of 13.15 percent.

Visitors from South Korea increased by 19.25 percent last year compared with the previous year, while those from Thailand rose 49.76 percent and from Vietnam 96.44 percent, the statistics show.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News 
Date: 2018/10/01
By: Duncan DeAeth, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – The Intellectual Property Office under the Minister of Economic Affairs in cooperation with National Taiwan University and Google Cloud hosted the first ever “HACKIDB Smart Technology Application Contest” which provided prizes of over US$300 thousand in Google Cloud Platform (GCP) Credit.

The first prize winner of the Goolge Cloud HACKIDB competition was the “NexRetail” team, which won US$100 thousand worth of GCP credit, and which will work with “iKala GCP” on the future Google Cloud “Surge Project,” reports Apple Daily.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/10/01
By: Chu Che-wei and Ko Lin

Taipei, Oct. 1 (CNA) The government is actively encouraging Taiwanese businesses

operating in China to relocate their production facilities to Taiwan amid the ongoing trade battle between the United States and China, Premier Lai Ching-te (賴清德) said Monday.

Speaking at an annual meeting organized by the Monte Jade Science and Technology Association, an association of technology company executives in Taiwan, Lai said the government will try to clear obstacles to investment to help companies return home.

It will continue to promote tax breaks, relax regulations and introduce proposals to resolve the “five shortages,” Lai said, referring to land, water, electricity, skilled worker and manpower shortages that have long plagued the industrial sector.

Those issues were highlighted in the annual white paper published in July by the Chinese National Federation of Industries (CNFI), which represents the majority of manufacturers in Taiwan.    [FULL  STORY]