Taipei Times
Date: Aug 25, 2018
By: Lisa Wang  /  Staff reporter

E Ink Holdings Inc (元太科技), the world’s No. 1 supplier of e-paper displays, yesterday said that revenue this year would be little changed from last year’s NT$15.2 billion (US$494 million), as growing uptake of electronic shelf labels and e-notebooks would offset a slump in e-reader demand.

E-reader customers this year are adjusting their product portfolios to changing demand, but the rough transition is cutting demand for e-paper displays, the Hsinchu-based company said.

E Ink supplies e-paper displays for Amazon.com Inc’s and Rakuten Kobo Inc’s e-readers. E-paper displays used in e-readers and e-notebooks made up 70 percent of E Ink’s total revenue in the first half of this year.

“We still believe e-readers are a business with consistent growth. This year is an exception. Next year, the e-reader market will resume high-speed growth as experienced over the past few years,” E Ink president Johnson Lee (李政昊) said at an investors’ conference.    [FULL  STORY]

POSITIVE FORECAST: The Ministry of Economic Affairs said that production should continue growing this month, as demand for electronic components remains solid

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 24, 2018
By: Lisa Wang  /  Staff reporter

The nation’s industrial production climbed 4.43 percent last month from a year earlier, fueled by restocking demand for components, such as semiconductors and camera lenses, ahead of new smartphone launches, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday.

Last month’s growth strengthened the ministry’s confidence that industrial production would continue its uptrend this quarter, following eight quarters of growth since the third quarter of 2016.

Growth in industrial production decelerated to 0.51 percent in June from a year earlier, due to weak demand for products related to cryptocurrency mining and fewer working days, but “the growth pace last month brings industrial production back on track for healthy growth,” Department of Statistics Deputy Director-General Wang Shu-chuan (王淑娟) told a news conference in Taipei.

This month, industrial production is forecast to continue expanding, backed by continuing demand for electronic components and the resumption of operations at of local petrochemical plants following annual maintenance, the ministry said, citing a survey it conducted.    [FULL  STORY]

SMART CHOICE: The company is gearing up to launch a mobile version of its self-developed ‘TS Online,’ which offers higher margins than distributing foreign titles

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 23, 2018
By: Ted Chen  /  Staff reporter

Soft-World International Corp (智冠) is betting big on nostalgic marketing as it prepares to reboot classic titles on smartphones in the second half of the year.

Following the success of other revivals such as the smash-hit Lineage M, Maple Story M and StoneAge M, the company is gearing up to launch a mobile version of TS Online (吞食天地) next month, a classic massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) that was first released on PC in 2003.

TS Online could push Chinese Gamer International Corp (中華網龍), Soft-World’s game development subsidiary, back into the black at the end of this year, Soft-World chief financial officer Chung Hsing-po (鍾興博) told an investors’ conference in Taipei yesterday.

TS Online could be the first hit title that was wholly developed in-house, which offers much higher margins compared with distributing games made by other studios, Chung said.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/08/21
By: Kuo Hsin-yi and Frances Huang

Taipei, Aug. 21 (CNA) Taiwan recorded a net fund outflow for the 32nd consecutive quarter in the second quarter, the longest run in the country’s history, according to Taiwan’s central bank.

Central bank data showed a net outflow in Taiwan’s financial account, which measures the flow of direct investment and portfolio investments, of US$12.64 billion in the April-June period, bringing the total net outflow for the 32 quarters to US$380.42 billion.

The continued outflow, which shows that more funds for investment are flowing out of than into Taiwan, has fueled growing concerns that investors will keep moving funds out of the country and into U.S. dollar denominated assets.

The central bank dismissed the concerns, however, saying Taiwan is one of the few countries in the world to record a long-term current account surplus, and countries with such surpluses tend to register net financial account outflows.    [FULL  STORY]

POSITIVE SENTIMENT: The economy last quarter grew at the fastest clip in more than three years and the approaching holiday season is expected to boost local companies

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 22, 2018
By: Crystal Hsu  /  Staff reporter

Public confidence in the economy and equity investment showed signs of stabilization this month, ending five straight months of declines, after the government last week raised its GDP growth forecast for this year, a survey released yesterday by Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) showed.

More people expect the economy to continue to expand from last month, despite a trade war between the US and China, the nation’s largest financial services provider said.

People who expect the economy to deteriorate in the coming six months fell slightly to 48 percent, while 16.5 percent expect an improvement, the monthly survey found.

Thirty percent said the economy would remain unchanged, while 4.9 percent expressed no opinion, according to the online survey, which polled 16,243 respondents between Aug. 1 and Aug. 7.    [FULL  STORY]