Council of Agriculture seeks to boost food sales amid pandemic with online platform

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/08/10
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The Taiwan Agriculture Produce Festival online shopping platform organized by the Council of Agriculture (COA) will feature fruits and other food items popular in the summer.

Anticipating the coronavirus pandemic’s potential impact on sales in brick-and-mortar stores, the COA launched the Taiwan Agriculture Produce Festival online shopping platform in the first half of this year, according to CNA.

According to the COA’s Department of International Affairs data, the online shopping platform, which in the first half of the year gave back the consumer NT$50 (US$1.67) on every NT$500 purchase, created NT$450 million in revenue for the online shopping economy in that period, far exceeding its NT$350 million goal.

For the second half of this year, the Taiwan Agriculture Produce Festival has upped the ante by offering NT$100 back for every NT$500 purchase and NT$500 back for every NT$2,500 purchase in the hopes of increasing transactions.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 08/10/2020
By: Chang Chien-chung and Frances Huang

Taipei, Aug. 10 (CNA) Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) saw its sales in July fall more than 12 percent from a month earlier, likely the result of a loss of orders from Chinese telecom and phone brand Huawei amid trade sanctions imposed by the United States.

In a statement, TSMC said its consolidated sales in July totaled NT$105.96 billion (US$3.59 billion), down 12.3 percent from a month earlier, but it was still the third highest total for the year behind NT$120.88 billion in June (an all-time high) and NT$113.52 in March.

The July sales were also 25 percent higher than in July 2019 on strong demand for TSMC's advanced technology processes, analysts said.

At an investor conference in mid-July, TSMC Chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) said his company stopped taking orders from Huawei on May 15 due to the U.S.-China trade dispute, and he expected TSMC to fill its outstanding orders to Huawei by Sept. 14.    [FULL  STORY]

‘POSITIVE MOVEMENTS’: Monthly wages increased as the COVID-19 outbreak eased in Taiwan and most companies emerged from its effects, the DGBAS said

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 11, 2020
By: Crystal Hsu / Staff reporter

Average monthly take-home pay in June rose 1.41 percent from a year earlier to NT$42,352, while total wages including overtime and performance-based compensation increased 4.09 percent to NT$50,581, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.

The data represented a pickup from May, as the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic subsided in Taiwan and most companies began recovering from the outbreak, the statistics agency said.

The improvement is also evidenced by an enlarged job pool — the workforce expanded slightly by 0.08 percent to 7.9 million — the first increase since the virus broke out in late January, DGBAS Deputy Director Chen Hui-hsin (陳惠欣) told a news briefing in Taipei.

“The [employment] situation reported the first positive movements in June after seeing job losses between February and May,” Chen said.    [FULL  STORY]

Gaming monitors available in 27-, 32-, and 43-inch models, set for 'holiday season' release

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/08/07
By: Eric Chang, Taiwan News, Contributing Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Asus has announced through its Republic of Gamers (ROG) brand that it will soon be launching three HDMI 2.1 capable monitors.

According to a press release posted by Videocardz, Asus said its upcoming 43-inch monitor is the first to receive HDMI 2.1 certification, passing all compatibility and validation tests conducted by Allion Labs, Inc., a product testing company. Asus will also be offering 32-inch and 27-inch models with HDMI 2.1 ports, according to PC Gamer.

The ROG monitors will be compatible with Sony’s PS5 and Microsoft Xbox Series X next-generation gaming consoles. They will have up to 48 gigabits per second (Gbps) of bandwidth allowing them to support 4K ultra high definition (UHD) visuals at variable refresh rates of up to 120 Hz, according to Tom’s Hardware.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 08/07/2020
By: Wu Chia-jung and Frances Huang

Taipei, Aug. 7 (CNA) Taiwan's exports inched up in July, reversing a year-on-year decline seen in the previous four months, the Ministry of Finance (MOF) said Friday.

Solid demand for high-tech gadgets offset the weakness in outbound sales posted by old economy industries amid the continuing impact from COVID-19, the MOF said.

Data compiled by the MOF showed the country's exports rose 0.4 percent from a year earlier to hit US$28.20 billion after a 3.8 percent year-on-year drop in June.

On a month-on-month basis, the July outbound sales also rose 3.9 percent, the data indicated.
[FULL  STORY]

’WHITE BOX’: The open platform would give local firms access to Cisco’s cloud-based mobile network to develop 5G telecom equipment and tap into the global market

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 08, 2020
By:: Angelica Oung / Staff reporter

The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) yesterday introduced a new 5G “open lab” in collaboration with US-based information technology and networking giant Cisco Systems Inc to address the rapidly growing “white box” 5G networking equipment market.

The open lab will be a platform where Taiwanese manufacturers can access Cisco’s cloud-based mobile network to develop their own 5G telecom equipment, such as small-cell base stations, network switches, modems and Internet of things (IoT) devices, a ministry statement said.

The open platform would allow Taiwanese manufacturers to tap into the lucrative 5G telecom equipment market, which was previously monopolized by Nokia Oyj, Ericsson AB and Huawei Technologies Co (華為), Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua (王美花) said at the inauguration in Taoyuan.

“In the 3G and 4G world, telecommunication technology was tied to the manufacturer. It was a closed system,” Wang said. “But with 5G, we have the opportunity to create our own innovative products”    [FULL  STORY]

CYBERSCOOP
Date: Aug 6, 2020
By: Sean Lyngaas

Taiwan’s semiconductor industry, a centerpiece of the global supply chain for smartphones and computing equipment, was the focus of a hacking campaign targeting corporate data over the last two years, Taiwan-based security firm CyCraft Technology claimed Thursday.

The hackers went after at least seven vendors in the semiconductor industry in 2018 and 2019, quietly scouring networks for source code and chip-related software, CyCraft said. Analysts say the campaign, which reportedly hit a sprawling campus of computing firms in northwest Taiwan, shows how the tech sector’s most prized data is sought out by well-resourced hacking groups.

“They’re choosing the victims very precisely,” C.K. Chen, senior researcher at CyCraft, said of the hackers. “They attack the top vendor in a market segment, and then attack their subsidiaries, their competitors, their partners and their supply chain vendors.”

It was unclear which companies were targeted; CyCraft declined to name them. It was also unclear who was responsible for the hacking. CyCraft said there were signs the group of attackers was based in China, including their familiarity with simplified Chinese characters and the breaks they took during Chinese national holidays. CyberScoop could not independently confirm that a Chinese group was responsible for the hacking.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/08/06
By:  prnasia.com

TAIPEI, Aug. 6, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — Chunghwa Telecom Co., Ltd. ("CHT", "Chunghwa Telecom" or the "Company", TAIEX: 2412, NYSE: CHT) announced that its Board of Directors yesterday has appointed Mr. Vincent Y.S. Chen as Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Chunghwa Telecom, effective on September 1, 2020.

Mr. Vincent Y.S. Chen, Ph.D. in Accounting from State University of New York at Buffalo, former head of Accountancy Sector Research Centre of Singapore Accountancy Commission, is now a professor in the Department of Accounting at National Chengchi University. Chunghwa Telecom expects to leverage his experience and outstanding academic performance in the financial field, government and the academia in Taiwan and Singapore, to further improve the company's financial and accounting performance and become a world-class enterprise.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 08/06/2020
By: Flor Wang and Pan Tzi-yu

Taipei, Aug. 6 (CNA) Taiwan's consumer price index (CPI) in July grew 0.14 percent from June, due mainly to a rise in gasoline and plane ticket prices, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) reported on Thursday.

After seasonal adjustments, the CPI increased 0.17 percent month on month, but decreased 0.52 percent from the same month last year, which marked a sixth consecutive contraction year on year, thanks to a fall in vegetables, cloth, and hotel prices, the agency said.

The wholesale price index (WPI), meanwhile, climbed 0.62 percent from a month earlier and added 0.51 percent after seasonal adjustments, which marked a slide of 9.15 percent from the same month in 2019, it said.    [FULL STORY]