Taiwanese Gov’t Aims to Enhance Taiwan-China Tech Ind. Cooperation

To revive sluggish exports of Taiwan’s tech products, including ICT devices, display panels, optoelectronics and photovoltaic products, LEDs, machinery etc., the Taiwanese government has decided to help enhance cooperation in such industries between Taiwan and China.

To that end, the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) has already mapped out new strategies and methods to restructure Taiwan’s tech industries and encourage cross-strait cooperation, with mutual investments, tax breaks and overseas acquisitions as options, all of which have been recently proposed to Premier Jiang Yi-huah.

Woody Duh, vice economic minister, indicated that actually display panel manufacturers in Taiwan and China, for instance, show intense interest in mutual investment to avoid overlapping investments and vicious competition, and to achieve vertical and horizontal integration to better carve out niches, ever since the Taiwanese government loosened regulations on Chinese investments in the industry last year.

However, Duh admits that no cross-strait investments have been undertaken in the industry across the Taiwan Strait so far, mainly because insiders have yet to come up with suitable conditions and business models to sustain such partnerships. That is also the reason Taiwan’s top-2 display panel makers, AU Optronics Corp. and Innolux Corp., haven’t approved any Chinese investments despite the global market being increasingly challenging.

Duh said that the Chinese authorities generally back proposals to enhance cross-strait cooperation in tech industries to prevent reckless competition, and the both sides are still trying to find feasible ways to that end.

In addition to China, the National Development Commission under the Cabinet advises the government to also push collaboration among small and medium-sized enterprises between Taiwan and Japan; to help strengthen technology cooperation with U.S. contract manufacturers to tap supply chains of large-sized enterprises and leverage U.S.’s policy of reviving domestic manufacturing; and to join hands with China to nurture emerging industries and stipulate shared standards. (SC)