MOEA activates A-Team to promote machinery sales

Taipei, March 25, 2005 (CENS)--Seeing the outstanding performance of the ‘A-Team' group achieved by domestic bicycle industry, the Ministry of Economic Affairs has recently resolved to form a similar group for the machinery industry to promote domestic brands and boost sales worldwide.

The statement was recently released by Economics Minister Ho Mei-yueh. She said the government will raise the output of the domestic machinery industry by cementing cooperation between the manufacturers of TFT-LCD (thin film transistor-liquid crystal display) panels and equipment suppliers. In addition, the government will also help machinery manufacturers obtain land lots and talents to facilitate their expansion of production capacities.

Ho said the bicycle A-Team group, comprising such large-sized manufacturers as Giant, Merida, and Ideal, has helped the domestic bicycle industry lay a solid foundation in the global high-end market and the machinery industry should form a similar group to promote sales.

To that end, the MOEA will convene a meeting for representatives from the academic, industry and government sectors to formulate prospective development directions and guidelines. With the efforts made by the MOEA, the local machinery industry will see annual output reach the goal of NT$1 trillion (US$31.8 billion at US$1:NT$31.4) in the foreseeable future.

Ho noted domestic machinery and molds and dies sectors have strong competitive edge. The output of the domestic machinery and mechanical parts sector amounted to NT$590 billion (US$18.78 million) last year and the figure is expected to break the NT$1 trillion mark in 2009.

In response to a suggestion made by Edwards Yang, president of Goodway Machine Co., Ho said she will instruct Industrial Development Bureau (IDB) to negotiate with the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation, which owns many land lots around the island, to release idle lots for local machinery makers to set up plants to expand production capacity.

The IDB said it has worked out a plan to double the output of the domestic machine-tool industry. Under the plan, the IDB will help the industry develop such high-value-added models as the milling/cutting combination machines and elevate the operating accuracy of domestically made machine tools. This way, the overall production value of domestic machine-tool industry will be elevated in an efficient way.

In addition, the IDB will also help domestic machinery manufacturers to develop robots which are considered a powerful engine behind the achievements of domestic machinery industry to secure NT$1 trillion in annual production value.

According to a survey made by the IDB, the robots can be divided into industrial, household, and office models. As the industrial robots are widely used in many industries, the IDB will guide the manufacturers to hasten the development of office and household models which heavily rely on innovation and creativity.