A visiting Henry Luce Fellow looks at the progress Taiwan has made on its urban digitization efforts and what is needed to make those programs more effective and equitable for all citizens. Over the past five years, Taiwan has placed “smart cities” – urban centers that run on data collected through sensors and other electronic…
Taoyuan City, the gateway to Taiwan, occupies a core strategic position in terms of industrial internationalization, transformational development, and logistics management, and links Taiwan to the global market via sea and air transport. The Taiwanese government’s “Taoyuan Aerotropolis Project” reappropriates usage of the 4,564-hectare area of land surrounding the Taoyuan International Airport through urban planning….
This year has brought unprecedented challenges to the global economy. As COVID-19 spread across the world over the past half year, supply chains are restructuring, the operating modes are changing, and the need for digital transformation is increasing. The virus has also given rise to numerous business opportunities in the digital realm, and under the…
As one of the “Four Asian Tigers,” Taiwan a few decades ago was widely viewed as among the world’s most vibrant economies. In recent years, however, growth rates have slowed as competition in international markets has intensified. To inject revived dynamism into the economy, the Tsai Ing-wen administration has been promoting the “5+2 Innovative Industries”…
Major multinationals are engaging in research and training programs in Taiwan. How can Taiwan’s highly successful – but low margin – contract electronics manufacturing prowess be leveraged to create innovative brand leaders as higher-margin “internet of things” (IoT) businesses? That is the ambitious task given to the government’s Asia Silicon Valley Development Agency (ASVDA) as…
The nexus between the two locations is playing an important part in Taiwan’s efforts to cultivate startups. At a demo day in San Francisco organized by Taiwan Accelerator and Startups Greater Asia last October, nine Taiwanese entrepreneurs took the stage at the Google Developers Launchpad Space and for the first time pitched their fledgling startups…
The major new development is creation of Taiwania Capital Management, a government-backed venture-capital operation. Among the seven industries targeted in the government’s “5+2 Industrial Innovation Program,” the one starting with the strongest foundation is smart machinery. Overall machinery production value this year could break the NT$1 trillion (about US$33 billion) mark for the first time,…
But capturing the possibilities will require a difficult shift in focus from hardware and assembly to software, plus a change in regulatory mindset. Long before there was Facebook, YouTube, or Instagram, Taiwan had an active social network of its own: the PTT bulletin board system (BBS). National Taiwan University student Ethan Tu founded PTT in…
One of Taiwan’s most up-and-coming cities hopes to become a preeminent innovation hub in Asia. Taiwan has bold ambitions for its industrial transformation. One of the central tenets of that bid is the Asia Silicon Valley Development Plan, which policymakers hope will create a hotbed of technological innovation in the northern Taiwan city of Taoyuan….
While much of the 5+2 Innovative Industrial plan remains controversial, two sectors have gained support from both major political parties: smart machinery and Asia·Silicon Valley. Smart machines mean manufacturing equipment that is intelligent, self-learning, and can communicate with other machines and human operators, transmitting data in real time. These advanced technologies are finding applications in…
