By Carmen Russell

The dignitaries, guests and reporters boarded the train, visibly excited about the trip. The interior reeked with newness, a pleasant but overwhelming scent of fresh plastics and upholstery and the chemicals used to treat them. It was the familiar “new car smell.” And this car is the newest: the most advanced rail technology designed to take local to speeds they have never before seen from a ground-based vehicle.

Walking on the still-plastic wrapped floor, the passengers found seats and jovially investigated their immediate surroundings: brand-new covers, expansive windows, tray tables, etc.

But the fun was only beginning and the train started to leave the station. A monitor presented the view from the front of the train and showed posts, trees and scenery whipping by at an increasingly accelerated rate. It also showed the speed in kilometers-per-hour: 100, 200 and, finally 300. Hitting 300 kph elicited universal sounds of awe and a few cheers.

The loudspeaker softly crackled and the Premier of Taiwan announced what the passengers already knew: they had hit the train’s cruising speed and were traveling as fast as anyone ever had before in Taiwan and, even, most of the world. But even more important, the passengers could barely tell they were moving as the train seemed to just glide over the smooth rails.

The train horn honked a long celebration.

After the run, Premier Frank Hsieh told reporters that he had taken the shinkansen in Japan before and was excited that he was able to ride the bullet train in his homeland. He called the test a big success and explained how he was impressed by how smooth the ride was, noting that he had a cup of water on the train. The cup sat perfectly still and no water spilled out, he said.

“It (the excitement) can be likened to that of an elementary school student, who is thrilled about going on a field trip the next day,” Hsieh said. “It elicited back memories of 30 years ago.”

Returning to Tainan Station, however, brought the reality of the state of the “shinkansen,” or “bullet train” rushing back. The station, inside-and-out, resembled a construction site. But there is a reason: it actually is a construction site. Despite having been expected to open last month, the shambles of the station provided stark reminder that the scandal-ridden Taiwan High-Speed Railway System is far from ready.

Still, the ride, as a harbinger of things to come, provided hope. While the nation has been repeatedly promised it would be here soon only to be shortly followed by the disappointment of politics, the THSR may prove worth the wait.

The first BOT (build, operate and transfer) project in Taiwan, the Taiwan High-Speed Railway was scheduled to run by October this year, but the delay in construction has caused THSRC to announce in September that the plan be postponed for another year.

The decision has put the Taiwan High-Speed Rail Corporation (THSRC) in a financial predicament. A news report from Apple Daily News showed the deferment would cause the company to lose a total of NT$66.7 billion. After major shareholders showed reluctance in raising their stakes in the company, it then sought financial assistance from the government.

In October, MOTC decided to offer funds of NT$7.5 billion to THSRC, with NT$4.5 billion coming from the China Aviation Development Foundation and NT$3 billion from the China Technical Consultants Incorporated Foundation (CTCI).

According to a THSRC statement, the company has accomplished 89.7 percent of the overall construction.

Hsieh noted that the high-speed railway project has experienced ups and downs over the years and has been troubled by critiques and misunderstandings from the public. The success, he said, is a historical moment and called for continual support of THSRC.

“If we abandon it now, it would be a worthless piece of metal,” Hsieh said, “And we will sure be sorry for the rest of life.”

There is the efficiency to consider after all. While it currently takes six hours by train to get to Kaohsiung from Taipei, the shinkansen will reduce it to one and a half.

But even beyond that, it will be an experience that many Taiwanese will revel in and a source of pride for the highly developed island.

“This success makes it all worth it,” Hsieh concluded.

A test run of the bullet train on the entire route — 345 kilometers in length – is expected to begin in April next year and the new grand launched is scheduled for next October.

Shelly Shan also contributed to this report.
Photos by Carmen Russell
You can see the China Post story at
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/detail.asp?ID=71500&GRP=A

By Carmen Russell
The China Post

Today’s featured artists come all the way from Hong Kong. Okay, that’s not really that far, but this is their first time making the trip to perform in Taiwan, so we’ll treat it as a journey.

And it’s really a continuation of a journey that has covered a vast distance in a very short period of time. Only a few years ago, the band now known as inLove was not even inMind. And now they are headed for being inChart.

InShort, they are a Hong Kong band with a fresh new sound.

Given that inLove sings mostly in Mandarin and they are rapidly rising in popularity on their home island closer to the mainland, I asked my Taiwan friends if they had ever heard of them. They all answered my question with another question.

“Should I have?” asked one.

“What’s their Chinese name?” another asked.

And my favorite “Did they sing that song ‘Anyone but your mother?’”

Answers: “I guess not,” “They don’t have one, it’s just ‘inLove’” and “Um…, no. But what the hell is that one about?”

Okay, so inLove hasn’t made it yet. But, that is going to change
inTime.

In 2002, three long-time friends, Lu Shen, Dickie “Dicia” Di and Daniel Kuang, decided to get together to enter their local acoustic-oriented SoundBase competition and put together a band only a few months before they were due to perform. Despite the limited preparation, practice and experience, the newly formed inLove took home the award for best original composition for “Awaiting” (still my personal favorite). They were rewarded with a great deal of positive feedback from a legion of new
fans.

The ensuing support helped them put out their first album “Demitint” two years later with five songs all sung in Mandarin. It sold out shortly after. Another year and just last month they released the much more comprehensive “Realm” (“Taking Chances” in Chinese) with 13 tracks (plus bonus) sung in Mandarin, Cantonese and English.

Okay, the band’s name reeks with pop cheese (what did you expect them to come up with on short notice?), but it completely belies what goes on inside the album. The music is fresh, intimate and highly acoustic, nothing like much of the technology-dependent pop coming out of Hong Kong (or the rest of the world, for that matter).

“They broke through the established norms with confidence, courage and the drive to take risks,” Taiwan’s own pop idol Kay Huang has been quoted as saying. “With a keen perception, they have explored every possibility in their music.”

Lu’s voice begs to be listened to and Dickie and Daniel ably accompany her with their intricate guitar melodies. Interwoven into all of the songs are provocative lyrics which Lu gives strong heart-felt meaning. “Pursuing dreams are what they’re all about,” announces the band’s Web site.

Okay, a lot of the lyrics do give weight to their chosen name. Many of the songs such as “Awaiting,” “Because of You,” and “Studied Love,” are underlined with romantic themes. These aren’t your typical sappy love songs, however. Rather they are more uplifting and thoughtful and the near-folksy acoustic background gives Lu’s melodious crooning a unique sound in Chinese pop akin to, say, the Indigo Girls while keeping an indigenous quality.

Throw in an ode to a “Lonely Little Hedgehog,” and inLove separates itself even further from the norm. I’ve listened to the “hedgehog song” a number of times wondering if the hedgehog has some deeper meaning. But, I guess it’s possible it’s just about comforting a shy hedgehog starved for affection.

And that’s okay, too.

The new album has motivated the group to start venturing out form their HK base further into the Chinese-speaking world including Guangzhou and Taipei. You can catch them live at The Wall (B1, #200, Roosevelt Road, Sec. 4) tomorrow night at 10 p.m. Tickets are NT$400 per person (buy four get one free).

To find out more about inLove, check out www.inlove-enough.com

By Carmen Russell
The China Post

Picture for a minute, if you will, your average computer engineer. What does he or she (most likely “he”) look and act like? Let me guess: gawky, awkward and shy? Always sitting at the computer or tinkering with some electronic gadget? Probably hard-working and not so much into going out into a more social environment?

That would be the stereotype, wouldn’t it?

Yet, as members of the upper echelons of salaried employees, these guys are often viewed by many as “a good catch,” especially one that works for a market leader such as Asustek Computer.

The combination of long hours and a shy disposition, however, isn’t a good one for meeting members of the opposite sex. If you work for Asus, your employer has expressed an interest in your love life. Or, rather, an interest in helping you have one.

“These days professionals spend a great deal of time at work,” said Ruu Wu, a public relations manager with Asus. “Men in the technology field particularly have a lot of pressure so they have very little opportunity to meet new people.”

Asus recently teamed up with Yahoo!Kimo to give workers in the technology field an opportunity to meet that someone special. It kind of makes sense. Asus and other hi-tech companies have many shy, busy professional young men and Yahoo!Kimo has many single women listed on their Match Web site who are looking for just such a partner.

Sounds a little like two sets of parents getting together to arrange a meeting between their respective offspring.

“Yahoo!Kimo is the largest online meeting platform in the world, with more than 1.2 million members,” explained Wu. “We worked with them because we wanted to use Internet technology to help our employees find significant others online.”

Between Oct. 24 and 28, the two companies set up a meeting place every evening on-line. The participants signed in and to join a group discussion. If they met someone they were interested in knowing more about, they had the option of leaving the group and pairing off.

Wu called the event an immense success. “In just over a week, the activity attracted nearly 700,000 unique users,’” she said. “There was a great deal of discussion during the meetings. Many of the companies and participants said they hoped that it would be held again. In the future we do have plans to do it again and hope that there will be even more participation.”

It’s a little sexist. Basically the Web site tells the “engineer men” that they can meet “attractive women” there, following the Chinese principal of a perfect match: “the man is talented and the woman is beautiful.”

And it would seem not to address some of the fundamental labor issues within the industry.

That is that maybe engineers are simply working too hard if they can’t afford a social life to begin with.

But, according to Wu, there was overwhelming positive feedback from the participants.

“The online users were fascinated from the marketing that they said resembled the movie Densha Otoko,” she said referring to the Japanese movie in which a young man is smitten with a girl he sees on the train but is too shy to approach her, and gets help from chat buddies online.

“Employees from Giga said they hoped to hold an event of their own but others said that in the Web conference, some of the participating users felt lost and complained that they didn’t know what to do after eight o’clock.”

By Carmen Russell, Taipei
The China Post

The two-year case against the distributors of Kuro, Taiwan’s most popular peer-to-peer (P2P) software, ended yesterday with unprecedented prison sentences for its distributors and one of its users.

“Kuro violated copyright law by offering members software with which to download MP3 music,” said Liu Shou-sun, a spokesperson for the Taipei District Court which heard the case.

While the court neglected to adjudicate the legality of P2P software, it found Kuro responsible for encouraging its members to illegally trade copyrighted content through advertising.

In addition to NT$300,000 fines for each of its top three executives, chairman Chen Shou-teng received a sentence of two years in prison while CEO James Chen and general manager Victor Chen were each sentenced to three years.

The court also handed down a four-month prison term to Chen Chia-hui, a member that used Kuro to download more than 900 songs, likely setting an explosive example for Kuro’s other estimated 500,000 users.

Ruby Hsu, an attorney who represented IFPI in the Kuro lawsuit, said that the judgment brings Taiwan up to international judicial standards.

“This verdict follows international cases such as those against Kazaa and Grokster,” Hsu said, referring to recent court judgments against the two major P2P providers in Australia and the U.S. “The foreign courts have decided that if you offer a P2P service and you know a high percentage of the songs that are traded are copyrighted, you have to take responsibility.”

When reminded that the prison sentences deviated from the foreign court rulings, Hsu said that such punishments were necessary in Taiwan.

“In the case of Napster in the U.S., the civil court told them they must shut down and they had to respect the judgment of the court,” she explained. “The injunctions against Kuro and Ezpeer have been largely ignored, so Taiwan has had to employ criminal punishments.”

Even after yesterday’s verdict, Kuro representatives have declared that the show will go on as they appeal to a higher court.

“Currently Kuro’s member services and day-to-day business will remain the same,” said Kuro attorney C.P. Lee.

Kuro spokesperson Eric Yang added that the company is unlikely to make any changes to the problem areas identified by the court despite the threat of imprisonment.

“We will not stop advertising,” he said.

Yang also blew off the idea that the company executives may actually spend time in jail.

“We will worry about that when the appeals verdict is handed down.”

By Carmen Russell, Taipei
The China Post

With the lifting of the Multifiber Agreement (MFA) the first of this year, Taiwan’s textile industry if facing the ultimate test in survival as the limits on China’s exports expire.

In an exclusive interview, Douglas Hsu, chairman of Far Eastern Textile Ltd., told the China Post that, while the competition may be getting stiff, Taiwan has a role as a mid- and upstream producer. In order to maintain that position, Hsu noted, Taiwan firms must focus on a combination of technology and creativity.

To this effect, local firms will be strutting their products at the ninth annual Taipei Innovative Textile Application Show (TITAS) next month, focusing innovation, new materials and more fashionable attire.

Natural course

According to Hsu, this is simply the way things go.

“Basically, Taiwan’s textile industry is following history in the sense that it succeeded and grew and then started to decline as competition forces in the region came into play,” Hsu said.

“For example, Taiwan and Korea replaced Japan in the 1970′s and 80′s and graduated to export status. We even replaced a lot of European and U.S. firms. Now we are being replaced; that seems to be the direction.”

Hsu, a former chairman for the Taiwan Textile Federation, has served in the industry since working as an apprentice in his father’s factory in Shanghai in his twenties. Although Hsu is now better known for his investments in other areas such as telecommunications and hotels, he has seen the full development of Taiwan’s textile and apparel industry.

Forty years prior, industrialized nations largely dominated global exports of textiles and apparel. They were surpassed by developing countries during the 1980s with sources of inexhaustible low-cost labor. But then those developing nations largely finished developing and new developing economies are looking to take up their positions.

According to a report issued by the European Union in 2003, developing countries now account for half of total textile exports and nearly three-quarters of world apparel exports.

And China tops the list.

China’s rise

China was already the world’s largest exporter of apparel even during the quota era. Despite the limitations on China’s exports over the years, they have still enjoyed significant increases. World Bank statistics show that China’s exports grew more than 123 percent between 1990 and 2000, reaching US$16,135 million, excluding Hong Kong.

Research conducted in 2002 by Arlington-based Nathan Associates, however, showed that Chinese exports were constrained nearly 60 percent by the American and European import quotas. In the absence of quotas, therefore, exports from China are seen as potentially doubling.

An impact model formulated by the U.S. International Trade Commission in 1999 predicted that China’s share of the U.S. apparel market would grow 18 percentage points. Looking at the global market, China’s share is expected to increase 6 percentage points from 30 percent in 2004 to 36 percent in 2010. Other studies are far more generous, giving China as much as 50 percent of the global market in the quota-free world.

The biggest reason is labor-oriented. China has a low labor cost and a highly disciplined workforce. However, China holds some other advantages such as self-sufficiency in a number of raw materials.

Hsu points out, however, that China lacks a number of features necessary if it were to move beyond simple production and achieve a full vertical industry.

“Even though China looks so bright, it has its own problems,” he explains, “They lack labor distribution, can’t keep pace with small products and don’t have quick response mechanisms. They can’t compete on an everyday basis and lack name branding.”

Although China may mean the lowest input costs, Hsu notes that investors are leery regarding the low-quality of the products and the mainland’s shipping abilities, areas Taiwan is still dominant in.

This year, U.S. firms still did not bet too much on China, so we got a little boost,” he said. “This was because of a fear of not being able to ship “hot categories. Popular hot items can’t be shipped so easily and this helped us.”

“Still,” he added. “We must do these things better and quicker because China is well positioned and, even though don’t have many of these elements now, they will.”

Taiwan’s future

No longer able to rely on simple economic efficiency, firms in more developed (read: higher-value labor) places such as Taiwan, experts say, will need to develop its own advantages. Companies may need to attend to other areas to stay competitive such as focusing on research and development for new materials and creativity in order to meet demands for fashionable attire.

Hsu, however still sees a promising future, given that Taiwan still holds advantages in up-stream production.

“We can optimistically say we are keeping it going by being making new materials and being R&D oriented,” he said. “Successful companies are doing this.”

In an article entitled “Apparel Globalization: The Big Picture,” published in Bobbin Magazine in 2003, Rahual Tyagi argued that the quota system Taiwan’s success will come from higher value-added activities, such as design and marketing, while sourcing out low-cost production.

Technology also will play a large part, Hsu says.

“Taiwan is doing a lot of innovation, for example functional use apparel and ultraviolet-use materials. Where textiles are going, some of these firms are staying in R&D intense fields – keeping a leading position for the future.

“Unless we are more hi-tech, science and technology-oriented, it will be heard because of the disparity in cost of labor.

But real success, Hsu adds, will come from a marriage of hi-tech inputs with more creative fashion outputs.

“Now we have to introduce design capability, fashion capability, all these interplayed aspects to keep it going. For fashion, we are training more designers to be fashion-oriented. But designers have to stay close to manufacturing places; we have to do these things together.”

And finally, marketing the results will determine future growth. Taiwan companies, Hsu says, retain marketing expertise.

“Selling to Japan is different for importers, if you are selling to Takashima in Tokyo, you can’t necessarily sell to Osaka. If you go to Macy’s in New York, you sell to all Macys. The ability to market is an important strength.”

Business models

Referring to “one dragon,” Hsu explains that there are a number of levels in production and that Taiwan operates a fully vertical system.

“In a way, each of the corporate structures is different,” he explains. “We have a vertical system from chemical raw materials to chemical fiber to textile to apparel. This total verticalness helps us to sell intermediates in between the line.”

Although China has a lot of basic resources, Hsu says they are just “still not there.”

It’s not just machines that can do this,” he says. “These are skill sets that come from experience. To have what Taiwan has is not easy. China is in a widespread cluster effect with development in certain areas.”

Future on display

Under the banner of “Fashion and Function,” TITAS will be held from September 29 to October 1. The exhibition’s organizer, the Taiwan Textile Federation (TTF), is billing it as the place to see the future in terms of technology and fashion trends.

Exhibitors will hold seminars on advanced technologies shaping the industry such as nanotechnology, bamboo charcoal fiber and anion technology. Other firms will be demonstrating the functional aspects of their goods such as waterproof, breathable and thermal garments.

Actual items on display will include many midstream and upstream products which Hsu and TTF have noted are keeping the local industry competitive.

Over 250 exhibitors will be taking up around 500 booths. TTF is also anticipating as many as 15,000 visitors.

By Carmen Russell, Taipei
The China Post

From digital-quality music stations heard on your cellphone to on-demand airline flight information on your car radio, digital audio broadcasting (DAB) is promising to make radio a more interactive experience.

Starting today, representatives on the forefront of the movement are gathering in Kaohsiung to demonstrate the possibilities.

“You will not only listen to radio, you will look at radio,” said Sylvie Scolan, product manager for Harris, the global market leader in DAB transmitters. “You can see the picture of the CD, you will see the concert in which the song is performed, or the words in text… DAB applications include a video and audio mix as well as features like traffic information.”

DAB is already on the air in a few countries, namely the U.K., Germany and Canada. In addition, a number of well-known electronics manufacturers have put DAB receivers on the market including Hitachi, Blaupunkt and Phillips.

As with any cutting edge technology, the range of possibilities has not been completely explored yet, but promoters have already noted a number of applications. First among them is simple radio with digital quality, far and above the knob-tuned, wave-modulated radio we currently know. Like analog radio, basic DAB is terrestrial based, but it isn’t affected by the normal interferences that analog must deal with such as mountains and buildings.

But beyond that, they note, we will soon be seeing DAB-equipped cell-phones, handheld PCs, electronic display boards and broadcast Web sites, all with such features as real-time news and financial updates and music and information on-demand.

The Kaohsiung seminars, which are taking place today and tomorrow at the Splendor Hotel, cover the range of topics related to the technology and applications of DAB services.

Speakers come from around the world and include representatives from the World DAB Forum and firms that are building the devices and infrastructure for the networks such as Korea’s Alticast and Electronics and Telecommunications and Research Institute (ETRI), the UK’s RadioScape, Digital One and British Broadcasting Service (BBC), Germany’s Blaupunkt and Taiwan’s own Industry Technology Research Institute, Futurewaves and AU Optoelectronics. The current focus of providers is on business-to-business marketing and consumers in Taiwan have yet to experience the technology.

“As DAB is still in its first rollout, it is going B2B as it will make more revenue than simple digital radio,” Scolan explained.

According to Jack Chang, CEO of PC-Radio, DAB-related products should start becoming available in Taiwan next spring after years of installation and building of the networks.

“We started six years ago,” he said. “It’s been a long trial period. First we have to have a year before you can spend money on DAB. But by next spring, firms will be able to acquire the licenses they need.”

Scolan added that, as the opportunities arise, there are a number of criteria suppliers must consider in their bid to find success in the new industry including available spectrum, attractive services content, affordable receivers in sufficient supply and 60 percent coverage in the target area.