Hi everyone, I'm Loli from Taipei.
I'm still slowly recovering from the nasty cold I caught at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona a couple of weeks ago – but at least I have my voice back! After conducting more than 30 interviews in less than a week, including some with my colleague Cheng Ting Fang, my voice was so deep that I sounded like a less musical Miley Cyrus. By the end of the industry event, I could barely make a sound.
And that wasn't the only little drama. On the first day of the trade show, as I was heading to the metro station, an employee asked everyone to leave because the train stopped running “unexpectedly.” My mind went blank for a few seconds. I had to get to the venue to interview the CEO of HPE, the second largest server provider in the world. Many other people, most of whom were apparently headed to MWC as well, seemed as shocked as I was.
A very nice Chinese man offered to share an Uber with me, even though we had to wait 20 minutes for the car. It turned out that the man is an executive director of Huawei in Europe. We talked about 5G and 6G satellite communications and low Earth orbit on the way. In contrast to the optimism of HPE, Dell, Microsoft and others, he was more conservative about 5G prospects this year. His view was that there were no signs of recovery in the global economy and that telecom operators were becoming more cautious in their spending.
Back in Taipei, Acer President Jason Chen is also looking for signs of recovery, in this case in the PC market.
Speaking to reporters this week, he said the most pressing challenge his company faces is volatile display prices, which have been fluctuating wildly due to an abundance of supply. The personal computer industry has been in a slump for two years and has yet to show a strong recovery despite the recent hype around AI-powered computers.
“If we do not control our purchases of key components properly, we may have to record an inventory valuation loss. So we have to be very careful,” Chen said.
Communications become personalized
Ericsson and Nokia, the world's leading telecommunications equipment suppliers, are following Chinese rival Huawei Technologies in bolstering their chip design capabilities to better compete in the 5G era, Nikkei Asia's Luli Li and Qingting Fang write.
Developing chips internally will give equipment makers more control over programming the features and performance they want, further differentiating their products from competitors. However, these efforts are not easy or cheap.
“We've seen that with 5G, doing this has become even more important [chip development] Freddy Södergren, Head of Technology and Strategy for Business Area Networks at Ericsson, said: “Ericsson is better able to work in-house than it was before.
The company has expanded its investments in semiconductors in the past six or seven years, including a new location in Austin, Texas, and an expanded team in Sweden, Sodergren said. He added that it now has “several hundred” engineers dedicated to developing chips.
Ericsson's Finnish rival Nokia took a similar approach, launching the ReefShark line of system-on-chip (SoC) products in 2018.
“We recognize that from 4G to 5G and now to 6G, capabilities and understanding requirements are closely linked to how we deliver better performance with less power consumption,” said Jane Rygaard, Nokia's global president. From partnerships between companies. “Of course, we can continue to go out and buy [chips]But when it comes to how we want performance and how we want stability, it means design [needs] To be at home.”
The price of quitting smoking
After graduating from a university in Shanghai in 2022, Yao, a self-described introvert, joined the grocery operations of Pinduoduo, the city's fastest-rising tech giant.
A year later, he left and joined a competitor. He was soon placed under surveillance by his former employer. A subsequent labor arbitration case means he now owes Pinduoduo about twice the amount he earned during his year working there.
Yao is one of at least a dozen former Pinduoduo employees who found themselves trapped by non-compete agreements they claim they were required to sign, according to an investigation by Nian Liu and Ryan McMorrow of the Financial Times.
Chinese labor lawyers say local technology companies have resorted to abusing such contracts to discourage even lower-level employees from leaving to work at competing companies.
Cases related to Pinduoduo reviewed by the Financial Times indicate that the company repeatedly used surveillance of former workers and then lawsuits to enforce non-competes.
Former employee Aaron said Pinduoduo hired a team of private investigators to hunt him down. “They were following me from my house, since I left in the morning… all the way to my workplace, and taking videos of me as I entered the building.”
Place in the tremor
VinFast, the Nasdaq-listed Vietnamese electric car maker, has set a goal to attract drivers in 50 markets, from the United States to India, an ambitious goal given that many of them have likely never heard of the company, writes Lien Hoang of the Nikkei Asia.
Chairman Le Thi Thu Thuy shared reasons for her optimism at the Asia Green Tech Summit held by the Nikkei and the Financial Times.
“Honestly, we feel that there is an opportunity for a company from Vietnam like us to become a global company when the automobile industry is going through a very structural change,” Thuy said.
VinFast's share price has been falling since August, and the company admits the window to act will not remain open for long as investors grow impatient with losses. Its shares were trading at about $5 on Tuesday versus a peak of $82 in August.
The global electric vehicle crown is up for grabs as brand loyalty toward gas-powered vehicles fades. But even giants like Tesla and Toyota have to prove themselves in this new field, and VinFast, which started making electric cars in 2021, has gotten off to a rocky start. Despite its debut on the Nasdaq, it faced poor industry reviews and recalls that followed its entry into the US in 2023.
United States vs. TikTok
The US House of Representatives has passed a bill that would ban TikTok in the country unless it cuts ties with its Chinese parent company ByteDance within six months, Nikkei Asia's Yifan Yu reports.
But the fate of TikTok, which 170 million Americans use to share and browse short videos, is far from certain as the bill heads to the Senate. The legislation also faces an unexpected but powerful opponent: Donald Trump. The former president once tried to ban the video app himself, but now says doing so would benefit Facebook, a platform he considers an “enemy of the people.”
The bipartisan bill, titled the Protecting Americans from Apps Controlled by Foreign Adversaries Act, calls for banning TikTok and any “successor apps” developed by ByteDance unless the Chinese tech group divests its shares.
If the Senate passes the bill, it will then go to President Joe Biden's desk to be signed into law. Biden pledged to sign the bill if it is passed.
TikTok critics have long argued that ByteDance would share data on American users with the Chinese government or pressure TikTok to promote Beijing's views. TikTok said it would not comply with such demands if they were made.
Suggested readings
South Korean chipmakers halt sales of old equipment over fears of US backlash (FT)
SpaceOne's Kairos rocket explodes immediately after launch in Japan (Nikkei Asia)
Japanese chip stocks decline amid signs of overheating (Nikkei Asia)
Malaysia: Surprise winner of US-China chip war (FT)
The love relationship between China, Apple and Tesla reaches a difficult stage (FT)
Chinese lidar technology faces intense scrutiny in the US (Nikkei Asia)
Washington pushes its allies to tighten restrictions on the chip industry in China (FT)
Alibaba improves stock options and other incentives for employees (Nikkei Asia)
Anyone for cockroaches? Vietnamese company aims to serve insects in Singapore (Nikkei Asia)
US lawmakers adjust TikTok pressure to introduce bill to ban app (FT)
#techAsia is coordinated by Catherine Creel of Nikkei Asia in Tokyo, with assistance from the FT's tech office in London.
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