TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Stan Shih, co-founder of Acer Inc., on Friday (May 7) praised the southern city of Tainan as the best place for the nation’s proposed Ministry of Digital Development.
Following I-Mei Foods Co. CEO and Digital Taiwan Roundtable President Luis Ko's (高志明) call for Tainan to house the digital development ministry, Shih said during a signing ceremony that establishing the ministry in Tainan will help achieve a north-south balance for development. Tainan has seen a boom in green energy technologies and is the historical birthplace of Taiwan, he remarked, adding the southern city has a key role in the digital age and future.
Tainan Mayor Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) echoed Shih, saying the city has become an important production center for automotive wafers and components, semiconductors, precision machinery, and optoelectronics. Tainan's economy continues to grow, and the semiconductor industry has a pivotal and important position around the world, Liberty Times cited him as saying.
He said the Tainan-based Shalun Smart Green Energy Science City is an important research center for renewable energy development. Through working with industry, government, and academia, it drives green energy industries in the south and is set to become an Asia-Pacific renewable energy development center in the future, the mayor said.
Huang said that Tainan has an extensive transportation network, which connects key facilities and industrial areas to a number of administrative districts. In terms of talent cultivation, Tainan has 14 colleges and universities, with more than 130,000 teachers and students.
Furthermore, he said, the city’s abundant human resources provide the R&D and corporate talents needed for industrial development.
Tainan already hosts the Digital Taiwan Roundtable, a platform that promotes the integration of digital technology development into people’s daily lives. Additionally, Tainan Science Park and Shalun Green Energy Science City help link Chiayi with Kaohsiung’s Qiaotou Science Park and Pingtung Science Park, forming a science and technology corridor and allowing talents to drift from south to north and vice versa.
Last month, the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) held the finals for its girls-only hackathon in Tainan at the Joint Research Center for Green Energy Technology, in Shalun Green Energy Science City. The event aimed to encourage more Taiwanese women to pursue careers in cyber security
Kao, Mayor Huang, and MOST Minister Wu Tsung-tsong (吳政忠) attended the event.
Referring to the government’s push to develop southern parts of the country, Kao credited the Tsai administration for helping to establish the Shalun Smart Green Energy Science City in Tainan. He added that he hopes to see increased cooperation between the government and tech industry in order to attract further investment and talent to the south.
* I-Mei Foods is the parent company of Taiwan News
