Riding China's coattails
Viewed from another angle, the lure of the China market is "wreaking havoc on the industrial structure and economic progress of neighboring nations, including Taiwan," says Wu Ho-mou of the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research. He adds that fears of a "hollowing out of the industrial base" are not unique to Taiwan: Japan, Korea, Hong Kong and the nations of Southeast Asia are all terrified of the economic "black hole" that is China.
But, in spite of its fears, Taiwan is the most likely of these to benefit from this process.
According to Huang Ho-ming, firms the world over are drooling over the thought of China's cheap land and labor, and its enormous markets, but are hampered by their unfamiliarity with the language and culture. Even after making large investments of time and money in learning, they still don't understand how to liaise with Chinese officialdom or manage Chinese employees. As a result, many European firms are placing orders in Taiwan while demanding that their Taiwanese suppliers set up production in China. This allows them to reduce their own risks while enjoying the benefits of Chinese production. Over the last two years, even Japanese firms have begun seeking out Taiwanese partners for China ventures, demonstrating how useful Taiwanese expertise can be.
China offers another benefit to Taiwanese manufacturers-the opportunity to develop their own markets and brands.
Chou Chih-yuan, president of the Beijing subsidiary of Global View, a Taiwanese firm that makes China's number-one brand of electronic dictionary, says that without your own brand, you can't be truly global. According to Chou, every major brand of international standing has a strong base in its domestic market from which to expand. "There are only 23 million people on Taiwan, so the market is too small to function as such a base. But China can be a great place to build a brand for Taiwanese firms that do their homework."
Taiwan must exploit the strength of others, in this case China, if it is to realize the greatest possible economic gain for itself. A number of clear-sighted Taiwanese firms recognized this some time ago, and set up mainland operations well ahead of the pack. Such firms are the reason for China's and Taiwan's ever-increasing mutual reliance on cross-strait trade. China (via Hong Kong) accounts for more than 20% of Taiwan's exports, and is now Taiwan's largest export market, importing more Taiwanese goods than even the United States. As a result, Taiwan enjoys a trade surplus of more than US$20 billion per year with China, and China trade has become a major force driving the island's economic growth.
Win-win or zero-sum?
However, formal cross-strait relations remain at an impasse. Within Taiwan, opinion is polarized: one camp believes that Taiwan needs China to survive, the other avers that China will be the death of Taiwan.
S.T. De, chairman of National Association of Small and Medium Enterprises ROC and of San Sun Hat and Cap, points out that while Taiwan has continued to run a huge trade surplus in recent years, both incomes and foreign exchange reserves have stagnated. To De, this clearly indicates that Taiwanese capital is flowing overseas.
Wu Ho-mou, meanwhile, declares that the role of cross-strait trade is the most important variable in the development of Taiwan's economy over the next ten years. Should Taiwan aggressively promote stronger economic links under the supposition that what is good for either side is good for both? Or should it keep its distance, operating under the assumption that economic links with China are a zero-sum game?
In an effort to find the path that offers the greatest benefit to both sides, President Chen Shui-bian stated in his inaugural address that establishing the so-called "three links" with China would be a priority of his administration. Following last August's Economic Development Advisory Conference, the "go slow, be patient" policy that had been in effect since October of 1996 was officially dumped in favor of a new policy of "active opening, effective management."
Although the government has now decided to move in the direction of liberalization, the numerous "technical issues" that remain continue to make difficult any easing of the current political impasse. Proposals to allow "three links," to permit Taiwanese firms to invest in semiconductor or upstream petrochemicals production in China, to allow Chinese capital and workers into Taiwan, and even to establish a free port that would make it easier to bring semi-finished goods from China to Taiwan for processing, still remain just that: proposals.
"The lack of 'three links' is wasting the money of Taiwanese businesses; they are the ones hurt by not being able to establish bases in China." A person with ties to both government and business remarks that in many situations, people need to take the long view. Where would Taiwan's high-tech industries be without those "unpatriotic" Taiwanese, men such as Morris Chang (chairman of Taiwan Semiconductor) and Hu Ding-hua (chairman of Macronix International), who pursued careers in the US after completing graduate studies there?
Viewed from that perspective, are the Taiwanese firms that are investing big bucks in China "unpatriotic," or in ten years will they perhaps become a driving force in the Taiwanese economy?
No more hand-me-downs
The Taiwan government often has little control over the dimensions of cross-strait trade. It does, however, have somewhat more ability to facilitate the transformation of firms that choose to remain in Taiwan. But this, too, is a difficult task, and it represents the second great variable in plans for the future development of Taiwan's economy.
According to Steven Chang, who got his start in the textiles industry before moving over into high-tech and is now the chairman and CEO of U-Tech Media, Taiwan has always been one of the world's key manufacturers. Whether in textiles, home appliances or IT and communications hardware, it has always imported hot technologies from more advanced countries and used them to manufacture a never-ending stream of products. Taiwanese firms have never had to make the mental effort required to conduct innovative research and development, set standards or design production equipment. Even Taiwan's much-admired semiconductor foundries rely on foreign technologies.
Chang says, "The technologies come from advanced countries to Taiwan, and are later passed along from Taiwan to China or Southeast Asia. The process has always worked very well." Today, developed countries are confronted by so many promising possibilities that nonetheless offer no guarantee of success, that even they are uncertain which direction to take, which has made them less willing to provide the less developed world with their "hand-me-down" technologies.
Take the personal computer, the cornerstone of the IT industry, as an example. Now that CPUs are reaching the limits of personal computer users' processing demands, what is next? There are almost as many views as there are people in the industry. The communications industry has also reached an impasse as the world struggles to agree upon a standard technology. Will it be GSP? CDMA? 3G? Something else? No one knows. Once that is decided, there are still technological bottlenecks to be overcome. The "digital home" is another fine idea that has been bandied about for years to remarkably little effect.
Riding the crest of the wave
Steven Chang says, "In these days when the world's technologically advanced countries can't even help themselves, Taiwan can no longer expect to have orders come pouring in by sticking to its old, low-risk approach of manufacturing products that have already proven their viability in the marketplace." In recent years, the government has invested large amounts of capital to better meet the developmental demands of new technologies. It hopes to encourage an increase in overall research and development spending to 3% of GDP by 2005.
According to Lance Wu, president of Vista Incubation Technology Corporation, in the past Taiwanese industry simply followed the lead of others. The time has come for Taiwan to catch a new wave and ride it!
Wu notes that Taiwan ranks fourth among the 75 nations surveyed by the World Economic Forum for its Economic Creativity Index. If Taiwan can just implement measures that will take it in a more knowledge-based, technologically innovative direction, it should be able to realize this ambition.
Taking the number of patents granted in a given year as an indicator of technological innovation, Wu stresses that Taiwan filed more than 6,500 patents applications in the US last year, a figure which trailed only Japan and Germany.
Given this plethora of innovations, Wu says, "Taiwan should move its low-margin OEM manufacturing operations to China, and instead focus on further developing the two extremes of Stan Shih's 'smiling curve'-research and development, and logistics and marketing."
Searching for new industries
"Taiwan supports itself through manufacturing. But years of policies favoring manufacturing have given rise to a myth as to its importance." Wu asks which of the world's advanced economies doesn't now make its living off its brains.
"Look at the US. Does Dell Computers, the world's largest PC manufacturer, actually build its own computers? Where are IBM and Cisco's manufacturing bases?" Wu points out that these international business groups instead exploit their upstream R&D and their downstream distribution channels and brand names to rake in fat profits with little effort. He argues that these are the firms that should be Taiwan's model for upgrading its industries.
Huang Ho-ming agrees and says that Taiwanese should not let the success of the semiconductor industry cloud their vision: "Taiwan does not have the resources to support endless expansion of manufacturing. Power alone presents a major challenge to this model." Huang further comments that while you can make OEM sound good by calling it "professional manufacturing services," it does not readily generate technological advances, nor is it the best way to make money. Eventually, a new approach is required.
Recognizing this, Huang reminds companies that while they can, of course, continue to pull in orders from major international corporations by setting up production facilities in China, they should not forget to use the time and capital they save to invest in the R&D that will allow them to transform their businesses into knowledge-based enterprises.
What sort of knowledge-based industry would best suit Taiwan? Lance Wu thinks Taiwan should build out from its base in the semiconductor foundry business by going into IC and software design. Nanotechnology, a developing field that involves manufacturing on the molecular level, is another possibility. The field is expected to bring about a revolution in materials and manufacturing. The "twin stars" named by the Six-Year National Development Plan-biotechnology and digital content-are also very promising industries that are worthy of investment. (See "Two New Economic Stars Revealed.")
"Taiwan's industries could upgrade themselves in any number of ways." Luo I-chiang says that given the stability of Taiwan's high-tech industry and the island's abundance of venture capital (Taiwan ranks second in the world in terms of the availability of venture capital), the government need only build a good environment for investment and no one need worry about Taiwan's economic future; firms will naturally make choices based on their own needs and in their own interests.
The global race to innovate
If Taiwan wishes to develop a knowledge-based economy, it must still address a number of weaknesses. The CEPD's Lee Kao-chao sees a global race to innovate getting underway among the world's developed nations, and sees human resources as the key to winning that race. Taiwan's relative lack of qualified personnel poses a serious challenge to the island.
San Sun Hat and Cap's S.T. De says that his company operates five factories in four countries. To facilitate the company's logistical operations, it needed an enterprise resource planning system that would collect and share information within the company. De complains that none of the local software companies he contacted were up to the task of designing appropriate software. In the end, San Sun had to rely on assistance from a client, the Polo Ralph Lauren Corporation, to get the system completed.
"Taiwan has only 45,000 software engineers, and even these don't have enough practical experience." De wonders how the government can talk about helping industry to "get wired," not to mention its much more grandiose objective of creating a "digital Taiwan," when something as essential as software engineers is lacking.
Huang Ho-ming, who is assisting the government in fostering the development of IT talent, says with some frustration that statistics show that Taiwan needs approximately 50,000 more software engineers than it has, forcing firms to continually steal staff from one another.
To meet this shortfall, Taiwanese IT firms are establishing R&D centers in the mainland even though Taiwan's government has yet to approve such ventures. In what is an open secret within the IT industry, firms have also been extending their feelers into universities all over the mainland, offering large scholarships and awards of all kinds to students there.
The importance of quality of life
To cultivate home-grown talent, the Executive Yuan recently commissioned National Chiao Tung University to implement a "Silicon Island" plan. The government is expected to permit Taiwan's universities to hire 80 foreign IT faculty members, prompting university presidents to begin making recruiting trips overseas. Meanwhile, calls are growing for an easing of regulations governing hiring foreign professionals.
Huang Ho-ming says that there is also a pool of mainland-Chinese talent in the United States that Taiwan could tap into. If the government is concerned about bringing in mainland Chinese, technology professionals from Vietnam, Turkey or India offer a viable alternative. However, the government must also take Taiwan's current unemployment problem into consideration.
On this point, Huang raises an interesting question: "Why must good jobs be reserved for our own people? Why not encourage fair competition?" Huang notes that turning Taiwan's 500,000 unemployed into programmers is a truly difficult task. He notes that if Taiwan instead brought in foreign technicians, the sales they helped create would bring new prosperity, leading to further development of the services sector, and creating new jobs that would be of benefit to Taiwan's unemployed.
Of course, attracting professionals to Taiwan isn't simply a matter of high salaries; creating an environment in which technology professionals want to live is even more important.
According to Steven Chang, "Green spaces, books, cafes. . . regardless of where knowledge-workers are from, they all want a leisurely, comfortable, liberal environment in which they can explore the limits of their creativity." He says that the creation of an outstanding living environment is critical to Taiwan's future economic competitiveness.
Reforming at home
Looking back at the last year, Taiwan's economic growth has recovered from its low of -4% in the third quarter of 2001 to 0.89% in the first quarter of 2002, and growth for all of 2002 is now forecast to reach 3%.
"Without doubt the worst is behind us," says Wu Chung-shu, a research fellow with the Academia Sinica's Institute of Economics. But people shouldn't get too excited just yet: "In the past, whenever the global economy has begun to recover, Taiwan's economy has immediately surged. This time, even with last year's extremely low basis of comparison, Taiwan is looking at only 3% growth. That's hardly remarkable performance."
Luo I-chiang also believes that we can't ease up just because the numbers show positive growth in the economy once again. He notes that Taiwan's growth still lags behind that of Korea, Hong Kong and even Malaysia, indicating that its competitiveness is still slipping. In today's hyper-competitive world, Taiwan certainly cannot be permitted to slide any further or waste opportunities.
Luo recalls that in the wake of 1997's Asian financial crisis, South Korea resolved to implement reforms and Singapore stuck to its economic principles-free and open markets and global service. In contrast to its fellow "Little Dragons," Taiwan's economic policy has been waffling since 1997. With so much still up in the air, foreign investors have been unwilling to put their money into Taiwan and local businesspeople have begun losing patience with the government's dithering. Perhaps the most worrisome aspect of Taiwan's economic outlook is that government and industry are headed in opposite directions and the distance between them is growing.
Wu Ho-mou feels that instead of merely worrying about the future, Taiwan should be taking control of its destiny by implementing plans to create the future that it wants. Taiwan must choose a direction and begin moving forward once again.