Day: June 25, 2022

A posthumous citation from President Tsai Ing-wen (???) was presented at a memorial service for Ipay Wilang (???), the last government-designated preserver of Indigenous facial tattoos in Taiwan in her home village of Tawsay, Hualien County on Saturday.

The president praised the late Seediq elder’s contribution to preserving Indigenous facial tattoos and enriching the country’s intangible cultural heritage.

Ipay Wilang passed away on June 18 at her residence in the Seediq village.

Although her registered birthday was April 1, 1922, New Taipei City’s Indigenous Peoples Department head Lo Mei-ching (???) told CNA that Ipay Wilang was actually 106 years old at the time of her passing, as in the past many newborns were registered long after after birth.

In the presidential citation, Tsai acknowledged how facial tattoos are a testament to female virtue in Seediq women.

The president also addressed how the tradition of having face tattoos in the Atayal, Seediq and Truku cultures was banned when Taiwan was under Japanese colonial rule between 1895 and 1945.

As a result, Ipay Wilang was forced to remove her facial tattoos when she was 15 which left scars on her face. Tsai honored her resilience and positivity during that difficult time.

In addition to the presidential citation, Ipay Wilang was also awarded a First Class Award for Contributions to Indigenous Peoples by the Council of Indigenous Peoples (CIP) in recognition of her status as a living cultural treasure, a title she was officially given in 2016.

Both the citation and award were received at the memorial service, by Ipay Wilang’s daughter Kimi Uwy (???).

Due to her status as a living treasure, Ipay Wilang’s service was attended by Presidential Office Spokesperson Kolas Yotaka, Presidential Office Indigenous Historical Justice and Transitional Justice Committee Deputy Convener Alang Manglavan, Hualien-based historian Kimi Sibal (???) and Legislator Kao Chin Su-mei (????).

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

The defending P. LEAGUE+ champions Taipei Fubon Braves moved one game closer to winning their second consecutive title after overpowering the Hsinchu Jko Lioneers by 18 points in Game 4 of the league finals Saturday.

The Braves outhustled the Lioneers 128-110 at Taipei Heping Basketball Gymnasium to lead 3-1 in the best-of-seven final series, meaning that the Taipei-based team just needs one more win to clinch the championship for the second time since the league’s inauguration last season.

Stepping onto the hardwood at the start of the game coming off two consecutive wins in the finals, the confident Braves led 71-65 at half time with a vocal home crowd of 7,000 fans cheering them on.

The gap widened even further after the Braves went on a 33-22 run in the third quarter to lead comfortably 104-87 just before the fourth quarter.

The Lioneers rallied in the final quarter but failed to overtake the Braves, who shot with higher accuracy from the floor by making 49 percent of their shots (50 out of 102 shots), while the Hsinchu team only achieved 43 percent accuracy by making 37 out of 86 shots.

Lioneers center Singh Bhullar, who was named the Import Player of the Year on Friday, which is given to the league’s best foreign player for the season, posted a double-double of 24 points and 18 rebounds, while last season’s finals MVP Braves forward Mike Singletary recorded 24 points and 17 rebounds.

After the game, Braves forward Josh Chou (???), who scored 17 points for his team, said the strategy they used was to play a tough defense so that they could wear out the other team.

“We also had more players on rotation, so we had more choices on offense,” Chou said.

Chou had a remarkable outing as he shot 7-10, including 6-6 on two-pointers.

Game 5 of the finals will be on Monday at Hsinchu County Stadium.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

Singer-songwriter Paolo Sandejas will feature as the only foreign performer on the final day of a Golden Melody Festival showcase event on Sunday, where he will perform original Pilipino music (OPM) from his native Philippines, according to media reports.

The three-day Showcase concert, part of the Golden Melody Festival, kicked off Friday at Kaohsiung’s Backstage Live music venue, featuring 11 artists and bands from Taiwan and abroad who were given the opportunity to showcase their music to fans, as well as top music executives and professionals.

Sunday’s show will feature Sandejas giving a pre-recorded online performance, in addition to live performances by two other Taiwanese groups, six-piece band OVDS and indie band Sweet John.

Taiwanese rap star Leo Wang (Leo ?), who nabbed the Golden Melody Award for Best Male Vocalist (Mandarin) in 2019, was also supposed to perform on Sunday but his performance has been canceled after he tested positive for COVID-19, according to the Golden Melody Festival.

Sandejas said it was an amazing feeling to finally share his brand of music with the rest of the Asian music scene, according to POP!, INQUIRER.net’s pop culture channel, in the Philippines.

He said it was a chance to represent original Pilipino music (OPM) which refers to any musical composition originally created by a Filipino, POP! said.

“While it’s definitely a lot of pressure for me to represent the Philippines and OPM as a young artist, I’m really motivated to showcase how the OPM scene has grown and diversified over the years. Despite the pressure, I couldn’t be more excited!” Sandejas was quoted by POP! as saying.

Sandejas said people should look forward to enjoying some laid-back indie tunes in his “intimate virtual performance” and he also looked forward to performing his original songs live in Taiwan if given a chance after the Golden Melody Festival, according to POP!

Before dropping his debut EP “Purple Afternoon” in 2020, Sandejas had already released several singles such as “My Girl,” “After Hours,” and his own versions of Michael Jackson’s “Rock with You” and “Sway,” according to the Golden Melody Festival website.

In 2022, he released official music videos of his singles “Dad Jeans” and “Different Shade of Blue” which attracted a lot of listeners on Spotify this year with over 632,000 plays and counting, the Golden Melody Festival website said.

The 2022 Golden Melody Festival, being held from June 24 to June 26, aims to facilitate cross-industry and cross-border collaboration through a series of events including international conferences, master workshops, showcases, business-matching, and networking events.

The festival precedes the Golden Melody Awards, which will be held on July 2 at Kaohsiung Arena.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

A clean room facility owned by a subsidiary of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) in Japan was inaugurated Friday, paving the way for the contract chipmaker to develop high-end integrated circuit packaging and testing services.

TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said the clean room at its Japanese subsidiary — the TSMC Japan 3DIC R&D Center — is located in the Tsukuba Center of the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST).

In a statement released on Friday, the chipmaker said the center will continue its research efforts into the next generations of three-dimensional silicon stacking and advanced packaging technologies in materials science on the back of the presence of the new clean room.

The technologies developed by the subsidiary will enable system-level innovations to strengthen computing performance and integrate more functionality, which is expected to facilitate new ways to drive semiconductor technology forward, beyond the industry’s conventional path of shrinking transistor size, TSMC said.

Following the completion of the clean room, the TSMC Japan 3DIC R&D Center will support R&D efforts in state-of-the-art 3D IC packaging materials in collaboration with the chipmaker’s Japanese partners, domestic research institutes and universities that are strong in semiconductor materials and equipment, the company added.

TSMC set up its Japan 3DIC R&D Center subsidiary in March 2021 and later began construction on the clean room facility in the Tsukuba Center of AIST.

In addition to its strong capability in pure wafer foundry operations, TSMC has moved aggressively into high-end IC packaging and testing services to provide one-stop shopping services for clients who buy chips and require advanced 3D IC packaging and testing technologies.

TSMC currently operates four advanced IC packaging and testing plants in Taoyuan and Hsinchu in northern Taiwan, Taichung in central Taiwan and Tainan in the south.

The company is building a fifth IC packaging and testing plant in Zhunan, Miaoli County, with phase one scheduled to start commercial production later this year.

In the statement, TSMC CEO C.C. Wei (???) said he is upbeat about cooperation between professionals in Taiwan and Japan and such efforts will “empower each other to make breakthroughs together.”

Yutaka Emoto, vice president and general manager of the TSMC Japan 3DIC R&D Center, said in the statement that with an increase in structural demand driven by the mega-trend of 5G and high performance computing-related applications, further technology innovations are necessary to meet such demand.

Also in Japan, the construction of a wafer fab to be run by Japan Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing, Inc. (JASM), a joint venture with TSMC, began in April, with shipments from the plant scheduled to start in December 2024.

In November 2021, TSMC announced it would spend up to US$2.12 billion in equity investment on the wafer fab in Japan, establishing TSMC-majority-owned JASM in Japan to provide foundry services, with Sony Semiconductor Solutions Corp. taking a stake of up to 20 percent in the new company.

In February, Japan’s Denso Corp. said it would take a stake of more than 10 percent in the TSMC joint venture.

The move by TSMC to set up JASM was intended to reinforce ties and cooperation with Sony, one of the Taiwanese chipmaker’s most important clients, as the Japanese company is a leading global supplier of CMOS (complementary metal oxide semiconductor) image sensors, or CIS used in automotive electronics, according to market analysts.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel