For a country that thrives on innovation, it is no wonder that Taiwan is already recognized as one of the top countries in the world that truly excels in manufacturing and exporting products that will help improve people’s lives for the better.
Founded in 1993, Taiwan Excellence continues on its mission to showcase what Taiwan is made of with regard to best products and even manufacturing practices that can be the envy of even the most progressive countries around the world.
A spirit of innovation and creativity
At Taiwan Excellence, it is about fostering a spirit of innovation and creativity in almost all industries, including machinery, building materials, infrastructure, medical/health care, Information and Communications Technology (ICT), Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), cybersecurity, smart technologies and others.
Leonor Lin, President and CEO of Taiwan External Trade and Development Council (TAITRA), said Taiwan Excellence is dedicated to looking for outstanding products based on research and development, design, quality, marketing, and strong spirit of innovation. Awarding these products with the Taiwan Excellence Award means that the products displayed superior innovation and quality, which can help the enterprises that created them to attract the attention of a worldwide audience and expand their territory in the global market.
To showcase these industries and their capabilities, Taiwan Excellence embarked on an aggressive campaign to showcase Taiwan’s industries. Even amid the pandemic, where events and face-to-face contact is not allowed, Taiwan Excellence continued the campaign through a series of webinars where the industries and enterprises presented their products to potential buyers and the international media for them to witness first-hand what these products and services were all about.
Battling a crippling pandemic
To date, Taiwan continues to be the benchmark in handling the pandemic, and Taiwan is even willing to share its expertise and own experiences in handling the virus without so much disruption, particularly with regard to trade. Taiwan Excellence even tapped local artists such as Gloc-9, an outstanding Filipino rapper, together with indie song artist Keiko Necessario, to create a music video that shows Taiwan as a good role model on innovation, how it is battling a debilitating pandemic, and its vision for progress.
The Taiwanese government also altered its trade promotion policies where it worked closely in monitoring changes and market tendencies, even assisted industries in helping restore business activities as early as possible. Businesses were also helped to survive the pandemic through multiple approaches such as new business activities, especially connecting them to business partners all over the world. They were provided trade support through insurance, professional marketing to reduce costs, diversify their export reach, and helped them break through the crisis with new concepts for global trade or international marketing, with focus on digital transformation, providing more digital capacity and capability.
The pandemic even made Taiwan more resilient, says Simon Wang, TAITRA EVP. A digital platform was created to share how Taiwan handled the crisis and overcame challenges through https://www.anticovid19tw.org/ This medical and healthcare virtual pavilion is where Taiwan showcased tools and demonstrated its expertise in battling the virus through Taiwan’s medical and healthcare ecosystem, which also served as a new marketing strategy. The pavilion severs the boundaries of time and space and even social distancing rules where countries can interact with companies whose products they are interested in.
Beyond COVID-19
Having quickly controlled the spread of Covid-19 domestically, Taiwan is now exporting its expertise in technology and medical hardware and was hailed as a role model for pandemic prevention. Taiwan received many procurement requests for medical supplies, where it gladly responded on humanitarian grounds, with a sense of responsibility to share its experiences to help other countries battle this pandemic. If COVID-19 is the desert, then Taiwan can be the oasis with the way it battled the pandemic in terms of health, safety, as well as industry.
Taiwan was able to handle the pandemic well despite because it has a good government, people are disciplined enough and followed safety protocols set by the government, and technology that was well applied in terms of control and management. Its robust ICT industry also allowed Taiwan to grow its exports to 2.4 percent for the first 9 months of the year despite the global economic slump where many countries suffered in their export growth; and though many countries’ GDP growth slowed, Taiwan GDP is expected to hit 1.5 percent this year and grow by 2.9 percent by next year.
COVID-19 has been constantly changing people’s lives, whether for work, study or play and it has become a daily routine to keep social distancing as a common guideline. Like all the other countries, Taiwan was confronted with the pandemic, but it made a quick recovery where its medical industry, particularly its epidemic prevention products, has won high praise worldwide.
Post-COVID-19, Taiwan Excellence will continue to look and develop more Taiwanese brands so they can create more integrated, expandable and customizable products, particularly in the field of AI solutions and cybersecurity, to make smart life become a reality in the very near future. It will also engage and encourage more Taiwanese companies to pursue excellence and innovation. That is the essence of Taiwan Excellence, to make amazing dreams by recognizing the best in Taiwan and help create a healthy world and a better future for all.
