TAITRA Publicizes 2008 Taiwan Excellence Award Winners

2008/07/10 | By Quincy Liang

The Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA), the semi-state-run trade promotion body, announced on May 23rd at a gala ceremony in Taipei the winners' list of Taiwan Excellence, consisting of the eight gold and 21 silver medal winners.

Every year since 1993, Taiwan Excellence honors the most innovative and top-quality products developed, designed or produced in Taiwan with the coveted Taiwan Excellence Awards, which are given out based on the evaluation by international experts from Asia, Europe and North America. Hundreds of products are submitted each year, but only those truly embodying the core values of "Innovalue" or innovation combined with added-value, are selected as winners.

The panel of international judges at the 16th Taiwan Excellence boast expertise and experience in R&D, design, product quality, to marketing, criteria of which are the basis of the awards selection. Besides enjoying the immediate satisfaction of being award winners, products honored with the Taiwan Excellence logo is recognized worldwide as a mark of quality, innovation, and value.

These winners symbolize Taiwan's manufacturing prowess for high-quality, innovative, and high value-added products that play contributing roles in enhancing the overall upgrading of technological caliber in factories, offices and homes around the world.

Taiwan Excellence has joined the ranks of globally-significant product design competitions, as well as becoming a key event for the local manufacturing and design sectors, as evidenced by the rapidly increasing participants and products submitted yearly. Further proof of the world-caliber of Taiwan Excellence is the fact that many of the products submitted also win the hallmark design competitions as iF and reddot of Germany, G-Mark of Japan, and IDEA of the United States.

This year, outstanding companies in Taiwan submitted 601 products to vie for the gold and silver medals, a clear increase of 23% from 487 in 2007.

Among this year's contenders, 111 belong to the consumer electronics and appliance category (18.4% of the total 601 items); 189 are computer hardware & peripherals (31.4%); while 88 are included in the networking/communication category (14.6%).

They target wide-ranging consumers, boast a broad price range, and are the brainchild of all kinds of industrial sectors.

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: Notebook PC

Model: Eee PC

Company: Asustek Computer Inc.

Asustek Computer Inc. impressed judges across the board with its innovative gadget, Eee PC 4G. According to Ralph Wiegmann, general manager of iF International Forum Design GmbH, the Eee PC is a perfect example of innovation where the four key elements of R&D, design, quality, and marketing truly come together. "Eee PC drives innovation, it's pioneering and has opened up a whole new market segment," said Wiegmann.

The innovative and compact device weights only 0.92kg and features mobility, reliability and connectivity, allowing users to travel with it everywhere and always stay connected, while enjoying unparalleled shock-protection and reliability. "It captures the essence of what a lot of people have been looking for and hoping for a long time," said Alan Lammin, publishing director for Asia, TIME magazine, elaborating on its mobility, functionality and simplicity.

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: Portable Navigation Device

Model: R700t

Company: Asustek Computer Inc.

Asustek picked up another Gold Award with its Portable Navigation Device R700t. R700t with its stylish and slim outlook provides a 3D panoramic view that makes it simple for users to navigate complicated and multi-level junctions. In addition, it contains a built-in auto light sensor and Bluetooth hands-free functions in enhancing driving safety for users. The TMC (traffic message channel) module for instant traffic updates also provides satisfactory navigation.

"The R700t is really a wonderful design piece, regarding the shape and angle," said Wiegmann, "and it's really easy to handle."

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: AVerVision SPB350 Document Camera

Model: P0B9

Company: AVerMedia Information Inc.

AVerVision SPB350 document camera provides instant display with 30-frame per second. With the image sensor featuring 500M mega pixel high resolution and multiple digital decoding chip, AVerVision SPB350 offers practical functions with diversity and high image quality of up to 1,080 pixel. The innovative document camera offers individual functions as split screen and picture-in-picture conveniences. The camera comes with remote control and laser pen; and the AVerVision software is easy to use.

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: Ultra-slim 13.3-inch Wide LCD Panel

Model: N133I6

Company: Chi Mei Optoelectronics Corp. (CMO)

CMO's innovative ultra-slim 13.3-inch WXGA panels are mainly for notebook PC displays, weighing merely 219 grams. The N133I6 is light and slim, while it also features high brightness and low power consumption.

The 13.3-inch wide notebook display supports better performance, improves the mobility and enhances outdoor readability, featuring many related and advanced technologies to meet the needs for high brightness and sharp imaging even under strong sunlight. Consumers who choose the 13.3-inch wide notebook display with CMO panels (for example, the Apple Air ultra-slim notebook) enjoy mobility, adequate display size, and the convenience of technology any time and anywhere.

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: Glee Cube Multi-Media IP-TV Box

Model: MBA-00

Company: Giga-Byte Technology Co., Ltd.

By connecting the Glee Cube with the TV cable, DVD player, and surveillance cameras at home as well as the LAN (local area network ) cable, users can watch TV, DVD programs as well as surveillance video on a PC or PDA cellphone via the Internet.

The Glee Cube also features many advantages such as instant or scheduled recording of TV/ DVD programs; allow connection with USB disk to store the recorded video programs and to share the programs with friends; real-time streaming technology for real-time home surveillance; support video recording through remote data control etc.

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: Touch Cruise

Model: P3650

Company: High Tech Computer Corp. (HTC)

The HTC Touch Cruise is sleek, stylish, and compact, at the same time, displaying significant features and offering an LCD screen size that gives users excellent multimedia experience on one single mobile device.

With HTC's innovative TouchFLO interface, the Touch Cruise is extremely easy to use. Using easy finger actions, it allows convenient navigation. Users can quickly browse e-mails, web pages, messages, music, and images. Live HTC Home vibrantly displays important information, such as real-time weather updates and a large easy-to-view clock. A quick application launcher provides easy access to favorite programs. HTC Home also gives users quick access to ring tone settings, making it easy to adjust sounds and alerts.

The built-in GPS functionality and the included software enable users to find the shortest route to destinations, indicating restaurants and services along the way.

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: Ecological & Economical Lubrication Module

Model: E2 series

Company: Hiwin Technologies Corp.

In tune to green concerns, Hiwin developed the Ecological & Economical lubrication module: E2 series. It effectively realizes compactness in a lubricator, as well as successfully minimizing maintenance by preventing oil leakage. It's an ideal lubrication solution for automation, semiconductor equipment and photonics.

The E2 series features portable, user-friendly, economical, and ecology designs. Using an integrated ball-screw, the E2 module, when fully filled with lubrication oil (50cc), can supply the ball nut to travel a lubricating distance of over 15,000 km.

Award: Taiwan Excellence Gold Award

Product: Ninety Six Carbon Full- Suspension Bike

Model: Ninety Six series

Company: Merida Industry Co., Ltd.

The Ninety-Six suspension bike adopts a mixture of all avaibale techniques of carbon manufacturing. More importantly, the frame-segments are manufactured and bonded with the use of pre-compressed carbon prepregs (pre-impregnated materials), which have a very low percentage of resin. Such processes involve the usage of the best quality fiber available and seasoned know-how from manufacturing partners.

In addition, the adoption of the Nano-Matrix material can upgrade the frame impact resistance by about 40%, in comparison with carbon-frames of regular epoxy matrix-material.

Silver Award Winners