Success is a hard act to follow for the Nankang Software Park

This article was written by Graham Norris and published by the Taiwan Journal on December 9, 2005. It features Taipei's Nankang Software Park, which is a high-tech hub of research and development and has attracted some of the biggest names in the global information technology (IT) business.

The Nankang Software Park measures greater than 80,000 square meters and houses 250 companies. In 2004, these companies generated US$5.7 billion in revenues.

The planning of the Nankang Software Park began in the early 1990s, when the government decided to halt Taiwan's dependence on manufacturing and move toward higher-valye production and services. The first phase of construction completed in 1999 and attracted nearly 100 software, IT-service and other technology companies, including IBM and Sony. The second phase of construction completed four years later and attracted not only software companies, but also those involved in integrated-circuit design, biotechnology and digital content. Now the Nankang Software Park is being expanded again.

An important feature of the Nankang Software Park is a system that helps with the creation of specialist design centers, training facilities and incubation centers. A good example is the biotechnology incubation center set up by the Academia Sinica's Genomics Research Center, which focuses on functional genomics, cellular and molecular medicine, chemical biology and bio-informatics.

Other examples include the Nankang Software Incubator, which plans to cultivate more than 1,300 software professionals by 2007, and the Digital Content Institute, a government-funded training center for animators, game designers and programmers.

In all, the focus of the Nankang Software Park is to create a center of innovation for the industries of the future by gathering business and creative talents in one place. This article analyzes the park's achievements in recent years. It also explains various challenges faced by the park in the coming decade, including attracting more multinational companies, providing the most advanced office and exhibition facilities, improving all transportation links, and to become more environmentally friendly.

For more details about the Nankang Software Park in Taipei, please check out this article.