The Golden Hand Awards are Taichung’s most coveted industrial honour — now in their 25th year. Run by the IDIPC, they recognise the city’s outstanding small and medium manufacturers: the “hidden champions” whose precision and craft quietly underpin global supply chains.
Entrants first meet a series of legal, financial and other qualifications, then are judged on labour practices, social responsibility, technological achievement and more by a panel of scholars and industry experts. About twenty winners are named each October.
Recognition, though, is only the beginning — Industries Taiwan exists to carry these winners to the world. This is the 2026 edition.
Industries Taiwan is built around companies and the people who lead them. We lead with Taichung and its “Golden Valley” of hidden champions, follow the priorities the IDIPC is driving on the ground, and stay open to wherever Taiwan’s excellence rises next.
…and beyond. Smart manufacturing, semiconductors, AI and the next industries Taiwan leads — we follow the best stories wherever they rise. Open by design, so the magazine grows with our partners.
Taiwan makes things the world depends on — the machine tools behind other countries’ factories, the bicycles Europe rides, the precision components inside products that never carry a Taiwanese name, and, increasingly, the collaborative robots, machine-vision systems and AI that run the world’s smartest factories. The excellence is not in question. The visibility is.
Industries Taiwan exists to close that gap. We are an English-language magazine that tells the stories behind the companies — the people and decisions that turn a quiet factory in a place like Taichung’s Golden Valley into a world-class supplier. A buyer trusts a face and a story long before a spec sheet, and the best Taiwanese companies have earned both.
Two ideas run through every issue. The first is Excellence — we anchor our features to Taiwan’s great award ecosystems, telling the stories of winners. The second is The Successors — the next generation now taking the helm of family champions, often educated abroad, fluent in the world’s markets, and ready to lead. And we tell these stories in the languages of the buyers who matter, because excellence deserves to be understood everywhere.
This is a sample. The stories are real. The ambition is simple: put Taiwan’s champions where the world can finally see them — and connect them with the buyers who are looking for exactly what they make.
— The Editors, Industries Taiwan & Compass Magazine
We help Taiwan’s leading industrial companies build global credibility — through premium executive storytelling, international media exposure, and buyer intelligence that connects them with qualified U.S. and global market opportunities.
Features anchored to Taiwan’s juried awards — the Taiwan Excellence and Golden Hand ecosystems. We tell the stories of winners.
An annual series following the next generation taking over Taiwan’s family champions — the leaders the world will buy from next.
IDIPC Director Apollo Chen’s urgent mission
Apollo Chen, director of the Industrial Development & Investment Promotion Committee (IDIPC) of Taichung City, had already spent a long, distinguished career working as a journalist, elected local and national representative, government official and political party thinktank consultant in three of Taiwan’s most important cities, although never in Taichung. Nevertheless, he didn’t hesitate when he got an invitation from Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen to head up one of the city’s key government-supported business promotion organizations.
About six months into the job, he feels an urgency and passion to promote industries, companies, products and investment in Taiwan’s second-largest city. Compass Magazine Co-Publisher Douglas Habecker recently sat down with Director Chen to learn about this critical mission for him and the IDIPC.
“I really enjoy this job because it allows me to bring people from different industries together to achieve something,” said Chen, noting that his deep political experience meant that he could serve as a connector, and had given his advice and input credibility within the private sector and central and local governments, allowing him to integrate a variety of resources eager to cooperate, from industry associations and research institutes to trade organizations. However, this also means he has been extremely busy over the past six months: “I’ve been racing against the clock. I feel like I’ve been doing three days of work each day.”
Part of Chen’s strong motivation may arise from his personal on-the-job discovery of what he calls “hidden champions” in a variety of sectors, from machine tools and precision machinery to local dessert and pastry makers, underlining Taichung’s crucial role in local and global supply chains. As a central Taiwanese industrial and manufacturing hub, Greater Taichung—encompassing the surrounding counties of Miaoli, Changhua and Nantou—is home to thousands of businesses that, like Taiwan as a whole, produce a staggering variety of products, from top-end bicycles to some of the world’s most advanced semiconductors.
“It’s made me realize why Taiwan, as a small country, can be so strong on the world stage. You can see the true example of that in Taichung,” he said. “So, I’ve been visiting and connecting with many business leaders, factories, and organizations every day. After I get to know these industries, I can connect everyone and understand what their needs are, rather than just telling them what I think they need.”
An example Chen pointed to was Taichung’s global-leading precision machinery industry “Golden Valley”, running for about 60 kilometers along the eastern flank of the Dadu Mountain ridge. Building on the city’s decades-old traditional machinery and tool industry, this industrial cluster now employs about 300,000 at around 1,500 companies and tens of thousands of downstream suppliers. That makes it Taiwan’s precision machinery hub and one of the worlds’ most complete ecosystems for precision/smart machinery, which has in turn expanded into aerospace, robotics, defense and related industries and products, notably drones in recent months. Connected to this cluster are the Precision Machinery Innovation Park, Taichung Industrial Park and Central Taiwan Science Park, with the latter park alone generating NT$32 billion in revenue across five sites and the location for TSMC’s first 1.4nm fab.
While TSMC has practically become a household name around the world, such is certainly not the case for thousands of Taichung companies that are seeking increased international recognition, investment, partnerships, markets and other opportunities in a challenging, rapidly changing business landscape. And that is precisely where the IDIPC is critical. Director Chen sees his organization—jointly funded by Taichung City Government and Taiwan central government’s Ministry of Economic Affairs—as a key platform for both Taiwanese enterprises and industries seeking to boost global exposure and competitiveness and foreign firms and countries interested in Taiwanese products, expertise, investment and other cooperative opportunities.
He pointed out that the unique status of the Taichung IDIPC, like its counterparts in other Taiwan cities and counties, gave it a flexibility to achieve such goals that normal government organizations lack, as it worked across various government departments and consolidated a broad spectrum of government, industry and other non-government resources to make it an essential “right hand” for the mayor as well as a local connector for Taiwan national government initiatives.
Chen’s extensive background serving as a multi-term Taipei City council member, Taoyuan County national legislator and Cultural Affairs Bureau director-general, Kaohsiung City mayoral candidate and other positions has given him tremendous resources and connections to help. For example, he recently invited former diplomats from Indonesia, India and Vietnam who are personal friends from his days in Legislative Yuan to give a series of seminars on business/investment opportunities for Taiwanese businesses, sharing from their deep knowledge of these countries. As he pointed out, this has become particularly important as legions of Taiwanese companies that set up in China over the past three decades, helping fuel that nation’s rise as the “world’s factory”, are now seeking greener pastures back home, in Southeast Asia and other parts of the world.
Chen is quick to point out that the IDIPC is also an invaluable resource for international companies looking for Taiwanese suppliers or considering investment in the city:
“If you come to Taichung to invest, if you have any questions, we will tell you which unit to cooperate with. I work with various bureaus and departments and with the central government and the private sector. I have very good relationships with everyone. If you have any questions, find me, and I’ll tell you which department to contact to resolve it.”
One of the leading ways that the IDIPC promotes outstanding Taichung companies is its annual Golden Hand Awards, now in its 25th year. Businesses seeking this coveted recognition must meet a series of legal, financial and other qualifications before being evaluated on the basis of labor practices, social responsibility, professional technological achievements and other criteria by a panel of scholars and other experts, with about 20 winners announced each October.
Other IDIPC efforts focus on grassroots businesses and consumers. Now in its 15th year, its Taichung Top 10 Gifts competition has become one of the city’s highest-profile promotional events and attracts a broad spectrum of local companies making pastries (another Taichung specialty), desserts, packaged snacks, alcoholic/non-alcoholic beverages, souvenir items, culture-creative and other products, all vying to be chosen by judges and public vote as the city’s top gift items.
As significant as both of these award events are, Chen believes that it is the IDIPC’s responsibility to boost international exposure and business opportunities for award winners, starting with improved English websites and other online information. It is his goal that international buyers and consumers will also learn about these manufacturers and products and has collaborated with English media partners such as Compass Magazine to promote these and other companies in English.
“Whether it’s a Golden Hand Award or Taichung Top 10 Gifts winner, after they receive the award it’s like they’re put on a library shelf and no one ever looks at them again. Only someone who really wants to read that book will flip through it and those who don’t like to read will never find it,” he said, noting that such a situation would devalue such awards for businesses. “We need to give them more good opportunities. We’ll take what’s on the bookshelf and turn it into something you see on your dining table every day. That will increase the chances of being seen, of [foreign] buyers seeing them. Frankly speaking, in my time here I think this is the most important thing.”
Other recent IDIPC projects to boost local businesses and products include the first-time release of a digital map guide to 50 top iced-desserts shops for the summer, the organization of a late-June combined Taiwan indigenous tribe harvest festival and Hakka cultural event to promote the mushroom industry in the city’s Xinshe District, where 60% of the nation’s mushrooms are grown, and work to transform a West District street into a new art zone revolving around creative businesses opened by young owners. Yet other initiatives focus on sustainable development and female entrepreneurs.
These and other IDIPC-city government efforts continue to bear fruit. As an example, the director pointed out that a delegation from the American Unmanned Systems Industry Association had just visited Mayor Lu and held a presentation for local companies, including those invited by the Taichung-based Aerospace Industrial Development Corporation, Taiwan’s largest aerospace manufacturer. Taichung-based Machan International Co., Ltd. is 50-year-old sheet metal manufacturer specializing in toolboxes, storage trolleys and medical equipment. As it turned out, Amazon was seeking a supplier for drone storage boxes and discovered the Taichung company completely met all of its requirements. The matchmaking of the previously unacquainted Taiwanese supplier and American buyer further emphasized the importance of the IDIPC’s mission and need to expand promotional efforts.
Taichung’s mayor has promoted her city as a major center for the rapidly growing global drone industry and in April met with the de facto US ambassador to Taiwan, American Institute in Taiwan Director Raymond Greene, to discuss drone development and manufacturing cooperation, touting Taichung’s complementary strengths in aerospace, semiconductors, precision machinery and optics. To this list Chen also added the growing strength of Taiwanese laser-related companies in northern and central Taiwan.
Director Chen is quick to tick off other strong Taichung industrial sectors his organization is working to market globally. Taichung remains the world’s bicycle industry capital, with leading companies like Giant Manufacturing Co. Ltd. and numerous other bike/component suppliers headquartered in the city. The IDIPC supports Taichung Bike Week, the global bike industry’s largest annual event, and Chen plans to add affiliated activities this year that will better promote city at large.
IDIPC works closely with the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA), a non-profit government co-sponsored trade promotion organization that shares a similar mission on a national level of boosting the international competitiveness of Taiwanese companies and helping them to deal with challenges encountered in foreign markets. TAITRA is the nation’s leading organizer of international trade shows like the renowned COMPUTEX Taipei, one of the world’s largest computer, technology and AI related trade shows and exhibitions.
While the vast majority of international industry trade shows previously took place at the Taipei World Trade Center and other venues in the capital city, Chen pointed out that the official March 2026 opening of Taichung International Convention and Exhibition Center (TICEC), a massive architectural landmark with 130,000 square meters of exhibition floor space, was already proving to be a game-changer for the city. Under TAITRA management, TICEC is already fully booked for the year and hosting a larger volume of exhibitions than the Taipei Nangang International Exhibition Center, due in part to Taichung’s deeper reservoir of manufacturers and industries. Taichung-hosted trade shows also offer significant advantages to foreign participants, according to Chen. While Taipei events often require that foreign businesspeople travel for up to three hours to other parts of Taiwan to visit suppliers, the distance between the exhibition floor and factory floor can be as little as 30 minutes for Taichung events, giving the city’s companies a “home court advantage”.
“In the past, Taichung had to go to Taipei and Kaohsiung to exhibit. It essentially didn’t have its own ‘storefront’ so it became reliant on others. The new exhibition center fulfills Mayor Lu’s slogan of ‘a store in front and factory in back,’” he said. “[TICEC] will drive the entire city’s development and help make Taichung an international city.”
Speaking as a Taipei native, Director Chen said that he had most appreciated Taichung’s widely-praised sunny weather and pleasant climate, adding that he had found local residents extremely warm-hearted, harmonious and “not always fighting over who’s number one”. However, in that compliment perhaps lies the unspoken implication that Taichungers need to compete harder for recognition, and that he and the IDIPC need to promote their city more boldly to the world.
“In a strongly competitive society, you shouldn’t deceive people if your products aren’t good. But if your products are good, you should let more people know,” he said. “So, in the past six months as IDIPC director, I’ve placed great emphasis on marketing. I highly value media exposure because I want more people to know about good things. It’s not just the people of Taichung who should know; people outside of Taichung should know as well. I think Taichung’s products are good enough and it’s important to let people know.”
Every feature in the magazine gets its own dedicated Leadership Access page. Scan its QR code and the reader lands on a gated digital hub — the full interview, audio, and the leader’s contact-card details. The reader gives an email to unlock; from that moment, every interaction is measured.
Every scan, view, audio play and lead flows into a live engagement dashboard — the buyer-intelligence a supplier receives. Who is reading, from where, on what device, and how close they are to a conversation.
The same loop runs behind every story in this magazine — turning a reader’s moment of interest into measurable buyer intelligence.
The reader scans with a phone — no app, no friction — straight from the printed page or a trade-show stand.
They land on the gated digital hub and unlock the full interview, audio and a direct line to the leadership team. That email is a qualified buyer.
Scans, plays, clicks and leads flow into a live dashboard — who is reading, from where, on what device, and how close they are to a deal. Delivered back to the supplier.
What follows is a preview of the year ahead — built for the partners and investors backing Industries Taiwan. Each pairing shows a sample cover with the edition behind it: its focus, its cover story, and the buyers it is designed to reach. The Golden Hand issue you just read is the model. These are the next three.
The three example editions behind the covers you just saw — each with its focus, a sample cover story, and the buyers it is built to reach.
The next generation taking over Taiwan’s family champions.
Heirs — often educated abroad and fluent in world markets — modernizing decades-old companies without losing what made them great. The leaders the world will be buying from for the next thirty years, introduced before everyone else knows their names.
Semiconductors, advanced packaging & the silicon backbone the world runs on.
Taiwan’s most famous strength, center stage: the executives running the fabs, materials makers and equipment suppliers that keep the world’s most advanced chips moving — the company a global buyer needs, and rarely gets to meet.
The year-end annual — the best of Taiwanese industry across the great awards.
The keepsake edition gathering the year’s standout companies from Taiwan’s great juried awards, from Taiwan Excellence to the Golden Hand — a definitive portrait of the year: the winners, the breakthroughs and the people who defined them.
Launching in U.S. English — for the world’s largest buyer market — and built to travel. Each new partnership opens another country, in its own language: the trade capitals where Taiwan’s buyers already gather across North America, Europe, Japan, Southeast Asia, India and the Gulf. One issue, every market that matters.
An AI-native, fully instrumented magazine platform — data, analytics and tracking that connect global buyers with Taiwan’s suppliers. Every story, scan and click is measured, turning global buyer attention into qualified buyer intelligence.
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Industries Taiwan is making Taiwan’s quiet champions impossible to ignore — and putting them in front of the buyers who matter. The partners who move with us first are the ones the world meets first.