Everyday, interesting tech in Taiwan (an observation from my 2023 first-time trip)
About the cover photo…
Raohe St. Night Market (Simplified: 饶河街观光夜市, Traditional: 饒河街觀光夜市) is quite an attraction, and was one of the first places I visited. At its entrance facing the Section 4 of Bade Road (八德路四段), lies a shop featured in MICHELIN Guide’s Point of View — Fuzhou Black Pepper Bun (福州世祖胡椒饼). By the time I got there, there had been a line of 20+ people waiting to enjoy hot, crusty buns on a cold, windy January night — which I initially mistook it for people queuing to get into the market.
Why I wrote this
I see this story simply as a page in my journal about my first trip to Taiwan, and hope it’s at least an entertaining read to you. So, this is by no means a exhaustive list of tech local people use everyday. Without further ado, let’s go check it out.
Table of contents
1. EasyCard (悠遊卡): One card to rule them all?
2. YouBike（微笑单车）
3. Gogoro Smartscooter
4. Smart parking and payment booths
5. Mobile payments
6. Directions, Maps & GPS navigation
7. Powerbank rental
8. Social media
9. Posky, iChef, and many others
10. Online food delivery
11. Hand warmer
12. Sterilizer + Deodorizer
13. Water dispenser (My favorite)
14. A “Green” machine: recycle and earn points!
15. Automatic door
16. Gimmicky 3D navigator1. EasyCard (悠遊卡): One card to rule them all?
Just as succinctly explained on its Chinese version of the website, EasyCard enables contactless, multi-function e-payment at MRT stations, buses, parking lots, supermarkets, gas stations, bike rental, etc. I personally used it to get on MRT and buses, and saw that it’s accepted at places like 7-ELEVEN, FamilyMart, smart payment booths at parking lots, food and drink stalls, in taxis.
2. YouBike（微笑单车）
I’ve known about bike rental services for years, mostly through news and articles on China, and am deeply concerned about the negative effects of (unregulated?) competition in that kind of market on the environment, as reflected, for instance, in this article. It’s a breath of fresh air to learn that YouBike in Taiwan is a public service — hence, no unnecessary overproduction as happened in China, and I’m elated that the company invests in building bikes to withstand frequent use.
On the streets of Taipei, 7 out of 10 bikes I see are YouBikes, and it seems it’s living up to its Chinese name of bringing smiles to riders as people have been getting around worry-free and hassle-free. Besides, bike-friendly lanes are ubiquitous in the cities.
3. Gogoro Smartscooter
I may have been living in a cave, since I have never seen anything like Gogoro smartscooters. When it comes to electric vehicles, it used to be that Tesla was the first thing that came to my mind — with its cool design and advanced software experience, basically iPhone on wheels.
What grabbed my attention about Gogoro in an instant was GoStations, which I initially thought were some kind of strange storage units. Within a minute after I took the above photo, two young men on a scooter passed by and stopped in front of the station. They both got off, and one lifted the seat to take two elongated cylinders out of the compartment and shove each into an empty slot of the station. Then, on the station screen, a battery charging animation showed up, which made me realize those cylindrical thingies were in fact batteries. “Wow, pretty cool!” I told myself. Next, his friend did a few taps on his phone, and two freshly charged batteries from different slots popped off. He took them and shoved them into the compartment under the scooter’s seat, and they rode away. All that happened within about 15 seconds!
It seems Gogoro has really thought it through, with its widespread, dense network of GoStations all over Taiwan — to offer convenience of swapping batteries within riding ranges of its scooters. In one location I had been to, there’re two GoStations within a 3-minute walking distance. What surprises me more is that, in addition to manufacturing their own scooters, Gogoro partners with other manufacturers such as YAMAHA, Aeonomotor, and PGO to provide variety in scooter choices.
All in all, I think it’s pretty cool!
3.1. iONEX Smartscooter
A week into my visit, I thought Gogoro was the only player in town as almost all battery-swapping stations I saw were Gogoro’s. On the morning of the Chinese New Year’s Eve, as I crossed a road on my way to a park, I spotted a battery station with a different brand: iONEX.
As competition is good for consumers, I’m elated about the presence of another player in the market, although it’s much much harder to come across an iONEX station than a GoStation.
4. Smart parking and payment booths
In light of EasyCard, let me add smart parking, where you can pay with an EasyCard, to my story.
It used to be that parking lots in Taiwan used physical tokens to track the parking duration of a car: as you drive to the unmanned gate, you roll down your window (or get off the car) to take a token, which can be quite an inconvenience on a rainy day. When you’re about to leave, 1) you walk into the booth → 2) you beep the token at a sensor to check the payment due → 3) you pay → 4) you get to your car, and on your way out, you insert the token back at the gate. An interesting anecdote: A local relative of mine lost the token once and was fined NT$800 (you can eat ~11 cakes for that money)!
The new smart parking systems, co-existing with the old ones, use OCR to read license plates to track parking durations. No more tokens, one fewer headaches.
A keen observer might have found by now that there are contactless e-payment methods other than EasyCard, accepted at the payment booths. Let’s check them out.
(By the way, when all those techs don’t work, you can always pay with cash at the booths.)
5. Mobile payments
My Product Manager instincts kicked in as I sat at my desk thinking of doing business model canvas, comparison study, SWOT analysis, etc. of those mobile payment apps. With my detail-oriented personality, that would take me 2 days of focused research and add 1,000s of words to this story — ugh, I don’t wanna take away enjoyment from your causal reading.
Observing my relatives who have been living in Taiwan for decades, mobile payment, it seems, isn’t as common as, say, in China. Most common payment methods have been swiping cards or paying cash — usually, this is what they ask: in Chinese, “刷卡或付现?” – when I pay my bills. However, an aunt of mine running a Yunannese cuisine shop once said that her customers used LINE Pay more because they offered enticing rewards, such as LINE POINTS: you can get NT$1 discount for 1 point, and there’s no limit to the discount — so it says in the above photo.
6. Directions, Maps & GPS navigation
I initially thought there could be no surprise when it came to this category – were you thinking of Google Maps (GMaps) as the one and only app out there? Me too. People here definitely rely on GMaps a lot, and on a taxi ride one night, I noticed this:
What initially caught my attention was the UI, which obviously wasn’t Android Auto, and that it was more real-time in location tracking than GMaps — I had Maps opened on my phone to compare it. Moreover, the LOCALKING could show CCTV live footage as the car passed through the traffic cameras, and announce speed limit signs. One more detail: the driver that night was a lady in her 50s and, as with older people, they prefer to scribbling their search terms than typing. And, the app leverages the big screen to offer a good writing experience. The developer definitely has their design focus on their driver userbase.
6.1. The Android Auto alternative
On a related note, I can see how this can be really accessible to an average driver:
- Physical buttons (on the left) for easy, fast navigation of the app; given the today’s trend of going all screen, as seen in smartphones, we shouldn’t forget that physical buttons are crucial to a great number of people.
- Connectivity with their mobile phones: they can take calls, chat via walkie-talkie with dispatch and other drivers, etc., and watch videos — which is an important way of spending their leisure. I saw lots of drivers have their lunch while watching TV or movies in their cars. Some drivers basically turn it into a mini karaoke set.
Curious, I asked the lady:
- Q: Why do you use LOCALKING? A: “I felt safer driving with it than with Google Maps.”
- Q: How much did it cost you to install the system? A: “NT$20k (US$665.30, as of Feb 8, 2023) one-time payment for both software [including all the apps] and hardware.”
6.2. Public transport apps
As with any big, developed city, Taiwanese cities have metro, bus, high-speed rail and light rail, and there are “millions” of apps for those navigating the cities — especially, tourists and newcomers.
At the time of this writing, I was participating with my friends in the 2023 Taipei Metro Go UI/UX hackathon, and let me share some findings from my user interviews:
- One aunt who prefers bus to metro because she can enjoy scenery on a bus has TransTaiwan (iOS, Android) app installed on her phone.
- A restaurant-chain manager, who always takes the metro to commute to work, uses “台灣鐵道通 Taiwan Rail” app for buying high-speed rail tickets, and checking bus routes. She doesn’t need an app for metro since she remembers her routes.
- A college student, who has access only to bus in his school area, hops between “台灣等公車 Bus Tracker Taiwan” (iOS, Android), Taipei Metro Go (iOS, Android), Bus+ (Android), and Moovit (iOS, Android).
Ugh, so many apps!
7. Powerbank rental
Back in 2017, powerbank rentals were the latest trend in China, and I found a player in the Taiwanese market: CHARGE SPOT.
Interestingly, I didn’t spot any other brands in this space.
8. Social media
Facebook (+ Messenger), Instagram, and LINE are big in Taiwan;
- LINE in Taiwan is like WeChat in China.
- Instagram is popular like Douyin (globally called, TikTok) in China.
9. Posky, iChef, and many others
Can you guess what they’re?
One evening, my parents and I were invited for a dinner by an uncle. Soon after I got seated, I noticed there was no menu on the table, and no one came to deliver a copy as well. Then, I saw this:
Posky, as implied by its name, is a POS solution with its inception centered around improving the interaction experience between merchants and customers — regarding ordering and paying bills.
The little details I liked about it were:
- I could change my order before I confirm it — such as updating quantity, and removing the items (although I couldn’t change the spec — e.g., switching the “medium spicy” to “mild spicy”).
- I could have my order summary sent to my LINE account (although it didn’t work that day).
Of course, with a POS solution, it isn’t just about the customer side; there’s a lot more to the merchant side of managing the orders, connecting with the kitchen, tracking sales, managing finance, etc.
Lastly, scanning QR code to order online is quite common here — 7 out of 10 shops has such a POS solution, based on my observation. By the way, my aunt shop uses iChef.
10. Online food delivery
UberEats and foodpanda dominate in this space, and foodpanda seems to spend more on marketing — such as in collaborating with one of the big bands in Taiwan, Mayday（五月天）.
My aunt’s daughter works with these terminals and apps, and her cursory comment was that foodpanda merchant app was more difficult to use.
11. Hand warmer
In my college years in the US, I experienced the coldest days in my life — it was -24°C, and I never saw hand warmers there. In Taiwan, it’s everywhere.
How it works: basically, you rip the plastic packaging apart and take out the pack inside— which contains black powders. Wait awhile, and it gets warm.
Magic, right? Well, it’s chemistry. The black powders inside are made of iron, and they’re made into fine powders to drastically increase their surface areas to speed up the reaction process, called oxidization. Usually, when we see iron reacts with oxygen, it is oxidized into rust. In this case, there’re other catalysts (such as activated carbon or salt) in the pack that helps accelerate the reaction, whereby heat is released. After the heat dissipates from the hand warmer, you can feel the texture is changed, as the iron powders become bulkier.
Besides keeping hands warm, used hand warmers can be put near shoes to remove the unpleasant odors — that’s what my aunts learn from social media.
12. Sterilizer + Deodorizer
Being an island country, winter days in Taiwan are damp and rainy. For busy and/or lazy people, doing laundry — especially when it comes to coats — is a chore they’ll pay to avoid. Introducing this:
You just simply spray your chore away. At some point, you do have to do your laundry, though.
In a similar vein, some restaurants or religious places where there’s lots of incense have a deodorizer of some form:
13. Water dispenser (My favorite)
13 is my alma mater’s lucky number, so allow me to introduce my favorite tech.
Such machines are quite common; I saw them at hotels, hospitals, shopping malls, and tourist attractions. I drink a lot of water and they help me reduce using plastic water bottles — a godsend!
14. A “Green” machine: recycle and earn points!
Taiwan is big on recycling and sorting wastes; everywhere you go, you have to properly throw away your trash.
Here’s the process:
- Pour out the content of the cup.
- Open OPEN POINT (iOS, Android) app , and go to the “Recycle cups” page.
- Tap “Begin process”.
- A QR code is generated.
- Show the code to the camera in the upper right corner of the machine screen.
- Dispose of the lid in to the rectangular opening (Skip this step, if you don’t have a lid).
- Scan the QR code on the recyclable cup.
- Dispose of the cup when an opening opens, with the cup opening upside.
You can exchange 1 point for NT$1; cool?
15. Automatic door
“Huh? What’s up about it, ” you must be wondering. Well, at least it’s the kind I haven’t see in person, and it’s quite common in Taipei — hotels, restaurants, hospitals, etc. — so common that I wanted to mention it here.
I reckon, this was greatly convenient during the pandemic — and it’s even now; you can simply elbow it if you don’t wish to use your fingers.
16. Gimmicky 3D navigator
UX could definitely use some improvements, but it’s somewhat fun to watch the animation.
See you in the next story. 再见、再見。
