Tokyo--Toshiba Corporation today announced that it has been selected to provide the world's fastest elevators for the world's tallest building. The ultra-high speed elevators are part of a comprehensive package of 63 elevators and 34 escalators that Toshiba and its Taiwan distributor, GFC LTD., will supply to the Taipei Financial Center, a new tower complex in the heart of Taiwan's capital, scheduled for completion 2002.

The Taipei Financial Center will rise 508 meters above Taipei's skyline and will have 101 floor above ground and 5 basement. It will house companies, offices, department stores and restaurants, and is expected to welcome 120 thousand occupants and visitors a day. The building's ownership consortium of Taiwanese financial institutions and insurance companies devoted several months to careful study and evaluations of the optimum vertical transportation system for the building, all of which pointed to Toshiba as the clear choice.

Toshiba will provide a total of 63 elevators for the Taipei Financial Center. The jewels in the crown are two ultra high-speed elevators that will shuttle from the level-one basement to the 89^th floor observation deck at a maximum speed of 1,000 meters per minute; a mere 39 seconds, all in quiet, vibration-free comfort. The new elevator's performance is designed to surpass that of all other elevators now in operation, including those in Yokohama's Landmark Tower, currently the world's fastest, with a maximum speed of 750 meters per minute.

Toshiba also will supply 27 single-deck elevators and 34 of its high-capacity people movers--double-deck high-speed elevators that combine a maximum load of 4,080 kg. or 62 persons with a maximum speed of 480 meters per minute. This will be one of the world's largest groups of double-deck elevators in operation in a single building.

In addition to elevators, Toshiba will supply a total of 34 escalators for the new building's podium. This 7-story shopping center is slated to meet Taiwan's growing appetite for mall shopping with a range of department stores and specialty shops.

Toshiba has a record for establishing elevator-firsts in Taiwan. The two 540 meters-a-minute elevators installed in the SK Tower in 1993 were long known as "The fastest elevators in Taiwan". With the new elevators for the Taipei Financial Center, visitors will not only be able to use the fastest elevators in Taiwan, but the fastest in the world.

This new order confirms Toshiba's sophisticated expertise in cutting-edge elevators and escalators, transportation systems and advanced electronics control technologies. It also fits in with the company's wider general capabilities in promoting safe, record-breaking high-speed transport.