Short Bio：

1956 – Born in Busan, South Korea.

1978 – Graduated from National Taiwan University with a degree in International Trade, and entered the publishing industry.

1988 – Appointed as President of China Times Publishing Company, later resigned in 1996. Fall of 1996, founded Locus Publishing Company.

1997 – Appointed President and Editor-in-Chief of The Commercial Press, Ltd. (Taiwan), later resigned in 1999.

2001 – Founded Net and Books

2010 – Founded ChineseCUBES

2009 -2013 National Policy Advisor to the President of Republic of China, Taiwan

2021 – bestowed upon the title of Knight of the Order of the Italian Star by the President of the Italian Republic.

Presently serving as the Chairman of Locus Publishing Company  and the Publisher of Net and Books.

Author: Work on Water (Locus), My Korean Story (Locus), Confessions of an Underground Buddhist (Net and Books), Reading in the Internet Age (Net and Books), Taiwan Unbound:Our Next Ten Years (Net and Books), Taiwan Sets Sail: New Hope (Net and Books), Search for That Magical Book (Net and Books), If I Were Fifteen (Net and Books), A-bi Sword(co-author as the script writer using the pen name of Ma Li, Dala Pub), Prequel of A-bi Sword(novel using the pen name of Ma Li, Dala Pub), Taiwan Unbound: a New Chapter (Net and Books).

Translation works: How to Read a Book, Mortimer J. Adler and Charles Van Doren (Commercial Press),  2001: A Space Odyssey, Arthur C. Clarke (Yuan-Liou Publishing)

Related Websites:
Rex How personal website
Rex How personal FB in Chinese
A-bi Sword
Locus FB 

Extended Bio：

2023

Taiwan Unbound: A New Chapter published.

2022

Movie and TV rights of Abi Sword sold to Jeffrey Chan.

2021

Oct
Bestowed upon the title of Knight of the Order of the Italian Star by the President of the Italian Republic.

2020

Feb
Prequel to Abi Sword, the first novel of Rex How under the pen name of Ma Li, published.

Jan
Curated The Passion of Taiwan Comics in Angouleme Comic Book Fair, France.

2019

Oct
Curated Taiwan Comics Forest in Frankfurt Book Fair.

Oct
iMage3 Visual Language Space, in National Taichung Theater, launched for one year. 

April
Locus won BOP – Bologna Prize for the Best Children’s Publishers of the World!.

Jan
Curated The Trilogy of Taiwan Comics in Angouleme Comic Book Fair, France.

Jan
Rex How’s 10th book If I were Fifteen: the Magic of the Combinations of the Knowledges published.

2018

April
Curated Library of Fantasy: Taiwan Publishers and Illustrators in Bologna Children Book Fair.

Feb
iMage3, a new imprint of Locus focusing on the picture books, launched.

2017

Sep
10 Years’ Anniversary and Revised edition of Reading in the Internet Age published.

Jun to Aug
Launched a civil movement to ask the government to respond to the questions and worries aroused by a eight years’ economic infrastructure plan.

Mar
Curated the Museum of Fantasy: Taiwan Publishers and Illustrators in Bologna Children Book Fair.

Feb
Rex How’s 9th book Searching for that Magical Book published.

Feb
Celebrating 20th Anniversary of Locus Publishing in Taipei Book Exhibition.

2016

Sep
Gave speech Setting Sail to Openness and Change at TEDxTaipei

Jul and Aug
Launched Open Taipower campaign and worked, as the coordinator, with the government to do a research and investigation of the management of Taipower, the monopoly energy supplier in Taiwan.

Feb
Rex How’s 8th book Taiwan Sets Sail: New Hope published. A sequel to Taiwan Unbound: the Next 20 Years.

2015

Dec
Launched Let the New Energy Goes to Congress campaign and supported 27 new congress candidates. 5 of them got elected later.

July
Rex How’s 7th book Taiwan Unbound: the Next 20 Years published.

2014

Aug –  Golden Tripod Special Contribution Award

April – ChineseCUBES AR Cubes and iPad App win two ComputED’s 20th Annual Best Educational Software Awards (BESSIE) for best Multi-level: World Language Learing (Mandarin), and World Language Learning App (iPad).

April – Launched the “There is a Sunflower in Each of Us” event and campaign

Mar – Spoke at the demonstrations on the Ketagalan Boulevard [See here]

Mar – Spoke at the Student Sunflower Movement inside the Legislative Yuan, “Let Us Pray for Lofty Ideals.”
[See here]

Feb – ChineseCUBES is named Best of Toy Fair at 2014 New York Toy Fair by Techlicious

2013

October
ChineseCUBES co-organized Chinese Character Festival in New York with NYU Steindhart.

CBS/ WLNY morning talk show “The Couch” .

TimeOut New York Kids .

New York Times.

AMNewYork The best FREE events in New York this weekend.

July
Resigned the position of the National Policy Advisors to the President with a letter
Rex How_Letter to the President_EN

June
AEP, The Association of Educational Publishers, established in 1895, has been announcing different kinds of Awards since 1967.
ChineseCUBES won the Innovation Award of Digital Games and Simulation Tools this year.

Check here.

Mar ChineseCUBES has been selected as a finalist for a 2013 SIIA CODiE Award, with 27 years’ history, in the following two categories:
Best Education Game or Simulation
Best PK-12 Personalized Learning Solution
Check here.

Feb ChineseCUBES won the iF Communication Design Award 2013. iF, or the International Forum Design Awards, with more than 50 years’ history, is the Oscar for the product designers.
Check here.

Feb ChineseCUBES AR exhibited at the New York Toy Fair, which held at the Javits Center each year. Nerdy With Children, an online reviews and community site for parents, ranked ChineseCUBES as one of the top five toys at the Toy Fair. What’s more, ChineseCUBES topped their list at number one! Check here.

Feb The influential Coolhunting.com picked up 4 top learning tools, and ChineseCUBES is one of them and the number one!
Check here.

2012

April Organized the Taipei Chinese Character Festival of 2012.

Jan Curated Taiwan Pavilion, the theme pavilion of 2012, in Angouleme Comic Book Fair, France.

2010

Jan ChineseCUBES, Ltd. established.

2009

Dec Simplified Chinese version of the the Diamond Sutra and Me: the Confessions of an Underground Buddhist published in China.

Nov Simplified Chinese version of Abi Sword published in China.

Oct Announced Beta version of Chinese Cubes in Frankfurt Book Fair. Chinese Cubes will be launched officially in the first months of 2010.

July Launched Classics Now, a campaign with twenty-four speakers around Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing
and Taipei to promote reading classics in the age of internet. Classics Now will be edited into a series of books and a website at the beginning of 2010.

Feb Rex How’s sixth book, the Diamond Sutra and Me: the Confessions of an Underground Buddhist, published.

Jan China Times Daily did an interview with Rex How to reveal his international publishing strategies.
Accepted the invitation to be one of the National Policy Advisors to the President.

2008

Dec Began to write the Diamond Sutra and Me: the Confessions of an Underground Buddhist.

Sep Starting to spend more time each month in Beijing to explore the mainland Chinese publishing market.

June The book of Our Hope Map was published. President Ma Ying-jeou came to the news conference to accept the book together with the hopes gathered in it.
An on-line survey about the performance of the new government was done afterwards by Hopemap.net. And the survey will be held once every year in President Ma’s terms.

Feb Invited 56 people together to launch Our Hope Map, the first project of HopeMap.net. A civic movement in the 2008 Presidential election of Taiwan as well as an effort trying to initiate an on-line performance art.
The website,HopeMap.net,was built up in 11 days from nothing, with the concept of Rex How, the interactive design teamwork of Akibo Works and Storynest, and database system design/support from Seednet.
HopeMap.net was open on 29th of Feb.
Up to the 20th of March, three weeks since its launch, this civic awareness  movement together with interactive game website have been gathering more and more support from both the on-line and off-line world. There are more than 150 websites and bloggers, among them are the big supporters like Taiwan Yahoo, together with very personal bloggers, who voluntarily support and link themselves to this website. And there are more than 60 libraries and bookstores in the real world which have voluntarily set up a bulletin to inform people that they can go on-line to post their own hopes.

Jan Abi Sword, pubished originally in 1989,  was a well-acclaimed Chinese martial-art story, by the famous comic artist Chen Uen and scriptor Mali.
In the August of 2007, Andrew Lau, the Hong Kong director of Infernal Affairs, remade as the oscar-winning The Departed by Martin Scorsese later, announced that he was going to adapt Abi Sword into a TV seriese as well as a moive in 2008.
Rex How openly admitted that Mali was his pen name for the first time, and began the serialized writing of Prelude of Abi Sword in his website.
A new edition of Abi Sword was published after 18 years.

2007

Launched U Care, I Care, www.ucareicare.net , in March. A  campaign to improve the relationship between patients and medical people.

Revised version of Work On Water published in China. It rapidly became a bestseller at major bookstores.

Rex How’s fourth book, Interviews with 9 People, published.
Inspired by Confessions of an Underground Buddhist, the ucareicare.net campaign, which heralds a change in medical and public welfare, is launched.

Rex How’s fifth book, Reading in the Internet Age, published. Becomes another bestseller. Mainland Chinese version to be published in January 2008.
Andrew Lau, co-director of Hong Kong blockbuster Internal Affairs, (remade by Martin Scorsese into a multi Oscar-winning film The Departed), announced that he would make Sword A-Bi, a classic Chinese martial arts graphic novel published in 1992 by illustrator Zheng Wen and script writer Rex How, into a TV series and a movie at the beginning of 2008.

A personal report on publishing in Taiwan, Our Next Ten Years, was publicized on the http://blog.rexhow.com and received an overwhelming response throughout the Chinese- speaking world. At the end of October, it was published by China Book Business Report in Beijing, filling five pages from its front page onwards.

2006
Honored as Taiwan’s Person of the Year by both China Times Daily and Kingstone Bookstore.
Launched Trans+, an imprint of supernatural topics, and N3Y , an imprint concerning women’s issues.
Rex How’s third book, Confessions of an Underground Buddhist (also known as The Light You See) published in Taiwan. The book, promoting better communication between doctors and patients, was not only a bestseller but also sparked an island-wide debate in Taiwan.

2005
Honored as one of “The Most Important Chinese Publishers for the Past Decade (1994-2004),” by the China Book Business Report, a highly influential publishing news media outlet in China.

2004
Co-founded Taipei Book Fair Foundation and elected as the Chairman of this foundation.
In charge of the 2005-2007 TIBE (Taipei International Book Exhibition) which has the most international flavor in Asia.
The second work of Rex How, My Korean Story, is published in Taiwan.

2003
Began Dala Publishing, an imprint of Locus focusing on sexuality and comics.
Co-translated How to Read a Book by Mortimer Adler and Charles Van Doren.

2002
Championed Taiwanese graphic artist Jimmy Liao, one of Locus’s authors, who became a phenomenon there.
Translated 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur Clarke.

2001
Founded “Net and Books,” a project combining a series of mooks (book-like magazines) and a website, fulfilling the desire of the readers throughout the whole Chinese-speaking world.

1999
At year’s end, left The Commercial Press, Ltd.
First work by Rex How, Work On Water, is published in Taiwan. It has become a long-time bestseller.

1998
Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie is published by Locus. The book went on to sell nearly 800,000 copies. Jean-Dominique Bauby’s The Diving Bell and Butterfly was another bestseller for Locus, selling 200,000 copies.

1997
President and Editor-in-Chief, The Commercial Press, Ltd. (Taiwan), the most historic publishing company in the whole Chinese-speaking world.
Joined the board of directors of The Commercial Press International in Beijing, which is the only publishing house with Taiwan partners officially linked to China.
Launched an OPEN series for the Commercial Press to celebrate its one hundredth anniversary, which received unanimous acclaim.
Concurrently maintained Chairmanship of Locus Publishing.

1996
At the end of October, founded Locus Publishing Company, a pioneer with the spirit of Future, Adventure.
With the very first book, Only the Paranoid Survives by Andy Grove, sold 100,000 copies, Locus immediately became one of the most vigorous publishing companies in Taiwan.

1996
Organizer, “The 5th TIBE, Taipei International Book Exhibition,” repositioning it as Asia’s most internationally flavored book fair.
Honored as Taiwan’s Person of the Year by Kingstone Bookstore, one of Taiwan’s largest booksellers.
At the end of March, left China Times. The last book published while there was Emotional Intelligence, which reached a record high of 700,000 copies in sales.

1988
President, China Times Publishing Company.
During the eight year tenure, both the number of books published annually and the annual sales increased dramatically as title numbers went up sixfold and sales revenues climbed fivefold, which laid down a solid foundation for the company to go public shortly thereafter.
The first to introduce Milan Kundera, Italo Calvino, and Haruki Murakami to Taiwan. All of them became literary phenomenons.
Under my direction, China Times became the first Taiwan publishing house to go international and was also the first to organize the Taiwan Publishers’ Pavilion at the Frankfurt Book Fair, which lead to a long friendship with then Frankfurt Book Fair President, Mr. Peter Weidhaas.
Created the series, Brain Turner, which hit a milestone with 6 million copies in sales.
Many local Taiwan authors, such as Tsai Chi-chung, Zhu De-yong, and Ao Yio-shiang, became top bestsellers in China later.

1979 ~1987
Worked for three different publishing houses and magazines: Long Bridge Publishing Company, 2001 Magazine, and Productivity Magazine.

1978
B.A. in International Trading, National Taiwan University.

1956
Born in Busan, South Korea.
Traditional Chinese education at Busan Overseas Chinese School through age 18.

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Reports on Rex How in English:

1. PW: Taiwan’s Wunderkind Publisher Goes Solo
Date: Jan 17, 2000
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA167859.html

2. When in Taipei- 2-5-2007 – Publishers Weekly
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6413161.html

3. Of TIBE, TBFF and Books – 9-11-2006 – Publishers Weekly
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6369642.html

4. A New Breed of Publishers
Date: Sep 11, 2006 | Author: by Teri Tan
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6369643.html

5. PW: Who is Publishing What in Taiwan
Date: Jul 1, 98 | Author: Sally Taylor
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA165785.html

6. Books in Taiwan: Still Flourishing
Date: Jul 12, 99 | Author: Sally Taylor
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA167099.html

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Rex How’s writings in English:

1. Opening the Digital Gate in East Asia, published in Book and Computer, Tokyo, 2003.

2. Memories of My Father, published in Reader’s Digest, Australia, 2001.

3. The man I know, Peter Weidhaas, and the Frankfurt Book Fair,  published as the preface to the History of Frankfurt Book Fair, by Peter Weidhaas, Taipei, 2006.

4. Conversation with Kohei Sugiura：Keeping the Ability to Be Surprised, published as one of the interviews in Interviews with 9 People, by Rex How, Taipei, 2006.