■ Automobiles
BMW grows in Asia
Asia has emerged once again as a BMW Group target this year after an 18.5 percent increase in regional sales last year over the previous year. BMW sold 93,000 cars in the region out of a record 1.1 million globally last year, chairman of the board Helmut Panke said Friday. After tailgating Mercedes-Benz for more than 10 years, BMW for the first time overtook its archrival in Asia, he said. "In the long term, we continue to pursue the goal of raising Asian sales steadily to the high level of our traditional main sales pillars: Germany, West Europe and the United States," Panke said. World economic prospects have improved and a slight increase in the automobile market was expected, with Southeast Asia and China continuing to show "dynamic development," he added. Looking ahead, Panke said BMW was on track to double Asian sales by 2008.
■ Internet
Kazaa offices raided
The Sydney offices of the Australian firm that runs the global file-sharing Web site Kazaa have been raided by litigants in a civil copyright case brought by major record labels, Australia's ABC Radio reported yesterday. The swoop by recording industry officials came ahead of next week's court case in which the industry hopes to close down Kazaa, a site run by Sharman Networks. The industry alleges Kazaa promotes copyright piracy, which it says is costing it hundreds of millions of dollars in lost revenue. Michael Speck, the general manager of Music Industry Piracy Investigations, told the ABC that the raid "sends a very clear message to Internet pirates in Australia that the game is up." The raids follow the sentencing of three Sydney university students in November for running a Web site that allowed visitors to swap MP3 files.
■ Fashion
Chanel ties with Ducasse
Icons of the French way of life, couture house Chanel and star chef Alain Ducasse, on Friday said they were planning to open a Ducasse restaurant atop a Chanel building in Tokyo. "It will be in narrow collaboration, as a joint-venture, and thus be a big first in our industry as well as in the prestige restaurant business," Richard Collasse, chairman of Chanel Japan, told reporters by telephone from Tokyo. No figures were available on the deal, but further details are expected at a Tokyo media conference March 30. The restaurant would be located on the top floor of a building being built by Chanel on Tokyo's Ginza avenue.
■ Financial aid
Zambia wants off blacklist
Zambian Finance Minister Ngandu Magande presented the national budget for this year to parliament Friday, saying this year's prime objective was to have its suspension from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) lifted. "This is critical and cardinal for the country to reach," Magande said. The impoverished southern African country was suspended from the IMF poverty reduction and debt relief programs after it mismanaged its 2003 to 2004 budget by over-spending 610 billion kwacha (about US$130 million). "In this regard, we urgently need a sharp adjustment in 2004 to address a growing threat to fiscal sustainability, which will greatly erode and endanger our economic propects," Magande said.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day