■TRADE
ECCT re-elects chairman
The European Chamber of Commerce Taipei (ECCT) re-elected Philippe Pellegrin as chairman of its board of directors on Friday at its annual general meeting. Pellegrin, who has been on the ECCT board for three years, serving as treasurer in his first year and now chairman, acclaimed this year as one of the group’s best years ever. ECCT membership increased by 22 member companies and 50 individual members to a record high of 702 individual members this year, Pellegrin said, and the group also was able to organize meetings with government officials at all levels. Pellegrin, the senior country officer of Calyon Taiwan, said the new board will hit the ground running next week when ECCT members meet with Minister of Economic Affairs Yiin Chii-ming (尹啟銘) to discuss how European companies can work with the government to stimulate Taiwan’s economy.
■INDIA
Bank cuts interest rates
The central bank cut its two key interest rates by 100 basis points each yesterday to spur economic growth and counter fallout from the global financial crisis. The Reserve Bank of India reduced its repo rate — the rate at which it lends to commercial banks — to 6.5 percent and its reverse repo rate to 5.0 percent. The rate cuts were part of a wider stimulus package to bolster India’s trillion-dollar economy, which has been hit by the global recession and shaken further by last week’s deadly attacks in the financial capital Mumbai.
■BANKING
ANZ to cut 800 workers
Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd (ANZ), the nation’s fourth-largest, will cut 800 workers, or 2 percent of its workforce, amid a global economic downturn. Chief executive officer Mike Smith told staff at a briefing on Friday of the job losses, Kevin Foley, a spokesman for Melbourne-based ANZ, said yesterday by telephone. ANZ said on Nov. 14 that more than 500 jobs would be cut to cushion the company from the impact of the global credit crisis. Royal Bank of Scotland Plc is also cutting between 120 and 150 workers from the Australian unit of ABN Amro Holding NV, which it acquired this year, the Australian Financial Review said yesterday.
■INTERNET
Microsoft still wants Yahoo
Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer said on Friday the US software giant remained interested in acquiring Yahoo’s search business and would rather do a deal “sooner than later.” in an interview published in the online edition of the Wall Street Journal, Ballmer said: “I think a search deal makes great sense for Microsoft, and Yahoo. I think I’ve been very open about that.” Asked by the newspaper whether the Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft and Sunnyvale, California-based Yahoo were in talks, Ballmer replied: “The answer is no, but I wouldn’t tell you if there were.”
■AIRLINES
Lufthansa acquires Austrian
Lufthansa AG signed a deal in Vienna to buy 41.65 percent of Austrian Airlines from Austria’s state holding OeIAG on Friday, creating Europe’s biggest airline. The debt-ridden flag carrier will be sold for the token price of 366,000 euros (US$465,000), OeIAG confirmed in a statement, while Austria will inject 500 million euros into the company. The German carrier plans to take over 100 percent of Austrian Airlines, first through the privatization, and then through buying free-floating shares. The closing of the deal still depends on approval from the European Commission, which is expected for next spring.
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],”
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
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained