■HONG KONG
Disneyland to expand
Lawmakers in the special administrative region have approved a government plan to expand the city’s Disneyland at a cost of about US$465 million. The approval late on Friday came after the Walt Disney Co and the Hong Kong government agreed to expand their joint venture, Hong Kong Disneyland, two weeks ago after two years of negotiation. The proposed expansion will add three more theme areas and 30 more new attractions, enlarging the park by nearly a quarter over the next five years.
■CHINA
Firm gets go-ahead for IPO
A construction company has received approval for the biggest initial public stock offering this year and hopes to raise 42.6 billion yuan (US$6.3 billion), a state newspaper reported yesterday. China State Construction Engineering Corp (中國建築工程), the country’s biggest builder of housing, plans to issue 12 billion shares, the China Securities Journal reported. The company’s showcase projects include the “Water Cube” swimming center for the Beijing Olympics, the futuristic state TV headquarters and the Shanghai World Financial Center.
■INTERNET
Rosetta Stone sues Google
Rosetta Stone, a language-learning software producer, on Friday filed a federal lawsuit against Google for infringing its trademark through Google’s AdWords online advertising program. Rosetta Stone charges that Google is wrongly allowing its name and other trademarks to serve as keywords that other businesses can use to target paid advertisements to people on the Internet. Google said on Friday that its policy is to allow trademarks to be used to target AdWords advertising.
■AUTOMOBILES
Porsche board calls meeting
The German luxury sports car maker Porsche has scheduled an extraordinary meeting of its supervisory board on July 23 to discuss offers by Qatar and Volkswagen, sources said on Friday. A Porsche spokesman confirmed the meeting, while a source close to the supervisory board said the Qatar and VW offers would be discussed. Invitations were extended by Wolfgang Porsche, head of the supervisory board, the spokesman said.
■AVIATION
Continental to join alliance
The US government on Friday approved Continental Airlines’ bid to join the Star Alliance and granted partial antitrust immunity to a new joint venture within the group. The Transportation Department announced final approval of the requests made by Star members and Continental, confirming an April 7 finding that the proposed agreements would not hurt competition. Continental, the fourth-largest US airline and currently a member of the SkyTeam Alliance, will join Star, a grouping of more than 20 US and international airlines.
■PUBLISHING
Gannett announces cuts
The latest wrenching cutbacks at Gannett Co fell last week, as hundreds of employees at the largest US newspaper publisher received notices of layoffs. The company informed its newspapers last week that roughly 1,400 positions would be cut at Gannett’s US community publishing division, a unit that does not include its flagship USA Today newspaper. It was the latest major cutback for Gannett amid drastic revenue declines across the newspaper industry.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
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],”