■INTERNET
Google founders sell shares
Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin each plan to sell 5 million shares in the Internet giant, a move that would reduce their joint holdings to below 50 percent, a filing TO the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said on Friday. The SEC filing said the stock sales, which will occur over the next five years, are part of a pre-determined stock trading plan set up by Page and Brin on Nov. 30.
■BREWERIES
Beer blockade lifted
A blockade that threatened to strangle supplies of top Belgian beers to home and neighboring European markets ended on Friday, after management and unions said a compromise was reached. Two weeks after workers first barricaded Stella Artois, Jupiler and Hoegaarden breweries, in protest at owners Anheuser-Busch InBev’s plans to cut 10 percent of its European workforce, drinkers can breathe easier. AB InBev produces around 60 percent of the beer consumed in Belgium’s bars and cafes.
■COMPUTERS
Wife punishes Oracle chief
Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, and Oracle Corp president Charles Phillips has learned that lesson in a very public way. Huge billboards depicting the married software executive with YaVaughnie Wilkins, his former mistress, appeared this week in New York, Atlanta and San Francisco, setting tabloid tongues wagging. The billboards with the words “You are my soulmate forever!” appeared to be an attempt by Wilkins to embarrass Phillips after their relationship ended and he returned to his wife. The billboards also featured the address of a Web site that contains photos of Wilkins and Phillips, karaoke tracks and articles written by Wilkins.
■BANKING
Barclays’ bonuses deferred
Top staff at Barclays will defer payment of up to 100 percent of their bonuses for up to three years as they seek to respond to public anger about banking pay, the Financial Times reported Saturday. The business daily said this would apply to members of the British bank’s 11-member executive committee, led by chief executive John Varley, while the next 2,000 or so staff could defer upwards of 75 percent for three years.
■INDUSTRY
GE income down 19 percent
General Electric Co’s fourth-quarter net income fell 19 percent, but the industrial bellwether is seeing signs of stability as it moves into a key rebuilding year. For the quarter, GE posted net income of US$2.94 billion, or US$0.28 per share. That compared with US$3.65 billion, or US$0.35, a year earlier. GE said that orders improved late in the year in its businesses that supply equipment like turbines for power plants and sonogram machines for hospitals.
■FAST FOOD
McDonald’s profit rises
McDonald’s dollar menu keeps gaining fans in the recession, and its profit rose last fall, but the world’s largest burger chain said on Friday that its annual revenue slipped for the first time in at least a quarter century. For the three months that ended on Dec. 31, McDonald’s rang up revenue of US$5.97 billion — 7 percent more than the same period last year. Falling commodity costs and currency fluctuations helped boost the company’s fourth quarter profit, which amounted to US$1.22 billion, or US$1.11 per share. For the full year, McDonald’s profit climbed 6 percent to US$4.55 billion, or US$4.11 per share.
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