AVIATION
Air Canada strike ends
Air Canada’s 3,800 customer service and ticket agents were set to return to work yesterday after reaching a deal with the airline to end a two-day strike. The agreement was reached after the government, concerned about the stoppage’s impact on economic recovery, threatened to order the strikers back to work. The new contract includes a salary hike. However, the outstanding issue of future pension benefits for new employees is to be referred to arbitration for resolution.
AUTOMAKERS
Suzuki strike settled
India’s largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki ended a 13-day strike late on Thursday that has cost the company more than US$60 million, the Press Trust of India quoted a government minister as saying. Employees at the company, 54.2 percent-owned by Japan’s Suzuki Motor Corp, went on strike to demand that a new union be recognized by management. It was not immediately clear if that demand had been met. Maruti, which operates two manufacturing facilities in India, has fired 11 workers at the Manesar plant since the strike began, citing indiscipline.
MINING
Rio Tinto buys Riversdale
Anglo-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto yesterday said it would buy the remaining shares in Riversdale Mining, after acquiring Tata Steel’s stake in the Africa-focused company. Rio said that as of yesterday it had purchased 99.74 percent of Riversdale shares, including the 26.28 percent stake of India’s Tata, and that it would compulsorily acquire the remaining stock. The Indian company said on Thursday it would sell its Riversdale assets for about US$1.1 billion.
MACAU
Studio City taken over
Casino operator Melco Crown Entertainment said yesterday that it would pay US$360 million for a controlling stake in a new gaming resort, its second in the Asian gaming hub. The Macau Studio City on the lucrative Cotai Strip will be in direct competition with big names including Las Vegas Sands’ 3,000-room Venetian and Galaxy Macau’s US$1.9 billion casino mega-resort which opened last month. The deal ends a stand-off between the previous owners, eSun Holdings and New Cotai Holdings, who were suing each other in Hong Kong.
SOFTWARE
Microsoft pushes Kinect
Microsoft on Thursday began letting software developers imbue computers with voice and motion-sensing technology from its Kinect controller for the Xbox 360 videogame console. A free Kinect for Windows Software Development Kit opens the door for computer programs enhanced with depth--perception, voice recognition or gesture controls using the popular console accessory. Microsoft last week added YouTube, voice commands, television shows and more to its Xbox 360 with Kinect as the videogame console matures into an entertainment center.
SOUTH KOREA
Interest rate boost needed
Seoul needs to continue raising interest rates to combat inflation, the IMF said yesterday in Gwacheon. The fund also cut its inflation projection for this year from 4.5 percent to 4.3 percent. Bank of Korea board member Kang Myung-hun said on Thursday the central bank might need to slow the pace of interest-rate increases because of the global economic outlook. Inflation has exceeded the bank’s 4 percent target every month this year.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to