TELECOMS
Huawei to buy out venture
Chinese telecoms giant Huawei Technologies (華為) will buy out a joint venture with US security software maker Symantec by acquiring its 49 percent stake for US$530 million, the firms said yesterday. The venture, Hong Kong-based Huawei Symantec (華為賽門鐵), was set up in 2008 to provide security, storage and systems management solutions. The companies decided that having a single owner would help the Hong Kong firm to grow, Huawei and Symantec said in a statement. Enrique Salem, Symantec president and chief executive, was quoted as saying that China was one of Symantec’s fastest-growing markets and that it had exited the joint venture with a “good return.”
APPLIANCES
Electrolux to cut costs
Swedish appliance maker Electrolux AB said it plans to cut costs by about 5.1 billion kronor (US$770 million) a year and will review staffing levels in all regions. Electrolux said yesterday it has been “tangibly affected” by a decline in consumer confidence in Europe and North America, while increased costs for raw materials have also weighed on earnings. It says the savings plan is estimated to provide 2.6 billion kronor more in savings than its previous plan. Measures include adapting manufacturing capacity, speeding up synergy savings, improving purchasing and reducing costs through a review of employment levels. The company said it expects the measures to cost 5 billion kronor.
BANKING
UBS names Ermotti CEO
UBS AG said its board has appointed interim chief Sergio Ermotti as the Swiss bank’s new chief executive. Ermotti had been tipped to succeed Oswald Gruebel following the German’s premature departure over a US$2 billion rogue trading loss. The 51-year-old Swiss took over on an interim basis on Sept. 24 and has since announced several reforms to the bank’s operations. Zurich-based UBS also said yesterday that board chairman Kaspar Villiger would make way for his successor Axel Weber at the bank’s shareholder meeting in May next year.
EMPLOYMENT
Google tops US students’ list
Google tops the list when it comes to where US students want to work after graduating, according to a survey released on Monday by brand specialty firm Universum. The California-based Internet firm placed among the top 10 “ideal employers” for college students in an array of majors, including liberal arts, natural sciences and information technology. Google, Apple and the Walt Disney Co, in that order, were considered the best places for business majors to work, based on the survey of 61,726 students at 345 universities.
COMMODITIES
No wrongdoing: Sino-Forest
Sino-Forest Corp (嘉漢林業), a Chinese timber firm listed in Toronto, said an independent committee found no evidence of fraud at the company, whose share price has been savaged this year following allegations by short-seller Muddy Waters. “We can categorically say Sino-Forest is not the ‘near total fraud’ and ‘Ponzi scheme’ as alleged by Muddy Waters,” Sino-Forest chief executive Judson Martin said in a statement. Sino-Forest was the largest forestry company listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange until its shares collapsed in June after the fraud allegations surfaced. In the statement, Martin, a Canadian, said the committee verified the company’s cash balances, timber assets, book values and revenues. A final report by the committee should be completed by the year-end.
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