ELECTRONICS
Samsung PRC fab approved
South Korea yesterday approved Samsung Electronics’ plan to build a new plant in China to produce high-tech memory chips used in tablets and smartphones, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy said. Following the approval, the world’s largest memory chip maker will select a site for the plant and seek Chinese government permission with a view to starting production next year, the ministry said in a statement. Samsung had requested permission for its planned export of key technology relating to NAND flash memory chips. When completed, the plant will produce 10,000 12 inch wafers per month.
INTERNET
Google demotes Chrome
Google Inc demoted its Chrome browser in Web-search rankings after an advertising effort for the tool ran afoul of its own rules governing paid promotions. The company is “making manual action to demote” Chrome and lower its ranking for at least 60 days, Mountain View, California-based Google said in an e-mailed statement on Tuesday. Google’s remarks came in response to blog posts that made favorable remarks about the Chrome browsing tool and said they were sponsored by Google, said Aaron Wall, founder of SEOBook.com, which trains marketers on how to improve search results.
TRAVEL
Thomas Cook does shake-up
Thomas Cook yesterday said that three board members would leave next month, two of them early, as the travel firm shakes up its leadership in the wake of a funding crunch that triggered a collapse in its share price. The world’s oldest travel firm said non-executive directors David Allvey, Bo Lerenius and Peter Middleton would all retire at the company’s annual shareholder meeting on Feb. 8, but that only Allvey had been due to go after nine years of service.
AUTOMAKERS
Suzuki plans Indonesia plant
Japan’s Suzuki Motor Corp yesterday said it would build a new engine factory in Indonesia in a bid to help boost output of small cars in the fast-growing Southeast Asian market. The car and motorcycle maker has spent ¥10 billion (US$130 million) on a 1.3 million square-meter site in an industrial park outside Jakarta for its third Indonesian factory, Dow Jones Newswires said.
ENERGY
PetroChina buys Athabasca
China will take over full ownership of a Canadian oil sands project for the first time after Athabasca Oil Sands Corp announced on Tuesday it sold the remaining 40 percent of the MacKay River oil sands development to PetroChina (中石油) for US$673 million. Athabasca had previously sold PetroChina a 60 percent stake in two oil sands projects, including MacKay river, and the possibility of the Chinese taking over full ownership was included in that deal and approved by the Canadian government.
UNITED STATES
Manufacturing grows faster
US manufacturing last month grew at its fastest pace in six months, capping a late-year upswing, but a European slump and rising oil prices posed threats to the US economy in the new year. The Institute for Supply Management’s index of national factory activity hit its highest level since June, coming in above forecasts at 53.9, more evidence that the US economy picked up steam in the fourth quarter. A reading above 50 indicates expansion.
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
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
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