LABOR
Firm tries to end dispute
Platinum giant Lonmin said on Friday it was committed to reaching a deal within days to end a labor dispute that has killed 44 people at a South African mine as authorities revived mediation efforts. Lonmin, the world’s third-largest platinum firm, said it would spend the weekend persuading the workers to return to the job on Monday, following the nation’s deadliest police action since apartheid.
OIL
YPF in talks with Chevron
Nationalized Argentine oil firm YPF said on Friday that it held talks with US company Chevron on cooperation in the development of Vaca Muerta shale oil and gas reserves in western Argentina. YPF chief executive Miguel Galuccio discussed working together on tertiary recovery projects and unconventional deposits in the Neuquen province oil and gas basin with Chevron’s Latin America and Africa director, Ali Moshiri, the Argentine company said. In May the Argentine government seized YPF from Repsol, accusing the Spanish oil giant of allowing oil and gas production to lapse, forcing the country’s oil import bill to rise.
BANKING
European fund faces delay
The European Commission has asked Spain to delay by another week the plans to create a “bad bank,” a fund that would pool much of its financial sector’s soured property investments, so that experts in Brussels can review the project, the government in Madrid said on Friday. The planned legislation was initially scheduled to be approved at Friday’s Cabinet meeting, but will now be cleared at the next ministers’ meeting on Aug. 31, Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said. The banks, eight of which have been nationalized, are loaded with more than 176 billion euros (US$223 billion) in bad real estate loans and other investments following the collapse of the property market in 2008.
FRAUD
Jewelry firm fined for fraud
A Hong Kong jewelry company has been fined US$800,000 for defrauding US Customs of more than US$1 million. Fai Po Jewellery Co entered its plea and was sentenced on Friday in the US District Court in Anchorage. The company must also pay just over US$1 million in restitution and the costs of the investigation.
The US Attorney’s office for Alaska said that the company prepared two invoices for every shipment of gold to US buyers. One with the true amount was sent to the buyer, but a smaller invoice that undervalued the goods was sent with the shipment through customs.
SEMICONDUCTORS
Chip sales set to slow
IHS iSuppli said on Friday that global semiconductor chip shipments are set to fall by 0.1 percent this year. That is down from a previous forecast for growth of up to 3 percent. It is the first annual decline since recession-colored 2009. ISuppli said shipments slowed noticeably compared to normal seasonal patterns in the April to June period. The weak global economy is one culprit, but most of the slowdown is in chips for PCs, iSuppli said. The company predicts better luck for the high-tech industry next year, projecting a 9 percent jump in chip shipments.
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],”