INDUSTRY
Tanaka to lead Toshiba
Toshiba Corp, the Japanese maker of flash memory chips, elevators and nuclear reactors, said Hisao Tanaka will take over as president in June as it tries to bolster growth from energy and chip operations. Tanaka, 62, a corporate senior executive vice president in charge of strategy planning, purchasing and production, will replace president Norio Sasaki in June, the company said in a statement yesterday. Sasaki, who has headed Toshiba since June 2009, will become vice chairman, and Atsutoshi Nishida will remain chairman, Toshiba said. The changes are subject to approval by the board following a shareholders meeting in June. Toshiba, which supplies chips to Apple Inc, also needs to rebuild its home-appliances business after the unit had a ¥1.3 billion (US$14 million) loss last quarter. Tanaka’s experience in emerging markets is “very important” for the company, Nishida, 69, said yesterday in Tokyo.
BANKING
Mizuho to cut more jobs
Mizuho Financial Group Inc, Japan’s third-biggest bank by market value, plans to cut an additional 600 jobs as it targets profit of ¥550 billion in three years following the merger of its lending units. The bank will eliminate 4,300 positions, more than the 3,700 cuts previously planned, Mizuho said in an outline of its three-year business plan yesterday. The net income target for the year ending March 2016 compares with a ¥500 billion profit forecast for the current fiscal year. Mizuho has said it will combine its corporate and retail banking arms on July 1, bringing it in line with larger rivals Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc. The job reductions, which are already under way, include 2,000 over the next three years. Mizuho expects the unification into its “one bank” system will bring in ¥140 billion from cost savings and increased revenue by March 2016, it said yesterday.
AUTOMAKERS
CEO’s salary revealed
General Motors Co (GM), the largest US automaker, is proposing to pay chief executive officer Dan Akerson US$11.1 million this year, according to a document obtained by Bloomberg News. GM is planning US$82 million in compensation for its top 25 executives, the document shows. While the names of the GM employees were redacted, Akerson was identified as the highest-paid by a person familiar with the material who asked not to be revealed disclosing private information. Akerson was paid US$7.7 million for 2011, when his target compensation was US$9 million. Ally Financial Inc, formerly GM’s lending arm, wants to pay its CEO Michael Carpenter US$9.6 million, according to another document obtained by reporters. Pay for executives at seven bailed-out companies, including GM and Ally, was scrutinized and restricted by the US Department of the Treasury starting in 2009.
RESOURCES
CNOOC completes takeover
Chinese oil company CNOOC (中國海洋石油) says it has completed its US$15.1 billion purchase of Canadian energy producer Nexen. State-owned CNOOC said in a statement that the acquisition was completed on Monday. China’s biggest overseas energy deal was finalized after winning approval from a US agency that reviews takeovers by foreign companies for national security implications. The agency had a say because Nexen has Gulf of Mexico oil and gas fields.
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],”