SOUTH KOREA
Growth outlook raised
The nation yesterday raised its economic growth outlook this year to 2.7 percent from the 2.3 percent estimated in March, citing payoffs from back-to-back stimulus measures. The government also predicted that the economy would expand 4 percent next year. Meanwhile, the nation’s monthly current-account surplus hit an all-time high last month, with exports growing and imports falling, the Bank of Korea said yesterday. The current-account surplus stood at US$8.64 billion last month, the highest monthly amount on record, and up from US$3.57 billion a year earlier.
INDIA
Account deficit narrows
The nation’s current account deficit narrowed to 3.6 percent of GDP in the first quarter of the year, data showed yesterday, helping to reverse a dramatic slide in the rupee to historic lows. The better-than-expected figures eased pressure on the currency, which lost nearly 2 percent on Wednesday when it touched a record 60 to the US dollar. The deficit for the three months to March was US$18.1 billion, compared with a record US$32.6 billion, or 6.7 percent of GDP, for the previous quarter, the Reserve Bank of India said in a statement.
AVIATION
ANA discusses compensation
Japan’s All Nippon Airways (ANA) has begun compensation talks with Boeing over losses stemming from its troubled Dreamliner aircraft, the Nikkei Shimbun said yesterday. The carrier told its annual shareholders meeting that it lost about ¥12.5 billion (US$128 million) in sales after Boeing’s next-generation jet was grounded in January over a series of battery glitches, the report said, citing executive vice president Kiyoshi Tonomoto. Last week, Japan Airlines (JAL) said it had started compensation talks with Boeing after being forced to cancel hundreds of flights. JAL said it lost about ¥3.9 billion because of the problems.
TLECOMS
Dish ends Clearwire bid
Dish Network on Wednesday ended its bid to acquire Clearwire, clearing the path for rival Sprint Nextel to acquire the 50 percent of Clearwire it does not already own. Dish said it was withdrawing its tender offer to acquire Clearwire for US$4.40 per share, which was topped last week when Sprint raised its bid to US$5.00 a share. Last week, Dish abandoned its bid to acquire Sprint itself for US$25.5 billion after Japan’s Softbank raised its bid for Sprint.
AUTOMAKERS
GM to invest in Mexico
General Motors (GM) announced on Wednesday that it will invest US$691 million to boost its operations in Mexico, a nation whose low wages and proximity to the US are increasingly attracting automakers. GM said US$349 million will be allocated for a plant to build eight-speed transmissions in the central city of Silao, US$211 million to expand its complex in Toluca, near Mexico City, and US$131 million to expand a next-generation transmission factory in San Luis Potosi.
ENERGY
Gazprom ends gas project
Russia’s energy giant Gazprom yesterday said it was giving up development of the Shtokman natural gas field under the Barents Sea until new technology made the project viable. “We are waiting for the emergence of more efficient technologies, less costly or that market conditions change,” company spokesman Sergei Kuprianov told Moscow radio, delaying indefinitely a project in which France’s Total remained a partner.
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