ELECTRONICS
Samsung factory robbed
Authorities say a group of bandits raided a Samsung Electronics factory in Brazil and made off with about US$36 million worth of cellphones and computers. Sao Paulo Police Lieutenant Vitor Chaves told the Globo television network that the gang captured several plant employees and stole their ID tags. The group then overpowered security guards and spent about three hours in the plant, trucking out the electronics early Monday. Investigators are looking at security video supplied by the South Korean company. The factory is in Campinas, north of Sao Paulo.
RETAIL
Carrefour to exit India
French retail giant Carrefour SA said on Monday that it would pull out of the Indian market with the closure of its five wholesale “cash & carry” stores by the end of September. Press reports have linked the move to the general election victory in May by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, said to oppose opening up the huge Indian retail market to foreign distributors. Carrefour chief executive George Plassat had already indicated that the group had been considering whether to maintain a presence in India, where its first store opened in 2010.
AUTOMAKERS
GM outlines Argentina plan
General Motors Co (GM) is to invest US$740 million in Argentina through 2016 on its first South American factory turning out aluminum motors, Buenos Aires said on Monday. The new unit is to be installed in the GM complex in Rosario, an agro-industrial port city about 300km northwest of the capital, according to the office of Argentine President Cristina Fernandez. Production at the new factory is to start in 2017 and aims to reach 140,000 motors a year.
TRADE
Japan posts fourth surplus
Japan recorded a current account surplus for the fourth straight month in May, government data showed yesterday, as the country’s trade shortfall narrowed. The surplus of ¥522.8 billion (US$5.1 billion) was down 7.7 percent from the same month a year ago, but the rate of decline was much smaller than a 76.1 percent drop in April. The latest current account figure was influenced by a drop in the country’s trade deficit as imports fell for the first time in 19 months.
TRADE
German surplus widens
Germany’s trade surplus widened in May, as imports fell faster than exports, official data showed yesterday. In seasonally adjusted terms, Germany exported goods worth a total of 92.8 billion euros (US$126 billion) in May, down 1.1 percent from the figure for April, the federal statistics office Destatis said in a statement. Imports dropped by 3.4 percent to 74.1 billion euros. That meant the seasonally adjusted trade surplus increased to 18.8 billion euros in May from 17.2 billion euros in April.
CHIPMAKERS
Panasonic, Intel team up
Intel Corp said it signed up Panasonic Corp as a customer in its biggest win so far for its chip-production effort. Panasonic’s chip division is to use Intel to make system-on-chip products on the US company’s 14-nanometer technology, which is the most recent type of manufacturing process for semiconductors, Intel said in a statement on Monday. Intel is to make chips for audiovisual equipment for the Japanese company, the statement said. Intel has signed five other customers, including Altera Corp, the company said.
WASHINGTON’S INCENTIVES: The CHIPS Act set aside US$39 billion in direct grants to persuade the world’s top semiconductor companies to make chips on US soil The US plans to award more than US$6 billion to Samsung Electronics Co, helping the chipmaker expand beyond a project in Texas it has already announced, people familiar with the matter said. The money from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act would be one of several major awards that the US Department of Commerce is expected to announce in the coming weeks, including a grant of more than US$5 billion to Samsung’s rival, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), people familiar with the plans said. The people spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the official announcements. The federal funding for
HIGH DEMAND: The firm has strong capabilities of providing key components including liquid cooling technology needed for AI servers, chairman Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday revised its revenue outlook for this year to “significant” growth from a “neutral” view forecast five months ago, due to strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers from cloud service providers. Hon Hai, a major assembler of iPhones that is also known as Foxconn, expects AI server revenues to soar more than 40 percent annually this year, chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) told investors. The robust growth would uplift revenue contribution from AI servers to 40 percent of the company’s overall server revenue this year, from 30 percent last year, Liu said. In the three-year period
LONG HAUL: Largan Energy Materials’ TNO-based lithium-ion batteries are expected to charge in five minutes and last about 20 years, far surpassing conventional technology Largan Precision Co (大立光) has formed a joint venture with the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) to produce fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, mobile electronics and electric storage units, the camera lens supplier for Apple Inc’s iPhones said yesterday. Largan Energy Materials Co (萬溢能源材料), established in January, is developing high-energy, fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries using titanium niobium oxide (TNO) anodes, it said. TNO-based batteries can be fully charged in five minutes and have a lifespan of 20 years, a major advantage over the two to four hours of charging time needed for conventional graphite-anode-based batteries, Largan said in a
Taiwan is one of the first countries to benefit from the artificial intelligence (AI) boom, but because that is largely down to a single company it also represents a risk, former Google Taiwan managing director Chien Lee-feng (簡立峰) said at an AI forum in Taipei yesterday. Speaking at the forum on how generative AI can generate possibilities for all walks of life, Chien said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) — currently among the world’s 10 most-valuable companies due to continued optimism about AI — ensures Taiwan is one of the economies to benefit most from AI. “This is because AI is