VIDEO GAMES
Nintendo’s sales boost profit
Nintendo Co yesterday posted a ¥3.17 billion (US$26.3 million) profit for the fiscal second quarter, buoyed by sales growth of portable video game machines and software titles. The Japanese maker of the Super Mario and Pokemon video games, said July-September sales rose 18 percent to ¥113.96 billion, allowing it to stay in the black for the second quarter in a row. The company reported a ¥8.97 billion operating profit for the fiscal first half compared with a loss of ¥215 million a year earlier. It left its annual profit forecast unchanged at ¥35 billion.
BREWERS
Heineken beats estimates
Heineken NV, the world’s third-largest brewer, reported third-quarter sales growth that beat analysts’ estimates as good weather in Europe spurred consumers to buy more beer. Revenue increased 7.5 percent, the Amsterdam-based company said yesterday. Analysts expected 3.9 percent growth, according to the median of 14 estimates. Beer volume rose 5.4 percent, compared with the 2.6 percent gain predicted by analysts. The company expects to “continue to deliver positive top and bottom line growth,” chief executive Jean-Francois van Boxmeer said in a statement.
INTERNET
Twitter reports slim growth
Twitter Inc on Tuesday reported slim growth in its user base and a disappointing outlook. The social network said its loss in the third quarter narrowed to US$132 million from US$175 million in the same period last year. For its base of users, Twitter reported 320 million monthly active users — only modestly up from 316 million in the previous quarter and 11 percent higher than the previous year. Revenues grew 58 percent year-on-year to US$569 million, in line with its recent lowered forecast. However, the outlook for the coming quarter was for revenue in the range of US$695 million to US$710 million — well below most analysts’ expectations of US$740 million.
TECHNOLOGY
IBM under investigation
IBM Corp on Tuesday said that federal regulators are investigating its accounting of some of its business transactions in the US, the UK and Ireland. The company made the disclosure in a filing with securities regulators, saying it learned of the investigation in August. IBM said in the filing that it is cooperating with the probe, which is focused on the way the commercial technology giant reported revenue for certain transactions. IBM declined to provide further details, but issued a statement that said it “has a rigorous and disciplined process for the preparation of its financial statements and the reporting of revenue.”
AUSTRALIA
Inflation lower than expected
Inflation came in at a lower-than-expected 0.5 percent in the third quarter, official figures showed yesterday, boosting hopes that the central bank will cut interest rates next week. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) reading follows a 0.7 percent increase in the three months to June and brings the rise through the year to 1.5 percent, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said. Expectations had been for a CPI rise of 0.7 percent for the quarter and 1.7 percent year-on-year, with economists agreeing that the surprisingly weak data boosted the rate cut argument.
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],”