MEDIA
Visual buys Corbis unit
Chinese image licensing company Visual China Group (視覺中國) on Friday said it had acquired the image division and content licensing unit of photograph library Corbis Entertainment, owned by Microsoft Corp cofounder Bill Gates. The company signed another deal with media service provider Getty Images Inc to distribute Corbis’ images and content to customers, thus bringing in a major photograph library and an image distributor to China.
UNITED STATES
Home resales jump 14.7%
Home resales rebounded last month from a 19-month low and prices surged, the National Association of Realtors said on Friday. Existing home sales jumped a record 14.7 percent to an annual rate of 5.46 million units, after being temporarily held back by the introduction of new mortgage disclosure rules, data showed. Sales for last month were also boosted by unseasonably warm weather and buyers rushing into the market in anticipation of higher mortgage rates. Overall, sales for last year rose 6.5 percent to 5.26 million units, the strongest since 2006.
CANADA
Retailers warn of price hikes
The Canadian dollar’s plunge to a nearly 13-year low this week has grocers, fishmongers and other import-reliant retailers warning that shoppers can expect further price increases in the coming months. Data released on Friday showed annual inflation rose last month as food prices surged. Canadians paid 4.1 percent more for food purchased at stores, mainly due to higher prices for fresh fruit and vegetables. The dollar has dropped along with national economic prospects as the price of oil tests its lowest levels since 2003.
AUCTIONS
Sotheby’s posts Q4 loss
Sotheby’s, the New York-based auctioneer of art and collectibles, on Friday posted a fourth-quarter loss and said it would scrap its quarterly dividend to buy back more shares instead. The net loss is likely to be about US$10 million to US$19 million, Sotheby’s said in a report. The company said it would no longer pay its US$0.10 quarterly dividend, after its board of directors approved a US$200 million increase to the remaining US$125 million share buyback program.
SOFTWARE
VMware to cut 900 jobs
VMware Inc is to cut about 900 positions under a restructuring plan to be announced next week, a person with knowledge of the matter said. The job reductions might be announced on Tuesday when the company reports quarterly earnings or a day earlier, the person said. That level of job cuts would represent about 5 percent of VMware’s workforce of 18,000. VMware’s parent company, EMC Corp, is being acquired by Dell Inc.
AUTOMAKERS
Apple car project head quits
Apple Inc’s Steve Zadesky, who has been overseeing the company’s electric car project over the past two years, has said he is leaving the company, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter. Zadesky is leaving for personal reasons not related to his performance, the Journal said. Apple declined to comment.
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],”