TRANSPORTATION
GM gives Lyft a leg up
Got a jalopy or do not even have a car? You can still be a driver for ride-sharing service Lyft Inc. General Motors Co (GM) is rolling out a program called Express Drive starting in Chicago and expanding to Baltimore, Boston and Washington that lets Lyft drivers rent a Chevrolet Equinox sport utility vehicle for US$99 per week. Renters also pay US$0.4 per mile (1.6km), but mileage is free for drivers who complete 40 rides a week and all fees are waived for those who handle 65, Lyft president and cofounder John Zimmer said in a telephone interview. The program is GM’s latest move to get a piece of the growing market of ride-sharing services. GM bought a 9 percent stake in Lyft for US$500 million in January to compete with Uber Technologies Inc, the US’ largest ride-sharing service, and develop a network of autonomous vehicles.
MUSIC
Sony to buy Jackson’s stake
Sony yesterday said that it is to pay Michael Jackson’s estate US$750 million for the late pop star’s share of a music venture that owns the rights to songs by some of the biggest names in music history. The deal will see the Japanese firm pick up Jackson’s 50 percent stake in Sony ATV Music Publishing, which owns several million titles, including those written by the Beatles, Marvin Gaye and Bob Dylan. Sony is to control all of the company, whose catalog also includes hits by Taylor Swift, Kanye West, Sam Smith and Lady Gaga. Sony ATV Music Publishing was formed in 1995 by the Japanese electronics giant and the late “King of Pop,” who transformed music with iconic hits including Thriller and Beat It. Jackson’s estate said it would still own his master recordings and the publishing company that owns all the songs he penned. It would also keep its stake in EMI Music.
ENERGY
GE chief makes US$33m
General Electric Co (GE) chief executive officer Jeffrey Immelt earned US$33 million last year as he accelerated a dramatic transformation of the industrial giant while boosting the value of the company’s shares. Excluding a change in pension value, Immelt’s adjusted compensation rose 14 percent to US$23.4 million, GE said on Monday in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. His base salary of US$3.8 million and bonus of US$5.4 million were little changed from the previous year. Under Immelt’s watch, GE boosted its market value by US$40 billion during the year and expanded industrial profit margins, earnings and revenue, the company said. It also reached deals to unload more than US$150 billion of lending assets and closed the US$10.3 billion acquisition of Alstom SA’s energy business.
INVESTMENT
No respite for PIMCO
Pacific Investment Management Co LLC (PIMCO) might not win a quick end to a lawsuit by Bill Gross alleging he is owed hundreds of millions of US dollars after being forced out of the firm he cofounded 45 years ago. A California state judge tentatively ruled that Gross met minimum requirements to go forward with his wrongful termination lawsuit against PIMCO. “Gross alleges sufficient facts based on allegations concerning his status as the founder, a 40-year history, an alleged track record of bringing success and/or fame to the enterprise, as well as a series of alleged oral promises/assurances of continued employment,” California Superior Court Judge Martha Gooding said on Monday in her tentative decision, issued before a hearing.
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
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
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],”
MAJOR BENEFICIARY: The company benefits from TSMC’s advanced packaging scarcity, given robust demand for Nvidia AI chips, analysts said ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packaging and testing service provider, yesterday said it is raising its equipment capital expenditure budget by 10 percent this year to expand leading-edge and advanced packing and testing capacity amid strong artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing chip demand. This is on top of the 40 to 50 percent annual increase in its capital spending budget to more than the US$1.7 billion to announced in February. About half of the equipment capital expenditure would be spent on leading-edge and advanced packaging and testing technology, the company said. ASE is considered by analysts