AVIATION
HNA on acquisition spree
Chinese conglomerate HNA Group Co (海航集團) agreed to buy Swiss airline catering company Gategroup Holding AG for 1.4 billion Swiss francs (US$1.5 billion), as billionaire Chen Feng (陳峰) continues on an acquisition spree of aviation assets around the world. Shareholders would get SF53 a share, as well as the previously declared SF0.30 per share dividend, HNA said in a statement yesterday. The offer is about 20 percent more than the closing price on Friday. The acquisition builds on the airline and aviation assets the conglomerate has made from Brazil to Switzerland. Private companies in China are starting to rival state-owned enterprises in heeding the government’s call to go global. Chinese buyers have announced plans to spend more than US$77 billion this year through February next year, Bloomberg data showed.
COMMUNICATIONS
Hutchison takeover slammed
CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd’s planned takeover of Telefonica SA’s O2 unit in the UK was criticized by the country’s competition authority, which wrote to the European Commission outlining its concerns about the proposed merger. Hutchison’s plan to create the UK’s largest mobile phone business by combining its Three unit with O2 would increase prices and possibly reduce the quality of service, the country’s Competition and Markets Authority said in a letter yesterday.
OIL
Gulf states hit by low prices
Oil-rich Gulf states are expected to borrow between US$285 billion and US$390 billion through 2020 to finance budget deficits resulting from low oil prices, a report said on Sunday. The six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states, which heavily rely on oil earnings, are expected to post a shortfall of US$318 billion last year and this year, Kuwait Financial Centre (Markaz) said in a report. The GCC groups Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates. Their public finances have been hit hard since oil prices shed more than two thirds of their value since the middle of 2014.
ENVIRONMENT
India under fire over funding
The Indian government has come under fire after allocating 3.5 billion rupees (US$52.7 million) for climate change adaptation over the next two financial years, a sum which environmental experts said is woefully inadequate given the size of the country and the challenges it faces. In a written response to a question by a member of parliament during a session to discuss the upcoming budget, Minister for Environment Prakash Javadekar said that the sum allocated to the National Adaptation Fund on Climate Change would cover the two financial years from last to this year and this year to next year. Experts expressed surprise and concern at the government’s announcement.
SOUTH AFRICA
Gupta family leave for Dubai
South Africa’s wealthy Gupta family, accused of exerting undue influence over President Jacob Zuma, have left the country for Dubai, a newspaper reported on Sunday. “The whole family is in the process of leaving,” family spokesman Nazeem Howa told the City Press weekly. The paper said that Ajay and Atul Gupta, two brothers from the family of wealthy Indian immigrants who own a vast business empire with interests in mining, media, technology and engineering, were seen on Thursday evening at a Johannesburg airport boarding their private jet for Dubai.
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
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six