SERVICES
Gourmet Master sales rise
Gourmet Master Co (美食達人), known for its coffee shop and bakery chain 85°C (85度C), yesterday said that revenue for last month reached NT$1.7 billion (US$52.77 million), up 13 percent from a year earlier. First-half revenue increased by 15 percent from a year earlier to NT$10.9 billion. The company attributed the increase to the integration of its central kitchens in China and the addition of stores in the US. Revenue in the second half is likely to continue growing from the first half, the company said.
AIRPORTS
Singapore plans high airport
Singapore is to build its new airport terminal higher than the rest of the city and has constructed seawalls along much of its coastline to protect the city from the effects of climate change. Changi Airport’s proposed fifth terminal will be built 5.5m above sea level, the government said in a climate change report released at the weekend. From 2011, the government required all new reclaimed land to be at least 4m higher than the mean sea level, up from 3m previously, the report said, and roads near coastal areas have been raised.
AUTOMAKERS
Anhui suspends electric SUV
Anhui Jianghuai Automobile Co (安徽江淮汽車) has stopped producing an electric SUV equipped with Samsung SDI Co batteries due to concern it might be stuck with unsold stock if the model is disqualified from government subsidies, because the South Korean supplier is not on a list of approved vendors. The Chinese automaker will resume manufacturing the iEV6s SUV, its most expensive electric model at 234,800 yuan (US$35,000) before subsidies, only after Samsung SDI makes it to the government’s approved list, a Jianghuai Auto executive in charge of new-energy vehicle research and development said.
CURRENCIES
Yen falls against 31 peers
Japan’s currency yesterday weakened against all 31 its major peers after Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo repeated his pledge for action on a stimulus package. Abe is to order measures to support domestic demand, including plans to speed up the construction of high-speed trains, he said. “This is good news for anybody who’s keen to get long [US] dollar-yen” before the Bank of Japan’s next policy meeting on July 29, said Gareth Berry, a foreign-exchange and rates strategist at Macquarie Bank Ltd in Singapore. “Give it another three weeks and dollar-yen bulls’ patience will be rewarded.” A long position means wagering on a currency pair to appreciate.
INTERNET
Line sets high IPO price
Japan-based Line Corp set the price of its initial public offering (IPO) at the top of the targeted range, as investors shrug off market volatility caused by Britain’s decision to withdraw from the EU. The messaging app, owned by South Korean portal Naver Corp, will sell at least 35 million shares at ¥3,300 apiece, the company said yesterday. That is at the top end of the increased ¥2,900 to ¥3,300 band the company had forecast. The higher price means Line will raise at least ¥115.5 billion (US$1.1 billion). Line will begin trading in New York on Thursday and in Tokyo the next day. The company’s US traded stock was priced at US$32.84. Best-known for letting users send each other cute cartoon “stickers,” Line is hugely popular in Japan, particularly among teenagers.
BUSINESS UPDATE: The iPhone assembler said operations outlook is expected to show quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year growth for the second quarter Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported strong growth in sales last month, potentially raising expectations for iPhone sales while artificial intelligence (AI)-related business booms. The company, which assembles the majority of Apple Inc’s smartphones, reported a 19.03 percent rise in monthly sales to NT$510.9 billion (US$15.78 billion), from NT$429.22 billion in the same period last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 14.16 percent, it said. The company in a statement said that last month’s revenue was a record-breaking April performance. Hon Hai, known also as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), assembles most iPhones, but the company is diversifying its business to
Apple Inc has been developing a homegrown chip to run artificial intelligence (AI) tools in data centers, although it is unclear if the semiconductor would ever be deployed, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. The effort would build on Apple’s previous efforts to make in-house chips, which run in its iPhones, Macs and other devices, according to the Journal, which cited unidentified people familiar with the matter. The server project is code-named ACDC (Apple Chips in Data Center) within the company, aiming to utilize Apple’s expertise in chip design for the company’s server infrastructure, the newspaper said. While this initiative has been
GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓), the world’s No. 3 silicon wafer supplier, yesterday said that revenue would rise moderately in the second half of this year, driven primarily by robust demand for advanced wafers used in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, a key component of artificial intelligence (AI) technology. “The first quarter is the lowest point of this cycle. The second half will be better than the first for the whole semiconductor industry and for GlobalWafers,” chairwoman Doris Hsu (徐秀蘭) said during an online investors’ conference. “HBM would definitely be the key growth driver in the second half,” Hsu said. “That is our big hope
The consumer price index (CPI) last month eased to 1.95 percent, below the central bank’s 2 percent target, as food and entertainment cost increases decelerated, helped by stable egg prices, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. The slowdown bucked predictions by policymakers and academics that inflationary pressures would build up following double-digit electricity rate hikes on April 1. “The latest CPI data came after the cost of eating out and rent grew moderately amid mixed international raw material prices,” DGBAS official Tsao Chih-hung (曹志弘) told a news conference in Taipei. The central bank in March raised interest rates by