INDIA
Digital cash stocks surge
Prime Minister Narendra Modi might offer another gift to electronic cash companies. An index of the stocks has gained 12 percent since November last year’s surprise currency ban, and might further rally after the government introduced tax rebates on digital transactions on Dec. 25 last year. The gain in the gauge of 23 companies that make the devices and offer cashless services compares with the S&P BSE SENSEX’s 3 percent drop since Nov. 8 last year, when Modi invalidated 86 percent of the nation’s currency in circulation. Modi rolled out a slew of measures including rewards, tax rebates and discounts for digital transactions on Dec. 25.
TRANSPORT
Uber aims to placate critics
The ride-hailing company Uber and local governments often do not play well together. Uber pays little heed to regulations while city officials scramble to keep up with the company’s rapid deployment and surging popularity. However, with a new data-focused product, Uber is offering a tiny olive branch to its municipal critics. The company on Sunday unveiled Movement, a stand-alone Web site it hopes will persuade city planners to consider Uber as part of urban development and transit systems in the future. The site, which Uber is to invite planning agencies and researchers to visit in the coming weeks, is to allow outsiders to study traffic patterns and speeds across cities using data collected by tens of thousands of Uber vehicles. Users can use Movement to compare average trip times across certain points in cities and see what effect events might have on traffic patterns.
AUTOMAKERS
Mercedes-Benz leads pack
Mercedes-Benz is expected to reach its goal of becoming the largest premium automaker four years early — a feat achieved only after it stopped chasing market share and focused on making stylish high-tech cars. Introducing an elegant, sporty design and establishing itself as a pioneer in new technologies has helped revive the Mercedes brand which analysts say will help keep the Stuttgart-based automaker ahead of the pack. The achievement is a coup for Daimler chief executive officer Dieter Zetsche, who struggled to revive the company following a messy divorce from mass market brand Chrysler in 2007. On Sunday, Daimler said it had sold 2.08 million Mercedes-Benz branded passenger cars last year, taking the top spot from BMW AG, which has held the premium sales crown since 2005.
MACROECONOMICS
German production edges up
German industrial production crept up in November last year, official data showed yesterday, falling short of analysts’ predictions and moderating hopes Europe’s largest economy would end last year with a growth spurt. Production increased by 0.4 percent, correcting for price, seasonal and calendar effects, the federal statistics office Destatis said. Analysts surveyed by Factset had predicted slightly more robust growth of 0.65 percent. Investor and business sentiment indexes have been riding high in recent months after recovering from a post-Brexit shock, prompting some observers to predict a winter bonanza for the German economy. In a separate release, Destatis reported that German exports had seen a big increase of 3.9 percent in November last year, correcting for seasonal and calendar effects. Together, the data provide “some evidence that the German economy gained momentum in the final quarter,” ING Diba bank analyst Carsten Brzeski said.
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