AUSTRALIA
Economic growth surprises
The nation’s economy expanded at a faster-than-expected 1.1 percent annual pace in the final three months of last year, as resurgent coal and iron ore prices helped the country avoid recession. The growth followed a shock 0.5 percent decline in the previous quarter. Growth for the whole of last year was 2.4 percent, up from 1.8 percent for the year through September. Mining and agriculture saw relatively strong growth in the fourth quarter. Iron ore and coal are the nation’s biggest exports, and reduced demand from China has cooled a mining boom and hurt the Australian economy. Treasurer Scott Morrison welcomed a 2 percent increase in business investment in December last year, the first rise after a dozen quarters of decline. Treasury Department Secretary John Fraser told a Senate committee yesterday that the fundamentals of the economy were “sound, but finely balanced.” The third quarter of last year showed that the economy remains sensitive to shocks, Fraser said. The quarter was the nation’s first quarter of economic contraction since early 2011.
TRANSPORT
Singapore mulls drones
Singapore is considering using drones and unmanned vehicles to inspect its underground railway tunnels, its transport regulator said yesterday, its latest experiment with new technology. The nation’s Land Transport Authority has put out a request on the possibility of industry participation in the use of unmanned aircraft and vehicle technology for inspections of its Mass Rapid Transit system and road tunnels. Labor-intensive manual inspections are carried out regularly on the rail system and road tunnels to check for problems such as cracks or water leaks. Singapore has announced plans to begin testing driverless buses and trucks. Self-driving cars are already being tested on public roads in a high-tech district in the west of the city.
TRANSPORT
Eurotunnel posts best year
Eurotunnel, which manages the rail link under the English Channel, yesterday said that last year was the best year in its more than 20-year history as profits tripled and passenger numbers grew. Despite fears over Britain’s exit from the EU and terrorism jitters in France, Eurotunnel posted profit of 200 million euros (US$210.75 million), helped by recent acquisitions. “It’s the best year we’ve ever had at the Eurotunnel group since the opening of the tunnel,” company chief executive officer Jacques Gounon told reporters. Last year’s net profit included 50 million euros from the integration of ElecLink, an electric link under the Channel purchased the previous year, as well as 64 million euros from discontinued activities, the group said in a statement. It was a sharp gain from the 75 million euros posted in 2015 and all important passenger numbers showed “strong growth” with 2.66 million tourist vehicles and 1.64 million lorries transported through the tunnel. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation were 514 million euros, an annual increase of 26 million euros, while turnover was 1.02 billion euros, up 4 percent from the previous year. Looking forward, Gounon said the firm is “extremely confident” about this year and next year. Opened in 1994, the Channel Tunnel carries passenger vehicles and freight lorries on special trains under the sea linking England and France, as well as Eurostar passenger trains connecting London with Paris, Brussels and other points in Europe.
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