VEHICLES
Toyota forms EV venture
Japanese auto giant Toyota Motor Co yesterday said it was teaming up with Mazda Motor Corp and parts-maker Denso Corp in a new joint venture to develop electric vehicles (EV). Joint research — sharing cost, engineers and knowledge — is necessary to meet increasingly stringent, but varying environmental standards around the world, the three firms said in a joint statement. Toyota will take a 90 percent stake in the venture, to be launched next month in Nagoya, near the automaker’s headquarters.
TECHNOLOGY
Toshiba, Bain agree on sale
Toshiba Corp signed a final agreement to sell its flash memorychip business to a group led by Bain Capital for about ¥2 trillion (US$18 billion), moving a step closer to completing the deal after months of contentious negotiations. The Bain consortium includes major players Apple Inc, Dell Inc, SK Hynix Inc and Japan’s Hoya Corp, while Toshiba itself will maintain a stake, the company said in a statement yesterday. The total value of the transaction may change depending on capital expenditures.
ENERGY
Beach to buy Lattice Energy
Australia’s Beach Energy Ltd agreed to buy Origin Energy Ltd’s conventional oil and gas business, Lattice Energy, for A$1.59 billion (US$1.25 billion) in a deal set to triple the Adelaide-based company’s reserves. Beach is to fund the acquisition through a A$301 million share sale and a new A$1.58 billion debt facility, the company said in a statement yesterday. The agreement will boost Beach’s proved and probable reserves by 200 percent to 232 million barrels of oil equivalent, while lifting its this year’s production guidance by 150 percent to between 25 million and 27 million barrels.
NEW ZEALAND
Central bank holds rates
New Zealand’s central bank held interest rates at a record low and signaled it does not expect to raise them anytime soon amid weak inflation. “Monetary policy will remain accommodative for a considerable period,” Reserve Bank Acting Governor Grant Spencer said in a statement yesterday after keeping the official cash rate at 1.75 percent. “Numerous uncertainties remain and policy may need to adjust accordingly.”
GERMANY
Consumer confidence slips
Germans will be slightly less confident about future income and less keen on splashing out next month, a poll showed yesterday, even as belief in the nation’s economic strength remains high. Consumer confidence fell 0.1 points to 10.8, as measured by pollsters GfK’s forward-looking survey of about 2,000 people. People’s expectations for growth in their own income fell back slightly this month, but wage expectations “remain at a very high level,” GfK said, with people “assuming that they’ll clock up significant growth in income in the future.”
ENERGY
BNP to advise on SWCC sale
Saudi Arabia hired BNP Paribas SA to advise on the sale of a US$7.2 billion power plant, people familiar with the matter said. Saline Water Conversion Co (SWCC) is working with the French lender to find a buyer for the plant, the biggest of its kind when it was built in 2014, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. The sale is part of a broader strategy to privatize SWCC by selling some of its existing assets and developing new plants with the private sector, they said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last