SWITZERLAND
Holiday boosts watch exports
The country’s watch exports started the year with the strongest growth in more than five years, buoyed by strong demand for high-end timepieces in Asia and a later Lunar New Year. Shipments last month rose 13 percent to 1.6 billion francs (US$1.7 billion), the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry said yesterday. That is the biggest jump since October 2012 and the ninth consecutive month of gains. The numbers follow the first annual gain since 2014. Exports were lifted by orders for Lunar New Year, which occurred a month later this year than last year. A rekindled appetite for luxury timepieces in China and Hong Kong have led a rebound from the longest slump on record, which was caused by a Chinese crackdown on corruption, terrorist attacks in Europe and the rise of the smartwatch.
INDIA
Software sector to grow 9%
The nation’s software services industry expects growth of as much as 9 percent in fiscal 2019 as Tata Consultancy Services Ltd and its peers strengthen automation and adapt to the rapid onset of digital technologies. Sales are expected to rise 7 to 9 percent in constant currency terms in the fiscal year ending in March next year, the National Association of Software and Services Companies said yesterday at its annual meeting in Hyderabad. In the current financial year, revenue from the industry is expected to rise 7.8 percent to US$167 billion. The IT industry, led by Tata, is groping for a new business model as automation and artificial intelligence upends decades of billing customers for hourly work.
AUTOMAKERS
Toyota to cut rare earth use
Toyota Motor Corp is readying electric motors that include as much as 50 percent less rare earths amid concern of a supply crunch as automakers race to expand their electric-vehicle lineups. Asia’s biggest automaker has developed a magnet for the motors that as much as halves the use of a rare earth called neodymium, and eliminates the use of others called terbium and dysprosium, the company said at a briefing in Tokyo yesterday. In their place, Toyota is to use the rare earths lanthanum and cerium, which cost 20 times less than neodymium. Toyota sees demand for neodymium exceeding supply from 2025, by which time it intends to be offering an electrified version of every vehicle in its lineup. By 2030, Toyota aims to sell 5.5 million electrified vehicles — including 1 million wholly battery or hydrogen-powered cars — accounting for half of its projected deliveries.
SINGAPORE
Tax hike said to aim equity
The city-state’s tax increase on home purchases exceeding S$1 million (US$758,960) is aimed at making duties more equitable rather than imposing an additional property curb, Minister of Industry S. Iswaran said. Stamp duty on the portion of a property’s price above S$1 million was raised yesterday from 3 to 4 percent, after the government announced the move on Monday. Home prices have rebounded in the past two quarters, prompting aggressive land bids from developers as the market shrugged off cooling measures ranging from additional taxes to limits on loans to emerge from a four-year slump. Collective apartment sales for redevelopment in the first two months of this year totaled more than S$3.1 billion, almost double the S$1.66 billion seen in same period during the last en-bloc market peak in 2007, Nomura analyst Min Chow Sai wrote in a note on Monday.
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