AUTOMAKERS
US deal creates barriers
Unions at South Korea’s two largest automakers, Hyundai Motor and Kia Motors, say plans to revise a free-trade deal with the US involve concessions that would prevent local automakers from entering the fast-growing US pick-up truck market. Hyundai’s labor union yesterday said that the South Korean government gave in to US President Donald Trump at a time when the US market represents big opportunities. Kia’s labor union said it shares that view. Hyundai said in a statement that it hoped the two governments would work together to defuse trade tensions. South Korea and the US agreed to push back the earlier agreed-to elimination of import tariffs on pick-up trucks by 20 years to 2041.
CHEMICALS
Akzo Nobel to sell unit
Akzo Nobel NV is selling its specialty chemicals unit to US private equity firm Carlyle Group for 10.1 billion euros (US$12.5 billion) in a deal set to transform the Dutch company into a supplier of paints and coatings, chief executive officer Thierry Vanlancker said yesterday. Carlyle and Singapore sovereign-wealth partner GIC edged out rivals by agreeing to keep the business intact and giving assurances on workers’ salaries and benefits. “Different bids had different dimensions,” Vanlancker said. “Carlyle saw it as a strong business as a whole.” The sale caps a turbulent period for the Dutch manufacturer marked by a US$29 billion hostile takeover attempt last year by rival PPG Industries Inc and the attention of activist investor Elliott Management. Vanlancker, who sought to keep Akzo Nobel’s future in its own hands, will now have to make good on ambitious financial targets set for 2020.
RETAIL
Amazon targets France
Amazon.com Inc is taking aim at France, securing a delivery deal in Paris with Casino Guichard Perrachon SA that shakes up one of Europe’s most competitive grocery markets. Items from Casino’s Monoprix stores are to be sold via the Amazon Prime Now app in the French capital and the surrounding region, the companies said on Monday. The move comes as Amazon pushes further into the food business in Europe and as price competition among Casino, Carrefour SA and family-owned Leclerc heats up in France. Casino’s deal with Amazon is a “very defensive move,” aimed at protecting Monoprix from Leclerc, Fabienne Caron, an analyst at Kepler Cheuvreux, said in a note to clients.
BANKING
Deutsche Bank tensions rise
Deutsche Bank AG is considering candidates to potentially replace chief executive officer John Cryan amid heightened tensions between him and Supervisory Board chairman Paul Achleitner, the Times of London reported without saying where it got the information. The bank approached Richard Gnodde, the head of Goldman Sachs Group Inc’s international operations, but he is thought to have spurned the overture, the newspaper said. Deutsche Bank also considered UniCredit SpA CEO Jean Pierre Mustier and Standard Chartered PLC CEO Bill Winters, according to the report. “Cryan may be a good person, but he’s not the right guy on top of Deutsche Bank,” said Stefan Mueller, CEO of the German Institute for Asset and Equity Allocation and Valuation in an interview with Bloomberg TV. Still, “I think the main problem at Deutsche Bank is Paul Achleitner, he implemented all these CEOs in the last years.”
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