CONGLOMERATES
CJ Group to merge units
South Korea’s largest media conglomerate won the approval of shareholders to merge two units amid intensifying scrutiny of corporate governance at big family-run business groups. CJ Group’s plan for its home-shopping unit CJ O Shopping Co to acquire its K-pop business CJ E&M Corp garnered the support of shareholders, the companies said in filings yesterday following extraordinary general meetings. The transaction was valued at US$3.2 billion as of Monday close in Seoul. The nod from shareholders represents a victory for the company’s founding family and follows the rejection of a controversial plan to restructure Hyundai Motor Group that was seen as emblematic of the rising scrutiny of transactions by family-run conglomerates known locally as chaebol. CJ Group, which began as a sugar company and expanded to biotechnology, logistics and entertainment, has said it intends to raise revenue to 100 trillion won (US$93 billion) by 2020 from about 30 trillion won in 2016.
HEALTHCARE
Alibaba selling assets
Alibaba Group Holding (阿里巴巴) is selling assets from medical devices to drugs for HK$10.6 billion (US$1.4 billion) to a Hong Kong-listed unit that it will take control of and turn into its main healthcare arm. Alibaba yesterday unveiled a deal under which it would inject a plethora of businesses — from its online Tmall pharmacy (天貓醫藥館) to adult products such as condoms — into Alibaba Health Information Technology Ltd (阿里健康) in return for HK$10.6 billion worth of new stock in the affiliate. It would control a 56.2 percent economic interest and 67.5 percent of the voting interest in the company after the transaction. By taking outright control of the business, Alibaba can connect better with customers, smooth operations and allow the unit to take the lead in expanding the group’s footprint in a Chinese market estimated at 4.6 trillion yuan (US$719 billion), it said.
AVIATION
Tycoon Dassault dies at 93
French business executive Serge Dassault, a top aviation and arms industrialist and one of France’s richest men, died on Monday in his Paris office. He was 93. Dassault’s family announced his death in a brief statement to the conservative newspaper Le Figaro, which the Dassault Group owns. It said he died of a “cardiac deficiency” at the group’s office on the Champs-Elysees. Dassault was especially known for the development of France’s Mirage jet fighters, as well as for equipping the French Air Force and other militaries through global sales. He was chairman and CEO of the Dassault Group when he died, and president of honor of Dassault Aviation, which he once led.
AUTOMAKERS
Nissan to slash output
Nissan Motor Co is to cut vehicle output in the US and Mexico through this summer to reduce inventories in a cooling market, Nikkei Shimbun reported yesterday. The Japanese automaker is to cut workers’ hours and reduce production by as much as 20 percent at five assembly plants in the two countries, the publication said, without saying where it got the information. CEO Hiroto Saikawa this month said that the company is seeking to improve profitability rather than sales growth in the US. Predicting sales in the biggest market would drop in the fiscal year through March next year, he said Nissan would cut inventories at dealers and focus on retail sales.
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
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],”