AUTOMAKERS
VW optimistic on full year
Volkswagen AG (VW) on Wednesday said it was confident it could defy a worldwide squeeze in vehicle sales over the full year, although unit sales and operating profit fell in the second quarter. Operating profit before special items was down 8.1 percent year-on-year in the quarter at 5.1 billion euros (US$5.68 billion), VW said in a statement. Revenue grew 6.6 percent to 65.2 billion euros, although unit sales were down 2.8 percent at 2.8 million vehicles — falling especially in the vital Chinese market. Net profit surged 24.2 percent to 4.1 billion euros, it said.
AUTOMAKERS
Nissan to slash workforce
Nissan Motor Co yesterday said that it would cut 12,500 jobs and announced a plunge in quarterly net profit as it struggles with weak sales and the arrest of its former chairman. “Nissan will reduce its global production capacity by 10 percent by the end of fiscal year 2022. In line with production optimizations, the company will reduce headcount by roughly 12,500,” the firm said in a statement. Net profit slumped nearly 95 percent to ¥6.4 billion (US$59.23 million) for the three months to last month, from ¥115.8 billion a year earlier, due to falling sales and growing costs.
LUXURY BRANDS
LVMH hits record high
LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE shares yesterday rose to a record in Paris after second-quarter sales breezed past analysts’ estimates, fueled by creative revamps at its Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior fashion brands. Sales of fashion and leather goods rose 20 percent on an organic basis in the second quarter, the company said on Wednesday. LVMH’s first-half profit from recurring operations rose 14 percent to 5.3 billion euros.
BRAZIL
Cash stimulus for workers
The government hopes to inject US$11.2 billion into its slowing economy after announcing a plan on Wednesday to put some extra cash in the pockets of workers. Workers are to be allowed to withdraw up to 500 reais (US$133) this year and a certain percentage next year. President Jair Bolsonaro said that the extra money would help about 63 million people with “debts and overdue water, electricity and gas bills.” The stimulus is expected to add 2.5 percentage points to GDP per capita over 10 years and create 3 million jobs.
SOFTWARE
Salesforce, Alibaba team up
Salesforce.com Inc on Wednesday unveiled a partnership with Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) to enter the greater Chinese software market, chasing new business in Asia despite the US-China trade dispute. Alibaba is to sell Salesforce cloud-based software for clients’ sales, customer service and commerce needs in Taiwan, China, Hong Kong and Macau, the companies said in a statement.
CHIPMAKERS
SK Hynix dives on demand
South Korea’s SK Hynix Inc yesterday posted an 89 percent quarterly profit plunge amid sluggish demand, as a spat between Seoul and Tokyo threatens earnings. Operating profit fell for the third consecutive quarter to 637.6 billion won (US$539.74 million) and net earnings were down 88 percent to 537 billion won, while total sales were down 38 percent on the year to 6.4 trillion won. Market demand had “fallen short of earlier expectations,” SK Hynix said, adding that the price fall was “steeper than anticipated.”
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
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],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained