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World Business Quick Take

■ Electronics
BenQ may face huge claims
BenQ Corp (明基) may face a combined 1.2 billion euros (US$1.6 billion) in claims from creditors and 504 million euros from the insolvency administrator Martin Prager, the Central News Agency reported. The report, citing Prager, said that around 4,350 creditors of bankrupt cellphone unit BenQ Mobile & Co filed the claims. Among them are 3,500 former BenQ Mobile employees. The report said BenQ Mobile's total assets are worth 300 million euros, which is far below the creditors' demand. BenQ Mobile applied for insolvency protection to a Munich court last September.

■ Electronics
Mexico factory closes
Japanese electronics maker Hitachi Ltd said yesterday it will close a factory in Mexico and shed about 4,400 jobs as part of a global overhaul of its slumping hard disk drive business. The plant in Guadalajara will be shuttered by the middle of next year and its production of HDD components shifted to an existing plant in Laguna, Philippines, the company said in a release. The change will help Hitachi save nearly US$300 million over the next five years by bringing component manufacturing closer to the company's final assembly plants in Thailand and China, Tokyo-based Hitachi said.

■ Environment
IBM pledges gas cut
IBM Corp is pledging that by 2012, it will have reduced its greenhouse gas footprint by 7 percent since 2005, primarily through energy conservation. The technology company made the vow yesterday as part of the US Environmental Protection Agency's voluntary "Climate Leaders" program, in which more than 100 firms have committed to reducing their output of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. IBM's first such pledge was a 4 percent decrease from 2002 to 2005; the company says it achieved a 6.2 percent reduction. IBM said it planned to achieve further reductions with improved energy efficiency in the offices used by its 356,000 employees worldwide.

■ Taxes
Malaysia scraps tax
Malaysia will scrap capital gains tax on property deals from April 1, the prime minister said yesterday as he announced a slew of pro-investment programs and incentives in a bid to boost the economy. Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said he hoped the decision would "inject more excitement and dynamism in both the property and financial sectors." He said the government would continue to reduce stakes in government-linked firms in which it has a high level of ownership to increase equity market liquidity.

■ Aviation
Iberia mulls merger
Spain's national carrier Iberia signaled on Wednesday it was ready to look at a merger, with consolidation of the industry expected to gather pace on prospects of an EU-US deal to open up transatlantic air travel. Although the Spanish carrier said no such alliance was under discussion it added that it would consider all options. The carrier has charged chairman Fernando Conte with making relevant information available to potential investors. A tie-up between Lufthansa and Iberia would produce an airline carrying 100 million passengers per year, compared with Air France-KLM's 70 million per year.

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