■ AVIATION
Airline may charge for bags
Virgin Blue Holdings Ltd, the Australian low-cost airline partially owned by UK billionaire Richard Branson, is considering charging passengers to check luggage, CEO Brett Godfrey said. “A bag costs us more to put through an airplane than a passenger,” Godfrey said yesterday. The airline is also contemplating raising fares and cutting flights because of increased costs caused by surging jet-fuel prices, he said. Virgin Blue, Australia’s second-largest airline, slashed its fiscal earnings forecast for this year in April as its jet-fuel bill climbed. The carrier increased fares last month while larger rival Qantas Airways Ltd cut routes and reduced its fleet size as airlines try to mute the fallout from rising fuel costs.
■ ACQUISTIONS
AXA eyes Asian firms
AXA Asia Pacific Holding Ltd, a unit of Europe’s second-biggest insurer, is looking at acquisitions in Asia after this week buying the financial-planning business of Challenger Financial Services Group Ltd. “We’re interested in acquisitions both in Australia, as we’ve just done, but also right the way across the Asian region,” CEO Andrew Penn said yesterday on the Australian Broadcasting Corp’s Inside Business program. The firm bought the Challenger business for A$150 million (US$144 million) on Thursday.
■ CHEMICALS
Sichuan Hongda restarts
Sichuan Hongda Chemical Industry Co, China’s third-largest zinc producer, said a chemical unit resumed production after being shut by the 7.9-magnitude earthquake that hit Sichuan Province on May 12. Sichuan Mianzhu Chuanrun Chemicals Co restarted operations on Thursday, its parent company said in a statement to the Shanghai Stock Exchange on Saturday. Sichuan Hongda said it is working to help other units resume production. Sichuan Hongda recorded an economic loss of 160.2 million yuan (US$23 million) because of the earthquake, it said on June 3.
■ ELECTRONICS
Youth prefer PCs: study
Internet PCs are increasingly making CD players and even television obsolete for young people, a study by the University of Leipzig has found. The report found that four out of five young persons in Germany or 78 percent frequently listen to music on their computer, while only 36 percent turn on a CD player. And if music videos are on tap, two-thirds do not reach for the TV remote, but rather switch on the computer. Some 5,000 youths between 12 and 19 years were surveyed as part of the third wave of the long-term study on “Media Convergence Monitoring,” by the university’s Media Pedagogy and Continuing Education department.
■ TELECOMS
STT sells PT Indosat share
Singapore Technologies Telemedia (STT), a wholly-owned unit of state-linked investment firm Temasek Holdings, has sold off its interest in Indonesian telecom firm PT Indosat to business partner Qatar Telecom, the company said. Qatar Telecom will pay US$1.8 billion for the 40.8 percent stake in PT Indosat held by Asia Mobile Holdings, a joint venture firm between the Qatari outfit and STT, the company said on Saturday. “ST Telemedia will no longer have any involvement in Indosat,” it said in the statement. The disposal of the stake came after an Indonesian competition watchdog ruled that Temasek had broken anti-monopoly laws and ordered the Singapore investment firm to divest its holdings in either PT Indosat or PT Telkomsel.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)