■ Finance
APEC says SMEs need cash
A new APEC report has found that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Taiwan's tourism industry are facing difficulties in getting access to financial assistance. The findings are outlined in the Development Needs of Small- to Medium-Sized Tourism Businesses report prepared by the APEC International Center for Sustainable Tourism (AICST). The difficulty in obtaining financial assistance was found to be particularly damaging for the growing "homestay" sector, according to the report. AICST executive director Lan Kean said that despite the homestay sector becoming increasingly professional, there is still concern that business owners are having difficulty getting access to financial assistance from many institutions.
■ Airlines
Cathay to recruit new staff
Cathay Pacific Airways is recruiting 500 new cabin crew staff to handle additional flights as the airline eyes the expansion of its fleet, a spokeswoman said yesterday. Cathay, which currently employs a cabin crew of about 5,700, will hire an extra 400 Hong Kong-based flight attendants and 100 to be based in London, said Cathay spokeswoman Maria Yu. Yu said Cathay plans to expand its 85-aircraft fleet, and is currently negotiating with Boeing Co and Airbus to buy new passenger jets. She declined to give details. Without citing sources, local newspapers reported that Cathay was planning to order from Boeing and Airbus nine new wide-bodied jets worth between US$1 billion to US$1.5 billion.
■ Internet
Amazon offers campaign site
Shoppers at online retailer Amazon.com Inc can now spend money on something new -- US presidential candidates. A new feature that debuted on Friday collects campaign contributions of up to US$200 for US presidential candidates. Amazon said it is not endorsing any candidates and is charging each campaign its usual processing fees for the payments, which it will donate to a non-profit, non-partisan civil group. So far the campaign contributions page (www.amazon.com/gp/misc/flag.html) lists 17 presidential hopefuls, in alphabetical order, including US President George W. Bush. Among others, by early yesterday Democratic poll leader John Kerry had garnered 62 contributions totaling $1,699 at Amazon.com, former Vermont Governor Howard Dean had had 72 for a total of US$1,095.01 and Libertarian Party candidate Michael Badnarik had had 26 contributions totaling US$252 at the site.
■ Engineering
Bechtel gets Qatari contract
US engineering giant Bechtel signed yesterday a US$5 billion contract to build a new airport for the Qatari capital of Doha, the head of the Gulf emirate's civil aviation authority announced. The first of three stages in the construction of the new airport would be completed in 2008 at a cost of US$2.5 billion, Abdul Aziz al-Nuaimi told a press conference. "The airport will be one of the biggest in the world with an [annual] capacity of 50 million passengers in Qatar" when it is finished around 2015, he said. The chief executive of Qatar Airways, Akbar al-Baker, announced last month that tenders were going out for the first phase, adding that it would boost capacity to 12 million passengers.
NEW IDENTITY: Known for its software, India has expanded into hardware, with its semiconductor industry growing from US$38bn in 2023 to US$45bn to US$50bn India on Saturday inaugurated its first semiconductor assembly and test facility, a milestone in the government’s push to reduce dependence on foreign chipmakers and stake a claim in a sector dominated by China. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi opened US firm Micron Technology Inc’s semiconductor assembly, test and packaging unit in his home state of Gujarat, hailing the “dawn of a new era” for India’s technology ambitions. “When young Indians look back in the future, they will see this decade as the turning point in our tech future,” Modi told the event, which was broadcast on his YouTube channel. The plant would convert
Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday said the DRAM supply crunch could extend through 2028, as the artificial intelligence (AI) boom has led the world’s major memory makers to dramatically reduce production of standard DRAM and allocate a significant portion of their capacity for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips. The most severe supply constraints would stretch to the first half of next year due to “very limited” increases in new DRAM capacity worldwide, Nanya Technology president Lee Pei-ing (李培瑛) told a news briefing. The company plans to increase monthly 12-inch wafer capacity to 20,000 in the first half of 2028 after a
Property transactions in the nation’s six special municipalities plunged last month, as a lengthy Lunar New Year holiday combined with ongoing credit tightening dampened housing market activity, data compiled by local land administration offices released on Monday showed. The six cities recorded a total of 10,480 property transfers last month, down 42.5 percent from January and marking the second-lowest monthly level on record, the data showed. “The sharp drop largely reflected seasonal factors and tighter credit conditions,” Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房屋) deputy research manager Chen Chin-ping (陳金萍) said. The nine-day Lunar New Year holiday fell in February this year, reducing
Zimbabwe’s ban on raw lithium exports is forcing Chinese miners to rethink their strategy, speeding up plans to process the metal locally instead of shipping it to China’s vast rechargeable battery industry. The country is Africa’s largest lithium producer and has one of the world’s largest reserves, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS). Zimbabwe already banned the export of lithium ore in 2022 and last year announced it would halt exports of lithium concentrates from January next year. However, on Wednesday it imposed the ban with immediate effect, leaving unclear what the lithium mining sector would do in the
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