TECHNOLOGY
Microsoft sets pop-up shops
Microsoft said on Monday it is launching more than 30 pop-up holiday shops in the US and Canada as it gears up to sell its new Surface tablet computer. The company released a list of 32 locations for the shops — known as pop-ups because they have short or seasonal commercial leases — including in New York, San Francisco, Vancouver and Toronto. The US tech giant on Monday had job listings seeking retail store managers and other personnel. The company offered no specifics on how long these shops would be operational or what they would sell.
TECHNOLOGY
Sharp mulls more pay cuts
Sharp Corp is in talks with its labor union to deepen salary cuts as it projects a second straight annual loss. It is also reducing managers’ salaries by 10 percent starting next month and will cut bonuses in half to save a total of ￥14 billion (US$179 million) in fixed costs, the Osaka-based company said in a statement yesterday. Japan’s biggest maker of LCD panels last week put up its Osaka headquarters and some factories as debt collateral after its credit ratings were cut to junk.
RETAIL
Burberry warns on profit
Luxury goods maker Burberry PLC said that full-year pretax profit would be at the lower end of market expectations following a flat retail performance in the past 10 weeks. Burberry said yesterday that retail sales in the period ending Saturday were 6 percent higher than a year ago, but all of the growth was due to new stores. Comparing stores open for at least a year, retail sales were unchanged and the company noted “a deceleration in recent weeks.” Retail accounted for about two-thirds of the company’s sales in the year ending March 31.
BANKING
Chinese bank loans surge
China ramped up bank lending last month, according to central bank figures released yesterday, as the government seeks to give a boost to the slowing economy. Chinese banks granted 703.9 billion yuan (US$112 billion) in new loans last month, up from 540.1 billion yuan in July, the People’s Bank of China said in a statement. Last month’s figure is higher than market expectations of 600 billion yuan, according to a forecast of 13 economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires.
GAMING
Another Zynga officer quits
Jeff Karp, the chief marketing and chief revenue officer at Zynga, has become the latest executive to leave the struggling online company behind FarmVille and other games. Last month, chief operating officer John Schappert left the company after less than a year and a half on the job. Schappert’s exit was followed by that of Mike Verdu, the company’s chief creative officer. San Francisco-based Zynga’s stock has dropped 72 percent from its December initial public offering price of US$10 to US$2.82 on Monday.
AIRLINES
Lion to set up budget carrier
Indonesia’s Lion Air yesterday said it would set up a low-cost airline in Malaysia that would take off in May next year as part of an aggressive regional expansion. The move will see Lion Air, which controls nearly half the air travel market in Indonesia, playing catch-up to the region’s top budget carrier AirAsia. Lion Air will own 49 percent of the new airline, Malindo Airways, and Malaysia’s National Aerospace and Defence Industries the remaining 51 percent.
DIVIDED VIEWS: Although the Fed agreed on holding rates steady, some officials see no rate cuts for this year, while 10 policymakers foresee two or more cuts There are a lot of unknowns about the outlook for the economy and interest rates, but US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell signaled at least one thing seems certain: Higher prices are coming. Fed policymakers voted unanimously to hold interest rates steady at a range of 4.25 percent to 4.50 percent for a fourth straight meeting on Wednesday, as they await clarity on whether tariffs would leave a one-time or more lasting mark on inflation. Powell said it is still unclear how much of the bill would fall on the shoulders of consumers, but he expects to learn more about tariffs
NOT JUSTIFIED: The bank’s governor said there would only be a rate cut if inflation falls below 1.5% and economic conditions deteriorate, which have not been detected The central bank yesterday kept its key interest rates unchanged for a fifth consecutive quarter, aligning with market expectations, while slightly lowering its inflation outlook amid signs of cooling price pressures. The move came after the US Federal Reserve held rates steady overnight, despite pressure from US President Donald Trump to cut borrowing costs. Central bank board members unanimously voted to maintain the discount rate at 2 percent, the secured loan rate at 2.375 percent and the overnight lending rate at 4.25 percent. “We consider the policy decision appropriate, although it suggests tightening leaning after factoring in slackening inflation and stable GDP growth,”
Meta Platforms Inc offered US$100 million bonuses to OpenAI employees in an unsuccessful bid to poach the ChatGPT maker’s talent and strengthen its own generative artificial intelligence (AI) teams, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has said. Facebook’s parent company — a competitor of OpenAI — also offered “giant” annual salaries exceeding US$100 million to OpenAI staffers, Altman said in an interview on the Uncapped with Jack Altman podcast released on Tuesday. “It is crazy,” Sam Altman told his brother Jack in the interview. “I’m really happy that at least so far none of our best people have decided to take them
PLANS: MSI is also planning to upgrade its service center in the Netherlands Micro-Star International Co (MSI, 微星) yesterday said it plans to set up a server assembly line at its Poland service center this year at the earliest. The computer and peripherals manufacturer expects that the new server assembly line would shorten transportation times in shipments to European countries, a company spokesperson told the Taipei Times by telephone. MSI manufactures motherboards, graphics cards, notebook computers, servers, optical storage devices and communication devices. The company operates plants in Taiwan and China, and runs a global network of service centers. The company is also considering upgrading its service center in the Netherlands into a
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