AVIATION
Delta pilots want 40% rise
The union representing Delta Air Lines Inc’s pilots wants raises of almost 40 percent compounded over three years, attempting to reverse some of the pay and benefit cuts adopted in the early 2000s. The union cites the carrier’s surging profits in saying it had requested a 22 percent raise for this year, followed by 7 percent raises in the following two years, a memo from the Air Line Pilots Association said. The union and Delta declined to comment on the memo. Delta spokesman Morgan Durrant said the company looks forward to negotiating with the union to reach an agreement that is mutually beneficial.
AVIATION
China Express orders jets
China Express Airlines Co (華夏航空) has placed an order for 10 Bombardier CRJ900 jets worth US$462 million, the Canadian aircraft builder said on Thursday. The order would increase the China Express’ all-Bombardier fleet to 38, a statement said. Based in the southwest city of Chongqing, the nine-year-old carrier serves 62 cities in China. The CRJ900 is a regional jet that seats up to 90 passengers and with the China Express deal, Bombardier has racked up 409 firm orders for the aircraft.
ENERGY
GE to build Saudi plant
General Electric Co (GE) on Thursday said that it had won a contract worth nearly US$1 billion from Saudi Electricity Co to build and supply a power plant in northern Saudi Arabia. Under the contract, the US industrial giant is to build the Waad al-Shamal combined-cycle power plant and provide four advanced gas turbines, a steam turbine and turbine maintenance services. The 1,390-megawatt plant, which is to include solar technology, is expected to be able to provide the equivalent power needed to supply more than 500,000 Saudi homes.
RETAIL
V and D declares bankruptcy
The largest Dutch chain of department stores, US-owned Vroom and Dreesman (V and D), on Thursday declared itself bankrupt after years of losses, but said it expected a buyer to come to its rescue. Founded in 1887 in Amsterdam, the chain employs 10,000 people in 64 outlets. V and D failed to reverse a loss-making trend despite reducing the payroll and cutting wages in recent years. It reported losses of 49 million euros (US$53 million) in 2014, 42 million euros in 2013 and 19 million euros in 2012. A warm winter added to the chain’s problems at the end of this year, causing its winter collection to flop.
INVESTMENT
Canadian funds set record
Canadian pension funds, money managers and corporations acquired a record-setting US$205 billion in foreign assets last year, driving the nation’s deal total to an eight-year high. In all, there were US$281 billion worth of mergers and acquisitions involving Canadian firms through Wednesday last week, up 34 percent from a year earlier, data compiled by Bloomberg showed. It was the second-highest total on record behind 2007, when Canadians were involved in US$315 billion worth of transactions. The size of the deals involving Canadian firms were also uncharacteristically large last year with the four biggest deals worth in excess of US$10 billion for the first time since 2006, the data showed.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US. Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it. TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer
PROTECTION: The investigation, which takes aim at exporters such as Canada, Germany and Brazil, came days after Trump unveiled tariff hikes on steel and aluminum products US President Donald Trump on Saturday ordered a probe into potential tariffs on lumber imports — a move threatening to stoke trade tensions — while also pushing for a domestic supply boost. Trump signed an executive order instructing US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to begin an investigation “to determine the effects on the national security of imports of timber, lumber and their derivative products.” The study might result in new tariffs being imposed, which would pile on top of existing levies. The investigation takes aim at exporters like Canada, Germany and Brazil, with White House officials earlier accusing these economies of
Teleperformance SE, the largest call-center operator in the world, is rolling out an artificial intelligence (AI) system that softens English-speaking Indian workers’ accents in real time in a move the company claims would make them more understandable. The technology, called accent translation, coupled with background noise cancelation, is being deployed in call centers in India, where workers provide customer support to some of Teleperformance’s international clients. The company provides outsourced customer support and content moderation to global companies including Apple Inc, ByteDance Ltd’s (字節跳動) TikTok and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. “When you have an Indian agent on the line, sometimes it’s hard
PROBE CONTINUES: Those accused falsely represented that the chips would not be transferred to a person other than the authorized end users, court papers said Singapore charged three men with fraud in a case local media have linked to the movement of Nvidia’s advanced chips from the city-state to Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) firm DeepSeek (深度求索). The US is investigating if DeepSeek, the Chinese company whose AI model’s performance rocked the tech world in January, has been using US chips that are not allowed to be shipped to China, Reuters reported earlier. The Singapore case is part of a broader police investigation of 22 individuals and companies suspected of false representation, amid concerns that organized AI chip smuggling to China has been tracked out of nations such
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