AUTOMAKERS
Bug rewards offered
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV is turning to DIY mechanics and hackers to expose software vulnerabilities in its vehicles. The US-Italian automaker is offering a bounty of US$150 to US$1,500 to people who spot software bugs and report them so they can be fixed. The size of the reward depends on how critical the bug is and how many vehicles it affects. Fiat Chrysler said it is the first automaker with a full lineup of cars and trucks to offer such a bounty, although US electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc has made similar offers.
ENERGY
Nexen to cut 350 jobs
China National Offshore Oil Corp Ltd’s (CNOOC, 中國海洋石油) Nexen Energy unit is to cut 350 jobs this year after deciding not to repair its Long Lake oil-sands upgrader in Alberta, Canada, following an explosion in January. The facility, which processes bitumen into light synthetic crude oil, cannot be feasibly repaired in the short term, executives said via telephone on Tuesday. Workers will lose their jobs at Long Lake and at the Calgary headquarters. Nexen will continue producing bitumen from Long Lake, resulting in lower costs, as well as improved reliability and safety, the company said.
IRELAND
Economy grows by 26.3%
The economy grew by a barely believable 26.3 percent last year, according to official data published on Tuesday, which was largely skewed by companies relocating to the country for tax purposes. The Central Statistics Office said that the nation’s GDP had increased “significantly” last year as it drastically upgraded a previous estimate of 7.8 percent growth. The office said the result was largely due to “an increase in the number of new aircraft imports for international leasing activities” and the “reclassifications of entire balance sheets.”
LUXURY GOODS
Burberry reports flat sales
Burberry PLC reported a 3 percent drop in like-for-like sales in a “challenging” first quarter, underlining the size of the task facing Marco Gobbetti when he takes over as chief executive officer from Christopher Bailey next year. The British luxury goods group said a positive 3 percent contribution from new stores resulted in flat retail sales of ￡423 million (US$562 million), slightly better than analysts’ expectations. Burberry benefited from a drop in the value of the pound after Britain last month voted to leave the EU. It said its adjusted profit for the year would be boosted by about ￡90 million if exchange rates remain at current levels, compared with a previous forecast of a ￡50 million boost.
UNITED STATES
CBO projects rise in debt
Debt is set to rise faster than previously expected over the next two decades due to slower economic growth and congressional approval for tax cuts last year, the Congressional Budget Office said on Tuesday. In its latest report, the office projected that federal debt would climb from 75 percent of GDP currently to 122 percent by 2040. That is up from the office’s previous estimate of 107 percent for 2040 and well above a post-World War II peak of 106 percent of GDP. For 2046, the office lowered its debt projection by 14 percentage points to 141 percent of GDP, saying it now expects interest rates to be lower than previously anticipated.
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday said it would work with US chipmaker Intel Corp to jointly develop and deploy next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure and intelligent computing platforms in a move to capture booming demand for AI computing systems. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康), said in a statement that the partnership would combine its global manufacturing scale, system integration expertise and AI data center deployment capabilities with Intel’s strengths in processor architecture, silicon technologies and software ecosystem. The companies said they plan to work on equipment used in AI data centers, including server racks powered by
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
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