INDIA
Digital cash stocks surge
Prime Minister Narendra Modi might offer another gift to electronic cash companies. An index of the stocks has gained 12 percent since November last year’s surprise currency ban, and might further rally after the government introduced tax rebates on digital transactions on Dec. 25 last year. The gain in the gauge of 23 companies that make the devices and offer cashless services compares with the S&P BSE SENSEX’s 3 percent drop since Nov. 8 last year, when Modi invalidated 86 percent of the nation’s currency in circulation. Modi rolled out a slew of measures including rewards, tax rebates and discounts for digital transactions on Dec. 25.
TRANSPORT
Uber aims to placate critics
The ride-hailing company Uber and local governments often do not play well together. Uber pays little heed to regulations while city officials scramble to keep up with the company’s rapid deployment and surging popularity. However, with a new data-focused product, Uber is offering a tiny olive branch to its municipal critics. The company on Sunday unveiled Movement, a stand-alone Web site it hopes will persuade city planners to consider Uber as part of urban development and transit systems in the future. The site, which Uber is to invite planning agencies and researchers to visit in the coming weeks, is to allow outsiders to study traffic patterns and speeds across cities using data collected by tens of thousands of Uber vehicles. Users can use Movement to compare average trip times across certain points in cities and see what effect events might have on traffic patterns.
AUTOMAKERS
Mercedes-Benz leads pack
Mercedes-Benz is expected to reach its goal of becoming the largest premium automaker four years early — a feat achieved only after it stopped chasing market share and focused on making stylish high-tech cars. Introducing an elegant, sporty design and establishing itself as a pioneer in new technologies has helped revive the Mercedes brand which analysts say will help keep the Stuttgart-based automaker ahead of the pack. The achievement is a coup for Daimler chief executive officer Dieter Zetsche, who struggled to revive the company following a messy divorce from mass market brand Chrysler in 2007. On Sunday, Daimler said it had sold 2.08 million Mercedes-Benz branded passenger cars last year, taking the top spot from BMW AG, which has held the premium sales crown since 2005.
MACROECONOMICS
German production edges up
German industrial production crept up in November last year, official data showed yesterday, falling short of analysts’ predictions and moderating hopes Europe’s largest economy would end last year with a growth spurt. Production increased by 0.4 percent, correcting for price, seasonal and calendar effects, the federal statistics office Destatis said. Analysts surveyed by Factset had predicted slightly more robust growth of 0.65 percent. Investor and business sentiment indexes have been riding high in recent months after recovering from a post-Brexit shock, prompting some observers to predict a winter bonanza for the German economy. In a separate release, Destatis reported that German exports had seen a big increase of 3.9 percent in November last year, correcting for seasonal and calendar effects. Together, the data provide “some evidence that the German economy gained momentum in the final quarter,” ING Diba bank analyst Carsten Brzeski said.
SEASONAL WEAKNESS: The combined revenue of the top 10 foundries fell 5.4%, but rush orders and China’s subsidies partially offset slowing demand Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) further solidified its dominance in the global wafer foundry business in the first quarter of this year, remaining far ahead of its closest rival, Samsung Electronics Co, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday. TSMC posted US$25.52 billion in sales in the January-to-March period, down 5 percent from the previous quarter, but its market share rose from 67.1 percent the previous quarter to 67.6 percent, TrendForce said in a report. While smartphone-related wafer shipments declined in the first quarter due to seasonal factors, solid demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC) devices and urgent TV-related orders
BYPASSING CHINA TARIFFS: In the first five months of this year, Foxconn sent US$4.4bn of iPhones to the US from India, compared with US$3.7bn in the whole of last year Nearly all the iPhones exported by Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團) from India went to the US between March and last month, customs data showed, far above last year’s average of 50 percent and a clear sign of Apple Inc’s efforts to bypass high US tariffs imposed on China. The numbers, being reported by Reuters for the first time, show that Apple has realigned its India exports to almost exclusively serve the US market, when previously the devices were more widely distributed to nations including the Netherlands and the Czech Republic. During March to last month, Foxconn, known as Hon Hai Precision Industry
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and the University of Tokyo (UTokyo) yesterday announced the launch of the TSMC-UTokyo Lab to promote advanced semiconductor research, education and talent development. The lab is TSMC’s first laboratory collaboration with a university outside Taiwan, the company said in a statement. The lab would leverage “the extensive knowledge, experience, and creativity” of both institutions, the company said. It is located in the Asano Section of UTokyo’s Hongo, Tokyo, campus and would be managed by UTokyo faculty, guided by directors from UTokyo and TSMC, the company said. TSMC began working with UTokyo in 2019, resulting in 21 research projects,
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) chairman Barry Lam (林百里) yesterday expressed a downbeat view about the prospects of humanoid robots, given high manufacturing costs and a lack of target customers. Despite rising demand and high expectations for humanoid robots, high research-and-development costs and uncertain profitability remain major concerns, Lam told reporters following the company’s annual shareholders’ meeting in Taoyuan. “Since it seems a bit unworthy to use such high-cost robots to do household chores, I believe robots designed for specific purposes would be more valuable and present a better business opportunity,” Lam said Instead of investing in humanoid robots, Quanta has opted to invest
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