GAMING
Sony invests in Discord
The Sony Group has said that it has invested in chat app Discord and is looking to get it into the PlayStation next year. Sony Interactive Entertainment made a “minority investment” in the platform with more than 140 million monthly users, many of them gaming enthusiasts, Sony Interactive Entertainment chief executive officer Jim Ryan said. The news followed reports that Discord had terminated acquisition talks with Xbox producer Microsoft, while other firms expressed interest in partnering with the service.
INVESTMENTS
Berkshire names successor
Berkshire Hathaway Inc plans to name Greg Abel as chief executive when the conglomerate’s longtime chief, Warren Buffett, eventually exits, CNBC reported on Monday. Buffett, 90, confirmed the plan to the business network after Berkshire’s annual meeting over the weekend. “The directors are in agreement that if something were to happen to me tonight, it would be Greg who’d take over tomorrow morning,” Buffett told CNBC. Abel, 59, is vice chairman of Berkshire’s non-insurance operations.
SEMICONDUCTORS
Infineon runs at ‘full speed’
First-quarter results at German semiconductor manufacturer Infineon Technologies AG were boosted by strong demand, but it said that bottlenecks continue to plague a manufacturing supply chain that is running at “full speed.” Sales in the first quarter hit 2.7 billion euros (US$3.25 billion), compared with the average analyst estimate of 2.69 billion euros. Previous guidance from Infineon placed second-quarter revenue between 2.5 billion euros and 2.8 billion euros, while third-quarter revenue is expected to be between 2.6 billion euros and 2.9 billion euros.
APPAREL
Under Armour fixes charges
US athletic apparel company Under Armour Inc on Monday agreed to pay US$9 million to settle charges by US financial regulators that it misled investors about its revenues. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said that for six quarters from the third quarter of 2015 through 2016, Under Armour inflated sales to meet analysts’ expectations. Under Armour said the settlement resolves the charges, while “the company neither admitted nor denied the SEC’s charges,” it said in a statement.
RIDE-HAILING
Bolt unveils car-sharing pilot
Bolt Technology OU, which competes with Uber Technologies Inc in Europe and Africa, would launch a car-sharing project in the Estonian capital, Tallinn, chief executive officer Markus Villig said. If the pilot proves successful, Bolt would quickly expand it to other cities, as it has done with its food delivery service, which operates in 20 countries, Villig said, adding that 500 cars would initially be leased.
ELECTRONICS
Samsung widow’s stake leaps
Hong Ra-hee, the wife of the late Samsung Group chairman Lee Kun-hee, boosted her fortune to more than US$7 billion after receiving billions of dollars in stocks in the much-awaited transfer of her husband’s assets. Hong, 75, inherited about 83 million shares in Samsung Electronics Co, making her the largest individual shareholder in the tech giant with a 2.3 percent stake, a filing last week said. Hong is the richest woman in South Korea, with a net worth of US$7.4 billion as of Monday’s stock market close, the Bloomberg Billionaires Index showed.
UNWANTED ATTENTION: In the past two months, the automaker has made headlines, with a Chinese military ban of its vehicles and a protest at an expo Electric vehicle maker Tesla Inc, facing scrutiny in China over safety and customer service complaints, is boosting its engagement with regulators and beefing up its government relations team, industry sources said. Tesla’s change of strategy leading to more behind-the-scenes interaction with policymakers in Beijing compared with relatively little previously shows the seriousness with which the US automaker views the setbacks in its second-biggest market. TALKING SHOP It also comes at a time when China is trying to regulate large and powerful private companies, especially in the technology sector, on concerns about their market dominance. As they do elsewhere, regulators in China, the world’s biggest
Dell Technologies Inc has agreed to sell its Boomi cloud business to private equity firms Francisco Partners and TPG in a cash deal valued at US$4 billion, as part of efforts by chief executive officer Michael Dell to trim down the PC maker. The deal is expected to close by the end of this year, the companies said in a statement on Sunday without providing additional details of the terms. Dow Jones had earlier reported that the companies were near a deal. Boomi specializes in integrating different cloud platforms for companies and has more than 15,000 customers. Dell agreed to acquire the company for
Intel Corp wants 8 billion euros (US$9.7 billion) in public subsidies toward building a semiconductor factory in Europe, chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger was cited as saying on Friday, as the region seeks to reduce its reliance on imports amid a shortage of supplies. The pitch is the first time that Gelsinger has publicly put a figure on how much state aid he would want, as Intel campaigns to take on Asian rivals in contract manufacturing. “What we’re asking from both the US and the European governments is to make it competitive for us to do it here, compared to in Asia,”
GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓), the world’s No. 3 silicon wafer supplier, yesterday said that it is considering further capacity expansion as customers are requesting more capacity due to rising end-market demand and persistent supply constraints. The Hsinchu-based company said that emerging technologies and applications from 5G, artificial intelligence and electric vehicles are driving semiconductor demand. The semiconductor industry has a positive outlook for this year and beyond, with shipments of all diameters of wafers to increase through 2023, GlobalWafers said. “We have received requests for expansion from many strategic partners. We are now in discussions with customers,” company chairwoman Doris Hsu (徐秀蘭) told a
RSS