■TELECOMS
Siemens reports big loss
Siemens said yesterday it suffered a net loss of 1 billion euros (US$1.5 billion) in the last quarter of its 2008-2009 fiscal year, and expected the current year to be worse. Earnings from the year ended on Sept. 30 were slammed by 1.962 billion euros in charges stemming from the group’s Nokia Siemens Networks unit which Siemens owns with telecommunications equipment maker Nokia. Siemens’ full year net profit plunged by 58 percent to 2.5 billion euros, while sales slipped by just 1 percent to 76.7 billion euros.
■MEDIA
Comcast, GE unveil NBC deal
Comcast Corp have struck a deal to buy a majority stake in NBC Universal from General Electric Co (GE), creating a media superpower that can control not just how TV shows and movies are made, but how they are delivered to the home. Comcast, the largest US cable service provider, will contribute US$6.5 billion in cash and its own cable TV networks to take a 51 percent stake in NBC Universal, which owns TV networks, a movie studio, theme parks and local TV stations. GE will keep a 49 percent stake. The two sides said in a release yesterday that the deal valued NBC Universal businesses at US$30 billion. They valued the Comcast businesses that will be part of the deal at US$7.25 billion.
■RETAIL
Kingfisher sales rise in Q3
Kingfisher, the biggest home-improvements retailer in Europe, announced yesterday a rise in third-quarter sales helped by a stronger performance at its stores in Britain and Poland. Total group revenue rose 2.4 percent to £2.693 billion (US$4.499 billion) in the 13 weeks to Oct. 31 compared with a year earlier, “primarily reflecting strong sales in B&Q UK and Poland.” Kingfisher chief executive Ian Cheshire described the trading update as “a strong set of results.” He added: “With 80 percent of the quarter’s profit earned outside the UK and Ireland, we are clearly benefiting from our long-established international strategy.”
■ELECTRONICS
Tokyo Electron expects boost
Tokyo Electron Ltd, the world’s second-largest maker of chip-manufacturing equipment, expects orders this quarter to exceed the company’s forecast, helped by demand from memory chipmakers, chairman Tetsuro Higashi said. Bookings for chip and flat-panel gear in the three months ending Dec. 31 will be close to the ¥105 billion (US$1.2 billion) projected by Credit Suisse Group AG, Higashi said on Wednesday. That’s 12 percent higher than the ¥93.8 billion predicted by the firm in October. The recovery is widespread and demand in the industry will continue to grow for the next two years, Higashi said at the Semicon Japan trade show in Chiba.
■VITICULTURE
Wines sales up: forecast
Wine sales for this year are forecast to be up from last year, in a sign consumers may be regaining some confidence in the economy, a report shows. Market research group Mintel predicts wine sales will have risen by 2.1 percent to US$27.6 billion this year, up from US$27 billion last year. Last year, sales declined 3.2 percent, after years of growth. “In 2008, the recession was at its peak,” said Garima Goel Lal, an analyst at Mintel, adding that people drank less wine in restaurants and in bars. Consumers ditched luxury and imported wines priced at more than US$16 dollars a bottle in favor of bargains, the report said.
Taiwan’s Lee Chia-hao (李佳豪) on Sunday won a silver medal at the All England Open Badminton Championships in Birmingham, England, a career best. Lee, 25, took silver in the final of the men’s singles against world No. 1 Shi Yuqi (石宇奇) of China, who won 21-17, 21-19 in a tough match that lasted 51 minutes. After the match, the Taiwanese player, who ranks No. 22 in the world, said it felt unreal to be challenging an opponent of Shi’s caliber. “I had to be in peak form, and constantly switch my rhythm and tactics in order to score points effectively,” he said. Lee got
EMBRACING TAIWAN: US lawmakers have introduced an act aiming to replace the use of ‘Chinese Taipei’ with ‘Taiwan’ across all Washington’s federal agencies A group of US House of Representatives lawmakers has introduced legislation to replace the term “Chinese Taipei” with “Taiwan” across all federal agencies. US Representative Byron Donalds announced the introduction of the “America supports Taiwan act,” which would mandate federal agencies adopt “Taiwan” in place of “Chinese Taipei,” a news release on his page on the US House of Representatives’ Web site said. US representatives Mike Collins, Barry Moore and Tom Tiffany are cosponsors of the legislation, US political newspaper The Hill reported yesterday. “The legislation is a push to normalize the position of Taiwan as an autonomous country, although the official US
CHANGE OF TONE: G7 foreign ministers dropped past reassurances that there is no change in the position of the G7 members on Taiwan, including ‘one China’ policies G7 foreign ministers on Friday took a tough stance on China, stepping up their language on Taiwan and omitting some conciliatory references from past statements, including to “one China” policies. A statement by ministers meeting in Canada mirrored last month’s Japan-US statement in condemning “coercion” toward Taiwan. Compared with a G7 foreign ministers’ statement in November last year, the statement added members’ concerns over China’s nuclear buildup, although it omitted references to their concerns about Beijing’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Also missing were references stressing the desire for “constructive and stable relations with China” and
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday said it has lodged a protest with Pretoria after the name of the Taipei Liaison Office in South Africa was changed to the “Taipei Commercial Office” on the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation’s (DIRCO) Web site. In October last year, the South African government asked Taiwan to relocate the Taipei Liaison Office, the nation’s de facto embassy, out of Pretoria. It later agreed to continue negotiating through official channels, but in January asked that the office be relocated by the end of this month. As of the middle of last month, DIRCO’s Web
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