Given that the Indian economy has been reeling from one shock after another, a bit of good news would be welcome. And some has just arrived: The World Bank has declared that, over the course of a single year, India jumped from No. 130 to No. 100 in its “ease of doing business” ranking. The rise wasn’t entirely a surprise. ...

Samsung Electronics Co. made two major announcements recently amid its third-quarter earnings release. They need to be understood separately, but analysed together. First, South Korea’s biggest company pledged to double dividend payouts next year and dish out a total of 29 trillion won ($26 billion) in the three years through 2020. Second, the world’s largest maker of displays and memory ...

As Google appeals the European Commission’s antitrust ruling that cost the search giant €2.42 billion ($2.82 billion) and pretends to provide a remedy, its biggest competitor in shopping search, Amazon, is offering better service to customers. Google needs to shift gears—and fast—by focusing on improving its product, not the legal confrontation. The European Union has published a summary of Google’s ...

Bloomberg Apple Inc. is fixing supply problems with the iPhone X, its most important device in years, setting the company up for a better-than-expected holiday period. Supported by resurgent iPad and Mac sales, the 10-year anniversary iPhone will help push revenue to a record high of $84 billion to $87 billion in the quarter ending in late December, Apple said ...

Bloomberg Microsoft Corp., Oracle Corp. and IBM—looking to stoke demand for cloud computing services—are said to be shifting incentives for their sales representatives, pushing them to ensure customers become active users over the long haul. Microsoft in July revamped the way it pays its sales staff to tie incentives to how much customers actually use cloud-based software—rather than how many ...

Bloomberg Qualcomm Inc. issued a surprisingly bullish forecast for the current quarter, showing that robust demand for the company’s chips in China is making up for lost revenue from a bruising legal brawl with Apple Inc. Sales in Qualcomm’s fiscal first quarter will be $5.5 billion to $6.3 billion. Earnings per share, excluding some items, will be 85 cents to ...

Bloomberg Sony Corp. is bringing back its iconic robotic dog, aibo. The new version (which Sony is marketing as “aibo” instead of the prior “AIBO”) comes equipped with a powerful computer chip, OLED displays for eyes and the ability to connect to mobile networks. Like its predecessor, the new pet toy responds to voice commands and can bark, sit and ...

Bloomberg Mark Carney is tying the Bank of England’s next interest-rate shift to the success of Brexit negotiations. After raising interest rates for the first time in more than a decade, the governor said the pending divorce from the European Union is the main risk to the outlook, aggravating existing weaknesses that have hobbled the economy and holding back potential ...

Bloomberg Bank of America Corp. made the legal leap required to untangle what US clients are charged for research and trading, bringing to America a version of the changes being forced on markets in Europe. Its Merrill Lynch unit added the firm’s research department to an existing investment adviser registration late on Thursday, according to a document on the US ...

Bloomberg Italian bank executives and central bankers, take note: people trust you less and less. Just 16 percent of Italians have confidence in the country’s lenders, down from an already meager 17 percent in June, according to a poll by the SWG research group of Trieste. Only 24 percent trust the Bank of Italy, plunging from 36 percent in June. ...