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Abu Dhabi / WAM Abu Dhabi’s Smart Solutions and Services Authority (ADSSSA), signed 14 service level agreements to govern the digital data exchange process and streamline work between digital data providers and users. Aiming to further develop AD CONNECT — a comprehensive work system to enable governmental entities in Abu Dhabi to digitally exchange government documents — the agreements aim ...

Bloomberg For generations of investors, Exxon Mobil Corp. has been a cornerstone of fund managers’ portfolios alongside the biggest names in corporate America. Not so much any more. From leading the S&P 500 Index a decade ago, the company has dropped to the ninth-largest in a top 10 now dominated by technology giants. Its rivals Royal Dutch Shell Plc and ...

Bloomberg Saudi Arabian Oil Co. and Total SA are weighing jointly buying businesses such as Tas’helat Marketing Co to gain access to networks of retail fuel stations in the Gulf kingdom, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The state-owned company, known as Aramco, and the French oil giant are also looking at a range of options from consolidating ...

Bloomberg Are Berlin’s close energy ties with Moscow paying off? Data from Russia’s Federal Customs Service shows they might be after Germany paid less for natural gas from the world’s largest exporter than most other buyers. Only the UK, which produces most of its own gas, had lower import costs among the biggest offtakers, according to the figures obtained by ...

Bloomberg The Permian shale play is all about setting records. Now, the region may even become the world’s largest oil patch over the next decade. Output in the basin is forecast to reach 3.18 million barrels a day in May, according to the Energy Information Administration. That’s the highest since the agency began compiling records in 2007. By 2023, the ...

Bloomberg Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi Corp. is making unusual preparations for what may be the world’s biggest initial public offering this year. The Beijing-based company, led by serial entrepreneur Lei Jun, is promising to limit the net profit margin in its hardware business “forever” to no more than 5 percent, according to an emailed statement. The policy will apply to ...

Bloomberg Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. reached a preliminary agreement to buy Shire Plc with a sweetened takeover offer of about $64 billion, closing in on a takeover that would vault it into the ranks of the world’s top pharma companies. The UK-listed company’s board said it was willing to recommend the latest offer to shareholders, and the companies got more time ...

Bloomberg Months after calling off a planned partnership with Tata Motors Ltd., Volkswagen AG signalled it isn’t shutting the door on a tie-up with the Indian automaker as it works on a strategy to bring budget cars to millions of cost-conscious buyers in the South Asian country. Cooperation with the owner of Jaguar Land Rover Plc is possible “in principle” ...

Bloomberg Bharti Airtel Ltd. agreed to merge its tower unit with Indus Towers Ltd. in a deal that creates a $14.6 billion operator of telecom facilities that’s the largest outside China. The merger with Bharti Infratel Ltd. creates an entity controlling more than 163,000 towers across India, Bharti Airtel said in a statement. Under the deal, Bharti Infratel agreed to ...

Bloomberg Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma argues that nations from Japan to China need to develop their own semiconductor technology to get around America’s grip on the global chip market. The billionaire executive chairman of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., explaining the e-commerce titan’s growing interest in chips including this month’s acquisition of local design-house Hangzhou C-Sky Microsystems Co., said he’s motivated ...