Technology

BLOOMBERG  Japan ended restrictions on exports to South Korea of three key compounds used in the manufacture of semiconductors and displays, in the latest step towards improving long fractious ties between the two US allies. The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry announced the move to officially ease licensing requirements on fluorinated polyimide, hydrogen fluoride and photoresists, adding the move ...

BLOOMBERG  Tencent Holdings Ltd surged more than 8%, the most in about four months, as traders cited unsubstantiated talk that newly installed Premier Li Qiang toured the Chinese social media leader’s headquarters. Guizhou Party Secretary Xu Lin visited the Chinese company’s offices, according to the official WeChat account of a Guizhou state media outlet. Li, Xi Jinping’s top deputy, didn’t ...

BLOOMBERG  Toshiba Corp accepted a buyout offer from a Japanese consortium, according to people familiar with the matter, as the iconic conglomerate moved a step closer to ending a troubled chapter in its more-than-140-year history. The Tokyo-based company’s board approved a bid of about 2 trillion yen ($15.3 billion) from a group led by domestic private equity firm Japan Industrial ...

BLOOMBERG The national-security and mental-health risks posed by TikTok are shared by other social media platforms, according to an advocacy group that’s urging Congress to also hold US companies accountable ahead of high-profile testimony from TikTok’s chief executive officer. The Tech Oversight Project, a nonprofit, says Meta Platforms, Alphabet’s Google, Apple and Amazon.com employ the same harmful business practices as ...

BLOOMBERG Google announced a raft of new artificial intelligence (AI) – powered features for customers of its cloud-computing business, as the technology giant jostles for dominance in the burgeoning field with rivals such as Microsoft Corp. and startup OpenAI. As Silicon Valley buzzes about so-called generative AI — software that can create images, text and video based on user prompts ...

BLOOMBERG South Korea will join its largest companies including Samsung Electronics Co to pour some $422 billion into areas such as chips and electric vehicles in its most aggressive effort yet to win a heated global race for tech supremacy. The government will focus support on chips, batteries, robots, electric vehicles, displays and biotechnology in an investment plan through 2026, ...

BLOOMBERG General Electric (GE) Co Chief Executive Officer Larry Culp saw his total compensation decline more than 60% in 2022 after agreeing last year to a reduced annual stock award. The CEO’s total compensation in 2022 was $8.2 million, down from $22.7 million in 2021, according to the company’s annual proxy filing. The 64% reduction was expected, and mostly due ...

BLOOMBERG Cloud computing is expensive. As the tech economy stumbles and businesses pare back, growth at the largest cloud-computing companies has slowed. That’s created an opportunity for startups that want to help trim those bills. Vantage, a New York City-based company has raised $21 million from investors. The haul follows two larger investment rounds in recent months by competing companies ...

BLOOMBERG Apple Inc partner Foxconn Technology Group plans to invest about $700 million on a new plant in India to ramp up local production, underscoring an accelerating shift of manufacturing away from Beijing as US-China tensions grow. The Taiwanese company, also known for its flagship unit Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., plans to build the plant to make iPhone parts ...

BLOOMBERG Google’s YouTube will incorporate new generative artificial intelligence (AI) features into its video-sharing platform, as the internet giant hastens to keep up with artificial intelligence rivals such as OpenAI Inc. and Microsoft Corp. — both of which have rolled out their own consumer-friendly products such as AI chatbots and image-creating services. “The power of AI is just beginning to ...