January, 2017

• 23 January

  S’pore consumer prices rise for first time since 2014

  

    Bloomberg Consumer prices in Singapore rose in December for the first time in more than two years, adding to signs of recovery in the city-state’s economy. CPI rose 0.2 percent from a year earlier, compared with unchanged prices in November. The median estimate of 16 economists in a Bloomberg survey was for a 0.1 percent gain Prices increased 0.2 ...

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• 23 January

  May industrial strategy seeks to pick winning areas for UK

  

    Bloomberg The UK government will pick winning areas in the economy to champion as part of an industrial strategy aimed at boosting Britain’s productivity as the country prepares to leave the European Union. Announcing the long-promised plan on Monday, Prime Minister Theresa May said she wanted to see “sector deals” to identify and address barriers to expansion in different ...

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• 23 January

  Microsoft asserts clients’ rights in FBI e-mail searches fight

  

    Bloomberg Microsoft Corp.’s effort to halt the FBI’s so-called sneak-and-peak searches of e-mails may ride on whether it’s allowed to defend its customers’ constitutional rights. The judge who will decide whether the case can go ahead told the company’s lawyers to be ready in court on Monday to address earlier rulings that undercut their arguments. At stake is half ...

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• 23 January

  Cynosure weighs sale in strategy review

    Bloomberg Cynosure Inc., the maker of lasers for medical and cosmetic treatments, is exploring strategic options including a sale, according to people familiar with the matter, amid increasing interest in the technology from larger global companies. Cynosure is in talks with financial advisers as it weighs strategic options, the people said, asking not to be identified because the deliberations ...

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• 23 January

  Berkshire Hathaway agrees to buy German pipe company

  

    Bloomberg A unit of Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. agreed to buy Wilhelm Schulz GmbH, a closely held German maker of piping components, as the billionaire accelerates an expansion in Europe. Rainer Floeth, chief executive officer of Krefeld, Germany-based Wilhelm Schulz, confirmed by phone that Berkshire’s Precision Castparts had agreed to buy the company. He declined to elaborate on ...

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• 23 January

  Five economic lessons from Obama’s presidency

  

    I remember vividly the economic and financial mess President Barack Obama inherited when he was sworn in as the 44th US president eight years ago. Growth and trade were imploding, millions of Americans were losing their jobs, and the stock market was in free fall. This frightful combination was also playing out in many other countries, fueling a sense ...

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• 23 January

  Safran’s $10bn French stitch-up

  

    Politics and meanness are undermining an attempt to create a new French aerospace champion. Safran SA’s 9.7 billion euro ($10.3 billion) offer for industry supplier Zodiac Aerospace is structured in a way that threatens to give the state a better deal than ordinary shareholders. Safran has secured the agreement of Zodiac’s board for a deal that’s been circling for ...

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• 23 January

  WeChat’s app revolution threatens iPhone

  

    The biggest long-term threat to the iPhone isn’t Android, Samsung Electronics Co. or China’s bevy of cheap phone makers. Instead, it’s a deceptively simple idea: Apps work better if you embed them in a single program, rather than let them proliferate across your home screen. WeChat, China’s leading social media app, just launched a new platform with exactly that ...

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• 23 January

  Microsoft chief warns of ‘hubris’ amid AI boom

  

    Bloomberg Microsoft Corp. and its competitors should eschew artificial intelligence systems that replace people instead of maximizing their time, Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella said. “The fundamental need of every person is to be able to use their time more effectively, not to say, ‘let us replace you’,” Nadella said in an interview at the DLD conference in Munich. ...

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• 23 January

  FTC scrutiny thwarts Qualcomm’s lucrative licensing model

  

    Bloomberg Qualcomm Inc. built itself into the world’s biggest and most profitable smartphone chipmaker by using a simple formula: selling billions of dollars worth of semiconductors while raking in fat profits from licensing fees tied to the underlying technology. That lucrative model is under siege on a growing number of fronts — most recently this week when the US ...

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