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Dubai / WAM Smart Dubai launched the ‘Zakat Al-Fitr’ service on its flagship Dubai Now application, in an effort to embrace technology and provide best-in-class services to customers, in line with the spirit of the Year of Zayed. Dubai Now is an integrated platform, offering 61 smart services from 28 government, semi-governmental and private entities, which targets 11 different customer ...

Abu Dhabi / WAM The Abu Dhabi Fund for Development (ADFD), approved an AED40 million concessionary loan for the development of a rural electrification project in Kalongo, Uganda. Mohammed Saif Al Suwaidi, Director-General of ADFD, and Ajedra Gabriel Gadison Aridru, Uganda’s Minister of State for Finance Planning and Economic Development, signed the loan agreement at the ADFD headquarters in Abu ...

Bloomberg India’s Oil and Natural Gas Corp., which once had $4.3 billion of funds, is now bleeding cash. The state-run company’s cash reserves have shrunk by more than 90 percent in the past year, after it was ordered to purchase the administration’s stake in a refiner and it paid a record dividend. ONGC’s reserves dropped to about 10 billion rupees ...

Bloomberg As the UK government works to exit the European Union, the nation’s electric utilities are working to get closer. Power already flows between the UK, France, Ireland and Northern Ireland through four interconnector cables, and work is under way to more than quadruple the capacity of those links. The cables will establish a stronger physical tie with the continent ...

Bloomberg Botswana’s sole operating coal mine will increase output almost threefold within seven years as it eyes export opportunities created by a shortage of the fuel that’s used to fire most of southern Africa’s power plants. Morupule Coal Mine in the east of the country will ramp up annual production to 8 million metric tonnes by 2025 from 2.8 million ...

Bloomberg EDP-Energias de Portugal SA’s executive board reaffirmed that the 9.1 billion-euro ($10.7 billion) takeover offer from China Three Gorges Corp. is low and said it will seek more information from the bidder about its plans for the Portuguese utility. “The executive board of directors notes that there are merits in the strategic intentions of the offeror,” Lisbon-based EDP said ...

Bloomberg B.N. Srikrishna is a genial, 77-year-old former Supreme Court judge who recites Shakespeare and Sanskrit scriptures with equal facility. But he’s making the likes of Google, Amazon and Facebook more than a little nervous. Srikrishna is leading the effort to draft new data-privacy laws for India that will regulate how tech giants from the US and elsewhere operate in ...

Bloomberg Xiaomi Corp. is considering raising about half of its proposed $10 billion initial public offering from mainland Chinese investors, people familiar with the matter said. The company may seek about $5 billion from the sale of Chinese depositary receipts and a similar amount from selling shares in Hong Kong, the people said, asking to not be identified as the ...

Bloomberg Vietnam said the groups behind June 10’s protests against proposed laws demonstrators view as curbing Internet freedom and favoring Chinese investors were trying to damage the country’s image, after the rare display of public activism reportedly turned violent. Thousands of demonstrators from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City rallied against draft cyber and economic-zone laws being considered by the ...

Bloomberg Elliott Capital Management urged Thyssenkrupp AG to negotiate a better steel joint venture with Tata Steel Ltd., increasing pressure on the German company’s management to deliver more favorable terms. In a letter to Thyssenkrupp management, Elliott highlighted the divergence in performance in Tata and Thyssenkrupp’s steel businesses. The weakness in Tata’s recent performance means that a tie-up is now ...