Taiwan to revive aerospace fortunes with jet trainers

  TAICHUNG / AP Seeking to revive its long-dormant aerospace industry, Taiwan on Tuesday launched a $2.1 billion investment in the production of air force jet trainers to be designed and manufactured on the island to counter Chinese military and diplomatic pressure. President Tsai Ing-wen presided over a ceremony in the central city of Taichung to inaugurate the project, which ...

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Singapore Airlines profit drops 36%

  Bloomberg Singapore Airlines Ltd., Southeast Asia’s biggest carrier, posted a 36 percent drop in third-quarter profit as passenger numbers declined and the company wrote down the value of a budget unit’s brand. Net income in the three months through December fell to S$177.2 million ($125 million) from S$274.9 million a year ago, with the drop attributed to a S$79 ...

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JetBlue to trim 2017 capacity growth

  Bloomberg JetBlue Airways Corp. cut back on 2017 expansion plans, joining other U.S. carriers in the effort to keep the number of seats and flights in check to gain more control over pricing. The New York-based carrier is trying to catch up with larger U.S. airlines, which have been slowing growth to stanch bleeding in the closely watched measure ...

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Korean Air’s debt costs set to worsen as won weakens

  Bloomberg Korean Air Lines Co. ended last year with a credit rating downgrade and debt-to-equity ratio approaching 1,000 percent — the worst among Asian full-service carriers. Investors of the money-losing airline face an even bleaker 2017 as a weaker won raises the cost of repaying foreign debt. The Korean currency is projected to weaken around 7 percent against the ...

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Fighting fake news isn’t just up to FB and Google

  NEW YORK / AP The fight against fake news is not just being waged by Google, Facebook and big media companies. They are joined in the battle by academics and data scientists who started work on the subject years before bogus news stories were suspected of helping sway the 2016 presidential election. Their work has yielded tools that help ...

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Honda sees growing e-car demand ahead

  Bloomberg Honda Motor Co. plans to set up a joint venture with Hitachi Automotive Systems Ltd. to develop, produce and sell motors for electric vehicles, citing the expected increase in demand for electric autos with tougher environmental standards. The joint venture has plans to manufacture in Japan, US and China, and will consider using Hitachi’s existing plants in those ...

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Meet bat bot, the new flying drone

  WASHINGTON / AP Holy drone, Batman! Mechanical masterminds have spawned the Bat Bot, a soaring, sweeping and diving robot that may eventually fly circles around other drones. Because it mimics the unique and more flexible way bats fly, this 3-ounce prototype could do a better and safer job getting into disaster sites and scoping out construction zones than bulky ...

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Qatar Petroleum hunts for gas in Morocco, Cyprus

  Bloomberg Qatar Petroleum is exploring for oil and gas in Cyprus and Morocco as part of a strategy to expand the tiny Gulf emirate’s global energy investments. The world’s biggest producer of liquefied natural gas known as QP must cope with local limits on growth as it seeks to expand its LNG business and increase its production and reserves ...

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Offshore drillers still wait for recovery enjoyed by shale

  Bloomberg While oil drillers in US shale basins are starting to see business come back, their offshore brethren will have to wait for prices to surge well above $60 a barrel. US offshore operators like Diamond Offshore Drilling Inc. and Atwood Oceanics Inc. are down more than 15 percent in the last month, as companies focus on onshore oil ...

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US East Coast takes more foreign crude as Bakken supply dims

  Bloomberg US East Coast refineries, which have thrived for a few years on a boom of production from the Bakken shale play in North Dakota and eastern Montana, are increasingly looking abroad to supply their needs. Last year through November, the region imported 884,000 barrels a day, which would be the highest full-year total since 2011, data from the ...

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