Today's Focus
- SMIC changes coaches! Gao Yonggang was promoted to chairman
- Zhao Ming said that Honor does not build cars and has no self-developed chip plan
- Amazon completes an $8.5 billion acquisition of MGM
- Apple admits that the million-dollar display camera is not performing well
- Three Renesas plants in Japan were temporarily suspended due to the earthquake
Giants move
SMIC announced that the company's acting chairman, Gao Yonggang, has been appointed as the chairman of the company, effective March 17, 2022. At the same time, SMIC also announced that Dr. Zhou Zixue has resigned as an executive director of the Company due to health reasons, effective March 17, 2022. In addition to being chairman, Gao Yonggang now serves as an executive director and chief financial officer, and also serves as a director or chairman of several subsidiaries and participating companies. Gao Yonggang, Aged 57, was appointed acting chairman of the Company on 3 September 2021, a non-executive director of the Company in 2009, an executive Director on 17 June 2013 and a Chief Financial Officer of the Company since 17 February 2014.
Honor CEO Zhao Ming said in an interview with the media that Honor will not build cars and will not enter the automotive field in the next few visible years. For the expansion of the global market, Zhao Ming said that from March this year, Glory will fully open the global market, including Europe, the Middle East and Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America, and will release a product every month. Zhao Ming also said that in the high-end market, Huawei and Apple were once the two poles in China, and after Huawei's mobile phone business was restricted, Apple was dominant, and Glory wanted to change the situation of Apple's dominance. Zhao Ming also said that although self-developed chips are not a problem for Glory, Glory currently has no plans for self-developed chips.
Amazon said it has completed an $8.5 billion deal to buy MGM Pictures. MGM has joined Prime Video and Amazon to work. The deal will make Amazon's TV and movie library even stronger. MGM is the production company of the 007 series of films and owns the Epix cable channel. The deal is also the second largest acquisition in Amazon's history, after the $13.7 billion acquisition of Whole Foods in 2017.
Apple's recently released 5G display Studio Display camera was a disappointment. Apple has also identified this problem and is ready to improve its performance through software updates. The Camera integrated with Studio Display captures images with grain and noise, which is particularly bad in low light. Apple acknowledged that "the system did not perform as expected" and said it would be improved through software updates. However, it is unclear when Apple will push this update. Studio Display starts at 11,000 yuan.
Samsung released two low-end Galaxy A series 5G models
Samsung Electronics Online released its low-end entry-level new machines Galaxy A53 5G version and Galaxy A33 5G version. The Galaxy A series adopts a 5nm process chip to enhance the computing power of artificial intelligence and optimize the night scene shooting mode and portrait mode. The biggest feature of the two new machines is the use of artificial intelligence cameras, four-camera layout, etc., to strengthen the camera configuration. The Galaxy A53 5G edition is equipped with an optical image stabilization of 64 million pixels, the main camera and other rear quad cameras, and the front camera has 32 million pixels. The Rear of the Galaxy A33 5G Edition supports four cameras such as optical image stabilization 48-megapixel main camera, and 13-megapixel front camera. Both models use super AMOLED screen, the A53 5G version screen size 6.5 inches, refresh rate 120Hz, A33 5G version screen size 6.4 inches, refresh rate 90Hz. The battery capacity is all 5000 mAh.
Foxconn expects the operating environment to be more challenging this year
Foxconn expects this year's operating environment to be more challenging. Liu Yangwei, chairman of Foxconn, said that given various unstable factors, the global supply chain situation may take several months to become clearer. He said on the earnings call that while the Russian-Ukrainian conflict currently has a limited direct impact on companies, the underlying inflation could drive up costs and have an impact on global supply chains.
Renesas Electronics, a major Japanese automotive chip manufacturer, reported that the company's production in three factories near the epicenter was affected, and two factories were completely shut down, and some production lines at one plant were suspended. Renesas Electronics said that after the earthquake, production at its Naka plant (Ibaraki Prefecture), Takasaki Plant (Gunma Prefecture) and Yonezawa Plant (Yamagata Prefecture) located near the epicenter was affected. Production at the Naka plant and the Takasaki plant has been temporarily suspended. The Yonezawa plant also stopped production immediately after the earthquake, but partially resumed production of some of the test lines on March 17 at 8:00 a.m. Tokyo time (7:00 Beijing time on March 17).
China Telecom will explore the spin-off and listing of Tianyi Cloud
At China Telecom's 2021 annual performance briefing, Ke Ruiwen, executive director, chairman and CEO, said that the company has signed a framework agreement on the capital increase and share expansion of Tianyi Cloud with four large state-owned enterprises such as China Electronics, China Electronics, China Chengtong and China Guoxin, and the follow-up work is being accelerated. "The company will actively explore the possibility of a spin-off and listing of Tianyi Cloud under the condition of complying with regulatory rules." Kerryvin said.
Microsoft will build a regional data center in Finland
Microsoft will invest in regional data centers in southern Finland to meet cloud computing needs, while recycling waste heat generated by servers. Microsoft is working with Finland's state-owned energy company Futon to collect and distribute heat using the latter's existing district heating infrastructure. Cindy Rose, president of Microsoft Western Europe, said the data center will provide sustainable impetus to Finland's digital transformation in an "innovative way", while heating Finnish homes and businesses and helping cities meet their emissions targets.
Netflix will charge users who share their accounts
Netflix, which has turned a blind eye to password sharing for years, has had enough. The streaming giant will take action to charge users who share their accounts with people outside of their family members. Netflix, which just raised the price of its monthly subscription in the U.S. just a few weeks ago, has said it will test a new feature that charges extra for users' ability to share their accounts. Testing of this new option will begin in Chile, Costa Rica and Peru in the coming weeks, before introducing the change in other countries.
Streaming music service Spotify intends to test the waters of NFTs
Streaming music service Spotify is planning to incorporate blockchain technology and non-homogeneous tokens (NFTs) into its streaming services, a move that has excited both the cryptocurrency and music industries, which they believe will be expected to boost the income of artists with the help of NFTs. Two recent job postings show spotifying talent for Web3-related projects. The so-called Web3 refers to a network backed by a blockchain that cryptocurrency proponents hope will regain control of the internet from the hands of tech giants.
Industry dynamics
Global 5G mobile phone sales account for more than 50%
According to a report released by market research firm Counterpoint Research, global 5G mobile phone sales accounted for more than 50% of total smartphone sales for the first time, driven by the new iPhone. According to the report, 5G mobile phone sales accounted for 51% of total smartphone sales in January this year. The Chinese market is a key driver of demand for 5G handsets from major handset manufacturers. In 5G mobile phone sales, Apple is far ahead with a market share of 37%. Samsung's 5G market share is limited to 12% due to its backward position in the Chinese market. Chinese mobile phone brands Xiaomi, vivo and OPPO have 5G market share of 11%, 11% and 10% respectively.
Japan is the first to propose the "6G" international standard scheme
As a technical requirement for the next-generation communication standard "6G", which is expected to be practicalized in the 2030s, a draft that the Japan Government-Citizens Alliance plans to submit to the international conference in June surfaced. 6G has different standards for different uses, such as the communication delay time of autonomous driving is less than 1 millisecond (0.001 seconds), and the communication capacity of remote surgery is more than 10GB per second. 6G is expected to have more than 10 times more traffic than current 5G. It is expected to become the infrastructure for new technologies such as fully autonomous driving and remote surgery.
Corporate Alerts
China Telecom announced that the company achieved operating income of 434.16 billion yuan in 2021, an increase of 11.3% year-on-year; and achieved a net profit of 25.95 billion yuan, an increase of 24.4% year-on-year. EBITDA was RMB123.9 billion, up 4.2% year-on-year.
Accenture announces results for the second quarter of fiscal 2022 ended February 28, 2021. Quarterly revenue was $15.05 billion, up 24% year-over-year. By business, consulting revenue increased 29% year-over-year to $8.32 billion and outsourcing revenue increased 19% to $6.72 billion. Quarterly net income was $1.66 billion, compared to $1.46 billion in the year-ago quarter.
Razer's net profit jumped sharply in 2021. The company reported a net profit of $46.2 million, more than eight times the $5.6 million it saw in 2020. Revenue jumped 33 percent to $1.62 billion, with solid sales growth in its Hardware, Software and Services divisions.
Thunderbolt has released unaudited financial results for the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2021 and for the full year 2021. Xunlei's total revenue for the full year reached $239.6 million, up 28.3% year-on-year, and net profit reached $1.1 million, a year-on-year turnaround. In the fourth quarter, total revenue was $71.1 million, up 18.6% sequentially. Based on Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), net loss for the quarter was $500,000, compared to a net loss of $5.1 million for the prior quarter. Based on non-GAAP, non-GAAP held a net profit of $1.7 million for the quarter compared to a net loss of $3.1 million for the prior quarter.
Amazon Cloud Technology announced that a new quantum processing unit (QPU) Lucy is officially available. Provided by OQC ( Oxford Quantum Circuits ) , Lucy is OQC 's first publicly available quantum processing unit , named after pioneering quantum physicist Lucy Mensing , an octa-qubit quantum processing unit based on superconducting qubit technology.
Querge-Gen Communications LTE-A vehicle scale module AG525R-GL has won important certifications worldwide. The AG525R-GL vehicle-scale module is based on qualcomm SA415M chip and is one of the best-selling AG52xR series models in the world. Developed and manufactured in strict accordance with the IATF 16949:2016 automotive industry quality management system standard, the product has entered the mass production stage and has been selected by many well-known automotive brands to support their key in-vehicle applications.
Paris Saint Germain Esports has announced that EPOS' high-end gaming audio brand, which provides audio equipment to gamers, has become the official audio partner of its Dota 2 team, PSG.LGD, based in Shanghai, China. As an audio partner, EPOS will become the PSG. Official supplier of LGD players and staff, providing them with new gaming headsets and audio amplification equipment for a better competitive edge.
Inspur Information releases the first meta-universe server MetaEngine. MetaEngine will carry the technologies and tools required for the construction and operation of the metaverse, provide computing power support for AI, rendering, simulation, modeling and other loads, meet the different types of computing power requirements of the four major operation links of "collaborative creation, real-time rendering, high-precision simulation, and intelligent interaction" required for the creation of the metacosm, and expand to large-scale computing power clusters on demand through high-speed and non-blocking network channels.
The Inspur Information Ecology Partnership Conference IPF2022, with the theme of "Intelligent Computing And Creative Insights, Digital Reality Integration", was held on March 17. The "2021-2022 Global Computing Power Index Evaluation Report" jointly launched by Inspur Information, IDC and Tsinghua University shows that in the era of digital economy, investment computing power to drive economic growth has long-term and multiplier effects: a country's computing power index will increase by an average of 1 point, and the digital economy and GDP will increase by 0.35 ‰ and 0.18 ‰ respectively. When a country's computing power index reaches 40 points and 60 points, for every 1 point increase in the calculation power index, its driving force for GDP growth will increase by 1.5 times and 3.0 times, respectively.
Dahua Co., Ltd. announced that it will hold the 2022 Dahua Co., Ltd. "CloudLink Everything Digital Wisdom Future" Summit Forum online on March 22. The forum invited Pan Yunhe and Shen Changxiang, academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, Wu Junqing, deputy director of the Department of Economy and Information Technology of Zhejiang Province, as well as a number of industry experts and partners to conduct dialogues and jointly discuss the cutting-edge concepts and technical practices of digitalization.
IDC released a research report saying: As a leading global AI training data service provider, Appen has unique advantages in providing data solutions covering the entire life cycle of AI in the Chinese market. Appen provides enterprises with full-stack collection and annotation services and solutions for images, text, voice, audio and video in the AI life cycle.