Major International Business Headlines Brief::: 28 March 2018

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Major International Business Headlines Brief::: 28 March 2018

 


 

 


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*  South Africa's Sanlam raises $490 mln in new share issue

*  Djibouti in talks with CMA CGM to develop new container terminal

*  Traders back local firms to buy Petrobras' Nigerian oilfield stakes

*  South Africa's Capitec FY profit rises 18 pct, misses estimates

*  South African rand steadies ahead of lending rate decision

*  S&P: South Africa needs stronger growth to escape "junk"

*  Botswana's Debswana says expects further rise in diamond output

*  Djibouti plans new container terminal to bolster transport hub
aspirations

*  South Africa's Murray & Roberts rejects ATON's buyout offer

*  WTO: US-China trade war would have 'severe' economic impact

*  Data row: Facebook's Zuckerberg will not appear before MPs

*  Jaguar self-drive car revealed in New York

*  Tesla and Nvidia shares fall amid driverless car doubts

*  Huawei P20 Pro smartphone 'can see in the dark'

*  Uber barred from resuming Arizona self-drive trial

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 <mailto:info at bulls.co.zw> 

 


 

 

South Africa's Sanlam raises $490 mln in new share issue

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa’s Sanlam has raised 5.7 billion rand
($490 million) from selling new shares to help fund its joint acquisition of
Moroccan company SAHAM Finances, the insurer said on Wednesday.

 

Sanlam said it placed 65.5 million new shares, or roughly a 3 percent stake,
through an accelerated bookbuild process to institutional investors for 87
rand per share, representing a discount of 5 percent to its closing price on
Tuesday.

 

Sanlam, along with rival South African insurer Santam Ltd, said earlier this
month that it will buy the rest of SAHAM Finances for $1 billion, as part of
a plan to become a pan-African insurance group.

 

It said the proceeds from the placing will be used to fund that acquisition.

 

Subject to approval by the Namibian Stock Exchange Limited, the placing
shares will also be listed on the Namibian Stock Exchange.

 

J.P. Morgan and Deutsche Bank are acting as joint global coordinators and
joint bookrunners.

 

($1 = 11.6443 rand)

 

 

 

 

 


 <mailto:info at bulls.co.zw> 

 


Djibouti in talks with CMA CGM to develop new container terminal

ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Djibouti’s port authority is in talks with French
shipping company CMA CGM to develop a new $660 million container terminal
and hopes to award the concession in July, the authority’s chaiman told
Reuters on Tuesday.

 

Aboubakar Omar Hadi also said the Djibouti Ports and Free Zone Authority
offered to buy out DP World’s 33 percent stake in another project - the
Doraleh Container Terminal - after the state-owned port operator from Dubai
threatened arbitration.

 

 

Traders back local firms to buy Petrobras' Nigerian oilfield stakes

LONDON (Reuters) - Global oil traders Vitol and Glencore are in talks to
financially back Nigerian firms racing to buy assets owned by Brazil’s
Petrobras valued at up to $2 billion, several sources familiar with the
matter said.

 

Cash is being lined up for purchases of stakes in two major oilfields in the
west African country, according to the banking and industry sources.

 

The potential consortiums including Glencore and Vitol offer the local
bidders financial backing that would otherwise be hard to secure directly
through international banks.

 

For the traders, a deal would guarantee access to high-quality crude oil for
many years. They would then be able to syndicate out the debt to banks.

 

Signing up to long-term financing deals to increase volumes and gain
exclusive access is one of the traders’ strategies to compensate for
increasingly thin profit margins.

 

Last November, state-controlled Petroleo Brasileiro SA, known as Petrobras,
launched the sale of 100 percent of Petrobras Oil & Gas BV, or Petrobras
Africa, as part of the heavily-indebted company’s plan to offload $21
billion in assets through 2018 as it also faces a massive corruption
scandal.

 

Petrobras holds half the shares in the company while 40 percent are held by
a subsidiary of Grupo BTG Pactual SA and 10 percent by Helios Investment
Partners.

 

Scotiabank is running the process with Evercore, according to the sale
launch document
file:///C:/Users/U0158553/Downloads/Teaser-Oportunidade-em-aguas-profundas-n
a-Nigeria-Ingles.pdf.

 

The venture has stakes in two offshore blocks that contain two producing
fields, the major Agbami field in OML 127, operated by a local Chevron
affiliate and the Akpo field in OML 130 operated by Total SA.

 

The assets could fetch as much as $2 billion, according to bankers involved
in the process.

 

    Trading and mining giant Glencore was looking to back Nigerian producer
Seplat in bidding for the assets.

 

The world’s top oil trader Vitol is examining backing several bidders in the
process, according to the sources.

 

Swiss-based commodities trader Mercuria was involved in the initial bidding
round but was unlikely to continue in the process, sources said.

 

Oil major BP’s trading division had also considered participating in a
possible consortium, but dropped out.

 

Glencore, Vitol, Mercuria and BP declined to comment. A spokesman for Seplat
did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

The result of the auction is expected to be announced in early May but some
participants said the assets might not be sold in one package.

 

Industry sources in Nigeria said the winner of the Petrobras blocks would
likely be a local company due in part to government pressure.

 

While the government already has local content laws, a sale so close to the
presidential elections in early 2019 has raised pressure to secure
high-profile local involvement in the upstream sector. This has made it more
difficult, the sources said, for international companies to bid for the
assets without a local partner.

 

The Akpo field produces nearly 130,000 barrels per day (bpd) of condensate
and Total is also due to start production at the Egina development in OML
130 later this year.

 

The Agbami oilfield is the main prize, however, producing about 240,000 bpd
of light, sweet crude. Petrobras holds a 12.5 percent stake in the field,
Statoil has 20.2 percent and Chevron holds a 67.3 percent stake.

 

The operator is a Chevron affiliate called Star Deep Water Petroleum Ltd.
Famfa Oil is one of the concessionaires of Star Deep Water Petroleum and was
also looking to increase its stake in the oilfield.

 

Famfa did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

Famfa Oil was awarded the rights to the exploration block that holds Agbami
in the 1990s. Its owner, Folorunso Alakija, is one of Africa’s richest
women.

 

 

South Africa's Capitec FY profit rises 18 pct, misses estimates

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Capitec lagged estimates with an 18 percent rise in
annual profit on Tuesday as South Africa’s fifth-largest lender pulls back
from lucrative but risky unsecured loans in the face job losses and a weaker
economy.

 

 

Launched in 2001 as a micro-lending business, Capitec is positioning itself
as a fully-fledged bank with no-frills account, savings and insurance and
credit card products to cut its reliance on unsecured loans, which rely
solely on a customer’s promise to pay it back.

 

The company said diluted headline earnings per share (EPS) came in at 3,846
cents in the year ended February, slightly below a 3,883 cents forecast by
Thomson Reuters’ SmartEstimates — which puts more weight on recent forecasts
and those from historically accurate analysts.

 

Headline EPS, the widely watched profit measure in South Africa, strips out
certain one-off items.

 

Capitec, which competes with Nedbank, Standard Bank, FirstRand and Absa
Group, said net income from transaction fees jumped 31 percent to 5.1
billion rand ($437.27 million), while net income from lending was up 7
percent to 12.6 billion rand.

 

($1 = 11.6634 rand)

 

 

South African rand steadies ahead of lending rate decision

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa’s rand steadied against the dollar
early on Wednesday ahead of the central bank’s interest rate decision later
in the day, with economists expecting the main lending rate to be cut.

 

At 0645 GMT, the rand traded at 11.6750 per dollar, not far off its
overnight close of 11.6800.

 

With the rand appreciating in recent months and consumer price inflation
easing, economists expect the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) to cut its
repo rate by 25 basis points to 6.50 percent, a Reuters poll said last week.

 

“A rate cut now may be justified – further out, it is difficult to say
whether conditions will be as conducive to providing a growth stimulus,”
Standard Chartered Bank’s Chief Africa Economist Razia Khan said in a note.

 

The SARB’s press conference to announce the decision starts at 1300 GMT.

 

Stocks were set to open lower at 0700 GMT, with the JSE securities
exchange’s Top-40 futures index down 1.19 percent.

 

In fixed income, the yield for the benchmark government bond was down 0.5
basis points to 7.885 percent, reflecting firmer bond prices.

 

 

S&P: South Africa needs stronger growth to escape "junk"

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Credit rating agency S&P said on Tuesday it was not
anywhere near to upgrading South Africa from “junk” status but that stronger
per capita economic growth and faster debt stabilisation could lift ratings
in future.

 

Ahead of a rating review scheduled for May 25, S&P Global Ratings’ sovereign
analyst Gardner Rusike said the future rating path would be influenced by
whether new President Cyril Ramaphosa follows through on promises to reform
the economy.

 

“We are now probably in a good situation that supports our stable outlook,
but we are not yet anywhere near going upwards as far as the rating is
concerned,” Rusike told a conference in Johannesburg.

 

“What would provide upside potential is further strengthening of economic
performance. As we have indicated we are now in a positive per capita growth
rate but we need to be in a much stronger per capita rate that is closer to
the average.”

 

S&P rates South Africa’s foreign currency debt ‘BB’ and its local currency
debt ‘BB+’, having downgraded the country to below investment-grade last
year, citing a deterioration in the economic outlook and public finances.

 

Ramaphosa’s replacement of scandal-plagued Jacob Zuma as president in
February and his promises to fight corruption and reform the economy to spur
growth have revived optimism about Africa most industrialised economy.

 

Underlining the pickup in sentiment, another of the “big three” rating
agencies, Moody’s, upgraded South Africa’s outlook to ‘stable’ and kept its
rating at investment grade on Friday.

 

An investment-grade rating widens the pool of potential investors in a
country’s debt and lowers its borrowing costs — a significant factor for
South Africa which has large budget and current account deficits to finance.

 

Ramaphosa welcomed Moody’s decision on Tuesday.

 

 

“The decision by Moody’s not to downgrade us any further is a great shot in
our arm, because we can now face the other rating agencies and get them to
begin to review the negative rating they may have given us,” he said at the
launch of a youth employment initiative.

 

GROWTH SEEN STRENGTHENING

S&P said on Tuesday it now forecast that South Africa’s gross domestic
product would grow 2 percent in 2018, doubling its previous estimate. It
sees growth of 2.1 percent next year, up from a prior forecast of 1.7
percent.

 

S&P said its improved forecasts partly reflected stronger investor sentiment
after the change in South Africa’s leadership and ensuing policy
announcements.

 

But it warned that economic growth of just above 2 percent, or 0.5 percent
in per capita terms, is low for a country with South Africa’s income levels,
and not enough to reduce sky-high unemployment — currently around 27
percent.

 

Rusike said faster debt stabilisation than the Treasury had outlined in its
2018 budget would also be ratings-positive but would not necessarily lead to
an upgrade.

 

He said: “It is up to South Africa to continue with reforms that have been
initiated, and the realisation of those reforms is what can be supportive to
a higher rating path.”

 

The Treasury said in February’s budget that gross debt was seen narrowing to
56 percent of GDP in the 2020/21 fiscal year from nearly 60 percent seen in
the October mid-term budget statement.

 

Since then Ramaphosa has reappointed the finance minister Zuma fired in
2015, sacked some ministers allied to Zuma, put another respected former
finance minister in charge of struggling state-owned firms and suspended the
head of the revenue service.

 

 

Botswana's Debswana says expects further rise in diamond output

GABORONE (Reuters) - Botswana’s Debswana Diamond Mining said on Tuesday
production jumped 11 percent to a three year high in 2017 and it expects
growth this year as lower taxes in the United States leave consumers with
more to spend on luxury goods.

 

A worker at the Botswana Diamond Valuing Company displays a rough diamond
during the sorting process at the purpose-built centre in the capital
Gaborone, file.

Debswana, a joint venture between De Beers and the southern African
country’s government, said annual production rose to 22.2 million carats
last year.

 

Sales jumped 16 percent, contributing to a 20 percent increase in earnings
before interest, tax and amortization.

 

De Beers Executive Vice-President, Diamond Trading, Paul Rowley, said a
weaker dollar had boosted diamond sales and he expected global demand for
diamonds to rise again this year after rising 3-4 percent in 2017.

 

“Coming from the lows of 2015, a growth in consumer demand of between 3-4
percent is quite good for us,” Rowley said on the sidelines of a
stakeholders meeting in Gaborone.

 

Debswana’s managing director Balisi Bonyongo said the firm would continue
its strategy of mining to meet demand.

 

“With stable and improving macroeconomics, particularly in the USA, we will
see growth of the same order of magnitude or perhaps slight higher in 2018,”
Bonyongo told the meeting.

 

The firm is in the final stages of expansion plans to extend the lifespan of
its Jwaneng mine.

 

Under a project dubbed Cut 8, Bonyongo said about 25 billion pula ($3
billion) has been spent so far to extend its Jwaneng mine’s lifespan to
2030.

 

He added he expected the firm to remove about 81 million tonnes of material
to uncover 92 million carats.

 

Feasibility studies for the next expansion project at Jwaneng mine, Cut 9,
will be completed by the end of this year, he added.

 

($1 = 9.5057 pulas)

 

 

Djibouti plans new container terminal to bolster transport hub aspirations

ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Djibouti is in talks with French shipping company CMA
CGM to develop a new container terminal at an initial cost of $660 million
as part of the tiny African country’s bid to expand into a sea and air
transport hub for the continent.

 

Aboubakar Omar Hadi, chairman of the Djibouti Ports and Free Zone Authority
(DPFZA), told Reuters on Tuesday that the authority hopes to award the
concession in July. It was also prepared to buy out DP World’s stake in an
existing container terminal to end a row with the Dubai port operator and
avoid arbitration, he said.

 

Djibouti’s strategic location has led the United States, China, Japan and
former colonial power France to build military bases there.

 

Its ports already serve as an entry point for cargo which is then sent by
smaller vessels to ports along Africa’s eastern coast, but it is now seeking
to become a sea-air transshipment hub for the entire continent.

 

To do this, Hadi said DPFZA was also planning to construct a $350 million
airport and expand Air Djibouti’s fleet of cargo aircraft.

 

The new container terminal project could break ground as early as September
with construction expected to take 24 months, Hadi said, speaking on the
sidelines of the Africa CEO Forum in Abidjan, Ivory Coast.

 

“We are going to build DICT, Doraleh International Container Terminal. This
is a new plan,” he said. “We are in discussions with CMA CGM.”

 

The port authority was not in talks with any other potential partners, he
said. CMA CGM did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

Once operational, Hadi said the port terminal would boast an annual capacity
of 2.4 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU), but subsequent expansion
phases would bring that up to 4 million TEUs.

 

Fifteen percent of the project’s cost will be financed through equity. Of
that, the DPFZA will contribute 85 percent, with its concession partner
providing 15 percent. The rest will be raised via international institutions
and banks.

 

“We are targeting trans-shipment,” Hadi said.

 

DP WORLD DISPUTE

Meanwhile, Hadi said the port authority was ready to end a dispute with DP
World over its cancellation of a concession contract for another facility,
the Doraleh Container Terminal, by buying out DP World’s 33 percent stake.

 

Djibouti ended the contract with the Dubai state-owned port operator last
month, citing a failure to resolve a dispute that began in 2012.

 

DP World has called the move illegal and said it had begun proceedings
before the London Court of International Arbitration, which last year
cleared the company of all charges of misconduct over the concession.

 

“We are prepared to pay them their 33 percent of shares,” Hadi said. “There
is no need for arbitration. We are going to buy their shares.”

 

 

South Africa's Murray & Roberts rejects ATON's buyout offer

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Murray & Roberts (M&R) rejected on Tuesday German’s
ATON GmbH’s buyout offer that values the South African engineering and
construction company at nearly $600 million, saying it undervalues it and
was “opportunistic”.

 

ATON, the investment vehicle of German investor Lutz Helmig, which already
owns a third of M&R, offered to buy the rest of M&R’s shares from
shareholders at a cash offer price of 15 rand ($1.29) per share - a 56
percent premium to M&R closing price last Thursday.

 

But M&R’s independent board said the low offer price, in conjunction with
the risks presented in execution, make the offer “particularly unattractive”
for its shareholders.

 

“The Offer is opportunistic and made at a time of unprecedented share price
weakness as a consequence of low liquidity, declining valuations of its
legacy peers in the construction sector and halting of the Company’s share
buy-back programme in 2017,” M&R’s independent board said in a statement.

 

M&R’s board said it would recommend that its shareholders reject the offer,
once it is formally made to them.

 

ATON plans to post an offer circular to M&R’s shareholders on April 5,
saying it has the backing of M&R’s third largest shareholder, Allan Gray,
whose stake is around 11 percent.

 

Shares in M&R fell more than 6 percent after the company released its
statement before trimming losses to trade 5.42 percent weaker to 13.27 rand
at 1238 GMT.

 

South Africa’s construction industry has slowed sharply since the 2010 FIFA
World Cup, with few major infrastructure projects awarded and those that
have been approved risk being curtailed by fiscal strains.

 

($1 = 11.6668 rand)

 

 

WTO: US-China trade war would have 'severe' economic impact

A fully-fledged trade war between China and the US would have "a severe
impact on the global economy", the World Trade Organisation head has told
the BBC.

 

There was a risk global growth could fall "very quickly", WTO
director-general Roberto Azevedo warned.

 

His comments follow the US and China announcing proposed tariffs against one
another, as Washington and Beijing ramp up the rhetoric on trade.

 

The WTO now faced one of its toughest periods, Mr Azevedo said.

 

Last week US President Donald Trump announced proposed tariffs on $60bn
worth of Chinese goods.

 

Beijing responded saying it was not afraid of a trade war, but that
negotiations should remain open.

 

The US has since said it was "cautiously hopeful" that the two economic
giants could come to an agreement on trade issues.

 

'Serious'

Mr Azevedo told the BBC's HardTalk program that while a global trade war had
not yet been initiated, the world was "seeing the first movements towards
it".

 

Earlier this month the US announced broader tariffs on steel and aluminium
imports which affected many nations including China. Beijing responded with
its own set of proposed tariffs.

 

The scale of damage done to the global economy, and its rate of expansion,
would depend on what the trade war encompassed, Mr Azevedo said.

 

"If it's just limited to steel and aluminium, it's one thing. If you're
talking about hundreds and thousands of products, it's a completely
different thing. And the impact will be significantly different."

 

But he said there was little doubt that the trade clash was a "big problem".

 

"I don't think anybody believes that this is something minor, even in the US
administration.

 

"These conversations are ongoing precisely because people are beginning to
understand, I hope, how serious this is and the kind of impact this could
have to the global economy."

 

The WTO is facing one of its toughest challenges, Roberto Azevedo says.

'Catastrophe'

Washington has also has launched a complaint against China for breaking
basic patent rights rules at the WTO - a body that Mr Trump has said is a
"catastrophe" and "a disaster" for the US.

 

Mr Azevedo said the clashes between the US and China were some of the most
difficult moments the WTO had faced in its 23 year history.

 

"If not the toughest, one of the toughest, yes for sure," he said.

 

"Given the nature of the challenges before the [WTO] system, where it comes
from and so on, it's really tough right now."

 

But he said that despite some rhetorical statements that pointed towards the
US wanting to leave the WTO altogether, there was no indication this was
going to happen and that there were "still conversations ongoing and still
negotiations ongoing".

 

"Now that doesn't mean that we should downplay that - you don't want to be
in the war," he said.

 

"We want to avoid the war so everything that we can do to avoid being in
that situation, we must be doing at this point."BBC

 

 

Data row: Facebook's Zuckerberg will not appear before MPs

Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg's decision not to appear before MPs is
"astonishing", said the committee chairman who invited him to attend.

 

Damian Collins, the head of a parliamentary inquiry into fake news, urged Mr
Zuckerberg to "think again".

 

Facebook and data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica are at the centre of a
row over harvesting personal data.

 

Mr Zuckerberg has apologised for a "breach of trust", but said he will not
appear in front of the inquiry.

 

He will instead send one of his senior executives, Facebook's chief product
officer Chris Cox, who will give evidence to MPs in the first week after the
Easter parliamentary break.

 

The global reach of Cambridge Analytica

What does Cambridge Analytica do?

Facebook data sharing - time to act?

Mr Collins, the chairman of the Department for Culture Media and Sport
select committee, said: "Given the extraordinary evidence that we've heard
so far today... it is absolutely astonishing that Mark Zuckerberg is not
prepared to submit himself to questioning.

 

"These are questions of a fundamental importance and concern to Facebook
users, as well as to our inquiry as well.

 

"I would certainly urge him to think again if he has any care for people
that use his company's services."

 

Facebook said Mr Cox was "well placed to answer the committee's questions".

 

At the weekend Mr Zuckerberg took out full-page advertisements in several UK
and US Sunday newspapers to apologise, adding the company could have done
more to stop millions of users having their data exploited by Cambridge
Analytica.

 

 

The select committee on Tuesday heard from former Cambridge Analytica
employee Christopher Wylie, who claimed the UK may not have voted for Brexit
had it not been for "cheating" by the Leave campaign.

 

Mr Wylie told the committee that Canadian company Aggregate IQ - which has
been linked to Cambridge Analytica - received funding from Vote Leave and
played a "very significant role" in the referendum result.

 

He also claimed:

 

*         His predecessor died in suspicious circumstances in a hotel in
Kenya after a "deal went sour"

*         Vote Leave and other pro-Brexit groups were working together and
had a "common plan" to get round spending controls

*         Cambridge Analytica worked for Brexit group Leave.EU and its
"franchise", Aggregate IQ, was hired by Vote Leave

*         The data Aggregate IQ possessed was used to target between five
and seven million people during the referendum campaign

*         Aggregate IQ said it had a "conversion rate" of 5-7% in persuading
people to vote a specific way

*         Mr Wylie, whose allegations were first published in the Observer
newspaper over a week ago, has accused Cambridge Analytica of gathering the
details of 50 million users on Facebook through a personality quiz in 2014.

 

He alleges that because 270,000 people took the quiz, the data of some 50
million users, mainly in the US, was harvested without their explicit
consent via their friend networks.

 

Mr Wylie claims the data was sold to Cambridge Analytica, which then used it
to psychologically profile people and deliver pro-Donald Trump material to
them to assist the presidential election campaign.

 

He described his former boss, Cambridge Analytica's CEO Alexander Nix, as a
salesman with no background in politics or technology but a lot of wealth.

 

On one occasion, the two of them were running late because Mr Nix had to
"pick up a £200,000 chandelier", MPs heard.

 

Cambridge Analytica claimed Mr Wylie "misrepresented himself and the
company" to the committee.

 

It described him as a "part-time contractor" who left the firm in July 2014
after less than a year working there.

 

Mr Wyllie "had no direct knowledge of the company's work or practices since
that date", it said.

 

Cambridge Analytica also said it was "disgusted" by his "use" of the "tragic
death of a member of our team as a means to further his own agenda".

 

"An investigation by Kenyan authorities concluded that there was nothing
suspicious about our colleague's death, and we as a company were deeply
saddened by the loss," it said.

 

Cambridge Analytica also denies any of the data acquired was used as part of
the services it provided to the Trump campaign.

 

Lawyers for Aggregate IQ have said the firm had "never entered into a
contract with Cambridge Analytica" and it had "never knowingly been involved
in any illegal activity".

 

Vote Leave has denied accusations that they broke the spending rules during
the UK's 2016 referendum on whether or not to stay in the European Union.

 

In a blog on Friday, Vote Leave's Dominic Cummings said the claims were
"factually wrong" and the Electoral Commission had approved donations in the
run-up to the referendum.-BBC

 

 

Jaguar self-drive car revealed in New York

The first self-styled "premium" autonomous car has been unveiled in New York
- and it's a Jaguar.

 

The vehicle, made in conjunction with Google's self-driving unit Waymo, will
be tested on public roads this year.

 

By 2020, the firms say 20,000 self-driving Jaguar sport utility vehicles
(SUVs) will be part of Waymo's public fleet.

 

The launch comes a week after an Uber self-driving car killed a woman in the
state of Arizona.

 

The investigation into that crash is ongoing.

 

Waymo has committed to launching the first fully-driverless taxi fleet -
without a human safety driver - in Arizona by the end of 2018.

 

Driverless car worries hit US stocks

Uber halts self-driving tests after death

"That Waymo is moving forward shows a lot of confidence," commented Tim
Stevens, editor-in-chief of news site Roadshow.com.

 

"The company knows its technology is solid and it's eager to allow a wider
audience to experience it."

 

Fatal crash

But public confidence in self-driving tech has taken a severe hit since the
Uber incident.

 

It is not yet clear why Uber's self-driving car did not detect 49-year-old
Elaine Herzberg as she crossed the road with her bicycle.

 

Velodyne, the firm that designed the sensors on top of the vehicle, said it
was "baffled" as to why the crash happened, insisting its technology was
capable of spotting Ms Herzberg.

 

Uber has repeatedly declined to comment while the investigation is ongoing -
a preliminary report into the cause is expected in the coming weeks.

 

In the meantime, Uber has suspended its self-driving trials - and on Monday,
Arizona revoked its licence to do so anyway.

 

Fancier self-drive

Waymo is a company spun out of Google's self-driving department and is owned
by Google's parent company, Alphabet.

 

It describes the Jaguar I-Pace as the world's first premium self-driving
vehicle.

 

Until now, Waymo's fleet had been made up mostly from Chrysler Pacifica
models adapted to contain Waymo's sensor technology.

 

The I-Pace is already breaking new ground for its maker, Jaguar Land Rover
(JLR) - it is the first full-electric vehicle from the company, which is
owned by India's Tata Motors.

 

"That Waymo want to offer one million rides a day shows they're definitely
going after Uber," commented Mr Stevens.

 

"For JLR, this gives the company a huge boost on the tech side. While the
technology will be Waymo's, the image will be largely Jaguar."-BBC

 

 

 

Tesla and Nvidia shares fall amid driverless car doubts

Shares in Tesla and California chipmaker Nvidia dived on Tuesday amid fresh
worries about the promise of self-driving car technology.

 

The concerns added to a wider technology sell-off that saw US markets
reverse gains notched on Monday as fears of a global trade war receded.

 

The tech rich Nasdaq index plunged more than 200 points or nearly 2.9%.

 

The S&P 500 lost 1.73% to 2,612.6 points, while the Dow Jones shed 1.43% to
23,857.7.

 

Nvidia - a supplier of autonomous driving technology - was among the biggest
losers after the company said it had halted self-driving tests on public
roads.

 

Shares, which rose precipitously last year, closed down almost 7.8%

 

Nvidia's decision follows a fatal crash this month involving a self-driving
Uber car in Arizona.

 

On Monday evening the state said it would bar Uber from future tests until a
federal probe is concluded. Other firms, such as Toyota, have also said they
will scale back testing on public roads.

 

Questions about car safety also dogged Tesla, after US safety regulators
said they were investigating a fatal accident involving one of its vehicles.

 

The National Transportation Safety Board said it is examining the fire that
occurred after the accident and looking to determine if the autopilot system
had been active.

 

Tesla shares sank more than 8% to less than $280, the lowest price in about
a year.

 

Nvidia and Tesla were among high-flying stocks last year, when markets
surged in part due to expectations of deregulation and corporate tax cuts.

 

Their course has been more turbulent this year, as investors grapple with
trade tensions, potential rate rises by the US Federal Reserve and other
factors.

 

Facebook and Google's owner Alphabet were also down about 5% on Tuesday,
amid ongoing concerns about data privacy protections.--BBC

 

 

 

Huawei P20 Pro smartphone 'can see in the dark'

Huawei's latest smartphone can take photos in near-dark conditions without
using its flash or a tripod.

 

The P20 Pro takes exposures lasting up to six seconds to get enough light.

 

It then uses artificial intelligence to deliver sharp images and avoid the
blurring and smearing normally associated with employing this technique
handheld.

 

The Chinese company recently told the BBC it could soon become the world's
bestselling smartphone brand.

 

At present, it is in third place behind Samsung and Apple, with US telecom
networks' refusal to sell its handsets proving an obstacle.

 

Like Samsung's Galaxy S9-series phones - which recently went on sale -
Huawei's pitch to consumers for the P20 Pro is largely based on its new
camera capabilities.

 

But while the South Korean company's S9+ made the leap to having two lenses
on its rear, the P20 Pro is distinguished by being the first mainstream
phone to feature three.

 

"Huawei doesn't have the brand Samsung or Apple have, so it's almost had to
go the extra mile in terms of the product," said Ben Stanton, from the
technology consultancy Canalys.

 

"And it's nice to see it taking the lead with some of the hardware it's
producing.

 

"But the thing with camera technology is that unless you are looking at
side-by-side comparisons [of photos] it can be very hard to tell which
device is better.

 

"So, Huawei has its work cut out to sell some of the new features."

 

The P20 Pro will cost 899 euros including tax ($1,115; £788).

 

That is less than both the Galaxy S9+, which costs 949 euros, and the iPhone
X, which starts at 1,149 euros.

 

Three lenses

The new flagship's three rear cameras each offer different capabilities.

 

The main sensor has an unusually high resolution of 40 megapixels.

 

But it uses "light fusion" software to combine data from groups of four
adjacent same-coloured pixels to produce 10MP photos.

 

The benefit is that images taken in low-light conditions should be less
"noisy" as a consequence.

 

"If you had an area of a table and put 40 little buckets on top and it was
raining, it would take a longer time to get an inch-worth of rain in the
bottom of each than it would if you had 10 buckets four times the size,"
said marketing manager Peter Gauden.

 

"And that's essentially what we are doing. Using light fusion to combine
four smaller pixels together to make a much larger pixel, and therefore
enhance our capability of absorbing light into the sensor."

 

The facility can be switched off, however, if the owner wants 40MP snaps.

 

The two other cameras are:

 

The P20 Pro uses object-recognition technology to automatically adjust its
settings to suit each subject, and then catalogue the imagery, which it can
do without having to send data to the internet.

 

In addition, the software makes composition suggestions when appropriate -
such as when to adjust the phone to keep it level with the horizon, or to
loosen or tighten a shot.

 

AI-enhanced photos

Like the Galaxy S9, the P20 Pro has a super-slow mode in which 960 frames
per second can be filmed at 720p "high-definition" resolution.

 

But it also offers its unique long-exposure trick.

 

To achieve this, Huawei says, the device uses its ability to distinguish
objects to find the optimum frame for each item contained in a shot.

 

It then takes information from other frames to improve the definition of
each object, while ensuring that edges do not become blurred as a
consequence.

 

Finally, all the digitally finessed items are merged together to create a
single photo.

 

As a result, a photo of the inside of a dim bar, for example, can end up
looking brighter and more detailed than it appeared to the human eye.

 

But quirks can occur.

 

In one test by the BBC involving a person stood against a dim background,
the frame selected of their face had them blinking despite the fact their
eyes had been open for most of the six-second exposure.

 

Dialled-up threat

Huawei narrowed the gap with Apple last year, despite coming under pressure
from other Chinese technology companies, including Oppo, Xiaomi and Vivo.

 

Manufacturer        2017 handset shipments Year-on-year change      Market
share

Samsung     317.7 million         +2.0%         21.7%

Apple 215.8 million         +0.2%         14.8%

Huawei (incl Honor)        154.2 million         +10.7%       10.6%

Oppo  111.7 million         +12.0%       7.6%

Xiaomi         92.7 million +75.0%       6.3%

Vivo   87.6 million +13.4%       6.0%

LG      55.8 million +1.2%         3.8%

Industry total        1.46 billion  -0.5%          100%

However, efforts to crack the US market have been frustrated by AT&T and
Verizon pulling out of talks to sell its devices.

 

Reports suggested local politicians had pressured the telecom operators to
turn their backs on the company because of concerns it had ties to the
Chinese government.

 

Richard Yu, chief executive of Huawei's consumer products division, told the
BBC that the Americans feared his company was "too competitive [and] too
strong".

 

One industry-watcher, who is impressed by the new phone, said that was not
necessarily good news for its rivals.

 

"Huawei is going to throw everything that it's got at Europe now, because it
needs to make up the sales volume expectation that it had in the US," said
Ben Wood, from CCS Insight.

 

"Other smartphone-makers should be seriously concerned that the threat it
poses has just been dialled up a whole order of magnitude as it's just
released up resources and money to resolve some of its brand issues."--BBC

 

 

Uber barred from resuming Arizona self-drive trial

National Transportation Safety Board investigators have examined the vehicle
involved in the crash

Uber has been forbidden from resuming self-driving tests in the US state of
Arizona.

 

The car-hailing company had already halted its trial after one of the
vehicles involved struck and killed a pedestrian a week ago.

 

The state's governor wrote to the firm on Monday saying there had been an
"unquestionable failure" to make safety the top priority.

 

Uber said it would help investigators "in any way we can".

 

Governor Doug Ducey referenced a video released of the incident within his
letter.

 

 

It shows the car's operator looking down, rather than directly at the road,
for about five seconds before the night-time accident.

 

"I found the video to be disturbing and alarming, and it raises many
questions about the ability of Uber to continue testing in Arizona," wrote
Mr Ducey.

 

He added that he had ordered officials to suspend the firm's right to drive
autonomous vehicles on local roads pending the outcome of inquiries by
national transport safety regulators.

 

The governor's tone contrasts with a statement given in 2016, when Mr Ducey
said he welcomed the company's self-driving fleet "with open arms and wide
open roads".

 

Uber launched its experiments in the state after being ordered to halt tests
in San Francisco because it had failed to obtain a required permit.

 

In a related development, the chief of Intel's rival self-driving programme
suggested its Mobileye tech would have prevented the accident.

 

"We ran our software on a video feed coming from a TV monitor running the
police video of the incident," blogged Amnon Shashua.

 

"Despite the suboptimal conditions, where much of the... data that would be
present in the actual scene was likely lost, clear detection was achieved
approximately one second before impact."

 

The Bloomberg news agency has reported that the Volvo cars used by Uber
feature Mobileye chips and sensors, but their normal driver assistance
system was disabled, according to the auto-parts' supplier.

 

The head of Google's autonomous car division Waymo has also said its tech
would have been "able to handle" such situations.

 

Velodyne - the firm that designed the collision-avoidance sensors that Uber
employs - previously told the BBC that it was "baffled" by the accident
because its equipment was capable of seeing in the dark.--BBC

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 


 

INVESTORS DIARY 2018

 


Company

Event

Venue

Date & Time

 


 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

 


Zimplow

final dividend 0.13c per share record

 

23/03/2018 

 


TSL

AGM

28 Simon Mazorodze Road, Southerton

27/03/2018 12pm

 


Willdale

AGM

19.5km peg, Lomagundi Road, Mount Hampden

29/03/2018 11am

 


 

Good Friday

 

30/03/2018 

 


 

Easter Monday

 

02/04/2018

 


Zimbabwe

Independence Day

Zimbabwe

18/04/2018

 


 

Workers’ Day

 

01/05/2018

 


 

Africa Day

 

25/05/2018

 


Zimbabwe

Heroes’ Day

Zimbabwe

13/08/2018

 


Zimbabwe

Defence Forces Day

Zimbabwe

14/08/2018

 


 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 


 <mailto:info at bulls.co.zw> 

 


 

 


DISCLAIMER: This report has been prepared by Bulls ‘n Bears, a division of
Faith Capital (Pvt) Ltd for general information purposes only and does not
constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy or
subscribe for any securities. The information contained in this report has
been compiled from sources believed to be reliable, but no representation or
warranty is made or guarantee given as to its accuracy or completeness. All
opinions expressed and recommendations made are subject to change without
notice. Securities or financial instruments mentioned herein may not be
suitable for all investors. Securities of emerging and mid-size growth
companies typically involve a higher degree of risk and more volatility than
the securities of more established companies. Neither Faith Capital nor any
other member of Bulls ‘n Bears nor any other person, accepts any liability
whatsoever for any loss howsoever arising from any use of this report or its
contents or otherwise arising in connection therewith. Recipients of this
report shall be solely responsible for making their own independent
investigation into the business, financial condition and future prospects of
any companies referred to in this report. Other  Indices quoted herein are
for guideline purposes only and sourced from third parties.

 


 

 


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