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Category: Electronics

Retail News Asia is committed to providing both local and global retailers with the latest Electronics news throughout the Asian market. This on a daily base.

  • Samsung Electronics shares jump on sale

    Samsung Electronics shares jump on sale

    Samsung Electronics shares shot up 2.42 percent on Thursday over the previous day to close at 50,700 won ($47), largely due to two of the chaebol’s financial affiliates selling their stakes in the tech giant on Wednesday.

    The market sees the sale as a step toward changing Samsung’s complicated governance structure. Samsung Group has been under pressure to reform its governance structure, which relies on webs of cross-shareholding ties among its affiliates.

    Financial Services Commission Chairman Choi Jong-ku repeatedly stressed that it would be best if Samsung Life Insurance, the de facto financial holding company of Samsung Group, sold off its stake in Samsung Electronics.

    Fair Trade Commission Chairman Kim Sang-jo, in a meeting with executives of the top 10 conglomerates in Seoul on May 10, also warned that Samsung could face big consequences if it does not change its governance structure.

    “The worst decision [Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong] can make is allowing time to go by without making any decision,” Kim said.

    In response, Samsung Life Insurance on Wednesday sold 23 million Samsung Electronics shares valued around 1.18 trillion won. Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance sold 4 million Samsung Electronics shares valued around 210 billion won on the same day.

    J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs were in charge of selling the shares. Although neither company disclosed who purchased the shares, it is believed that foreign institutional investors were the buyers.

    The insurance companies sold their shares in Samsung Electronics because of a regulation that prevents financial affiliates of conglomerates from owning more than 10 percent of a nonfinancial company.

    Samsung Life Insurance had an 8.27 percent stake in Samsung Electronics and Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance owns 1.45 percent stake. The combined stakes of the insurance companies was below the 10 percent threshold, at 9.72 percent.

    The sales reduced Samsung Life’s stake in the electronics company to 7.92 percent while the Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance’s stake dropped to 1.38 percent.

    Samsung Electronics has been retiring its own shares since last year. The company has canceled almost 18 million common shares and 3.23 million preferred shares, which is about half of the shares the company issued. Samsung Electronics plans to cancel an additional 8.99 million shares that it owns, worth around 40 trillion won, by the end of the year. The company announced the cancellation at the beginning of the year as a move to increase shareholder value.

    If the stock cancellations go as planned, the combined stakes that the two insurers have in Samsung Electronics would have been 10.45 percent, which would have violated the maximum 10-percent regulation.

    It’s estimated that the selloff on Wednesday will bring down the stake the insurers have to 9.99 percent when Samsung Electronics’ share cancellations go through.

    “Because of the stakes that the insurers have in Samsung Electronics, it is inevitable that they will have to sell the shares,” said Lee Byung-gun, a DB Financial Investment analyst. The selloff on Wednesday reduces the risk of Samsung running afoul of the law.

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  • Vietnam a really cool market for air-conditioner makers

    Vietnam a really cool market for air-conditioner makers

    Most major air-conditioner makers are making themselves at home in Vietnam as demand surges alongside economic growth and improving living conditions.

    Vietnam’s market for the cooling systems was ranked Asia’s eighth largest in 2011, excluding Japan and China, with about 660,000 units sold.

    But the country surpassed Thailand in 2015 and sales soared to 1.98 million units in 2016, lifting it to third place behind India and Indonesia.

    Citing the Japan Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Industry Association, the report said global market grew 2.5 percent between 2011 and 2016, but surged 34.3 percent in Asia during that period, with Vietnamese sales tripling to 150 billion yen, or $1.35 billion.

    Vietnam’s local media reports said Daikin’s revenue surged 17 times in the past 10 years to more than VND10 trillion ($438.6 million) in 2017.

    The brand also set a record of earning more than 2 trillion yen ($18.3 billion) in five consecutive years between 2013 and 2018.

    In May, it opened its first factory in Vietnam in Hung Yen Province, not far from Hanoi, aiming to produce one million air conditioners per year by 2020.

    Rising wealth has fueled growth of the air conditioner market in Vietnam, Nikkei said.Vietnam’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 6.8 percent last year, the highest since 2007 before the economy broke another record in the first quarter of 2018 when it expanded by 7.38 percent, marking the highest growth rate in a decade.

    Vietnam’s per-capita GDP totaled about $2,300 in 2017, but topped $4,000 in Ho Chi Minh City and reached the upper $3,000 range in Hanoi, the country’s two biggest cities.

    Japan’s Daikin and Panasonic each control about 25 percent of Vietnam’s air conditioner market, followed by LG, Samsung Electronics of South Korea and Sweden’s Electrolux.

    In March, LG Electronics announced it would invest $1.5 billion to expand production of air-conditioners. Meanwhile, Panasonic is increasing output at its Malaysian factory to expand supply to Vietnam.

    With a population of more than 90 million, Vietnam is seen as a promising air conditioner market, with just 17 percent of Vietnamese households owning an air conditioner as of last year, according to British research firm Euromonitor International.

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  • Smartphone Sales Will Drop for Second Straight Year, IDC Predicts

    Smartphone Sales Will Drop for Second Straight Year, IDC Predicts

    Global smartphone sales are expected to fall for the second year running this year, before  returning to growth next year, according to analysis by the International Data Corporation (IDC).

    In the research house’s Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, smartphone shipments are forecast to drop 0.2 per cent this year to 1.462 billion units, after a 0.3 per cent decline last year. Looking further out, IDC expects the market is to grow roughly 3 per cent annually from next year onwards, with worldwide shipments reaching 1.654 billion in 2022 and a five-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 2.5 per cent.

    The biggest driver of last year’s decline was China, where smartphone sales declined 4.9 per cent year-on-year. And the IDC expects sales in China to decline a further 7.1 per cent this year before flattening out next year.

    The biggest growth market in Asia Pacific continues to be India, with volumes expected to grow 14 per cent and 16 per cent this year and next.

    “Chinese OEMs will continue their strategy of selling large volumes of low-end devices by shifting their focus from China to India,” says IDC. “So far, most have been able to get around the recently introduced Indian import tariffs by doing final device assembly at local India manufacturing plants. As for components, almost everything is still being sourced from China.”

    “With 2017 now behind us a lot of interesting market dynamics are unfolding,” says Ryan Reith, program VP with IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Device Trackers. “Even though it declined 5 per cent last year, China remains the focal point for many given that it consumes roughly 30 per cent of the world’s smartphones.

    “But plenty of pockets of growth can be found beyond China. India is now grabbing headlines and the market itself is going through some rapid transformation. Local Indian manufacturing continues to ramp up, despite still having a heavy dependence on China for components. The boom in India is likely to continue in the years to come, but the move toward building up local production has certainly caught the eye of many in the industry.”

    Outside of Asia Pacific, the biggest regions for growth will be the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America. All three regions have relatively low penetration rates and plenty of upsides, says IDC. Economic challenges have been the main inhibitor over the past two years, but IDC expects consumer spending to rise throughout the forecast and smartphones to be a big benefactor.

    5G opportunity

    The other catalyst to watch will be the introduction of 5G smartphones. IDC predicts the first commercially ready 5G smartphones will appear in the second half of next year with a ramp up across most regions happening in 2020. IDC projects 5G smartphone volumes to account for roughly 7 per cent of all global smartphone sales in 2020 or 212 million in total. The share of 5G devices should grow to 18 per cent of total volumes by 2022.

    “Although overall smartphone shipments will decline slightly this year, the average selling price (ASP) of a smartphone will reach US$345, up 10.3 per cent from the $313 of last year,” said Anthony Scarsella, research manager with IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker.

    “This year will continue to focus on the ultra-high-end segment of the market as we expect a surge of premium flagship devices to launch in developed markets. Devices featuring large Amoled bezel-less displays, advanced camera functions, and an overall increase in speed and performance will be the driving factor in the increase of ASPs. Moving forward, we can expect this trend to continue as the ASP for a smartphone will continue to grow throughout the forecast period. In 2022, the final year of our forecast period, the average selling price for a smartphone will be $362, resulting in a five-year CAGR of 2.9 per cent.”

    Android vs Apple

    Android’s share of t sales is expected to remain relatively stable at 85 per cent of total global smartphone sales. Volumes are expected to grow at a five-year CAGR of 2.5 per cent, with shipments totaling 1.41 billion by 2022.

    “There is no question that Android is the OS of choice for the mass market and nothing leads us to believe this will change,” says IDC. “Given the large number of Chinese OEMs dependent on Google’s OS, as well as components from other US companies like Qualcomm, it will be interesting to see how things develop with all the discussion about a US-China trade war. Android OEMs continue to drive down the cost of new technology features at a rapid pace. IDC estimates that 98 per cent of Android phones will ship with screens larger than five inches by 2022, with 36 per cent being six inches or larger. While some of these will remain premium flagship models, the aggregate ASP of Android phones with a six-inch screen or greater by 2022 is projected to be $414.

    Meanwhile, iPhone volumes are expected to grow 2.6 per cent this year to 221 million. IDC is forecasting iPhones to grow at a five-year CAGR of 2.4 per cent, reaching volumes of 242 million by 2022. With rumors of some upcoming larger screen iOS smartphones, IDC has changed its screen size forecast for Apple by introducing volumes greater than six inches. Products are likely to begin shipping in the fourth quarter of 2018, with volumes ramping up and accounting for 36 per cent of all iPhones shipped by 2022.

  • Apple gets warning for misleading consumers

    Apple gets warning for misleading consumers

    Tech giant Apple has been warned by the Commerce Commission of New Zealand after it likely misled customers, while online retailer NZSALE has pleaded guilty to four charges of failing to comply with product safety standards.

    In the Commission’s view, Apple is likely to have breached the Fair Trading Act in a number of ways, including telling consumers its products are only covered by a guarantee for two years, which is in direct violation of the Consumer Guarantees Act (CGA) in that they do not expire after a legally prescribed period of time.

    “Although businesses may form a view about how long a product should generally last, they must assess each reported fault on its own merits,” said Commissioner Anna Rawlings, “they should not base decisions solely on how long a consumer has owned a product. The reasonable lifespan of a product will depend very much on what the product is.”

    Apple was also warned for pushing customers to the manufacturer of non-Apple branded products when Apple is responsible, as a retailer, for all products it sells.

    “It is natural that many retailers may wish to liaise with manufacturers to assess and remedy product defects but they must not point blank refuse to address consumer complaints and refer consumers exclusively to manufacturers for attention,” Ms Rawlings said.

    Additionally, NZSALE has been charged with failing to comply with the product safety standard for children’s nightwear, after it was found that three types of nightwear and a sleep sack were made of material that was too flammable to be used, did not carry the right fire hazard label, or had no fire hazard labelling at all.

    The Commission’s investigation was sparked by a product recall of these products in Australia following an investigation by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. The products were publically recalled in New Zealand in December 2015.

    In New Zealand 73 units were sold – although only eight garments were returned through the recall and a further 15 were confirmed destroyed by consumers.

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  • Samsung’s flexible working hours get more malleable

    Samsung’s flexible working hours get more malleable

    Samsung Electronics announced plans to revamp its flexible working hours on Tuesday in preparation for the 52-hour work week that will be legally enforced from July.

    The Korean electronics giant plans to allow employees to decide their own working hours on a daily basis, as long as they work for at least four hours a day. Employees need to work an average of 40 hours a week on a monthly basis. The new system will come into effect from July.

    Under the new arrangement, an employee can work 50 hours in a busy week and then 20 hours in a quieter week during the same month. As long as the hours worked in the rest of the month add up to average 40 hours a week, the employee is free to balance their work as they please.

    This offers more flexibility for workers than the company’s current system, which allows employees to begin work anytime between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. as long as they work at least four hours a day and 40 hours a week. Samsung started the current flextime program in 2012.

    The Moon Jae-in administration revised the labor law to reduce weekly working hours from 68 to 52, or 40 hours a week with up to 12 hours of paid overtime. Companies with 300 or more employees are subject to the new regulations from July.

    Samsung will also adopt a discretionary system for workers that struggle with tight schedules due to the nature of their work, such as developing new products and technology.

    Under the discretionary system, employees working on high-intensity projects will determine with their managers roughly how many hours a week the work should take. While the project is ongoing, workers will then have complete autonomy, with no checks or limits on how often or how much they’re working provided the task gets done, and will be paid for the number of hours agreed at the start of the project.

    “If an employer and employee agree on a 50-hour workweek for a certain period of time, the company gives a wage based on the contract regardless of whether the employee worked that much or not,” said a spokesperson from the electronics giant. “This kind of system is only applicable for certain tasks that require worker autonomy, like developing new products.”

    The new flextime arrangements will apply to researchers and office workers at Samsung Electronics.

    For manufacturing workers, Samsung plans to adopt a different flextime option that allows for periods when demand is especially high for specific products.

    Factory workers will be able to coordinate their working hours so they meet an average 40-hour workweek over a three-month basis. This way a team of assembly line workers can work longer hours for the first 10 weeks, for instance, and then reduce their workload in the remaining two weeks.

    Samsung affiliates are likely to announce similar schemes in coming weeks.

  • Samsung loses patent case retrial

    Samsung loses patent case retrial

    A U.S. court has ordered Samsung Electronics to pay $538.6 million in damages for infringing the design and utility patents of iPhones in early Galaxy models in a retrial of a case that dates back seven years.

    The retrial jurors in the Northern District of California on Thursday awarded Apple $538.6 million in damages after five days of deliberations – $533.3 million for violating design patents and $5.3 million for violating utility (technical) patents.

    The amount is $140 million more than the $399 million Samsung had agreed to pay – equivalent to all profits from the sale of the infringing smartphones – before it asked the Supreme Court to order a lower court to retry the case.

    Samsung already paid $548 million in damages to Apple in December 2015 that included the $399 million.

    In 2012, the Korean tech giant was found liable for infringing three of its U.S. archrival’s iPhone design patents – the rounded corners, the rim that surrounds the front face, and the grid of icons that users view – and two technical patents, which affect the way some features work. But the two companies have long disputed the amount of damages to be paid.

    Samsung has not decided whether to appeal the retrial verdict, which would prolong the already lengthy legal battle.

    “Today’s decision flies in the face of a unanimous Supreme Court ruling in favor of Samsung on the scope of design patent damages,” Samsung said in a statement. “We will consider all options to obtain an outcome that does not hinder creativity and fair competition for all companies and consumers.”

    Apple said in a statement it was pleased that the members of the jury “agree that Samsung should pay for copying our products.”

    “This case has always been about more than money,” the iPhone maker said, adding, “we believe deeply in the value of design, and our teams work tirelessly to create innovative products that delight our customers.”

    “Samsung is now going to consider its options,” wrote Florian Muller, an intellectual property analyst who writes a closely followed patent blog Foss Patents. “Those options are post-trial motions and, possibly, another appeal.”

    The legal feud between the two biggest smartphone rivals began in April 2011 when Apple sued Samsung for violating its patents and copying the design of its iPhone, seeking $2.5 billion in damages.

    Samsung was ordered to pay $1.05 billion in damages by jurors in 2012, which was reduced on appeal to $930 million. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit stripped another $382 million from that, saying the iPhone’s appearance could not be protected through trademarks, to $548 million in December 2015.

    A year later, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered a lower court on Samsung’s petition to reconsider the $399 million in damages on unanimous opinion that damages for design patent infringement can be based only on the part of the device that infringed the patent, not on the entire product.

    Samsung argued then that it should only have to pay $28 million in damages for profits from the components of its Galaxy phones that copied Apple’s patents.

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  • Alibaba backs virtual showroom startup Ordre

    Alibaba backs virtual showroom startup Ordre

    Alibaba Group has bought a minority stake in Ordre, a European online luxury wholesale platform.

    Ordre, launched in 2015, allows fashion designers to show off their collections via 360-degree photography and virtual reality to interested wholesale buyers. The technologies make it more convenient for buyers, who aren’t always able to travel due to time and distance constraints, to build inventory each season. The reduced travel translates into lower carbon emissions at a time when sustainability is increasingly important to the industry, said Ordre.

    Dianne Von Furstenberg, Vivienne Westwood and Jason Wu are among the world’s leading designers who have established digital showrooms on Ordre. They also work with fashion brands such as Joseph.

    For Alibaba, the investment is a further push into the luxury sector, which is among its top strategic priorities, given the rising spending power and increasingly sophisticated tastes of Chinese consumers. The Hangzhou, China-based company plans to leverage Ordre’s technologies for consumers, however, delivering a more-enhanced shopping experience on platforms such as B2C marketplace Tmall.

    “Matching Ordre’s technology with Alibaba’s unique data insights and capabilities – of which our recently launched Luxury Pavillion is a great illustration—we can provide our consumers with a personalised and differentiated experience, helping brands develop a deeper engagement with them,” said Jessica Liu, president of Tmall Fashion and Luxury.

    The Luxury Pavillion, which lives within Tmall, was launched last August to deliver to China’s high-end consumers the same kind of brand exclusivity and tailored shopping experience online that they would expect at a brick-and-mortar store. About 50 brands, including l, offer products ranging from apparel and cosmetics to watches and luxury cars.

    The pavillion is driven by Alibaba’s New Retail technologies, which blend online and offline commerce to deliver a better buying experience for consumers. Simon Lock, founder and CEO of Ordre, said the company’s digital assets, including 360-degree images, 360 video and VR fashion shows and designer interviews, are in line with this strategy and could serve Tmall shoppers and brands.

    “Our 360-view allows consumers to understand every aspect and every view of a garment,” he said. “When you’re purchasing online, as much detail as can be provided is going to make your purchasing decision much more confident,” which can help drive down the product return rates.

    The companies are currently discussing a number of potential initiatives that would expand on these technologies. One of which would create new direct-to-consumer channels for Ordre’s partner brands by leveraging content to communicate their brand story and provide more information about products. For example, Ordre’s VR technology was able to recreate Stella McCartney’s Coachella-inspired 2018 fall show and the theatrical experience of Thom Browne’s latest showcase in Paris, so that buyers could watch fashion shows from the front row.

    Other potential collaborations include “fit avatars,” which allow buyers to see collections on models in 360-view and technology that allows buyers to remotely feel fabrics on a touch pad.

    Lock said he was also interested in Alibaba’s “See Now, Buy Now” technology, as well as the company’s artificial intelligence and cloud-computing capabilities.

    “We can work together to create the ultimate global fashion cloud,” he said.

  • HHI, Naver to build cheap robots

    HHI, Naver to build cheap robots

    Industrial robot company Hyundai Heavy Industries Holdings (HHI Holdings) inked a partnership with tech giant Naver on Monday to develop customer service robots that will sell for a fraction of the price of existing models.

    HHI Holdings, the holding company of Korean shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries, will handle the production, sales and quality control of the service robots while Naver’s research and development arm Naver Labs will lead technology and software development.

    The two companies plan on commercializing two types of service robots within the year.

    One is a high-precision indoor mapping robot dubbed M1, and the other is a service robot called Around that can control its own movements around shops using a 3-D map created by M1.

    The two robots were initially developed by Naver Labs, but the industrial robot maker will help commercialize the products by producing them at its factory in Daegu.

    According to Naver, it was able to minimize the number of expensive sensors used for Around as the precise map data captured by M1 gives the self-driving robot a better sense of direction without including numerous sensors and cameras.

    “By cutting the use of sensors, we pulled down the manufacturing cost of our autonomous robot to about one-tenth that of competing robots in the market,” a Naver spokesperson said. “To commercialize the robots, one of our priorities was making them more affordable.”

    The spokesperson said that competing models cost over 100 million won ($93,132), largely due to their high-tech sensors and cameras.

    The robots will be deployed in a variety of commercial locations, like airports, shopping malls, gas stations, hotels and factories to guide customers and provide product information.

    In the future, the two companies will also work together on new robot concepts and take advantage of both companies’ affiliates and customer networks, HHI Holdings said in a statement.

    Service robots are becoming more common in Korea nowadays. Incheon International Airport started testing guiding robots and cleaning robots made by LG Electronics from last year, and it is preparing to officially launch them later this year. In January, local coffee shop chain Dal.komm Coffee released a coffee-making robot called b;eat.

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  • Samsung’s IoT home comes with Jedi curtains

    Samsung’s IoT home comes with Jedi curtains

    Samsung C&T, the construction arm under the electronics giant, plans to make homes that are so smart they can recognize residents’ needs even before they call out for help.

    When this guests stepped into the 54-pyeong (1,921 square-feet) model house of Samsung C&T’s Raemian apartment brand in Munjeong-dong, southern Seoul, on Monday, the house welcomed the guest with a cool “air shower” to blow away fine dust.

    “There is a sensor in the ceiling of the entrance that can detect the fine dust level,” a spokesperson from Samsung C&T said. “If people coming in from outside increases the fine dust level in the house, the air shower [air blown from the ceiling] will be activated.”

    The air shower was just the beginning of the high-tech features that the “Raemian IoT Homelab,” the model house to be opened to the public from June, had to show off.

    The demonstration went from strength to strength as an employee entered the next room and waved his hand to automatically open the curtains. This “Star Wars” style magic trick was actually achieved as the internet-connected curtains communicated with the smart watches the demonstrators were wearing. The movement picked up by the gyro sensor in the watch triggered the curtains.

    Lazy home owners – or those who don’t like to wear watches – need not fear, as the smart curtains and other features in the house can also be controlled by voice command and a smartphone app.

    According to Baek Jong-taek, a senior vice president at Samsung C&T, most of the concepts will become reality by the end of this year and could be included in actual homes from next year. As the company is scheduled to begin presales of nine apartment complexes next year, they are the main targets for the latest Internet of Things (IoT) systems.

    “Whether all apartment units will be equipped with the system will depend on discussions with stakeholders such as apartment owners,” said Kim Myung-suk, vice president of the product design group at Samsung C&T. “The IoT system could be offered as a premium option only for residents that want extra smart home features.”

    To make the home – which includes 19 different IoT services and products – work, the company partnered with 12 other companies including speaker maker Harman International, electronic curtain provider Somfy, massage chair maker Bodyfriend, air quality management company Haatz and SK C&C, SK’s IT service unit with expertise in artificial intelligence.

    The constructor said it welcomes many more partners who would like to open up part of their software to make a richer smart home environment including Samsung rival LG Electronics.

    Monday’s event came as a surprise not only because top-notch IoT tech was introduced, but also because there have been rumors that Samsung plans to ditch its Raemian brand due to the low profitability of the reconstruction business. Last time it won a reconstruction order to build a Raemian apartment complex was in September 2015.

    Kim, however, made clear that Samsung has never said it would “not participate in reconstruction project bids” and added that the company “has been reviewing quality business opportunities.”

    Industry insiders said the event may be a sign that Samsung is back in the game with the upgraded Raemian brand.

  • Western Digital NAS device suffers from a potential Privacy issue

    Western Digital NAS device suffers from a potential Privacy issue

    The default configuration of Western Digital My Cloud EX2 network drives allows any unauthorised user on the local network to extract files by sending HTTP requests, according to security researchers. Western Digital’s My Cloud devices are storage/backup device that lets users backup and store important documents, photos and media files.
    In a security advisory, researchers at Trustwave said that when the device is switched on, the UPnP-media server automatically starts, which by default allows any user who can send HTTP requests to the device to extract any files. Thus, it is possible to bypass any permissions or restrictions set by the owner or administrator of the device.
    “It is possible to access files on the storage even when Public shares are disabled.  Specifically, anyone can issue HTTP requests to TMSContentDirectory/Control
    on port 9000 passing various actions. The Browse action returns XML with URLs to  individual files on the device,” said researchers.
    Researchers said that they had informed Western Digital about the problem in January of this year, but the manufacturer said that it will not release a patch. As a measure to prevent exploitation of the vulnerability, users are advised to disable DLNA if important data is stored on the device. Western Digital recommended that users follow this knowledge base article to turn off DLNA “if they do not wish to use the product feature.”
    Jason Garbis, vice president at Cyxtera, told that like all network-attached devices, organisations need to engage with their information security teams prior to deploying this drive onto their network.
    “Organisations of all sizes need to take a more proactive approach to network security and apply a zero-trust philosophy to their network. Once again, this vulnerability demonstrates that network access to a system – even without login credentials – is a privilege that must be managed. Today’s networks are far too open, which is a root cause of the many successful attacks and breaches affecting the IT industry,” he said.
    “With proper configuration, this device can be safely used. It should have the DLNA (UPnP) feature disabled, and ideally should have network access restricted to only authorised users. Deployed in its default configuration, this device exposes businesses to unnecessary risk of data breach, either to malicious insiders or external attackers.”
    Earlier this year, another security researcher found a plethora of vulnerabilities, such as pre auth remote root code execution, as well as a hardcoded backdoor admin account which cannot be changed. The backdoor also allows for pre auth remote root code execution on the affected device. The backdoor allowed anyone log in as user mydlinkBRionyg with the password abc12345cba. Western Digital has since issued a fix for this problem. It can be found here.
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  • Bic Camera Inc.’s profits come from Chinese tourists

    Bic Camera Inc.’s profits come from Chinese tourists

    Japanese retail tycoon Ryuji Arai can thank a growing flock of Chinese spenders for his swelling fortune.

    Bic Camera Inc., the Tokyo-based consumer electronics retailer that sells everything from cosmetics to liquor at discounted prices, has become a sought-after destination for tourists shopping in Japan. Profit has jumped to a record, sending its shares up by more than 50 percent over the past year.

    The surge has given 71-year-old Arai a $1.8 billion fortune. Arai, who founded the retailer four decades ago and steered the company to its initial public offering in 2006, is now chairman at the company. He owns a 43 percent stake in the shares through a set of trusts and his asset management company La Holdings.

    Bic Camera has won tourists over with bargain prices offered in its stores along with duty-free desks, and by giving overseas shoppers the option to make online reservations for products they wish to purchase. The company is also trying to woo Chinese shoppers by accepting payment methods such as Alipay, Wechat and even Bitcoin — which is helping boost sales, said Bloomberg Intelligence Consumer Analyst Thomas Jastrzab.

    “Bic Camera’s early adoption of new payment options could give it an edge over more cautious rivals,” said Jastrzab.

    Not much is known about the reclusive businessman. Bic Camera declined to make him available for comment for this story. He started his first company in his early twenties and later spun out the camera sales division into its own company, according to local media reports. He then went on to form Bic Camera in his early thirties with the opening of a store in Tokyo’s Ikebukuro shopping district.

    Arai is an anti-nuclear advocate, and Bic Camera displayed huge banners in 1995 to protest France’s plan at the time to resume nuclear tests in the South Pacific.

    In 2009, Arai stepped down as chairman of Bic Camera after the company became embroiled in a scandal over false earnings reports. After the shares lost almost half their value in January that year, they rallied when the company was allowed to retain its listing on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and it restated earnings for the fiscal years 2006 to 2008. The company was fined $1.3 million. He retook the role of chairman, without any directors role, several years later. Since then, Bic Camera shares have climbed eight-fold.

    After relinquishing the chairman role, Arai remained the largest shareholder of Bic Camera.

    Bic Camera has teamed up with Haneda Airport’s terminal operator, Japan Airport Terminal Co., to launch stores in airport terminals as well as Tokyo’s Odaiba shopping and entertainment district, according to Masanari Matsumoto, a spokesman for the company. Those stores are stocked with goods popular with inbound tourists to let them quickly find what they want, Matsumoto said. Inbound tourists shoppers to the electronics retailer have more than tripled in three years, according to the company.

    In recent years, the company has also ramped up sales through its own website and stores on e-commerce sites such as Rakuten and Amazon.com. Online sales accounted for about 10 percent of overall revenue in the six-month period ended Feb. 28, according to company filings.

    Bic Camera’s net income jumps more than five-fold over past four years.

    The company’s net income climbed fivefold to a record 13.5 billion yen ($122.6 million) in the financial year ended Aug. 31, according to figures from the company. Bic Camera predicts profit will increase to 16.4 billion yen this fiscal year.

    That strategy has helped Bic Camera become Japan’s third-biggest electronics and appliance retailer while offsetting the impact of a declining population at home. Bic Camera will benefit more than other big-box electronics retailers such as its competitors Yamada Denki Co. and Edion Corp. from the recovery in demand for digital consumer electronics, according to a Nomura Holdings Inc. research note last month.

    Online sales, with an increase in the weighting of sales on the company’s own website, will drive growth over the longer term, according to Nomura. While customers using Bitcoin have yet to account for a significant portion of sales, the option could help attract more foreign customers, especially during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

    ‘‘Quickly adding additional payment options is a good way to achieve differentiation,’’ said Bloomberg Intelligence’s Jastrzab. ‘‘It also helps to boost brand equity by creating a buzz with potential customers.’’

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  • Vietnam’s The Gioi Di Dong closed stores

    Vietnam’s The Gioi Di Dong closed stores

    Despite revenue growth, Vietnam retailer Mobile World has shuttered six The Gioi Di Dong stores.

    It closed the outlets last month following one earlier closure with a plan to maintain 1065 stores nationwide. The company says it has decided not to expand its store network to focus on revenue growth, but with the closing spree revenue for The Gioi Di Dong last month dropped 5 per cent from a year earlier to US$126.85 million.

    Now The Gioi Di Dong looks set to open only 500 locations by the end of this year instead of the previous goal of 1000 stores, according to chairman Nguyen Duc Tai.

    Mobile World is also struggling with its grocery business, Bach Hoa Xanh, which has added only 3 per cent to the company’s profit.

    In the first quarter of this year, revenue reached $1.31 billion, up 43 per cent year on year, to produce profit of $45.94 million, up 44 per cent.

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  • China’s Xiaomi expands into France and Italy

    China’s Xiaomi expands into France and Italy

    Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi Corp, which is planning to raise US$10 billion in a Hong Kong public listing, says it has launched sales in France and will enter the Italian market tomorrow.

    In France, Xiaomi is selling through its first Mi Store in Paris, via its own e-commerce platform Mi.com, and on other online and offline platforms including Amazon and Cdiscount. To date, the Beijing company has established a presence in 74 markets and has agreements with telecoms carriers in France, including Bouygues, Free, Orange and SFR.

    Smartphone shipments in western Europe fell 13.9 per cent in the first quarter, according to market research firm Canalys. Shipments to France dropped 23.2 per cent.

    However, Xiaomi shipments rose by more than 999 per cent, while Samsung and Apple saw 15.4 and 5.4 per cent declines respectively.

  • Samsung to open AI centers in three countries

    Samsung to open AI centers in three countries

    Samsung Electronics is opening research centers dedicated to artificial intelligence technology in the United Kingdom, Canada and Russia.

    That will bring the number of Samsung’s AI research centers to five, adding to existing ones in Korea and California.

    The Cambridge center in the U.K. opened yesterday, the Toronto center in Canada opens on Thursday and the Moscow center in Russia opens next Tuesday.

    In November, the electronics giant established an AI center under Samsung Research, a unit that heads development of future technology for the company. Two months later, a Samsung AI center was opened in Silicon Valley in the United States.

    The Korean center will function as headquarters for all five AI research centers, making it a global hub for AI research. Samsung has grand plans to expand the number of specialized researchers in the AI field to more than 1,000 by 2020, and some 40 percent will be foreigners.

    “[The AI center] will be a game-changer for Samsung to make a new world for the era of artificial intelligence,” said Kim Hyun-suk, president of Samsung’s consumer electronics unit at Tuesday’s inauguration ceremony of the AI center in Cambridge. Kim also heads Samsung Research.

    The Cambridge center will be led by Andrew Blake, who was director of the Microsoft Research Lab in Cambridge. Professor Maja Pantic of Imperial College London will also lead AI research as part of the unit. Her area of expertise is machine analysis of human emotions, for which she was chosen by the science journal Nature to speak at the 2016 World Economic Forum in Davos.

    Larry Heck was appointed to head the Toronto center. He is an expert in voice recognition and was a former leader of Samsung’s Silicon Valley center. The Moscow center will be led by Higher School of Economics Prof. Dmitry Vetrov and Skoltech Prof. Victor Lempitsky.

    Samsung Electronics has been active in artificial intelligence technology this year. It introduced its AI assistant Bixby in April 2017.

    At the Consumer Electronics Show in January, President Kim vowed to use the virtual assistant in all of its products, including home electronics, by 2020.

    Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong reportedly intends to invest in future growth areas such as AI following his return to management this year after months in jail.

    With Lee back at the helm, there is anticipation that Samsung may be more aggressive about acquiring companies with promising research.

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  • LG Group chairman dies at 73

    LG Group chairman dies at 73

    Koo, 73, had been ill for a year, LG Group said in a statement.

    Koo had been fighting a brain disease and had undergone surgery, said a group official who declined to be identified.

    “Becoming the third chairman of LG at the age of 50 in 1995, Koo established three key businesses – electronics, chemicals and telecommunications – led a global company LG, and contributed to driving (South Korea’s) industrial competitiveness and national economic development,” LG said.

    LG Group also established a holding company in order to streamline ownership structure and to begin the process of succession.

    The country’s powerful family-run conglomerates are implementing generational succession amid growing calls from the government and public to improve transparency and corporate governance.

    LG Corp (003550.KS), a holding company of the conglomerate, had said on Thursday its longtime chairman was unwell and it planned to nominate his son to its board of directors in preparation for a leadership succession.

    Heir apparent Koo Kwang-mo is from the fourth generation of LG Group’s controlling family. He owns 6 percent of LG Corp and currently heads LG Electronics’ information display unit.

    He joined the finance division of LG Electronics in 2006 and has been involved in several businesses such as appliances, home entertainment and group strategy, LG said.

    The late chairman adopted Koo in 2004 from his younger brother Koo Bon-neung after his only son died in a car accident.

    The change at the helm is not expected to be disruptive to the group’s business, one analyst said.

    “Although Koo passed away at a relatively early age, his son has already been in a senior position and I don’t think there will be a big change in governance structure or strategic decisions,” said Park Ju-gun, head of corporate analysis firm CEO Score.

    Under Koo’s leadership, the conglomerate changed its corporate brand to LG from Lucky Goldstar and sold LG’s semiconductor business to Hyundai, now SK Hynix Inc (000660.KS), under government-led restructuring in the wake of the Asia financial crisis in the late 1990s.

    Major affiliates are LG Electronics Inc (066570.KS), display maker LG Display (034220.KS) and electric car battery maker LG Chem (051910.KS).

    South Korean prosecutors said this month they raided LG Group’s head office as part of a probe into alleged tax evasion by family members controlling the conglomerate.

    The company said Koo’s funeral would be held privately with family members. Visitors including Samsung Group heir Jay Y. Lee have paid their condolences at his altar.

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