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Tag: asia

  • Quickly Philippines opens first store in Pampanga

    Quickly Philippines opens first store in Pampanga

    Quickly Philippines has opened its first outlet in Pampanga as it expands its local footprint.

    The Taiwanese tea chain, which opened its first store in Recto in Manila more than a decade ago, now boats 60 outlets across Metro Manila, Laguna, Cavite and Cebu.

    More regional locations will follow, the company says.

    Quickly claims its point of difference is serving fresh, healthy and exciting drinks including healthy fruit shakes made from natural fruit puree and blended drinks with pearls, puddings and other add-ons.

    Franchisee April Ocampo-Bertulfo saw an opportunity to bring something well-loved and proven to the province.

    “This brand is already in the Metro for several years now, and we thought, why not bring it here in Pampanga? We are sure that kabalens will love our products and will leave them wanting more as Quickly offers dozens of flavors and only uses high quality ingredients.

    “Quickly doesn’t add preservatives so it’s always fresh and healthy,” she said.

    Since its founding in Taiwan, Quickly has expanded into the US, Canada, Europe, Australia and Asia.

    Quickly is cashing in on the growing demand driven by health conscious consumers who believe its juices offer health benefits like aiding the fight against cancer.

    Ocampo-Bertulfo says the brand’s fruity variants are not powder-based, so customers will be refreshed with cooling drinks made from all-natural ingredients.

    “With every visit to our store and with every purchase of a Quickly cup, we promise that every sip cools you down and gives you satisfaction.”

    The new Quickly Philippines outlet celebrated its formal opening last weekend. The store is located on the Ground Floor of SM City Pampanga.

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  • Bangkok retail space limited despite growth

    Bangkok retail space limited despite growth

    Downtown Bangkok retail space is limited until the end of the year, according to a second-quarter report by property consultant Edmund Tie Thailand.

    Total retail stock downtown was 1.34 million sqm for the period, with three retail completions totalling 12,513 sqm as well as one of 6311 sqm in midtown. The next project is set for completion in the first quarter of next year.
    Average occupancy levels in the downtown for the quarter were steady at 92.7 per cent from the first quarter despite the new supply. Occupancy increased by 0.6 per cent year-on-year, and the average retail rent remained the same at THB2600 baht (US$78) a sqm per month – a decline of 1.14 per cent on year-on-year.

    Retail developments in the midtown market set for completion this year are all part of either office or residential mixed-use projects.

  • Online spending eases in June

    Online spending eases in June

    The growth rate for New Zealanders’ total online retail shopping eased back slightly in June, but spending was still up 10 per cent compared to June last year.

    According to the latest BNZ and Marketview monthly report on New Zealand’s online retail sales, purchases from offshore online retailers accounted for 44.5 per cent of the month’s online spending, and spending at these retailers was up 13 per cent on June 2016.

    A surge in spending on Computers and Electronics drove half of the increase.

    Clothing had a quieter month than usual, with purchases from offshore online retailers only up  per cent on June last year.

    Spending at local online retailers was up 9 per cent on June last year.

    “While slower than the double-digit growth rates we’ve generally been seeing since 2016, this level of growth is still more than double that of local bricks-and-mortar stores, which were only up 4 per cent on June last year,” said Gary Baker, director, institutional research, Bank of New Zealand.

    Food store-types drove approximately half of the growth at local online sites (June 2017 vs June 2016).

    Clothing purchases were also strong at local online merchants, up 16 per cent on last June.

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  • Logistics startup aCommerce seeking further funding

    Logistics startup aCommerce seeking further funding

    Thailand-based end-to-end logistics startup aCommerce is seeking to raise more than US$30 million in a series-B funding round.

    Insiders say the company is in discussions with global and local private equity groups to raise funding before the last quarter of this year.

    Founded in June 2013, aCommerce is a regional full-service e-commerce software provider, delivering tailored product to global brands and retailers including Hewlett-Packard, Lazada, Line, L’Oreal, Matahari Mall, Nestle, Philips, Samsung and Unilever.

    In July last year the company raised a $10 million strategic venture round led by MDI Ventures, Telkom Indonesia’s corporate venture capital arm, making it one of the largest series-A rounds for a tech startup in Southeast Asia. Also in the round were Australian firm Blue Sky and Swiss-based services provider DKSH, which had invested in aCommerce previously.

    aCommerce, which has a presence in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, plans to expand to Vietnam by the end of this year. It is also expecting its Indonesia business to turn profitable in the same time frame.

    Proceeds from the latest funding round will be used to strengthen its position in Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, as well as expand in Malaysia and Vietnam. Its services include marketing, fulfilment, store development, delivery, brand commerce and customer care. It launched a 7000 sqm warehouse in Cawang, Indonesia, last year and three months ago opened hubs in Bandung and Surabaya.

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  • Barista helps launch Need Coffee specialty outlet

    Barista helps launch Need Coffee specialty outlet

    Champion barista Daniel Concepcion Roque and his partners at Where Have You Bean have opened Need Coffee in Paranaque City in Metro Manila.

    Roque, who represented the Philippines in the World Aeropress Championship last year, says he did not originally intend to open a coffee shop.

    “My best friend’s father was planning to put up a coffee shop and just needed the expertise to do it,” says Roque. “From then on, we signed a contract and opened Need Coffee.”

    In its manifesto, Need Coffee says it is not out to “reinvent the wheel” but simply to give customers the middle ground of specialty coffee in a not overly commercialised package.

    “The chains get it. The average consumer does not walk into a shop expecting their lives to change over a cup of coffee. They simply need coffee,” the manifesto says.

    “Right now, specialty coffee is seen as unnecessary, overpriced and merely a trend. Need Coffee is here to differentiate itself from the stigma of bad-tasting commercial coffee, but also learn from commercial shops.”

    Roque says the company wants to train and grow with its baristas, later partnering with them in their own ventures.
    The shop serves espresso, Americano, latte, hot chocolate or even iced mocha and rose water cold-brew latte. Light snacks are also available.

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  • New McDonald’s China offers vision of innovation

    New McDonald’s China offers vision of innovation

    Deliveries and a digitalised, personalised dining experience are part of the “Vision 2022” strategy to be rolled out by the new owners of McDonald’s China and Hong Kong.

    McDonald’s Corporation yesterday confirmed its strategic partnership with Citic, Citic Capital Partners and The Carlyle Group following China’s regulatory approval half a year after the deal was announced.

    It is the largest McDonald’s franchisee outside of the US, covering existing businesses in Mainland China (about 2500 restaurants) and Hong Kong (about 240). Its development initiatives for China aim to drive double-digit sales growth in each of the next five years by almost doubling the number of restaurants to 4500 by the end of 2022.

    There will also be delivery hubs for more than three-quarters of the restaurants, plus more than 90 per cent will offer the “Experience of the Future” concept, taking digitalised and personalised dining to more customers.

    Innovation hubs

    The opening pace of mainland restaurants is expected to progressively ramp up from about 250 this year to 500 a year by 2022. Vision 2022 includes plans to significantly grow the restaurant portfolio mix in tier-three to -four cities to about 45 per cent.

    Innovation hubs in Hong Kong and Shanghai will introduce new menus and advanced digital retail experience.

    “China will soon become our largest market outside of the US, and we are excited to join forces with Citic and Carlyle for better localised decision-making to meet changing customer demands in this dynamic market,” says McDonald’s Corporation president/CEO Steve Easterbrook. “China and Hong Kong are leading the global system in capturing new consumer trends such as delivery and digitalisation, and its driving strong performance and growth momentum.”

    He says the corporation will continue to play an active part in the China growth journey through its remaining interest and participation on the China board.

    “We believe this is a winning formula that fuses McDonald’s global standards and branding with Citic and Carlyle’s extensive resources and market expertise,” says new McDonald’s China board chairman Zhang Yichen.

    McDonald’s has more than 37,000 locations in more than 100 countries. About 90 per cent of the restaurants worldwide are franchises.

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  • Esprit Holdings expects profit to more than double

    Esprit Holdings expects profit to more than double

    Fashion group Esprit Holdings expects to more than double its net profit for its financial year to the end of June, it has announced in a profit estimate for The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong.

    In a preliminary review of its unaudited consolidated management accounts, the company expects a net profit in the range of about HK$50 million (US$6 million) to $80 million, compared to the previous year’s $21 million.

    Company secretary Florence Ng Wai Yin says the overall development is attributable to two main factors:

    (i) an improvement of the financial performance of the group’s underlying business (excluding exceptional items), estimated to be about $370 million to $400 million; and

    (ii) less favourable taxation credit, which has been reduced to roughly between $156 million to $186 million compared to last year’s $606 million.

    The company expects to release its final results announcement next month.

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  • Furniture retailer’s share buyback delayed

    Furniture retailer’s share buyback delayed

    Smiths City Group shareholders won’t vote on a $5.7 million capital return at this month’s annual meeting as the retail chain operator works through outstanding regulatory matters.

    The Christchurch-based company had planned to put forward a planned share buyback to investors at the August 21 annual meeting, but will now have to hold a special meeting later this year as it irons out the details of the deal.

    Smiths City plans to pay 72c a share in a compulsory acquisition and cancellation of three shares in every 20, provided it gets approval from the High Court, Inland Revenue, lender ASB Bank and shareholders.

    “The return of capital was not referred to in the notice of meeting as the company is still attending to some regulatory matters that need to be dealt with prior to putting the return of capital to the shareholders of the company for their approval,” chairman Craig Boyce said in a statement.

    “The company’s intention is to put the matter to shareholders for approval at an extraordinary general meeting later in the year.”

    The retailer is partway through a five-year transformation programme where it wants to quit low margin businesses and expand its Auckland presence.

    In June it reported a 54 per cent jump in underlying earnings to $2m on largely flat revenue $227.5m on a smaller restructuring bill.

    The shares recently traded at 71c and have increased 2.9 per cent so far this year.

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  • Hung Fook Tong may double first-half profit

    Hung Fook Tong may double first-half profit

    Chinese herbal products retailer Hung Fook Tong Group Holdings has issued a positive profit alert, saying it expects to more than double the profit attributable to the owners of the company.

    Based on a review of its unaudited management accounts for the six months to the end of June, the profit is expected to be about HK$3 million (US$380,000), compared to the $1.4 million for its first half last year.

    Chairman/executive director Tse Po Tat says the increase is mainly attributable to:

    (i) an approximate 2 per cent increase in net sales, mainly in the wholesale segment through closer co-operation with key accounts in Hong Kong as well as more stringent control in rebates and discounts granted in Mainland China; and

    (ii) slight improvement in gross profit margin mainly because of continuous enhancement in procurement procedures.

    Hung Fook Tong expects to announce its interim results before the end of this month.

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  • New Look has tough Q1 as sales and profits plunge

    New Look has tough Q1 as sales and profits plunge

    Fashion retailer New Look’s bonds hit fresh lows on Tuesday on the back of poor quarterly results it had just released.

    The UK chain’s results showed the company’s adjusted Ebitda declining 37.3% to £27.2m, for the 13 weeks ending June 24.

    It said this was due to the challenges it faced in UK sales and investment in strategic initiatives.

    Revenue fell 4.4% to £338.7m with New Look Brand like-for-like sales down 8.2%, UK like-for-like sales down 7.5% and own website sales down 0.6%.

    While Third Party E-commerce sales rose 15.7%, that was the best news as underlying operating profit fell 60.3% to £12.1m and the loss after tax was £15.2m after a profit of £5.8m a year ago.

    CEO Anders Kristiansen said: “As expected, the UK market has remained difficult, which has resulted in a disappointing quarter of trading.

    We have managed the business accordingly by controlling costs, tactical investment in our strategic initiatives and enhancing our product proposition.”

    He added: “The evolution of our product proposition continues, and will be bolstered by the arrival of our new Chief Creative Officer, Paula Dumont Lopez, in September.

    We are pleased with our continued expansion in China, where we opened another 17 stores taking the total number to 127. In the UK, we are now trialling our new store concept and are encouraged by the early results.

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  • IDC names Smart City APAC Award winners

    IDC names Smart City APAC Award winners

    Hong Kong has been recognized in IDC’s third annual Smart City Asia Pacific Awards, scoring awards in two of the 14 categories.

    Hong Kong won in the transportation category for its Next Generation Intelligent Transport System, and in the smart building category for its Zero Carbon Building project.

    China meanwhile won in the smart meter category for its Shenzhen Smart Water project, and in the education category for its Hubei Public Services Platform of Education Resources.

    But the biggest winner was New Zealand, which picked up four awards in the smart grid, tourism/arts/culture, connected health and public works categories, followed by Singapore, which secured three awards in the administration, economic development and social services category.

    In total 18 smart city projects were represented across the 14 categories, due to ties in four categories – administration, education, land use/environmental management and smart buildings.

    “Asia-Pacific smart city projects in the past year have exhibited strong national development focus with an increasing citizen-centric personalization combined with ‘low investment-high impact’ agendas – all in hopes of attracting the right mix of manpower talents and lucrative foreign-direct investments,” commented Gerald Wang, head of IDC Government and Education Insights Asia Pacific.

    “This socioeconomic shift towards creating more localized and quality smart city ecosystems are notably influenced by new international and regional trade dynamics. The failure of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement and China’s increased efforts to boost its global leadership with endeavors such as the Belt and Road Initiative will continue to shape commerce and innovation drive in the region.”

    According to IDC, the key trends shaping the future of smart city programs in APAC include efforts to improve city economics and risk management, cybersecurity and compliance, socioeconomic growth and infrastructure as well as foreign investment and manpower development.

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  • Intel set to roll out 100 self-driving cars

    Intel set to roll out 100 self-driving cars

    Silicon Valley giant Intel on Wednesday (Aug 9) announced plans for a fleet of self-driving cars following its completion of the purchase of Israeli autonomous technology firm Mobileye.

    A day after closing the US$15 billion deal to buy Mobileye, which specialises in driver-assistance systems, Intel said it will begin rolling out fully autonomous vehicles later this year for testing in Europe, Israel, and the US.

    The fleet will eventually have more than 100 vehicles, according to Intel.

    The testing in real-world conditions “provides immediate feedback and will accelerate delivery of technologies and solutions for highly and fully autonomous vehicles,” said Mobileye co-founder Amnon Shashua, who is to run the unit for Intel.

    “Our goal is to develop autonomous vehicle technology that can be deployed anywhere.”

    The Intel test fleet with include various types and makes of vehicles, and capitalize on Mobileye expertise in computer vision, mapping and sensing.

    Intel, which has been expanding beyond its core of computer chipmaking, is keen for its technology to be an engine powering self-driving systems across the spectrum of vehicle manufacturers.

    “We want to enable automakers to deliver driverless cars faster while reducing costs,” Shashua said.

    Intel said the vehicles would offer “level 4” autonomy, which under industry standards represents a “high” level of autonomy just below the fully automated level 5.

    Most major automakers and several other technology firms have been stepping up efforts on autonomous driving in recent years, contending these systems will eliminate the vast majority of road accidents. Apple has a testing permit in California.

    German luxury carmaker Daimler and auto parts supplier Bosch have announced plans to work together to create completely driverless cars in the next few years.

    US-based Tesla boasts that all its models are built with the hardware for self-driving in event regulators five the technology a green light.

    US car rental giant Avis Budget earlier this year announced it will team up with Waymo on the self-driving cars being tested on Arizona roads.

  • Pandora APAC sales up 34%, eyes 60 more China stores

    Pandora APAC sales up 34%, eyes 60 more China stores

    Danish jeweller Pandora posted a surge in its APAC sales for the second-quarter period, as the Copenhagen-based firm signalled a shift toward the Chinese market to fight trading headwinds in the U.S.

    The jewellery maker known for its customisable charm bracelets said total revenue hit DKr4.83bn ($770m) – a 12 per cent gain on the previous year, but short of analysts’ expectations for DKr4.91bn.

    Net profit for the period dipped from DKr1.2bn to DKr1.1bn – analysts had expected it to be flat, said the news source. EBITDA reached DKr1.61bn, compared with an expected 1.74 billion.

    “We are pleased with the results for the second quarter delivering double digit top-line growth and continued healthy profitability,” said Anders Colding Friis, chief executive of Pandora.

    By market, Pandora said the US “remains challenging,” despite a comparable sale increase of 8 per cent. The EMEA increased 10%, driven by the UK, while APAC (China and Australia) revenues grew 34 per cent.

    “Markets like China, Italy, the UK, and Australia performed well, reflecting the significant growth potential for our product offering in both our newer and more developed markets. We also continue to make strides in improving the quality of our global store network and added net 70 new concept stores during the quarter.”

    The news follows on from Pandora’s first quarter period announced earlier in the year where it was reported that China revenues grew 91% in local currency.

    As a result, the company elevated its strategic focus in China to open 60 Pandora-branded stores in the nation this year, up from its previous estimate of 50.

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  • Wireless VR headsets to strain data networks

    Wireless VR headsets to strain data networks

    Wireless VR headsets will further strain telecoms networks, with data consumption from the devices set to grow by over 650% over the next four years to over 21,000 petabytes by 2021, Juniper Research predicts.

    When combined with traffic generated by VR headsets connected to PCs and consoles, this consumption will reach over 28,000 petaytes, the research firm said in a new report.

    VR requires fast data speeds to stream content effectively, ensuring that by 2021 data demand for each VR device is expected to exceed that of 4G, Juniper Research said. Growth in traffic will be driven by the need for higher image quality and framerates as VR becomes more mainstream.

    The report recommends that operators be brought into the VR standards conversation now to prepare for the growth in consumption and help make VR more accessible.

    Technologies designed to reduce the amount of data processing required, such as foveated rendering, will also need to be universally adopted.

    Meanwhile, although the first wave of the new generation of VR headsets has concentrated on single-user experiences, the report predicts that social VR will play a more important role in the future of the technology.

    Companies such as Facebook and WeChat are developing VR platforms and several popular VR games are incorporating social elements.

    “VR is currently seen as very isolating,” research author James Moar said. “The promise of having new worlds to explore is much more compelling when other people can share the experience, which needs social games and social interfaces, as well as the development of cross-platform standards.”

  • Fossil Group Asia sales down 9%, CFO quits

    Fossil Group Asia sales down 9%, CFO quits

    American watchmaker Fossil Group said total revenues took a dive in the second-quarter, on the back of soft sales in traditional watches and retail disinterest across all regions including Asia.

    For the three months ended July 1, the company’s net sales slipped 12.9 per cent to US$596.8 million from $685.4 million.

    By region, Asia was the best performing market, but still recorded a 9 per cent dive in revenues. This bettered the Americas down 16 per cent, while sales in Europe fell 10 per cent, said Fossil Group.

    By category, watch sales decreased 9 per cent, despite an increase in the connected watch business.

    Sales also declined in the company’s leather category, which was down 25 per cent, and in the jewellery category, slumping 22 per cent.

    “With the first half of 2017 now behind us, we believe that our traction in wearables, our significant progress in our supply chain evolution and our reduction in infrastructure costs show that we are pursuing strategies that can improve our profitability and return the company to solid growth over time,” said Kosta Kartsotis, chief executive officer, Fossil Group.

    The company’s net loss came to $344.7 million, or $7.11 a diluted share, compared with net income of $6 million, or 12 cents, a year earlier.

    Moreover, Fossil’s chief financial officer Dennis Secor has left the company due to personal/family reasons. The company said Jeff Boyer is set to join Fossil on October 16 as the new CFO. He is already a board member.

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