Booking a flight is getting a little more personal these days.
Under a new federal security program, all airlines will be required to ask for your name as it appears on your government-issued ID. Eventually, they also will ask for your date of birth and gender in an effort to bolster security and minimize the frequency of misidentifying passengers with people named on suspected terrorist lists.
The Transportation Security Administration will compare the additional information against government watch lists to decide whether travelers need extra screening — or are barred from flying altogether. Some airlines, including AirTran Airways, already have begun phasing in the program, called Secure Flight.
At Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, many travelers haven’t encountered the new requirements because the airport’s dominant carriers, American Airlines and Southwest Airlines, haven’t implemented them.
American says it will be begin gathering full names, dates of birth and gender sometime this fall. Southwest plans to start collecting the additional information by October.
All airlines are expected to be asking for names as they appear on IDs, dates of birth and gender by early 2010 for every domestic flight, said TSA spokeswoman Carrie Harmon. Similar information will be sought for all international flights by the end of 2010.
Before the Secure Flight program, airlines were responsible for matching travelers against the lists. The 9/11 Commission called for improvements to the matching process in 2004. The commission decided that matching "should be performed by TSA and it should utilize the larger set of watch lists maintained by the federal government."
Travelers have logged more than 58,100 complaints with the Department of Homeland Security’s Traveler Redress Inquiry Program since February 2007, Harmon said. Many contend people have had trouble boarding a plane because of watch-list issues, or that they have been needlessly singled out for additional screening.
Critics say the new program has its drawbacks.
"Secure Flight causes a lot of problems because it’s expensive and requires more data to be collected on everyone," said Chris Calabrese, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union’s technology and liberty program. "It may help some people who are erroneously matched on the watch list."
The TSA uses a subset of the terrorist watch list — the no-fly and selectee lists — to identify travelers who either are not permitted to fly or are subject to additional screening advance cash loan month paid.
Harmon said the no-fly and selectee lists contain about 16,000 people between them, with the no-fly list containing fewer than 2,500 individuals.
Auditors with the Government Accountability Office last month found that TSA had "made significant progress" toward reaching key Secure Flight milestones. But the TSA is still working on the system’s watch list matching capability, and cost and schedule estimates, the report found.
"Until these activities are completed," the GAO reported, "TSA lacks adequate assurance that Secure Flight will fully achieve its desired purpose and operate as intended."
TSA officials say traveler privacy will be protected. For instance, if a passenger’s name is not matched to watch lists, the data will be purged from the TSA systems after seven days.
Many passengers flying into Lambert recently said they weren’t troubled by the latest aviation security mandate.
Kate Spring of New Jersey said she was asked for her name as it appears on her ID when booking her flight to St. Louis on AirTran Airways. "If it’s for security, it doesn’t bother me a bit," Spring said while awaiting a ride outside Lambert’s Main Terminal.
The carrier, based in Orlando, Fla., began phasing in Secure Flight in mid-May, when it began asking travelers to furnish names in that manner, said AirTran spokeswoman Cynthia Tinsley-Douglas. AirTran will begin asking for dates of birth and gender information by Aug. 15.
Travelers have had questions about the name requirement but seem to be taking it in stride, Tinsley Douglas said. "We haven’t had too much push-back that I’m aware of."
But Bill Plachte of Denver said he doesn’t think the new security program will eliminate the problem of people being mistaken for those on watch lists.
"Because you’re not getting enough information," Plachte said after his Southwest Airlines flight arrived in St. Louis last week. "You’re not getting (Social Security) numbers. … They’re going halfway."
It could be the troubled auto sector’s ultimate win-win-win deal.
Taking advantage of an unprecedented global auto crisis, Frank Stronach, 76, scores the crowning achievement in his rags-to-riches career by taking a 20 per cent stake in Adam Opel GmbH, Germany’s second-largest automaker and for 80 years the main European arm of a now-bankrupt General Motors Corp.
Under terms of a tentative deal reached late last month, Stronach’s Magna International Inc., based in Aurora, and founded by Austrian émigré tool-and-die maker Stronach in Toronto in 1957, expands from one vehicle assembly plant, in Austria, to 10 in Germany, Britain, Spain, Portugal and Poland – becoming the only auto-parts maker ever to join the ranks of major automakers.
An insolvent GM, after surrendering 65 per cent of Opel for about $5 billion (U.S.) in German government loan guarantees, clings to its global strategy under the proposed deal by retaining 35 per cent of Opel, which also makes the Vauxhall brand in Britain.
In recent years, Opel has emerged as a key contributor to GM’s worldwide vehicle-development system. Opel models have long been the platforms, or underpinnings, of several models of Saturn, a GM division shed in its reorganization process.
Of late, though, Opel has also been responsible for engineering of all of GM’s mid-size and compact cars – the new, fuel-efficient "sweet spot" for automakers in future years of higher gasoline prices. Opel’s redesigned mid-size Insignia and Astra compact, regarded as among the best-engineered new Opel models ever, can easily be "re-badged" as Chevys or Buicks for non-European markets.
The tentative deal, to be finalized over the next few weeks, also works for OAO GAZ, the second-largest Russian automaker. GAZ’s chief creditor, state-owned Sherbank, would have a 35 per cent Opel interest, which it will likely sell to a GAZ that, for now, is in financial distress.
The GAZ link is Opel’s chance to gain a substantial foothold in Russia, which is expected to eclipse Germany as Europe’s biggest vehicle market when the global recession subsides. GAZ’s underused factories in Russia would benefit from economies of scale by turning out higher-quality, higher-priced Opels. And Opel would achieve greater efficiencies by spreading its new-product development costs over a larger sales base that could double in a few years, from 2008 sales of 1.46 million vehicles.
Much could go wrong with this multi-headed joint venture. The constant friction that characterizes most joint ventures could undermine the Magna-led consortium’s goal of lifting Opel into the top tier of world automakers.
Or the deal could be stillborn. Berlin is still welcoming rival Opel bids, presumably those that would reduce Germany’s loan exposure to Opel.
"With the Opel rescue we are throwing taxpayer money out the window with a sort of `free-beer-for-everyone’ mentality," said Michael Fuchs, chairman of the business wing of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party, to reporters. And thwarted suitor Sergio Marchionne, CEO of Fiat, as recently as Sunday expressed his continued interest in Opel.
But Fiat hasn’t improved its final offer. As with its deal to control Chrysler, a cash-challenged Fiat refuses to inject a penny of its own money into Opel, while the Magna-led bid called for a private-sector investment of close to $1 billion. Fiat also hasn’t offered to reduce the number of Opel layoffs and plant closings it contemplated – much deeper cuts than the Magna group envisions.
The Fiat plans for Opel are anathema not only to Merkel, with a September election on the horizon, but to GM unsecured personal loans with bad credit. As part of its own revival strategy, GM is counting on the output from Opel’s network of plants to retain and grow European market share. And some of the Opel facilities specialize in specific new technologies. Loath to see the Opel network it built dismantled, GM chose the Magna group over Fiat as its preferred final bidder.
In its struggle against larger competitors Fiat, Volkswagen, Renault and Peugeot Citroen (the latter two recipients of Paris emergency assistance), Opel has been starved for cash by its troubled U.S. parent. It also has been plagued by internal squabbles between executives in Detroit and Opel’s headquarters in Ruesselsheim, Germany.
So, Opel has suffered more than most competitors, with its European sales this year down 21 per cent, compared with a 5 per cent decline at Fiat and a 6 per cent drop at VW. Opel’s European market share has nosedived from 12.6 per cent in 1993 to a current 7.9 per cent.
But that was before the game changed, or will change if the Magna-led bid prevails. GAZ is an opening to the huge emerging Russian market. Its owner, Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, is something of a protégé to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
GM has told Magna it wants no Opels sold in North America. But GM is way behind the curve in mid-size car development. Having shed its Pontiac brand along with Saturn, Saab and Hummer in its bankruptcy reorganization, GM has North American Chevrolet and Buick dealerships in need of the wider product lineup to which they’re accustomed and they would welcome Opel products. The Opel-Saturn connection also puts a Magna-led Opel consortium in the lead position to take over manufacturing of Saturns from GM in 2011, at underused Opel and Vauxhall plants in Europe. (Saturn was recently purchased by auto-industry maven Roger Penske.) The Stronach musings lately about building Opels in Canada and assembling all-electric cars are fanciful. But turning some of Opel’s least busy plants over to "contract manufacturing" of Ford makes and other brands is not. Neither is the Opel deal. With Magna, GM, Berlin and the Russians having so much to gain from an Opel recovery, the parties have ample incentive to make their admittedly crowded partnership work.
GM is eager to retain its European presence and expand it into Russia. With the Magna-led deal, GM would "still have a tremendous broad-based global reach," Jeff Shuster, executive director of J.D. Power and Associates, told the Detroit News.
Which leaves Stronach sitting quite pretty amid a devastating industry downturn. Overly reliant on Detroit for years, Magna would have Opel demand to compensate for at least some of the decline in Detroit output in the next few years. And Magna stands to profit on the upside if the value of its 20 per cent Opel stake rises should the German firm recover.
"We dodged a bullet," Stronach told his shareholders earlier this year of Magna’s unsuccessful bid for Chrysler two years ago. By contrast with that proposed venture, in this deal Stronach limits Magna’s risk, shores up future demand for its core parts business, and has an Opel stake acquired at modest cost that could pay off with an Opel turnaround.
A turnaround that’s in the interests of so many parties that it’s not difficult to foresee – no matter how miserable the current shape of the global industry.
WASHINGTON–With the game-changing F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aircraft in early production stages, rival manufacturers are racing against time.
The F-35 may be regarded almost as much as an industrial and coalition-building policy as a warplane made by Lockheed Martin Corp the Pentagon's No. 1 supplier by sales and the world's largest aerospace company.
It is a projected trillion-dollar enterprise designed to dominate the lucrative global fighter market for decades while plugging its buyers into U.S.-built defense architecture and cementing U.S.-led alliances.
Unlike Lockheed's premier F-22 fighter, which flies faster, and higher and can range further, the radar-evading F-35 was intended for export from the get-go. It will be the first radar-evading, "stealth" U.S. warplane to be exported. And it is the costliest planned acquisition in Defense Department history.
The United States alone plans to spend nearly $300 billion for a total of 2,443 F-35s in three models to be delivered over 28 years. All are derived from a common design and would use the same sustainment infrastructure worldwide.
"The plan has firmed up" with no defections among foreign development partners, says Richard Aboulafia, a fighter-market expert at Teal Group, an aerospace consultancy in Fairfax, Virginia.
The F-35 is co-financed by the United States, Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, Turkey, Canada, Australia, Denmark and Norway. All the U.S. partners appear to be largely sticking to plans to buy a combined 750 F-35s, at least for now.
F-35 competitors include the Saab AB Gripen, the Dassault Aviation SA Rafale, Russia's MiG-35 and Sukhoi Su-35, and the Eurofighter Typhoon made by a consortium of British, German, Italian and Spanish companies.
Dassault has been pitching its Rafale to the United Arab Emirates in what would be the first overseas sale of the aircraft.
Brazil has short-listed the Rafale, Gripen and Boeing Co F-18E/F Super Hornet as finalists in a competition that could involve the purchase of more than 100 aircraft.
Next month, India is due to start year-long flight evaluations for the purchase of 126 multi-role fighters worth up to $10.4 billion, the biggest such market in decades. Indonesia and Malaysia are weighing Russian-made Sukhois. Switzerland is looking at the Eurofighter, Gripen and Rafale. Greece is evaluating the Eurofighter and the Super Hornet.
In India, Boeing is pitting its Super Hornet against Lockheed's F-16, Dassault's Rafale, Saab's Gripen, Russia's MiG-35 and the Eurofighter Typhoon.
Of the Swiss and Indian fighter competitions, Stefan Zoller, chief executive of EADS' defense and security division, told Reuters: "Both campaigns are hot; both campaigns are running exactly on schedule".
Chicago-based Boeing, the Pentagon's No. 2 supplier by sales and the top U.S. exporter, says it sees big opportunities for its F-15 and F/A-18 fighters before Lockheed works out kinks in the F-35, production ramps up and the price goes down.
"It's a great time to be in the fighter business," Bob Gower, the head of Boeing's F/A-18 program, told a briefing ahead of the Paris Air show next week.
Not since the days of McDonnell's F-4 Phantom fighter in the 1960s and 1970s has Boeing been entered into so many competitions worldwide, he said.
At the same time, Boeing is shopping for partners to co-fund development of a proposed new F-15 "Silent Eagle", a version aimed at Asian and Middle East markets that would feature special coatings to reduce its radar signature and other survivability improvements to go up against the F-35.
Chris Chadwick, president of Boeing's military aircraft division, told reporters last week: "With F-35 continuing to struggle to a certain extent, we think that we offer … the right amount of capability at the right cost at the right time for a lot of the international customers get a free credit report."
He described a four-to six-year window of opportunity including potential sales to India, Denmark and Brazil, which have competitions under way that also involve rival Russian and European fighters.
Japan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Qatar and Kuwait are among other countries that have shown interest in modernizing their fighter fleets in the relatively short term.
Australia has ordered 24 two-seat F/A-18F Super Hornets, with deliveries to start on July 8 and to be completed by 2012, the only Super Hornet export sale so far.
"The worst time you can buy a fighter is during the initial stages because the capability comes along later and the learning comes along later," Boeing's Chadwick said in a swipe at early purchases of Lockheed's F-35.
Boeing has offered the U.S. Navy a multiyear Super Hornet deal with a unit price of about $54 million, including advanced Raytheon Co actively electronically scanned array (AESA) radar systems and "the whole nine yards," Chadwick said.
Chris Geisel, a Lockheed spokesman, says the F-35A conventional take-off and landing model is projected to cost in the upper $60 million range per copy in adjusted 2014 dollars, when full production is due to kick in.
Three single-engine F-35 versions are under development by Lockheed: the conventional version for the Air Force, a short-takeoff-and-vertical landing model for the Marine Corps and a third for the Navy's aircraft carriers.
Lockheed's chief F-35 subcontractors are Northrop Grumman Corp and BAE Systems Plc Two rival, interchangeable F-35 engines are under development. One is built by United Technologies Corp's Pratt & Whitney unit; the other by a team of General Electric Co and Rolls-Royce Group Plc
Projected early F-35 buyers include Israel, which plans to acquire 25 in fiscal 2012 for delivery starting in 2014 with an option for 50 more. A sticking point has been Israel's efforts to add its own electronic warfare know-how.
Singapore, the other non-consortium member linked to the F-35 program through a special status, may start buying as many as 100 a year or two after Israel, Jon Schreiber, the Pentagon official who heads the program's international aspects, told Reuters in a March 17 interview.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates recommended buying 30 F-35s in fiscal 2010, up from the 14 funded this year, boosting funding from $6.9 billion to $11.2 billion. At the same time, the Navy is seeking nine fewer F/A 18s than had been projected last year and the department is planning to cap purchases of Lockheed's top-of-the-line F-22 at 187 planes.
"By accelerating the (F-35's) procurement ramp, we can lower procurement costs while also making the platform more cost competitive for our coalition partners," Air Force Secretary Michael Donley and General Norton Schwartz, the service's top officer, said in a June 3 statement to Congress.
Lockheed says all 24 countries that fly its multi-role F-16 fighter are potential buyers of the F-35, which is designed to replace at least 13 types of aircraft, including the F-16.
Overall, 2,909 fighters worth $163.7 billion are likely to be produced between 2008 and 2017, according to Teal Group, the aerospace consultancy. A total of 2,355 fighters worth $122.4 billion were built between 1998 and 2007, Teal said in a February 2009 market overview, representing a 34 per cent value growth.
"Boeing and the European primes have some strong business opportunities over the next five to 10 years," Aboulafia said in an email exchange. "But beyond these, the fighter market will belong to the F-35."
"It's quite likely that after 2020 the market will comprise the F-35 family and some Russian planes," he added.
Qualcomm Inc raised its quarterly profit and revenue targets as it forecast better-than-expected mobile phone chip sales, but said it remains cautious due to the weak economy.
Qualcomm said it now expects revenue of $2.67 billion to $2.77 billion for its fiscal third quarter, ending June 28, up from a previous forecast of $2.4 billion to $2.6 billion.
It raised its outlook for operating income, excluding its investment arm and other special items, to a range of $1.06 billion to $1.11 billion, from a previous target of $800 million to $900 billion.
“Our increased guidance reflects stronger-than-expected demand for more data-capable chipsets and increased licensing revenues driven in part by advanced 3G network upgrades,” Chief Executive Paul Jacobs said in a statement paydayadvance.
“While some chipset demand for developing markets has shifted to the fourth fiscal quarter and demand remains generally strong, due to the current economic environment we remain cautious and currently project a modest sequential decrease in chipset shipments,” he said.
The company did not give an earnings-per-share forecast due to market volatility and said its guidance does not include provisions for the consequences of any pending legal matters.
Qualcomm shares were down 1 percent at $45.58 in early trading on the Nasdaq stock market.
(Reporting by Sinead Carew; editing by John Wallace)
DETROIT — A former CEO and chairman of telecommunications giant AT&T Inc. will lead General Motors Corp.’s board after the automaker emerges from bankruptcy protection, GM said Tuesday.
Edward Whitacre Jr., 67, eventually will replace Kent Kresa, who will remain GM’s interim chairman until the reorganized automaker emerges as a new company that’s majority-owned by the U.S. government.
Whitacre was chairman and chief executive of AT&T and its predecessor companies from 1990 to 2007. During his tenure, he led the company through several acquisitions and sales.
Whitacre sits on the boards of Exxon Mobil Corp. and the railroad company Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp.
Whitacre also was a director of Anheuser-Busch Cos. from 1988 to 2008, when the company was purchased by InBev of Belgium. He is not on Anheuser-Busch InBev’s board.
If you are hunting for a job in the Toronto area this summer, you’d better hope that Big Brother has set his sights on you.
The latest Manpower Employment Outlook Survey suggests that Toronto will face a "conservative hiring climate" during the July-to-September period, with public administration employers appearing the most optimistic about padding their payrolls.
Public administration consists of local, provincial and federal governments, including jobs in the court system, correctional institutions and social services. Outside Toronto, the sector is expected to lead hiring across Ontario and Canada during the third quarter.
Lori Rogers, vice-president of staffing services for Manpower Canada, says public administration jobs are poised to be a rare "silver lining" in Ontario’s hard-hit labour market, which is bracing for more manufacturing layoffs. Nationally, manufacturing is facing its "weakest" outlook since 1978.
In sharp contrast, the public administration sector is reporting a "net employment outlook" of 9 per cent for all of Canada once seasonal variations are removed from the data. That compares with a year-ago level of 14 per cent and a second-quarter reading of 10 per cent.
Manpower, a staffing services agency, says its net employment outlook reflects the percentage of employers who plan to hire, minus the percentage of employers mulling layoffs.
Its forecast brightens considerably on a provincial basis, with public administration reporting a "healthy" third-quarter outlook of 20 per cent for Ontario and 9 per cent for Toronto.
"For those people who are potentially looking for work, then what we’re saying is public administration is still hiring," Rogers said. She acknowledged, however, that government hiring is not a cure-all. Most economists consider private sector hiring a more accurate gauge of labour market strength.
Last week, Statistics Canada said Ontario’s unemployment rate hit 9 one hour cash loan.4 per cent in May, its highest in 15 years. The province lost 60,000 jobs, the bulk in manufacturing.
Nationally, 42,000 jobs disappeared last month and that net loss pushed the jobless rate to 8.4 per cent. Still, public sector employment rose by 27,000 jobs across Canada, "largely driven by the gains in public administration," the federal agency said. Public administration aside, the Manpower study suggests that employers in finance, insurance and real estate foresee a "mild" third quarter with net employment outlooks of 5 per cent and 8 per cent for Ontario and Toronto, respectively.
Overall, Ontario’s net employment outlook is plus 4 per cent for the three months ending Sept. 30, marking a gain of three percentage points over the second quarter result, but a whopping 13-percentage-point drop on an annual basis.
Toronto’s third-quarter net employment outlook, meanwhile, is a meagre plus 2 per cent, a sharp decline from 20 per cent a year ago. Still, it represents a three-percentage point increase from the April-to-June period. "I’d say it is definitely downbeat for Toronto for the next quarter," Rogers said.
Other Ontario communities are expressing much more robust outlooks for the summer months. "Fort Erie hiring prospects are the healthiest, with local employers reporting an outlook of plus 22 per cent. Upbeat expectations are also reported for Niagara Falls, with an outlook of plus 14 per cent, and York Region, with an outlook of plus 13 per cent," the report said.
Four Ontario centres, meanwhile, are predicting "negative head count growth" for the period. The Windsor area has the dubious distinction of having the nastiest outlook, at minus 17 per cent.
Two senior Europe-based partners in U.S. private equity firm Cerberus, majority owner of carmaker Chrysler, have left the company, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing a person familiar with the company.
Ken Leet, a former strategic adviser to Ford Motor Co, left after two and a half years with Cerberus, the person told the paper.
Jeff Lubin, who joined the private-equity firm in 2005 to establish the European arm, also left, the paper said.
The departures came as Cerberus cut a third of its staff in the United Kingdom in the first quarter of the year, the Journal said, citing financial accounts filed at Companies House in May.
The documents said that head count at Cerberus UK Management Ltd fell to 15 from 23, the paper said business card.
The person told the paper that the European cuts, which included Leet and Lubin, came after Cerberus decided in January to cut about a tenth of its global staff.
A Cerberus spokesman declined to comment to the paper on the departures, while the WSJ was also unable to reach Leet and Lubin for comment.
Reuters could not immediately reach Cerberus for comment, outside of regular hours.
(Reporting by Esha Dey in Bangalore; editing by Simon Jessop)
The downfall of the American auto industry is wreaking havoc on state and local budgets from coast to coast.
The decline in auto dealerships, coupled with the drop in car sales, is costing states and municipalities millions of dollars in lost sales taxes, not to mention lost income and property taxes and other fees.
Though exact numbers aren’t available, car purchases account for about 12% to 15% of sales tax revenues in many states, estimates the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. And sales taxes usually account for about one-third of a state’s revenue.
As the recession deepens, state tax revenues have fallen off a cliff. This has opened up yawning gaps, forcing officials to scramble anew to balance their budgets.
The drop in sales taxes are the worst since World War II, and the plunge in car sales are a major reason for it, said Donald Boyd, senior fellow at the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government, a public policy group.
"The declines have been devastating," he said. "It comes at a time when the states can’t afford it."
Take California, which has seen new car sales plunge 43% in the first quarter and 186 dealerships disappear since the start of 2008. The Golden State, which is struggling to close a $21.3 billion budget gap, is slated to lose 32 Chrysler dealerships and possibly 100 GM dealerships as part of the automakers’ restructuring.
New car sales are the single largest component of the sales tax base, accounting for 10.6% in 2006, the latest year available, according to the state’s Department of Finance. Municipalities also depend on the sales taxes, as well as other revenues such as property tax, to fund their operations.
"Many communities are having to let go firefighters and police because the sales tax revenues are down," said Peter Welch, president of the California New Car Dealers Association.
Fewer sales, deeper budget cuts
Indiana, which is wrestling with a $1 billion budget gap, saw auto sales taxes fall by 23% in the second quarter, said Chris Ruhl, the state’s budget director Guaranteed payday loans. Car purchases are the third largest source of sales tax revenue, until recently accounting for about $550 million a year.
The state is now tightening its belt, Ruhl said, to deal with the lower revenues. On Monday evening, Gov. Mitch Daniels recommended cutting spending by 2.5% across-the-board and tapping into the state’s $1 billion-plus rainy day fund to balance its budget.
New Jersey, meanwhile, is also feeling the effects of the auto industry meltdown. The Garden State has lost 170 dealerships since the start of 2007 and could lose 90 more in the cutbacks by Chrysler and General Motors (GMGMQ), which filed for bankruptcy on Monday. New car sales are down 33% for the first four months of the year.
This plunge has a drastic effect on state revenues, said James Appleton, president of the New Jersey Coalition of Automotive Retailers. He estimates that the state loses $10 million in revenue for every 1% drop in car sales. Incomes taxes also suffer when dealers close since each employs about 65 people.
State officials are now scrambling to close a $4.4 billion budget gap, exacerbated by an unprecedented decline in sales taxes.
"Until these markets come back, the state will continue to suffer," Appleton said.
Cities hurting too
More than just sponsoring the local Little League team, auto dealerships contribute to the coffers of many cities.
For Scottsdale, Ariz., auto purchases represent 11.6% of the city’s sales tax revenues. But the category is down 29% over the past year — the most of any — and six of the 20 dealerships along the city’s Motor Mile have shuttered.
Facing not only the shriveling of car sales but a downturn in construction and tourism, officials have eliminated 200 positions and are looking at cutting more to close a $9 million budget gap.
"The loss of the auto dealers has aggravated the effects of the recession," said Pat Dodds, a city spokesman.
OTTAWA–Magna International Inc. chairman Frank Stronach says he expects the company's newly acquired Opel unit in Germany to break even in three years and turn a profit in four years.
Stronach was in Ottawa today unveiling his company's new electric vehicle to federal MPs.
Stronach says he expects to turn money-losing Opel around financially and expand the German carmaker's markets to Russia and other parts of the world payday loan rates.
Magna, headquartered north of Toronto, is Canada's largest auto parts maker with 74,000 employees in 25 countries.
The company announced plans to buy control of Opel on the weekend from parent company General Motors Corp., with the help of the German government.
Applied Materials Inc’s chief executive said on Tuesday there will be more failures in the semiconductor equipment sector in future as the number of customers declines.
Slammed by sluggish demand and high development costs, chipmakers are joining hands to survive, but that is not happening among their equipment suppliers, Mike Splinter told a group of reporters on Tuesday.
Acquisitions in the chip gear sector are “very difficult” to conduct, Splinter said. “That leaves very few avenues to give consolidation, other than … companies failing.”
Technological differences often hinder chip equipment makers from joining together even when the biggest are flush with cash.
Combining technologies takes precious time while rivals move forward, and scrapping one firm’s technological base means overhauling equipment and high restructuring costs.
Orders for semiconductor equipment are emerging from near record lows, as chip makers replenish their inventory. Chip sales inched up 6 percent in April from March.
But the orders are still a fraction of levels from a year ago, while the world’s No.2 PC maker Dell Inc said last week there was not enough momentum in the PC market to call a bottom yet cash advance lenders.
Chip makers are still thinking twice about investing big sums to make smaller, more powerful chips, as they deal with ongoing losses that are eroding their capital and that drove Spansion to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and Qimonda into insolvency.
“The semiconductor equipment industry cannot support the necessary level of R&D without some amount of consolidation,” Splinter said. “Today there is too much repetition, too much waste in the industry.”
Applied Materials competes with No.2 chip equipment maker Tokyo Electron of Japan.
Sliding prices and a weak demand outlook have forced chipmakers to team up to cut mounting development and equipment costs.
PC memory makers Nanya Tech, Micron and Taiwan’s Inotera are joining hands as are Taiwan Memory Co and Japan’s Elpida Memory Inc.
Intel Corp, Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and Toshiba Corp are jointly developing advanced chips, while Japanese microcontroller makers NEC Electronics and Renesas Technology are in talks to merge.
(Reporting by Mayumi Negishi; Editing by Michael Watson)
Powered by WordPress -- XHTML 1.0