Business summary from Nov 15-21

S P Setia project sells out in a day

• S P Setia's flagship development in Shah Alam, Setia Alam, successfully sold out all units of Garciae double-storey cluster homes and units of Validum double-storey terraces via online bookings, within a day.
• Bandar Setia Alam Divisional general manager Tan Siow Chung said that while movement restrictions have been eased, the company decided to continue leveraging on the convenience of technology and hosted online unit selections for both Garciae and Validum.

Insight: Dutch divorce – Shell splits with the Netherlands after 114 years

• The company would drop Royal Dutch from its name, discarding a link to the ruling House of Orange that goes back to its founding in the 19th century.

SKB Shutters eyes capacity expansion

• SKB's local shutter sales increased by almost 17% year-on-year, while its other product segment - racking - posted a revenue growth of 44.3%.
• However, with Covid-19 disrupting cross-border transactions, the export sales for shutters and racking fell by 40.7% and almost 17%, respectively.
• Looking ahead, SKB is eyeing more growth from the export market, driven by pent-up demand.

Applications for URUS open for eligible B50 customers

• Eligible B50 customers who wish to apply for URUS may do so directly with their banks.
• They said for further assistance, customers can contact their banks via the internet banking or telephone banking channels, or walk-in at branches.
• Customers who have loan/financing facilities from multiple banks only need to apply to any one of their banks where they currently have performing facilities under an existing repayment assistance programme.

AirAsia X says it will give travel credits to passengers affected by its debt restructuring

• AirAsia X (AAX) has given assurance that it will put in place travelling privileges in the form of travel credits for its passengers who are affected by its debt restructuring, where the credits can be utilised for future purchases of flight tickets once international borders reopen.
• AAX said the affected passengers would also receive the 0.5 per cent payment of what is owed and other cash-based entitlements based on its annual revenue performance over three years as explained in the explanatory statement issued to all creditors recently.
• These entitlements and the travel credits can only take place if AAX is successfully restructured pursuant to the terms of the scheme.

New Myvi launched with 4,303 bookings

• The New Myvi, which cost RM50 million to develop, has advanced technology, enhanced intelligent safety features, improved fuel economy, sporty new looks and a new colour.
• The New Myvi variants include the 1.5 litre AV (Advance Variant), 1.5 litre H variant, 1.5 litre X variant and 1.3 litre G with pricing from RM45,700 to RM58,800.
• First introduced in May 2005, Perodua has sold some 1.3 million units of the Myvi so far, and of that number, 277,329 units of the third generation Myvi has been sold.

Digi adopts Oracle Cloud to streamline, automate business processes

• Digi Telecommunications Sdn Bhd (Digi) is leveraging on Oracle Fusion Cloud Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure to streamline and automate its business processes.
• Digi, which is part of the global telecommunications provider, Telenor Group, said on Monday it has been connecting Malaysians and businesses for the last 25 years and now it provides advanced 4G LTE services to 10.4 million customers.
• Managing business processes in the cloud gives Digi the ability to expand on this vision with optimized processes and data driven insights.

Billionaire-backed group trumps Keppel with US$2.9b bid for SPH

• Cuscaden Peak raised its offer for Singapore Press Holdings Ltd to about S$3.9 billion ($2.88 billion), looking to fend off a challenge by Keppel Corp in a rare bidding war between two groups linked to Singapore state investor Temasek Holdings.
• Cuscaden - a consortium of billionaire property tycoon Ong Beng Seng's Hotel Properties and two independently managed portfolio companies of Temasek - raised its cash-plus-stock offer by around 14% to S$2.40 per share, the group and SPH said in a statement on Monday.

Aluminium jumps amid supply concerns on China smelter blast

• An aluminium plant in China's Yunnan province with annual capacity of 300,000 tonnes has stopped production after an explosion on Thursday evening, Shanghai Metals Market reported.
• The most-traded January aluminium contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange rose as much as 3.9% to 19,310 yuan ($3,026.27) a tonne, before easing to close at 19,205 yuan a tonne, still up 3.4%.
• Three-month aluminium on the London Metal Exchange surged as much as 3.1% to $2,697 a tonne and was trading up 2.4% at $2,679.50 a tonne at 0749 GMT.