South Africa
The University of Johannesburg (UJ) and Accenture have collaborated to establish a skills development project in under-resourced communities. The project, known as the Advanced Technology Centre, is located in Devland, Soweto. A modern building with state-of-the-art spaces is being built in Extension 1 of the township. The collaboration aims to address unemployment, impart digital skills of the future, and contribute towards the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) in South Africa. It plans to train 130 youth in 2021, growing to 300 by 2024.
According to a Reuters news report, the South African government has eased the terms of a bailout gifted to state-owned defence company Denel for the financial year that ends in March 2021. Denel, which has faced a liquidity crisis and struggled to pay salaries of late, was allocated R576 million to pay off guaranteed debt, but the company asked the government to allow it to use the outstanding R271 million for purposes other than paying off said debt, and instead support revenue-generating activities.
Overseas
Business
STMicroelectronics reported third quarter net revenues of $2,67 billion (a 27,8 percent sequential increase) and net income of $242 million, or $0,26 diluted earnings per share. Demand for automotive products, personal electronics and microcontrollers were the main factors that contributed to this result. The company expects full-year revenues to be just shy of $10 billion. To be exact, the projected estimate is $9,97 billion, which would translate to 4,3 percent year-over-year growth.
For Texas Instruments’ third quarter, it amassed revenue of $3,82 billion, net income of $1,35 billion and earnings per share of $1,45. Revenue increased 1 percent from the same quarter a year ago, and 18 percent sequentially, with notable strength from the rebound of automotive demand and growing demand from personal electronics.
Companies
EBV Elektronik has signed a distribution agreement with NanoXplore for the EMEA region. NanoXplore is a privately owned, fabless company based near Paris offering a comprehensive portfolio of SoCs and FPGA devices primarily targeting markets like aerospace. Its product portfolio includes a range of leading radiation-hardened FPGAs from low-end to high-end.
Mouser Electronics has signed a global distribution agreement with e-peas, a semiconductor company developing energy-harvesting power management ICs and processing and sensing solutions. With products that help design engineers to enable their hardware to be powered indefinitely, e-peas provides IC solutions for applications such as industrial, home and building automation, agriculture, health monitoring, smart metering and other sectors. Its Ambient Energy Manager (AEM) product line, available from Mouser, includes solar, thermal, vibration and RF methods for extracting energy to supply Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
SK Hynix has agreed to buy Intel’s NAND memory and storage business for $9 billion. The transaction includes the NAND SSD business, the NAND component and wafer business, and the Dalian NAND memory manufacturing facility in China. Intel says it intends to invest transaction proceeds to advance its long-term growth priorities in areas like artificial intelligence, 5G networking and the intelligent, autonomous edge.
Inpixon has entered into an agreement to acquire Nanotron Technologies, a global location awareness technology company, for $8,7 million. Nanotron has established itself over the past two decades as a provider of innovative IoT solutions for real-time location systems (RTLS) and indoor and outdoor positioning solutions.
IBM has announced plans to split into two public companies, in an effort to shift its focus to higher-margin businesses like cloud computing and artificial intelligence. A new company focusing on legacy IT infrastructure will be named and spun off next year. The company expects the separation to cost $5 billion, and its shares closed nearly 6 percent higher after the announcement.
SMART Global Holdings has entered into a definitive agreement to purchase Cree’s deeply entrenched LED products business unit for up to $300 million. Traditionally focused on the memory, computing and storage markets, SMART expects to license and incorporate the Cree LED brand and trademarks into its portfolio of businesses.
Industry
The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) announced that worldwide sales of semiconductors totalled $113,6 billion during the third quarter of 2020, an increase of 11,0 percent over the previous quarter and 5,8 percent more than the third quarter of 2019. Regionally, sales increased on a month-to-month basis in China (7,9 percent), Asia Pacific/Al Other (3,3 percent), Europe (3,3 percent), the Americas (2,2 percent), and Japan (1,5 percent).
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