I. Technology
14. Apple claims ‘half a trillion dollars’
App Store economy
Apple has said that more than
85% of that figure occurred via transactions from which it did not take a
commission. The announcement comes at a time when Apple and other US tech
giants are facing increased anti-competition scrutiny. A leading developer has
also called on the iPhone-maker to lower the fees it charges, ahead of its
annual developers’ conference next week.
The study was commissioned by
Apple but carried out by economists at the Boston-based consultancy Analysis
Group. It surveyed billings and sales related to apps running on the tech
firm’s iOS, Mac, Watch and Apple TV platforms.
These included:
- in-app advertising via
apps such as Twitter and Pinterest,
- the sale of physical
goods via apps such as Asos and Amazon,
- the sale of digital goods
and services via apps including Mario Kart Tour and Tinder,
- travel bookings via apps
such as Uber and British Airways,
- food deliveries via apps
including Just Eat and Deliveroo,
- subscriptions to media
apps including The Times newspaper and Netflix, and
- subscriptions to work
apps including Zoom and Slack.
The report attempted to
account for spending that occurred externally but led to content being used
within an app – for example, a direct payment to Spotify, whose songs were then
listened to via its iPhone app. Likewise, it subtracted a proportion of the
charge of in-app purchases whose content was used elsewhere – for example, a
Now TV subscription taken out via Sky’s app, if most of the shows were then
watched directly on a TV’s own app.
In total, the economists said
$519 billion (£406 billion) had been generated via Apple’s software eco-system.
The figure excludes sales generated by the Android and Windows versions of the
same products. Physical goods and offline services accounted for the biggest
share of the sum – $413 billion. By contrast, digital goods and services, from
which Apple typically takes a 30% cut, accounted for $61 billion.
(Source:
bbc.com)
15. How Elon Musk aims to revolutionise
battery technology
Elon Musk has perhaps the
most exciting portfolio of businesses on the planet. There’s SpaceX with its
mission to Mars and Tesla with its super-fast hi-tech electric cars. He claims
his Hyperloop concept could revolutionise public transport. And even his Boring
Company is kind of interesting – it aims to find new ways to dig tunnels. So
which one will end up changing the world most? His battery business is also in
contention. But the compact, lightweight lithium batteries that mean you can
now stream movies on wafer-thin phones, will soon be powering much more of your
life. Yet the market certainly seems to reckon that they are the future. Just
look at the Tesla’s share price. Last week, it briefly nudged ahead of Toyota
to become the world’s most valuable car firm, even though the Japanese giant
sold 30 times as many vehicles last year.
One reason is that Elon Musk
has been teasing investors and rivals with the promise of ‘battery day’
sometime soon, at which he will announce a series of advancements in battery
tech. And cars are not the only vast new battery market. You might have seen a
story about how the world is slowly weaning itself off coal. Well, gigantic
batteries connected to our electricity grids are going to be central to the
great renewable energy revolution, too.
The first of these was
announced just last week when the Chinese battery-maker that supplies most of
the major car makers, including Tesla, revealed it had produced the first
‘million mile battery’. Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL) says its new battery
is capable of powering a vehicle for more than a million miles (1.2 million, to
be precise – or 1.9 million km.) over a 16-year lifespan. Most car batteries
offer warranties for 60,000-150,000 miles over a three-to-eight-year period.
This is a huge improvement in battery life, but will cost just 10% more than
existing products.
Having a
battery you never need to change is obviously good news for the electric car
industry. But longer-lasting batteries are also essential for what’s known as
‘stationary’ storage, too. These are the batteries we can attach to wind
turbines or solar panels so that renewable energy is available when the sun
isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing. Fairly soon, you might even want a
stationary battery in your home to store cheap off-peak electricity, or to
collect the power your own solar panels generate.
(Source:
bbc.com)
II. World News
16. US
cities are losing 36 million trees a year
If you’re looking for a
reason to care about tree loss, this summer’s record-breaking heat waves might
be it. Trees can lower summer daytime temperatures by as much as 10 degrees
Fahrenheit, according to a recent study.
But tree cover in US cities
is shrinking. A study published last year by the US Forest Service found that
we lost 36 million trees annually from urban and rural communities over a
five-year period. That’s a 1% drop from 2009 to 2014.
If we continue on this path,
‘cities will become warmer, more polluted and generally more unhealthy for
inhabitants,’ said David Nowak, a senior US Forest Service scientist and
co-author of the study.
Nowak says there are many
reasons our tree canopy is declining, including hurricanes, tornadoes, fires,
insects and disease. But the one reason for tree loss that humans can control
is sensible development.
‘We see the tree cover being
swapped out for impervious cover, which means when we look at the photographs,
what was there is now replaced with a parking lot or a building,’ Nowak said.
More than 80% of the US population lives in urban areas, and most Americans
live in forested regions along the East and West coasts,’ Nowak says.
‘Every time we put a road
down, we put a building and we cut a tree or add a tree, it not only affects
that site, it affects the region.’ The study placed a value on tree loss based
on trees’ role in air pollution removal and energy conservation. The lost value
amounted to $96 million a year.
(Source:
cnn.com)
17. STEC
bags Rs. 1,126-crore civil contract Package 4 of Delhi-Meerut RRTS Line
Chinese multinational civil construction
firm Shanghai Tunnel Engineering Co. Ltd. (STEC) has emerged as the lowest
bidder among five for the construction of the 5.6 km. underground section
between New Ashok Nagar and Sahibabad of the Delhi-Meerut RRTS corridor.
When the National Capital
Region Transport Corporation Limited (NCRTC) opened financial bids for the
Delhi-Ghaziabad-Meerut RRTS corridor, a total of five national and
multinational bidders participated in the tender process. As per the results of
the financial bids disclosed by NCRTC, the position of the bidders is as under:
- Shanghai Tunnel
Engineering Co. Ltd. (STEC): Rs. 1,126 crores (L-1);
- Larsen & Toubro Ltd.
(L&T): Rs. 1,170 crores (L-2);
- Gulermak Agir Sanayi
Insaatve Taahhut AS (Gulermak): Rs. 1, 326 crores (L-3);
- Tata Projects Ltd. – SKEC
JV: Rs. 1.346 crores (CL-4);
- Afcons Infrastructure
Ltd.: Rs. 1,400 crores (L-5).
NCRTC had invited global bids
for the first underground civil construction package (CDM/CN/COR-OF/086) in
November last year and the technical bids for this contract package were opened
recently.
The scope of work includes
design and construction of tunnels by TBM from near New Ashok Nagar DN Ramp to
Sahibabad UP Ramp and One Underground station at Anand Vihar by Cut and Cover
Method (including architectural finishing and design, supply, installation,
testing and commissioning of electrical and mechanical systems, including fire
detection and suppression systems and hydraulic systems) on the
Delhi-Ghaziabad-Meerut RRTS Corridor.
After issuance of the letter
of acceptance (LoA) by NCRTC, STEC has to complete the tunnelling work by TBM
through the cut-and-cover method. This is the first underground contract
package issued by the NCRTC.
(Source:
urbantransportnews.com)
18. 57% investors say Big-4 auditors have
no credibility: IIAS survey
In more trouble for the
auditing fraternity, an investor survey has found that 57% of large investors
and sell-side analysts do not have any faith in the Big-4 audit firms as they
have lost credibility.
According to the survey by
Institutional Investor Advisory Services of 63 large investors and sell-side
analysts numbering 89, conducted online from 13th to 21st
April, as many as 57% of each of them have found ‘the Big-4 audit firms having
lost their credibility with investors and are therefore open to move beyond
them if they were banned’.
Between qualified and
unqualified accounts, 73% support qualified accounts because they feel that at
least they got to hear auditor concerns and if they asked for lean accounts,
the risk was that the auditors would be muzzled. It can be noted that ever
since the Satyam Computers scandal came out in January, 2009, the audit world,
especially the Big-4, have been under fire from the regulators.
While market watchdog
Securities and Exchange Board had banned PwC in 2018 from auditing listed
companies for two years in the Satyam scam, the Securities Appellate Tribunal
quashed the ban and SEBI challenged it. In June, 2019 the Reserve Bank of India
barred S.R. Batliboi & Company, an affiliate of EY, from carrying out
statutory audit of commercial banks for a year after it found several lapses in
the books of Yes Bank.
In the CG Power fraud, the
NCLT had thrown out the report prepared by Viash Associates, terming it as
unprofessional and full of ifs and buts. On top of these, there have been
frequent resignations of auditors, creating doubts on the quality of the audits
that are being presented to investors and also many instances of divergent audit
reports.
This is despite 77% believing
that ‘only unqualified accounts are true and fair’ as one gets to hear auditor
concerns. Meanwhile, the survey also found that 78% of the investors, who
normally clamour for dividends, in the poll preferred companies retaining cash
and fortifying their balance sheet this year as the economy is in shambles.
Similarly, 57% also see
promoters subscribing to warrants as a sign of confidence in the company and
its operations. However, equity dilution remains a concern for investors with
46% being uncomfortable if dilution exceeded 5% without disclosure regarding
how funds will be used and 30% putting this threshold at 10%.
(Source: Economictimes.com)
