27/08/2025

BIZ & FINANCE WEDNESDAY | AUG 27, 2025

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South Korea bets big on reviving US shipbuilding

The 61-page complaint, filed in federal court in Texas, accuses Apple and OpenAI of entering an exclusive deal that makes OpenAI’s ChatGPT the only generative AI chatbot integrated into Apple’s iPhone operating system, while blocking rivals like xAI’s Grok. “This is a tale of two monopolists joining forces to ensure their continued dominance in a world rapidly driven by the most powerful technology humanity has ever created: artificial intelligence,” the lawsuit states. The plaintiffs claim Apple holds 65% of the US smartphone market, while OpenAI controls at least 80% of the generative AI chatbot market through ChatGPT. Apple and OpenAI announced their partnership in June 2024, making ChatGPT the exclusive AI assistant accessible through Apple’s Siri voice assistant and other iPhone features. The lawsuit alleges this arrangement gives ChatGPT exclusive access to “billions of user prompts” from hundreds of millions of iPhone users. SEOUL: South Korean President Lee Jae Myung is leaning on promises to “Make America Shipbuilding Great Again” during his first official US trip, as the two allies wrangle over other details of their trade and security agreements. Lee met with US President Donald Trump for their summit on Monday, and will visit a shipyard owned by South Korea’s Hanwha Group to highlight investment plans. Under a South Korean pledge to inject US$350 billion (RM1.5 trillion) into US projects, shipbuilding has emerged as one of the most concrete areas of investment, with US$150 billion earmarked for the sector. Trump says he wants to revitalise shipbuilding to keep up with China, the world’s biggest shipbuilder and operator of the world’s largest maritime fighting force. The potential – and pitfalls – of that project will be on display when Lee visits Hanwha’s Philly Shipyard in Philadelphia, one of the largest US shipyards. Hanwha, which acquired the facility last year, plans to spend as much as US$5 billion to take its output from less than two vessels a year to as many as 20, Lee’s office said. In comparison, Hanwha Ocean’s shipyard in South Korea is 10 times bigger and builds a vessel a week. “The K-shipbuilding industry, equipped with the world’s strongest capabilities, will bring about a renaissance of the US shipbuilding industry and create a new historic turning point for mutual prosperity,” Lee said an event at Washington’s Centre for Strategic and International Studies after the summit. Lee agreed to increase South Korea’s own defence expenditures and play a bigger role in responding to the changing political situation in the region as part of alliance “modernisation” plans, his office said, without elaborating. South Korea’s Industry Ministry said 11 non-binding agreements were signed between US and South Korean companies during Lee’s visit, in shipbuilding, nuclear energy, aerospace, gas and critical minerals. In shipbuilding, HD Hyundai agreed with state-run Korea Development Bank and Cerberus Capital to create a multibillion-dollar joint investment fund aimed at strengthening the maritime capabilities of the US and its allies, including shipbuilding, marine logistics infrastructure and advanced marine technology. Samsung Heavy Industries agreed with Vigor Marine Group to partner in fields such as maintenance and repair of US Navy vessels, shipyard modernisation and joint ship construction. A top South Korean official said the two

o Lee promotes US$150 billion investment in troubled sector

Trump and Lee during their meeting in the Oval Office of the White House. – AFPPIC

Jeong, head of the Naval Ship Global Business at Hanwha Ocean, previously told Reuters. Training local workers could take four to five years, and it is hard to find people willing to do difficult shipyard work, South Korean industry sources told Reuters. Issues obtaining parts like steel plates may also hinder rapid progress. South Korean officials said that unless some US protectionist policies are eased, construction of full ships or modules to be delivered to US shipyards may be limited. – Reuters

China and South Korea are responsible for 83% of global commercial shipbuilding, according to UN Trade and Development data. “We’re going to go back into the shipbuilding business again,” Trump said during his Oval Office meeting with Lee. Experts, industry sources and South Korean officials say there will be a lot of work required to get there. “I think the US shipbuilding industry hasn’t had to compete very much. Facilities are old, and there’s a shortage of technicians,” Steve SK

countries had decided to establish a non-binding agreement to define the operation and structure of US$350 billion in investment funds agreed as part of their July trade deal. During tariff talks in July, South Korea offered a package dubbed “Make America Shipbuilding Great Again” partly to help modernise US shipyards, which officials in Seoul touted as instrumental in reaching their unwritten trade deal. US shipyards, which had the world’s highest production capacity during World War II, saw their market share fall to 0.04% by last year.

Trump adviser says US may take stakes in other firms after Intel

xAI sues Apple, OpenAI over Siri partnership WASHINGTON: Elon Musk’s companies xAI and X filed a sweeping US antitrust lawsuit on Monday against Apple and OpenAI, alleging the tech giants formed an illegal partnership to stifle competition in artificial intelligence and smartphone markets. The complaint also accuses Apple of manipulating App Store rankings to favour ChatGPT while delaying approval of updates to the Grok app. Musk’s companies are seeking billions in damages and a permanent injunction to stop the alleged anticompetitive practices. They have demanded a jury trial.

The other portion comes from a different award. Hassett said “the federal government has been giving money away” to companies. He maintained that under potential deals like that with Intel, “these are going to be shares that don’t have voting rights”, adding that the government plans to stay out of how companies are run. Intel warned in a securities filing on Monday that the government’s equity stake could limit its ability to secure grants from government entities in the future – among other risks. It noted that the timing for receiving the funding, and its ability to fulfil conditions for the funds, “remain uncertain”. Intel additionally noted that its international business could be “adversely impacted” by the US government being a significant shareholder. Critics of the deal warn it could be bad for the company’s viability if politics are seen as driving business decisions. In February, shortly after Trump returned to the presidency, the White House published a plan for the world’s biggest economy to set up a sovereign wealth fund. A sovereign wealth fund is a state-owned investment fund that manages a country’s excess reserves, typically derived from natural resource revenues or trade surpluses, to generate long-term returns. – AFP

WASHINGTON: The US government could take stakes in other companies after doing so with chipmaker Intel, Donald Trump’s top economic adviser Kevin Hassett said on Monday – with the president himself expressing hope to have more cases like it. Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, cited Trump’s plans for a sovereign wealth fund in a CNBC interview, saying “I’m sure that at some point there’ll be more transactions” in the semiconductor industry or others. He was responding to a question on whether a recently announced deal for the US government to take a 10% equity stake in Intel was the start of broader efforts towards similar moves in other industries that authorities have been funding. “I hope I’m going to have many more cases like it,”Trump told reporters separately. “There will be other cases. If I have that opportunity again, I would do that.” Under the agreement with Intel, the US government will receive 433.3 million shares of common stock, representing a 9.9% stake in the company, Intel said in an earlier statement. This amounts to an US$8.9 billion investment, funded partially by US$5.7 billion in grants awarded but not yet paid under the CHIPS and Science Act – a major law passed under former president Joe Biden, which Trump has criticised.

“This latest filing is consistent with Mr Musk’s ongoing pattern of harassment,” OpenAI said in a statement to AFP. Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The lawsuit follows threats Musk made earlier this month that triggered a fiery exchange with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. Altman called Musk’s accusation of ranking manipulation “remarkable”, charging that Musk himself “manipulates X to benefit himself and his own companies and harm his competitors and people he doesn’t like”. Musk called Altman a “liar” in the heated exchange. Both men were original founders of OpenAI before Musk’s departure in 2018 and now have a highly conflictual relationship. Musk founded xAI in 2023 to compete with OpenAI and other major AI players that have poured billions of dollars into AI since the blockbuster launch of the first version of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in late 2022. – AFP