12/03/2026

BIZ & FINANCE THURSDAY | MAR 12, 2026 17 Japan aims to sell eight times more chips in 2040 as in 2020 TOKYO: Japan has set a new sales target for domestically produced microchips, with the country aiming for an eightfold increase by 2040 compared with 2020 levels. In its 1980s heyday, the country boasted around half the share of the global semiconductor market, the government says. It has since been overtaken by Taiwan and other countries, with development of the Japanese chip industry hampered by slow digitisation among businesses and trade frictions with the US. Japan currently holds less than 10% of the global chip market – but the government is investing heavily in new factories in a bid to change that. In a strategy meeting on Tuesday, Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae’s administration said it aims to boost sales of Japan-made chips to ¥15 trillion (RM372 billion) by 2030, and ¥40 trillion by 2040. The 2040 target compares with sales of around ¥5 trillion in 2020, according to figures from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. The computing power of chips has increased dramatically as makers cram them with more microscopic electronic components. That has brought huge technological leaps to everything from smartphones to cars, as well as the advent of artificial intelligence tools such as ChatGPT. So Japan wants a piece of the action, with the government saying it expects the global semiconductor market to grow to ¥190 trillion by 2035. Newly founded Japanese chipmaker Rapidus is building a plant in the country to make cutting-edge “two-nanometre” chips, with mass production slated for 2027. And Taiwan’s TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, said last month that it will produce advanced three-nanometre semiconductors at a factory currently under construction in Japan. Globally so far, logic and memory chips – the “brain” and “data storage” of AI – have driven market expansion, the Japanese government said in a document titled “draft investment roadmap”. But “Japan has been unable to take advantage of this growth sufficiently”, it said. “We will secure the capacity to domestically develop and produce cutting-edge, next-generation semiconductors that will be crucial to this AI era,” it said. – AFP Lynas’ stock soars after deal with Japanese customers SYDNEY: Shares in Australian miner Lynas Rare Earths surged tesrerday after the firm struck a major supply deal with Japanese customers for minerals that are crucial to an array of new technologies. Lynas, the world’s biggest producer of separated rare earth materials outside China, jumped 13.8% in Sydney. Rare earths are a key ingredient in products ranging from smartphones to fighter jets, electric cars and wind turbines, and China is by far the world’s biggest producer. Lynas said on Tuesday it had extended an agreement to supply Japanese industry with rare earth metal neodymium-praseodymium (NdPr), which is used to make permanent magnets for highly efficient machinery. The Australian miner said it included a commitment to buy at least 5,000 tonnes of NdPr a year until 2038, with an agreed floor price. Lynas said it also would make available 75 % of all its heavy rare earth oxides to Japanese industry, which was represented by partly government-owned Japan Australia Rare Earths. “This new agreement will ensure continued reliable supply of rare earth products that are strategically important to Japanese industry and its global market,“ Lynas chief executive Amanda Lacaze said in a statement. – AFP

Cathay says surcharge to rise as fuel prices jump

o Airline plans 10% capacity boost despite geopolitical challenges

share, bringing total dividends for the year to HK$0.84 per share, or HK$5.2 billion. Cathay’s overall costs increased owing to capacity growth, with net fuel costs rising by 11.2%. It said it plans to reduce exposure to fuel price risk by hedging its expected consumption. Cathay also said extra flights to Europe would be operated in March to cater for an upsurge in demand. The carrier suspended all March flights to Dubai and Riyadh this week because of the war in the Middle East, extending earlier suspensions. “With fuel cost being a significant operating expense, the jump in jet fuel prices is expected to hurt profit for the June quarter at the least,” Lorraine Tan, Morningstar’s equity research director, said in a March 3 note about Asian airlines. Carriers all hedge a portion of their fuel costs but margins could still be affected, Tan said. Hong Kong Airlines said on Tuesday it will raise the fuel surcharge on most of its flights from today. – AFP

would boost passenger capacity by around 10% this year despite the “volatile” geopolitical environment. The Cathay Group reported an attributable profit of HK$10.8 billion (RM5.4 billion) in 2025, an increase of 9.5% on the previous year, which it said was driven by “increased capacity, solid passenger load factors and resilient cargo demand”. The firm said this represented a third consecutive year of solid financial performance during “a period of rapid rebuilding”. “The prevailing global geopolitical environment is volatile, causing unexpected shifts in passenger and cargo traffic flows as well as jet fuel prices,” chairman Patrick Healy said in a statement. “We expect to grow passenger capacity by around 10% in 2026 as we add frequencies and destinations to our network, which will also contribute to increased cargo capacity,” he said. Total revenue rose 11.9% from the previous year. The group also announced a second interim dividend payment of HK$0.64 per

HONG KONG: Hong Kong aviation giant Cathay Pacific said yesterday that fuel surcharges would rise as prices soared in March after war broke out in the Middle East. The price of fuel so far this month is double the average of the previous two months, CEO Ronald Lam announced at a news conference. Energy concerns arising from the war have driven up oil prices, with some Asian airlines hiking ticket fares in response. “In March, like ever since the Middle East episode began, the costs of our fuel already doubled,” Lam said. “So we are going to announce (a surcharge rise) very soon... in order to ensure the smooth operation of our flights.” The announcement came after Cathay predicted in a filing earlier yesterday that it

A Cathay Pacific staff member helps a passenger check in at Hong Kong international airport

yesterday. – AFPPIC

Beijing curbs OpenClaw use at state agencies, SOEs BEIJING: Chinese government agencies and state-owned enterprises (SOEs) have warned staff in recent days against installing artificial intelligence agent OpenClaw on office devices for security reasons, according to two sources familiar with the matter. promote an “AI plus” action plan that aims to create innovation-driven growth by embedding the technology throughout the economy, is also wary of cyber and data security risks, amid intensifying geopolitical tensions. implementation of Beijing’s national “AI plus” action plan. A research centre under Chinese tech hub Shenzhen’s municipal health commission last week ran an OpenClaw training session attended by thousands, as part of its “AI plus” push in healthcare.

One of the sources said staff at state-owned enterprises were told by regulators not to deploy OpenClaw, including in some cases on personal devices. The second source, from a Chinese government agency, said the software had not been banned outright at their workplace but staff had been warned about safety risks and advised not to install it. Both declined to be named as they were not authorised to speak to the media. It is unclear how widespread the ban is and whether it will affect local government policies, which in some cases offer million-dollar subsidies to companies that innovate using OpenClaw. These policies have all been framed as local

OpenClaw is an open-source software that can autonomously execute a wide range of tasks with minimal human guidance, going beyond the traditional research and query-answering capabilities of AI chatbots. Over the past month, it has been enthusiastically adopted and promoted by Chinese tech developers, leading AI companies, as well as several local governments based in China’s tech and manufacturing hubs. At the same time, central government regulators and state media have issued repeated warnings about OpenClaw’s potential to inadvertently leak, delete, or misuse user data once downloaded and given security permissions to operate on a device. The curbs suggest Beijing, while hoping to

It is also unclear whether the latest restrictions spell the end of all Chinese government deployment of OpenClaw. Shenzhen district Futian used OpenClaw to create an AI agent tailored to civil servant work, state-owned Southern Daily reported on Sunday. China’s state asset regulator and Industry Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Bloomberg News first reported the restriction. OpenClaw was developed by Peter Steinberger, an Austrian, and uploaded to GitHub last November. Steinberger was hired by OpenAI last month. – Reuters