Astra otoparts sells 51% stake

Astra otoparts sells 51% stake

JAKARTA: Indonesia's listed automotive spare-part maker, PT
Astra Otoparts, said Friday it has sold its 51 percent stake in a
compact camera-making joint venture to one of its partners for Rp
15.54 billion.

Astra Otoparts said it sold the majority stake in PT Adiwira
Presisi Industri to Japan's Nittoh Kogaku K.K., which already
held 35 percent of Adiwira.

Other shareholders are Mitsui & Co. Ltd. and its Indonesian
unit PT Mitsui Indonesia.

The local company didn't say why it sold the stake. Analysts
said Astra Otoparts needs to raise fresh cash to inject funds
into its automotive spare-part joint venture company, PT Nusa
Keihin Indonesia.

Astra Otoparts said Friday it will inject fresh capital into
Nusa without specifying how much. It owns 51 percent of Nusa,
while Japan's Keihin Seimitsu Kogyo Co. Ltd. controls the
remaining 49 percent. -- Dow Jones

Fujitsu to replace faulty drives

TOKYO: Japanese electronics giant Fujitsu Ltd. will replace
free of charge faulty hard-disk drives (HDDs) in its desk-top
computers as well as NEC and IBM products, a spokesman said
Friday.

The move will cost Fujitsu 2.4 billion yen (US$20 million).

The firm was only issuing a limited repair program rather than
replacing all 10 million HDDs shipped for use in computers made
by Fujitsu and other firms such as NEC Corp., IBM Japan Corp. and
Hitachi Ltd.

An estimated three percent of all HDDS produced by Fujitsu in
the year to September 2001 could encounter trouble when exposed
to high-temperature and high-humidity conditions, he said.

Computer makers have already started offering free repairs. --
AFP

GE to finance Japan manufacturer

TOKYO: The General Electric Co. (GE) group will start
a financing program targeted at Japanese manufacturers operating
in other Asian countries or planning to shift production there,
the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported in its Friday evening edition.

As a first step, the group will offer one-year or longer-term
financing schemes in the local currency to firms in Thailand and
Indonesia, aiming to lend at least 10 billion yen in the first
year, the financial daily reported.

Making the most of its financing expertise, the group intends
to offer a lending plan that allows loan repayments to vary
according to the monthly shipment value of a plant, and another
plan under which GE would lease plants back to companies after
buying the facilities from them. -- AFP

MobilCom to file for insolvency

BUEDELSDORF, GERMANY: The German telephone operator MobilCom
expects to file for insolvency "very swiftly", following the
decision by its major shareholder France Telecom to turn off the
financial tap, a spokesman said on Friday.

"It is to be expected that we will file for insolvency very
swiftly," the spokesman told AFP. "A few things still need to be
cleared up. For example, we need to know from France Telecom
whether we'll be starting with seven billion euros in debt or
zero debt." -- AFP

Samsung to export handsets to China

SEOUL: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. said Friday it would
export US$400 million worth of handsets to China Unicom Ltd. over
the three months to December.

Under the deal reached on Thursday, Samsung Electronics will
supply 700,000 units of code division multiple access (CDMA)
handsets by the end of this year to China's second largest mobile
carrier.

"It's a very important deal for us. The deal paves the way for
us to expand handset exports to China, one of the fastest growing
markets in the world," a company spokesman said.

The deal also marked the first exports of the higher-end CDMA
2000 1x handsets by Samsung Electronics to the Chinese market.

The CDMA 1x handsets feature color screens, many different
ring tones and built-in digital cameras. -- AFP

Nintendo to consider selling Rare stake

TOKYO: Japanese video game giant Nintendo Co. Ltd. said Friday
it would consider selling a stake in UK game software developer
Rare Ltd. if another firm, such as Microsoft Corp., showed an
interest.

Rare, which makes a series of games such as the classic
"Donkey Kong" for Nintendo's Gamecube home-use console and
handheld Gameboy, has contributed less and less to Nintendo's
sales in recent years, so any potential sell-off would have
little impact on the Japanese firm, a spokesman said.

"Last year Nintendo sold a lot of software but Rare's
contribution only comprised 1.5 percent. In 2000, it amounted
to 9.5 percent." said Nintendo's Yosuhiro Minagawa. -- AFP