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Apple, the worlds most valuable company, has finally joined a growing list of household names from Toyota to Samsung forced to cut back on business because of a global shortage of semiconductors.

Apple is now likely to slash its projected iPhone 13 production targets for 2021 by as many as 10 million units, Bloomberg News reported Tuesday.

For months, while supply chain shocks rocked the electronic, automaking, and even commodities industries, Apple remained the one company that could secure the chips needed to keep selling its latest range of products, due to its well-managed supply chain and the prestige of meeting its exacting standards.

But the recent setback for Apple has dashed any hopes that the supply-chain crisis was easing.

“If this is happening to the most powerful company,” it could happen to anyone, said Neil Campling, an analyst at Mirabaud Securities. Given “they have huge power in terms of their ability to source semiconductors as such a key customer, then everyone else will be having greater issues than they are.”

Apple’s scaleback is a clear sign that the supply disruptions that have wreaked havoc around the world are worsening, which may jeopardize the outlook for the post-pandemic economic recovery. Almost all major manufacturers have been impacted both by a lack of key materials such as semiconductors, but also an inability to get finished goods into the hands of consumers.

President Joe Biden is set to focus on transportation bottlenecks on Wednesday, with the congested Port of Los Angeles planning a 24 hours a day, seven days a week effort to confront the squeeze on goods. A.P. Moller-Maersk said it had to divert some ships from the U.K.’s largest container port because of congestion tied to a trucker shortage.

“Recent rumblings from chip producers suggest that the problems are expected to persist,” Deutsche Bank strategists including Jim Reid, global head of fundamental credit strategy wrote in a note. That “will make central bank decisions even more complicated over the coming weeks as they grapple with increasing supply-side constraints that push up inflation whilst threatening to undermine the recovery.”

Apple had expected to produce 90 million new iPhone models this year, but is now telling manufacturing partners that the total will be lower because Broadcom and Texas Instruments are struggling to deliver enough components, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the situation is private.

Japan Display Inc., which gets more than half of its revenue from Apple, fell as much as 5.6%, joining U.S. suppliers that fell in postmarket trading.

The shortage of semiconductors stems mainly from years of under-investment coupled with a failure to gauge the explosion in demand for connected devices. Even industry insiders were caught by surprise. ASML Holding CEO Peter Wennink, whose company sells the machines that enable most cutting-edge chipmaking, said in July it has underestimated the growth of the semiconductor industry over the past 15 years.

The amount of time that companies need to wait for chip orders to get filled has set records for nine straight months, signaling that semiconductor shortages will continue to plague businesses well into 2022 and likely beyond. AlixPartners, a global consulting firm, estimated last month that the global automotive industry will lose about $210 billion in sales for 2021 alone.

Earlier this year, Apple had already warned that it would face supply constraints of the iPhone and iPad during the quarter that ended September. But it held off from reducing its internal projections at the time.

The timing couldn’t be worse. The year-end quarter was expected to be Apple’s biggest sales blitz yet, generating about $120 billion in revenue. That would be up about 7% from a year earlier — and more money than Apple made in an entire year a decade ago.

In addition to facing tight iPhone availability, the company has struggled to make enough of the Apple Watch Series 7 and other products.

Separately, a protracted energy crisis in China may add to the iPhone maker’s headaches. Apple supplier TPK Holding Co. said last week that subsidiaries in the southeastern Chinese province of Fujian are modifying their production schedule due to local government power restrictions. That comes less than two weeks after iPhone assembler Pegatron Corp. adopted energy-saving measures amid government-imposed power curbs.

Some analysts however spot an opportunity for Apple.

“If Apple can’t meet near-term demand, the shortfall is likely to be even greater at competitors, creating an opportunity for share gains,” Morgan Stanley analysts wrote after Bloomberg’s report.

Published : October 14, 2021

By : Bloomberg

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Microsoft, which has faced pressure from employees and shareholders over contracts with governments and law enforcement agencies, agreed to commission an independent human rights review of some of those deals.

The move came in response to a June filing of a shareholder proposal asking the company to evaluate how well it sticks to its human rights statement and related policies. Microsoft committed to a review of any human rights impacts that its products have on those including communities of Black, Indigenous and People of Color in contracts for police, immigration enforcement and unspecified other government agencies, according to correspondence from the company viewed by Bloomberg.

Microsoft pledged to publish the report next year, and the shareholders, who include faith-based investors like Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary, have withdrawn their proposal ahead of Microsoft’s annual shareholder meeting next month.

Microsoft spokesman Frank Shaw confirmed the company will undertake the review.

“In response to shareholder requests, Microsoft Corp. will commission an independent, third-party assessment to identify, understand, assess, and address actual or potential adverse human rights impacts of the company’s products and services and business relationships with regard to law enforcement, immigration enforcement, and other government contracts. The assessment will include consultation with BIPOC communities, including immigrants, and other groups representing communities most impacted by Microsoft’s surveillance products, law enforcement and government contracts,” the company said in a statement.

As government, military and police contracts have become targets of scrutiny and activism, Microsoft employees have circulated letters demanding the company abandon a deal to build versions of its HoloLens augmented reality headsets for the U.S. Army as well as raising concerns about business with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella has stood behind software sales to the U.S. military, but paused selling facial recognition technology to police departments, although the company sells other programs to law enforcement. The California-based religious order agreed to lead the shareholder proposal because it wanted to make sure the company’s products don’t “cause human rights harms, including perpetuating systemic racial inequities,” Sister Joanne Safian, said in a statement.

Microsoft told the investors the review will be conducted by the law firm Foley Hoag. The proposal was filed by Investor Advocates for Social Justice, a nonprofit representing faith-based institutional investors. Microsoft didn’t specify which contracts will be examined, but shareholders “expect” it will include what the group said are about 16 active contracts with ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

“This will be an ambitious and complicated process and we’re certainly putting our faith in Microsoft and Foley Hoag to be conscientious,” said Michael Connor, executive director of Open MIC, a nonprofit shareholder advocacy organization that worked with IASJ on the proposal. “They’re asking for input from affected rights holders, which was a very big request on our part and they agreed to that.”

Human rights concerns have been raised by shareholders in areas related to labor and in the apparel industry around manufacturing conditions but are newer to the technology companies, he said. Open MIC has also made similar requestsof Amazon.com Inc., related to its facial recognition technology, as well as Apple Inc., Facebook Inc. and Alphabet Inc., without a positive response from the companies or a win at shareholder meetings, Connor said.

Open MIC is also working on two other shareholder resolutions related to Microsoft, including one that asks the company to stop selling facial recognition software to all government agencies.

“Tech companies take the position that all tech is good, and while we as shareholders recognize that tech can be helpful, there are also many downsides,” Connor said.

Published : October 14, 2021

By : Bloomberg

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Global Compact Network Thailand (GCNT) is determined to combat global warming, with the network’s members aiming to become net-zero emitters from 2050 to 2070 in a bid to urgently reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha emphasised that a zero-carbon economy will propel the country’s economy.

On Monday, the GCNT and the United Nations organised an online seminar titled GCNT Forum 2021: Thailand’s Climate Leadership Summit 2021 under the concept “A new era of accelerated actions” to prevent and solve problems emanating from climate change.

More than 800 leaders from various organisations and businesses attended the seminar.

Prayut, who was the keynote speaker, addressed the urgency to solve the escalating global climate crisis, setting net-zero greenhouse gas emission reduction targets and carbon-neutral goals.

The prime minister also said the government was in the process of drafting the Climate Change Act, and in November Thailand would attend the COP26 meeting in Glasgow, UK. Prayut hoped the meeting would reach a consensus on key issues, which would lead to actual implementation of the Paris Agreement.

Natural Resources and Environment Minister Varawut Silpa-acha said at the seminar that the new post-Covid-19 era should take into account environmental measures and apply them to every industrial and business process in order to move the economy forward.

But, Varawut added, this would require firm cooperation from the private sector.

Thailand network members set sights on net-zero emissions by 2070

GCNT president Suphachai Chearavanont said one-third of the network members have already proceeded with the Sustainable Development Goals by organising more than 500 projects valued at over THB4.2 billion.

Supachai said the projects would certainly help drive the country’s development.

Related news:

• PTT Shines on Carbon Credit Trading to Support National Net Zero Emission
• Business resilience in post-pandemic lies within climate change
• Thai govt backed by UNDP launches GCF-financed climate change adaptation project

Published : October 13, 2021

By : THE NATION