IN BRIEF (Page 24)

Airports see surging flights

China's airports saw surging international flights last year as more Chinese traveled overseas, official data show. Over 51.6 million passenger trips to international destinations were made in 2016 via the country's civil aviation service, rising by 22.7 percent year-on-year, according to a report by the Civil Aviation Administration of China. Domestic flights saw about 436 million passenger trips last year, up by 10.7 percent year-on-year. A total of 3.679 million passenger flights were made last year, with 76.8 percent of them generally on time, up by about 8 percentage points compared with 2015, the report says. By the end of last year, China had 218 licensed airports and 2,950 aircraft for civil aviation, according to the report.

Two companies raise stake in Santos

Two Chinese companies have increased their combined stake in Australia's No 2 independent gas producer, Santos Ltd, taking advantage of a slump in its shares, and together now hold 15.1 percent of the company, Santos said on May 11. Private equity firm Hony Capital, whose backers include state-sponsored Legend Holdings Corp and Singapore's Temasek, bought 2.3 percent of Santos' shares after the market close on May 10. Hony has been working with Chinese gas distributor ENN Ecological Holdings Co since 2015 to build up a stake in Santos. ENN is Santos' top shareholder.

Didi rolls out a bilingual service

Chinese on-demand mobility giant Didi Chuxing announced on May 8 the launch of bilingual functions on its app in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou to serve foreigners as part of the company's globalization strategy. Users in the three cities will have access to an English-language interface upon installing or upgrading the latest version of the Didi app. The bilingual functions will be rolled out to other Chinese cities over time, according to the company statement. The app also enables realtime, in-app instant text messaging translation between English and Chinese for the three major ride-hailing services on Didi's platform. Users will also have access to bilingual customer service support via email and phone.

Apps gain more attention

People are spending more time on mobile apps globally, and the trend will continue this year, a new study from research company App Annie found. The company says the increase of total time is largely a result of an exploding global user base. From 2015 to 2017, the time users spend on mobile apps increased globally. According to the report, US users spend an average of over two hours per day, while users in South Korea, Brazil, Mexico and Japan showed a more impressive figure of an average of around three hours.

Adidas outpaces Nike, booms online

German sportswear firm Adidas reported a bigger-than-expected increase in first-quarter sales and profits on May 11, as it outpaced archrival Nike North America and China and grew rapidly online. Adidas also reported a rebound in sales for its struggling Reebok brand, with quarterly growth up by 13 percent, compared with just 6 percent in 2016, which Adidas says was driven by the training category and retro styles. Adidas says net profit rose by 30 percent to 455 million euros ($495 million; ￡383 million) on sales up by 19 percent to 5.67 billion euros, ahead of average analyst forecasts for 421 million and 5.4 billion, respectively, according to a Reuters poll. Adidas says growth was particularly strong in e-commerce, with revenues up by 53 percent, and in North America and China, where sales grew by 31 percent and 30 percent, respectively. Nike reported sales rose by just 3 percent in North America in the quarter ended Feb 28, while they were up by 9 percent in China, falling short of double-digit growth for the first time in at least nine quarters.

Private equity spending spikes in April

There was a sharp increase in private equity investment in April, boosted by big deals in the medical and IT sectors, a key industry report says. The report by China Venture, an industry information provider, says the combined investment in 42 PE deals made public was $8.4 billion (7.7 billion euros; ￡6.5 billion) in April, much higher than the $466 million registered in April last year. In comparison, the combined investment volume in 160 venture capital deals stood at around $2 billion last month, less than the $2.6 billion for April last year. Against the backdrop of mass innovation and entrepreneurship, the nation has moved to embrace PE and VC investment, especially in emerging industries. China saw 49 percent growth in PE and VC investment last year, though global fundraising and investment as a whole fell, according to a recent PricewaterhouseCoopers report.

Foreign trade to continue growing

Imports and exports are likely to continue their upward trend this year, but pressure will remain due to external uncertainties, a report says. Foreign trade will be in a better position, thanks to improving structure and efficiency and more growth momentum, according to a report from the Ministry of Commerce. It says sound fundamentals remained unchanged and local companies still had advantages in global trade. Boosted by a pickup in external demand and a stable domestic economy, China's trade with the rest of the world grew strongly in the first quarter. Exports in yuan-denominated terms rose by 14.8 percent year-on-year, while imports jumped by 31.1 percent. The trade surplus dropped by 35.7 percent.

Photovoltaic power generation surges

China's photovoltaic power facilities generated 21.4 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity in the first quarter, up by 80 percent year-on-year, new data showed on May 5. The amount accounted for 1.47 percent of the country's total power generation, the National Energy Administration says. About 2.3 billion kWh of photovoltaic power, more than 10 percent of the total, was lost, partly due to the lack of supporting facilities and the mismatch of solar capacity with local power demand. Newly installed photovoltaic power capacity in the first quarter reached 7.2 million kilowatts, taking the total to 84.6 million kilowatts. The country aims to install at least 105 million kilowatts by the end of 2020. By 2020, electricity from renewable energy will account for 27 percent of China's total power generation.

China-Europe freight train services rise

China Railway Container Transport Corp, which supports freight flow between China and Europe, reported on May 10 a surge in its services to Europe. In the first four months, freight train services to Europe grew by 163 percent year-on-year, according to a report posted on peoplerail.com, China's railway news portal. Freight train services by CRCT to central and western Asian countries grew by 64 percent year-on-year. The company says its operating revenue for 2017 could surpass 6 billion yuan ($869 million; 799 million euros; ￡672 million). The increases were attributed to improvements to the company's international railway logistics system.

(China Daily Africa Weekly 05/12/2017 page24)