Новости за 06.05.2021

Efforts to accelerate the post-Covid-19 recovery in South Africa must be done sustainability and in an exclusive manner, speakers said during the Financial Services Working Group of the South African chapter of the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (Brics) Business Council’s webinar on May 6.  Development finance institution (DFI) the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) of South Africa CEO TP Nchocho said it, as was the case with most DFIs and banks at the advent of the pandemic... Читать дальше...

Data centre operator Teraco on May 6 said it had become an integral node to the Meltingpot Indianoceanic Submarine System (MÉTISS) – a 3 200 km subsea fibre-optic cable system connecting South Africa to the Indian Ocean islands of Madagascar, Reunion and Mauritius. MÉTISS consortium members have infrastructure in Teraco's Durban and Johannesburg data centre facilities, providing the Indian Ocean islands with direct access to Teraco’s ecosystem of more than 300 networks, 130 information technology service providers... Читать дальше...

The long lag between the establishment of community trusts that own a portion of the independent power producer (IPP) projects procured through South Africa’s renewables procurement programme and the flow of dividend income into these trusts has been identified in a new research report as a major impediment to the effectiveness of these trusts. The report, produced by Intellidex for FirstRand, estimates the projected dividend flows from projects procured, to date, under the Renewable Energy Independent... Читать дальше...

Mobile push authentication messages provide a better user experience and protect users more effectively than password-protected accounts and one-time pins (OTP), which is important to protect data as more companies have adopted cloud computing and remote working, says device identity and authentication software company Entersekt CTO Gerhard Oosthuizen. US wireless network operator Verizon’s annual security report showed that compromised credentials are the most often used asset (80%) when it comes to data breaches. Читать дальше...

International financial institution the International Finance Corporation (IFC) has provided financial services group Absa with a loan of up to $150-million to support the bank’s strategy to expand its climate finance business and help South Africa meet its greenhouse-gas (GHG) reduction targets. In South Africa, financial institutions are critical sources of climate finance, with commercial banks providing about 67% of the financing for renewable energy projects.

The Competition Tribunal has approved the acquisition by consumer goods manufacturer Premier of confectionery manufacturer Mister Sweet with the condition that it fill vacated nonexecutive roles with the 19 employees facing retrenchment. The merger parties had previously agreed to a moratorium on the retrenchment of 19 nonexecutive employees for a period of 24 months after the merger implementation date.

The European Space Agency (ESA) announced on Thursday that its latest space probe, the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice), had been delivered to ESA’s European Space Research and Technology Centre (Estec) in the Netherlands. The spacecraft had been transferred from the Friedrichshafen facility of its prime contractor, Airbus Defence and Space. The delivery to ESA (which is not an agency of the European Union) actually took place last week, but was only disclosed on Thursday. Juice is currently being... Читать дальше...

The International Air Transport Association (Iata) – the global representative body for the airline industry – has welcomed the agreeing, by the Tourism Ministers of the Group of 20 countries (G20), of the ‘Rome Guidelines for the Future of Tourism’. The association urged the G20 governments to follow-up the announcing of the guidelines with action, to restore international mobility. “The G20 has the right focus and agenda to restart travel and tourism,” affirmed Iata director-general Willie Walsh. Читать дальше...

Production from the Zinia Phase 2 short-cycle project, which is connected to the existing Pazflor’s floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) unit in Angola, has started. The project is operated by petroleum refiner Total, which is the joint operator of Block 17 in Angola, together with the Angolan National Oil, Gas and Biofuels Agency.

The Public Investment Corporation (PIC) has concluded a purchase agreement to acquire 100% of the leasehold rights, which include the office building and letting enterprise, housing Deloitte as the anchor tenant, in the prime location of Waterfall City, in Midrand, Gauteng. The asset was acquired on behalf of the Government Employees Pension Fund (GEPF) and was previously owned by Attacq, through Waterfall Investment Company; and Atterbury, through Dale Creek Investments.

Persistent low levels of capacity use in the manufacturing sector and low demand for locally manufactured goods are “worrying” trends compounding the prevailing Covid-19 restrictions that are limiting operations at industrial plants, says the Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of Southern Africa (Seifsa). Data released by Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) on May 6 shows that manufacturing capacity use in South Africa was 74% in the first quarter of this year, compared with 77.5% in the first quarter of 2020.

Consumer goods distributor Massmart has opened its new 53 000 m2 distribution centre (DC) in the Brackengate 2 precinct, in Brackenfell, Cape Town. Construction on the centre started in October 2019.

Social Housing Regulatory Authority (SHRA) council chairperson Bathabile Dlamini says the 2019/20 financial year had seen “encouraging” performance in that 13 projects were completed, delivering almost 14 000 units. Although the target for the year was not met, it is a solid achievement, she adds. This while demand for social housing remains high at 320 000 units nationally.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has welcomed the US’s decision to support a waiver on certain intellectual property (IP) rights provisions covering Covid-19 vaccines. During his term as chairperson of the African Union that ended in February this year, Ramaphosa had championed the call for fair access to vaccines to fight the virus.

The size of the South African new-vehicle market will be determined by the availability of stock this year, says Toyota South Africa Motors (TSAM) sales and marketing senior VP Leon Theron. “It’s a weird, weird year. The market is quite difficult to call.

SpaceX’s latest crewed spaceship design, the Starship, made its first fully successful test flight on Wednesday. This was the fifth such attempt, the previous four all seeing the rockets concerned blowing up, at different stages of the flight profile. This fifth flight involved an improved version of the spacecraft, designated SN15. This incorporated “multiple upgrades and improvements”, reported SpaceX Principal Integration Engineer John Insprucker. These changes were the result of analyses of the failure of the previous test flight. Читать дальше...

Pulp and paper producer Sappi says its operations are steadily recovering from the ongoing challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic. For the quarter ended March 31, its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) continued to improve to $112-million, compared with $98-million in the quarter ended December 31, 2020.

Despite having proved resilience last year by producing 2.6-million tonnes, the South African potato industry is appealing to stakeholders to form more partnerships to drive growth and transformation. Potatoes South Africa (PSA) CEO Willie Jacobs highlights that the potato helped ensure food security throughout the pandemic in South Africa last year.

The African Association of Automotive Manufacturers (AAAM) has welcomed the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between Supreme Spring, a subsidiary of JSE-listed group Metair, and Springs and Bolts, based in Ghana. Supreme Spring MD Mark Barley and Springs and Bolts CEO Derrick Asamoah Boahen signed the MoU at the premises of Supreme Spring during a visit earlier this month by a team from Springs and Bolts to familiarise themselves with the operations and possible areas of collaboration with the South African company.

Project professionals association the Project Management Institute (PMI) has launched an online course to support organisational transformation. The new course provides project professionals with the building blocks and fundamental knowledge needed to understand how organisations transform efficiently and effectively, the institute says.

Bearing and seal manufacturer SKF is testing a self-driving electric truck to transport goods on a public road between its factory and warehouse in Gothenburg, Sweden. It has partnered with Swedish transport technology company Einride.

Strong demand, supported by paper manufacturer Mondi’s range of innovative and sustainable packaging solutions alongside higher average containerboard selling prices, as well as strong cost control measures continued to support the company’s performance in the first quarter of this year. This was against a backdrop of input cost inflation and negative currency effects.

Results from the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) Novavax coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccine trial shows 51% efficacy against the B.1.351 variant in a South African study with HIV negative participants. A group in the trial, which included people who are HIV positive, showed 43% efficacy.

Eskom Holdings, South Africa’s State power utility, doesn’t want to buy electricity from the company that won most of a government emergency-power tender because it’s concerned about the cost and length of the contract, according to two people familiar with the situation. Meeting the terms of Karpowership’s 20-year deal would add pressure to Eskom’s already stretched finances and heighten its exposure to fossil fuels, said the people, requesting anonymity as the utility is yet to comment publicly. Читать дальше...

South African data science training institute Explore Data Science Academy (EDSA) is making a range of online data science and data engineering courses available to students in the rest of Africa, but with a specific focus on youth and talent within Nigeria and Kenya. The aim with the data science and data engineering courses is to offer talented, ambitious and hard-working young people in Africa the chance to be trained for a career in data science, data engineering, data analytics and business intelligence, says EDSA CEO Shaun Dippnall.