Company News in Brief

Heavy rainfalls affect Anglo Platinum Limpopo mineAnglo American Platinum announced that heavy rainfall in northern SA over the past week had caused widespread flooding, including at its Amandelbult Complex in Limpopo. Compounded by the collapse of the Bierspruit dam near Swartklip on Thursday, this caused water ingress at Tumela mine, which overwhelmed pumping capacity, flooding certain of the underground workings and the main pump station. The group said there had been a successful implementation of the emergency preparedness plans, including the temporary suspension of all operations at Amandelbult, ensuring the safe evacuation of all employees and contractors. Thumela contributes about 10% of its monthly metal-in-concentrate production, but preliminary indications are guidance of between 3 million to 3.4 million PGM ounces will not be affected.-FIN24Competition Commission orders Google to pay news publishers The Competition Commission has recommended that Google pay South African news publishers between R300 million and R500 million a year because of a "value imbalance" between the money the tech giant makes from news content, and what it shares with publishers. The commission published its provisional report on the Media and Digital Platforms Market Inquiry (MDPMI) following a 16-month investigation. The report is not finalised. Stakeholders will be allowed to make additional submissions as part of the inquiry for the next six weeks before a final report is published in four to five months. The inquiry aimed to establish whether there are market features in digital news content distribution that restrict, distort, or impede competition and adversely affect South Africa's news media sector.-FIN24Prosus to acquire Just Eat Takeaway.comConsumer internet group Prosus announced a deal to buy Just Eat Takeaway.com for €4.1 billion (almost R80 billion), with the offer at a 49% premium to the three-month volume-weighted average premium and will be paid in cash. The group said it is confident about growing Just Eat, which would join an expansive food delivery portfolio that includes iFood in Brazil and Mr D in SA, with the acquisition following its announcement in December it would spend about R30 billion on Latin American travel agency, Despegar.-FIN24Sasol reports dip in headline earnings Chemicals and energy giant Sasol reported a 30% slide in headline earnings and suffered from further write-downs of its Secunda and Sasolburg facilities amid a challenging macroeconomic and operating environment. Headline earnings fell to R9 billion in the six months to end December, when the group made a net loss of R6.2 billion, up from R5.8 billion previously, mainly due to further impairments at Secunda liquid fuels of R5 billion and R600 million at the Sasolburg liquid fuels refinery.-FIN24Salesforce Inc., Alphabet to collaborate Salesforce Inc. has signed a multibillion-dollar cloud deal with Alphabet Inc.'s Google, part of a larger effort to combine forces and attract corporate customers currently using Microsoft Corp.'s productivity and artificial intelligence products. Salesforce, which mostly relies on Amazon cloud services, has committed to spending at least $2.5 billion (R46 billion) over seven years on cloud-computing services from Google. The agreement will now let Salesforce customers choose to run their customer-management software, Agentforce autonomous AI assistants, and Data Cloud products on Google Cloud. The deal is emblematic of how big tech companies are forging alliances and partnerships to offer customers a broader menu of AI-enhanced products and services. Microsoft, which has a first-mover advantage in generative artificial intelligence for corporations, says most Fortune 500 companies already use its AI productivity tools. But adoption has sometimes lagged expectations, leaving an opening for Google, which will now be bolstered by Salesforce's market-leading customer-management software. - Bloomberg

Company News in Brief

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Namibian Sun 2025-05-02

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Company News in Brief

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Namibian Sun 2025-05-02

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