Company news in brief

Rio Tinto operation in South Africa shut by protests

A mineral sands operation on the South African coast run by Rio Tinto has been closed since Friday due to violent community protests which saw a security guard killed earlier this week, the company and a union said on Wednesday.

Community unrest is a common feature of South Africa’s social landscape, which is marred by high jobless rates and glaring income disparities, underscoring the social risks for investors in the country’s mining sector.

“Due to the escalation in activity around the blockades on the access roads, staff were sent home on Friday. Our highest priority is the safety of our people,” a Rio spokesman said. The operation, Richards Bay Minerals, is on South Africa’s Indian Ocean coast.

-Nampa/Reuters

Barclays Africa returns to its South African roots

Barclays Africa changed its name back to Absa on Wednesday, in a rebranding aimed at underlining its South African roots as Britain’s Barclays gradually retreats from the continent.

The name change comes almost a year after Barclays sold most of its controlling stake in Absa, South Africa’s third-largest lender, ending more than a century of the British bank’s involvement in Africa to focus on its home market and the United States.

Currently Absa is the brand name for the group’s retail banks in South Africa but in future all of the group’s operations across Africa will use that brand name.

-Nampa/Reuters

Australia prepares to ban Huawei from 5G project

Australia is preparing to ban Huawei Technologies Co Ltd from supplying equipment for its planned 5G broadband network after its intelligence agencies raised concerns that Beijing could force the Chinese telco to hand over sensitive data, two sources said.

Western intelligence agencies have for years raised concerns about Huawei’s ties to the Chinese government and the possibility that its equipment could be used for espionage. But there has never been any public evidence to support those suspicions.

-Nampa/Reuters

Departing Apple engineer stole autonomous car tech

An ex-Apple engineer on Monday was charged with stealing secrets from a hush-hush self-driving car technology project days before he quit to go to a Chinese startup.

Xiaolang Zhang was in custody for stealing trade secrets from the Apple project, according to a copy of the criminal complaint posted online.

The charge is punishable by 10 years in prison and a US$250 000 fine.

"Apple takes confidentiality and the protection of our intellectual property very seriously," the California-based internet titan said in response to an AFP query.

"We're working with authorities on this matter and will do everything possible to make sure this individual and any other individuals involved are held accountable for their actions."

-Nampa/AFP

Chipmaker Broadcom inks US$19 billion deal

Broadcom Inc announced a US$18.9 billion deal to buy US business software company CA Inc on Wednesday, venturing far beyond its realm of semiconductors and testing investors’ confidence in its Chief Executive Hock Tan’s dealmaking credentials.

The CA deal, outlined in a joint statement from the companies, comes just four months after US President Donald Trump blocked Broadcom’s US$117 billion hostile bid for semiconductor peer Qualcomm Inc, arguing it posed a threat to US national security and gave an edge to Chinese companies looking to build next-generation wireless networks.

-Nampa/Reuters