Author: tfwee
STEng – BT
ST Engg unit wins 33m yuan waste transfer station deal
THE ST Engineering (ST Engg) group has won a tender worth about 33 million yuan (S$6.5 million) in Wuhan, China, for the designing, building and delivery of a waste transfer station in Donghu Newtech Zone.
The project commences immediately and is expected to be completed by the third quarter of next year. The contract was awarded to ST Environmental Services & Technologies Co Ltd (STE&T), a wholly owned subsidiary of STSE Engineering Services Pte Ltd (STSE).
Since its incorporation in July last year, STE&T which is located in Shanghai’s new Pudong area, has bagged contracts worth about $12 million in China, including this latest win. It seeks to tap into China’s growing demand for eco services and technology.
STSE, which specialises in providing turnkey environmental engineering solutions such as waste transfer technology and landfill management, is a wholly owned subsidiary of ST Marine, the marine arm of ST Engg.
Separately, ST Engg announced that its US company, Vision Technologies Kinetics Inc (VTK), has acquired an additional 10 per cent equity stake in US-based MAK Technologies Inc from one of the individual shareholders, John Morrison, who has left the management team of MAK.
The purchase consideration was US$215,297 and, with this purchase, MAK becomes a 90 per cent owned subsidiary of ST Engg. The remaining 10 per cent is owned by Warren Katz, the chief executive of MAK.
VTK is a subsidiary of Vision Technologies Systems Inc, the US headquarters of ST Engg.
MAK is a world leader in simulation software that links, simulates and visualises the virtual worlds in a networked synthetic environment. The company builds commercial off-the-shelf simulation tools and toolkits that are used in developing trainers and simulators, from sophisticated networked mission training simulators to desktop training simulations, according to ST Engg.
STEng – BT
ST Engg secures US$87m contract from US Navy
ST Engineering’s US shipyard continues to reel in US defence contracts, announcing yesterday a US$87 million contract to build an enhanced version of a T-AGS 60 Class oceanographic survey ship for the US Navy.
The contract was awarded to ST Marine’s VT Halter Marine. ST Marine is the marine arm of ST Engineering.
Construction of the 107.6-metre new ship, T-AGS 66, will begin at Halter Moss Point in the first half of next year, with delivery scheduled in 2013.
The dynamic positioning-equipped vessel will have various enhancements of its equipment and electronics systems as well as a moonpool for through-hull launch and retrieval of scientific research equipment.
T-AGS 60 Class ships are designed and constructed to provide multi-purpose oceanographic capabilities for the Oceanographer of the Navy.
Typical missions of the T-AGS 60 Class ships may include: oceanographic sampling and data collection of surface, midwater and ocean floor parameters; the launching, recovering, and towing of scientific packages both tethered and autonomous including the handling, monitoring, and servicing of remotely operated vehicles; shipboard oceanographic data processing and sample analysis; and precise navigation, track line manoeuvring, and station keeping to support deep ocean and coastal surveys.
VT Halter Marine is the leading designer and builder of specialised oceanographic ships for the US Navy and has built the previous six ships of the T-AGS 60 Class.
‘VT Halter Marine is pleased to be given the opportunity to continue our long standing partnership with the US Navy and this contract is a testament to our track record of designing and constructing quality T-AGS oceanographic vessels for the US Navy,’ said ST Marine president Chang Cheow Teck.
The contract is not expected to have any material impact on the consolidated net tangible assets per share and earnings per share of ST Engineering for the current financial year.
TELCOs – BT
A tale of two halves for local telco sector
Operators come to life in second half after six-month hibernation
2009 has turned out to be a tale of two halves for Singapore’s telecommunications sector, with operators stirring to life in the second half after a six-month hiatus. And the action can only get more sizzling as the key players brace for heightened competition with the arrival of the new nationwide, ultra high-speed broadband network in 2010.
In the first six months of this year, Singapore Telecommunications, StarHub and MobileOne were mostly in hibernation, relying on a mix of tight cost controls and recurring subscriber revenues to tide them through the global downturn.
While many companies struggled, the three operators proved their mettle by delivering an encouraging set of first-half results in spite of the economic difficulties.
StarHub’s net profit rose 11 per cent during the period to $160.3 million, while M1’s net income fell marginally by 0.3 per cent to $78.9 million.
SingTel’s profit for its fiscal fourth quarter ended Mar 31 declined 17 per cent due to its overseas exposure. However, it rebounded strongly three months later with a 7.7 per cent rise in net income to $945 million for its first quarter ended June 30.
‘The biggest highlight was basically being able to grow the revenue from our Singapore business, our Ebitda (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) and free cash flow,’ said Allen Lew, CEO of SingTel Singapore.
While the telco front was starved of major competitive strides in the first half, one operator did ring in major changes to its management deck from the get go. In January, M1’s CEO of 12 years, Neil Montefiore, announced his resignation. Its long-serving chairman, Lim Chee Oon, also stepped down two months later.
M1’s chief financial officer Karen Kooi eventually took over the reins in April, becoming the second local telco CFO to be promoted to the top job after SingTel’s Chua Sock Koong. Teo Soon Hoe, Keppel Corp’s senior executive director and group finance director, took up the post of M1 chairman.
The first half also saw the start of another round of merger talks between SingTel’s Indian associate Bharti and South Africa’s MTN Group but regulatory hiccups caused the deal to be scuppered a second time.
But StarHub’s attempt at business diversification eventually succeeded as its subsidiary Nucleus Connect clinched the government’s OpCo (operating company) tender to operate the Next-Gen NBN (National Broadband Network), the country’s new fibre-optic broadband superhighway. ‘It is a milestone for us to win the bid to build and manage the OpCo for the Next-Gen NBN. This is the more exciting and innovative part of the Next-Gen NBN infrastructure,’ said StarHub spokeswoman Jeannie Ong.
Past the half-year mark, signs of economic recovery reignited the competitive flames among the three warring factions.
SingTel started the ball rolling by retaining its exclusive rights to sell the latest version of Apple’s coveted touch-screen handset – the iPhone 3GS – in July.
In the same month, StarHub announced that it had poached Mr Montefiore to succeed its outgoing chief Terry Clontz. Mr Clontz will retire at the end of this month.
M1, on its part, signalled its intention to branch into the broadband market by buying Internet service provider Qala for $14.9 million in September.
A month later, any uncertainty surrounding the change-of-guard at StarHub was made worse when SingTel managed to score the broadcast rights to the English Premier League (EPL) for its mio TV platform in October.
‘I have not seen so many people talk about mio TV until we won the EPL. The ability to bring mio TV from being a niche product to a must-have product is significant,’ SingTel’s Mr Lew said.
‘While we may not have the rights to air the EPL for the next three seasons, it is not game over for us. StarHub still has a wide array of content,’ responded StarHub’s Ms Ong.
While ‘robbed’ of the crown jewel of its cable programming, StarHub – along with M1 – finally managed to land the star of SingTel’s handset portfolio, the iPhone 3GS. The device, which went on sale at StarHub and M1 shops earlier this month, sparked off one of the fiercest mobile skirmishes in local history. StarHub upped the data bundle for its basic iPhone plan tenfold in a day in response to M1’s generous subscription packages. SingTel reacted the next day by doing the same.
Such tit-for-tat battles will likely continue into 2010 when the Next-Gen NBN starts to come online from the end of the first quarter, market watchers say.
‘Starting from a very low base, we believe that M1 is likely to benefit the most from this as it would be able to offer fixed line broadband services on an equal footing. It will also be able to make its maiden foray into the more lucrative corporate broadband arena with Qala,’ said OCBC research analyst Carey Wong.
StarHub, on the other hand, will finally get a chance to provide Internet connectivity to corporate customers, while SingTel can now replace its aging copper cables with high-speed fibre-optic pipes, he said.
SingTel, StarHub – BT
The bottom line is the scoreline for SingTel, StarHub
WITH less than six months to go before the world’s biggest football event kicks off in South Africa, Singaporean fans are still unsure if they will even get to watch the tournament on television at all.
This comes after the stunning revelation on Tuesday by both StarHub and Singapore Telecommunications that they had submitted a joint bid for the World Cup next year, but ultimately failed to reach an agreement with the sport’s world governing body, Fifa.
It was initially thought that the two telcos had put in separate bids, such is the intensity of their rivalry in gaining a stranglehold in the local pay-TV market.
But it seems that the cost of beaming the 64 live games is proving too big a price to pay, as the joint statement said that the costs have ‘escalated substantially’, although no exact figures were disclosed.
But let’s not be quick to suggest that SingTel and StarHub are trying to make huge profits from this venture. The price offered to Fifa ‘would sacrifice all World Cup margins’ for both telcos even as they try to match Fifa’s asking price and still keep the fees affordable for consumers, the statement added.
In 2002, StarHub did not charge its existing customers to watch the matches taking place in South Korea and Japan. Four years later, for the tournament in Germany, it charged $15.75 extra for existing Sports Group subscribers, while non-sports group customers were billed $26.25.
So what’s next for the 2010 World Cup? The options are few. One obvious way forward would be for the two telcos to put in an improved joint bid that would meet Fifa’s asking price.
Doing so, however, would result in another problem: Should the telcos stick with the same subscription fees or thereabouts to keep it affordable to the masses, or absorb the higher costs and end up in the red instead of just breaking even?
At the end of the day, it all boils down to making a sound and responsible business decision. If the asking price is just too high, then perhaps it would make better sense for the telcos to hold up their hands, admit they tried their best to clinch a reasonable deal, and then just pull out of the bidding altogether.
But where does this leave viewers in this football-mad country, who are still coming to grips with the stark reality that they could be missing the World Cup telecast for the first time? Not many can stomach the fact that at least 202 other countries – including Malaysia, Indonesia, Yemen, Lebanon and Iraq – will all get to enjoy the games while they may not.
The unsuccessful joint bid also throws up another interesting question of whether such collaborations can be successful in future, be it for the World Cup or any other pay-TV event.
Is Fifa generally reluctant to accept such bids, given that they could be perceived as anti-competitive and not offer the best, or highest, price? At this stage, no one knows for sure.
As fans in Singapore await the final verdict on the World Cup bid, don’t be surprised if some are already bracing themselves to make trips across the Causeway next June to watch the games in Malaysia. The more tech-savvy could resort to live streaming on the Internet, but where’s the fun in watching England take on Brazil on a tiny computer screen?
But let’s not jump the gun. Let SingTel and StarHub go back to the negotiating table with Fifa first. For everyone else, it’s a matter of keeping their fingers – and perhaps toes – tightly crossed that there will be some good news soon.