1 When IBM has a female CEO (San Francisco Chronicle) The appointment of a new chief executive at IBM has revived the debate over Augusta National's all-male membership just one week before the Masters. IBM hired Virginia Rometty as its CEO this year, which could mean a break in recent tradition if Augusta sticks to its history of never having a woman as one of its roughly 300 members. The last four CEOs of IBM all belonged to the club. However, a woman has never worn an Augusta green jacket since it opened in 1933.
"I think they're both in a bind," Martha Burk said Thursday evening from Washington. It was Burk who led an unsuccessful campaign 10 years ago for Augusta to admit a female member, demanding that four companies drop their television sponsorship because of the discrimination. Hootie Johnson, club chairman at the time, said Augusta would not be pressured to take a female member "at the point of a bayonet." "IBM is in a bigger bind than the club," Burk said. "The club trashed their image years ago. IBM is a corporation. They ought to care about the brand, and they ought to care about what people think. And if they're not careful, they might undermine their new CEO." Augusta National declined comment, keeping with its policy of not discussing membership.
2 India’s rich look beyond Mercs, BMWs (San Francisco Chronicle) Bentley Motors and Rolls-Royce Motor Cars are preparing to be occupied by India's 0.01 percent. Volkswagen AG's Bentley will announce this year plans to increase dealerships in the country, its second most important Asian market after China, said Amy Arora, brand director at distributor Exclusive Motors Pvt. Rolls-Royce said the BMW AG unit may triple its number of showrooms this year to six in India, home to the youngest person to ever buy a Ghost sedan, which starts at $570,000 (about Rs 29 million).
Their expansion illustrates the growing affluence of the burgeoning rich in India, where super-luxury vehicle sales are expected to quadruple by the end of the decade. While the World Bank estimates the majority of Indians live below the poverty line, CLSA Asia-Pacific estimates the number of millionaires will surge to 403,000 by 2015 from 173,000 in 2010. "India's new rich are looking to get a car that's different from the now-common Mercedes and BMW," said Deepesh Rathore, the managing director for IHS Automotive in India. "Growth at the top of the pyramid is much faster than at the bottom, and so we'll see many more millionaires rising in India, by hook or by crook."
The number of super-luxury cars - including Ferrari, Aston Martin, Lamborghini, Bentley and Rolls-Royce models - sold in India will jump to about 800 by 2020, compared with 180 last year, according to IHS Automotive.
3 When an employer seeks Facebook password (San Francisco Chronicle) Here are some suggestions to consider when discussing your social media use with an employer: If an employer asks for information you deem personal — outside of reference and background checks — ask for clarification and convey your sense of discomfort with asking such information. You have the right to decline not only from a personal perspective and because you may be violating Facebook terms of service by complying.
Be careful who you “friend” on social networking sites, and that includes your colleagues or employer. While you may receive numerous invitations and requests, use good judgment when accepting offers. Change your privacy settings and keep them updated. Weigh the pros and cons of accepting a job if an employer asks for such access, even if you really need a job. Their request can give you a glimpse of the company culture.
4 UK back to recession (The Guardian) The UK is heading back into recession and will be among the slowest of the world's largest economies to recover in the first half of this year, according to a study by the Paris-based thinktank, the OECD. Only Italy will struggle over a longer period to return to growth, highlighting the difficult situation confronting the British government as it battles to boost confidence and get the economy back on track. The OECD, which produces quarterly figures showing year-on-year growth, said UK output declined at an annual rate of 1.2% in the final quarter of 2011 and will decline at an annual rate of 0.4% in the first three months of 2012. The OECD also warned that the eurozone remained in a fragile state and would struggle to grow for the rest of the year. Germany and France will race ahead of the UK in the first half of the year but are forecast to slow down as the year ends.
5 To please Hu, India suspends Tibetans’ freedom (The Wall Street Journal) In an effort to shield Chinese President Hu Jintao from Tibetan protests, the Indian government placed extreme restrictions on exiled Tibetans, raising questions on the extent to which New Delhi is willing to compromise its democratic credentials for the sake of its ties with Beijing. For the past several days, many Tibetans living in New Delhi have been denied basic democratic freedoms, including the right to assemble and to protest peacefully. Law enforcement authorities have prevented many of them from leaving their homes or neighbourhoods for days, effectively placing them under house arrest. The measures were implemented following the dramatic act of a young Tibetan man, who on Monday set himself on fire in New Delhi to protest Chinese rule in Tibetan regions.
6 Corporates find India risky (The Wall Street Journal) If businesses like certainty, then India has been a big turnoff for foreign companies. A series of recent developments have greatly increased the perception that the country has a risky business environment where policies suddenly can turn hostile. Tax proposals in the national budget unveiled in March stunned foreign firms. They could create significant retroactive tax liabilities for international mergers stretching back a half-century and eliminate a tax exemption many investors now have, wreaking havoc on corporate deal making, legal experts say.
The government also singled out a UK-based oil producer for a multibillion-dollar levy that the company calls discriminatory. Internet executives from Google and Facebook are facing criminal prosecution for not removing Web content that some consider objectionable even though the companies have said they followed the letter of the law. And long-promised efforts to liberalize foreign investment in the retail, defense and insurance sectors have stalled. Foreign companies long have braved the risks of corruption and a stifling bureaucracy in the hopes of capitalizing on the fast-growing emerging Indian market. But the tax proposals, which are set for an April vote in Parliament and designed to reduce a yawning budget deficit, have helped heighten anxiety about doing business here.
7 When ‘Like’ button hurts planet (Dawn) Green groups around the world are turning to social networking to drive their campaign for Earth Hour on Saturday, when lights are turned off for an hour to signal concern about global warming. But here’s the irony. With every email, every tweet, every appeal watched on YouTube or “liked” on Facebook, environmentalists are stoking the very problem they want to resolve. Each time we network, we emit carbon dioxide (CO2) through the fossil fuels which are burned to power our computers and the servers and databanks that store or relay our message. In emails alone, the typical office worker is responsible for 13.6 tonnes of CO2 or its equivalent per year, a French government agency for energy efficiency, Ademe, calculated last year. The more people you cc and the bigger the mail, the greater the carbon emissions, Ademe said.
8 China tells Apple to care for workers (Straits Times) Chinese Vice-Premier Li Keqiang has told Apple's new chief that foreign firms should protect workers, as the US giant fends off criticism over factory conditions in China. International labour watchdog groups have said workers in Chinese plants run by major Apple supplier Foxconn of Taiwan are poorly treated, and have blamed a string of apparent suicides on the conditions. Mr Li, who is widely tipped to be the country's next premier, met Tim Cook while the new Apple chief executive was visiting Beijing.
9 High price of honesty (Mint) If there is one thing that India has paid a high price for in the last five years, it is the personal honesty of its leaders. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, honest to the core, is unable to fix the country’s broken governance. Now, defence minister AK Antony – another honest minister – has proved incapable of providing high-level politico-military leadership. A few days ago, a letter written by the controversial chief of the army staff, General VK Singh to the PM, was leaked. The content makes for scary reading. The army chief states that India’s air defences are obsolete; the infantry lacks night-fighting capabilities and is handicapped with “deficiencies of crew-served weapons”; the army’s tank fleet is devoid of critical ammunition required to defeat enemy tanks.
The blame for the situation falls squarely on the defence minister. As the minister charged with the country’s security, Antony has shown woeful lack of understanding in this matter. His notion of honesty is quaint. To prevent any malfeasance in contracts, his solution is not to sign any contracts. This policy will work wonders in the horticulture department of the government; in the ministry of defence it has a different by-product: serious erosion in the country’s war-fighting ability.
The year 2012 is not a happy year for these controversies to break out. It is the 50th anniversary of India’s defeat by China. It is a coincidence that the then defence minister – who also hailed from Antony’s state – ignored calls for modernizing the Indian army in the face of serious threats from China. The present defence minister is, of course, very different from VK Krishna Menon. But the end product of his policies – a whimsical notion of honesty and somnolence at the helm – is yielding the same result: an under-prepared army facing a hostile geopolitical environment.
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