Halliburton to cut 6,400 jobs; Africa chose China because the West did it no favours; Robots replacing factory workers at faster pace

1 Halliburton to cut 6,400 jobs (BBC) US oilfield services firm Halliburton has said it will cut up to 8% of its global workforce of 80,000, citing a "challenging market environment" as the oil price continues to tumble.  Oil price has nearly halved since June as a global supply glut and weak demand push prices down.

Halliburton had previously announced that it was planning job cuts in a conference call to discuss earnings on 20 January. The company reported fourth quarter profits of $901m (£591m), a 14% increase from the same period a year earlier.

Dave Lesar, chairman and chief executive officer, warned in a statement accompanying earnings that it was "clear that 2015 will be a challenging year for the industry". Halliburton said the job cuts total includes previously-announced plans to trim 1,000 jobs outside the US.

http://www.bbc.com/news/business-31381925

2 Africa chose China because the West did it no favours (Johannesburg Times) China is a force for good in Africa, said Tony Blair this week. Obviously, he said this only after implying that the stunning economic growth much of Africa is now experiencing was of his making.

How utterly strange for the former British prime minister to punt China as the Benevolent Dragon when the West has spent most of the past decade warning against a new form of colonialism from the Far East. He then said that African governments should diversify their portfolios. In other words, give the West a part of the business, too. Don't be so dependent on China.

What Blair is missing is that African governments are indeed diversifying. For the first four decades after independence, African states aligned with either the Soviets or the West. And the West represented none other than the old colonial masters mixed with a bit of US support. It did not work out so well.

Over the same period that South Korea leapfrogged middle-income nations to become truly developed, Africa remained stuck in lower-income territory. Only since the early 1990s have there been other options. China has a finger in most pies. But Blair is forgetting about Brazil's increasing role in the Portuguese-speaking parts of Africa. India is using its large diaspora in East Africa to establish a trading foothold.

Even Turkey and South Korea are getting in on the act. African countries have been choosing China because they don't believe you, Mr Blair, when you say you've helped them grow. So stop trying to take credit for a phenomenon much larger than yourself.

http://www.timeslive.co.za/thetimes/2015/02/11/africa-chose-china-because-the-west-did-it-no-favours

3 Robots replacing factory workers at faster pace (Khaleej Times) Cheaper, better robots will replace human workers in the world’s factories at a faster pace over the next decade, pushing labor costs down 16 per cent, a report has said. The Boston Consulting Group predicts that investment in industrial robots will grow 10 percent a year in the world’s 25-biggest export nations through 2025, up from 2 per cent to 3 percent a year now. The investment will pay off in lower costs and increased efficiency.

Robots will cut labor costs by 33 per cent in South Korea, 25 percent in Japan, 24 percent in Canada and 22 per cent in the US and Taiwan. Only 10 percent of jobs that can be automated have already been taken by robots. By 2025, the machines will have more than 23 percent, BCG forecasts.

Robots are getting cheaper. The cost of owning and operating a robotic spot welder, for instance, has tumbled from $182,000 in 2005 to $133,000 last year, and will drop to $103,000 by 2025, BCG says. And the new machines can do more things. Old robots could only operate in predictable environments. The newer ones use improved sensors to react to the unexpected.

Increasing automation is likely to change the way companies evaluate where to open and expand factories. BCG expects that manufacturers will “no longer simply chase cheap labor.” Factories will employ fewer people, and those that remain are more likely to be highly skilled. That could lure more manufacturers back to the US from lower-wage emerging market countries.

http://khaleejtimes.com/kt-article-display-1.asp?section=todaysfeatures&xfile=data/todaysfeatures/2015/February/todaysfeatures_February12.xml