China Tesla rival BYD strikes EV deal with ride-hailing firm Uber

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Uber have announced a deal which aims to bring 100,000 electric vehicles (EV) made by China’s BYD to the ride-hailing giant’s global fleet of cars.

The two companies say they will offer drivers incentives to switch to electric cars, including discounts on maintenance, charging, financing and leasing.

The multi-year agreement will be rolled out first in Europe and Latin America, before being made available in the Middle East, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

The announcement comes as EV sales around the world have slowed and Chinese car makers face higher import charges in places like the US and the European Union.

“The companies aim to bring down the total cost of EV ownership for Uber drivers, accelerating the uptake of EVs on the Uber platform globally, and introducing millions of riders to greener rides,” the two firms said in a statement.

They also said they will work to integrate BYD’s self-driving technologies into Uber’s platform.

Earlier this year, Uber said it was working with Tesla to promote EV adoption among its drivers in the US and planned to develop a purpose-built EV with South Korean car giant Kia.

The US, the European Union and other major markets have recently hiked tariffs on China-made EVs in moves aimed at protecting their car industries.

The move has prompted BYD and other Chinese EV makers to expand their production facilities outside China.

In July, BYD agreed a $1bn (£780m) deal to set up a manufacturing plant in Turkey.

The new plant will be able to produce up to 150,000 vehicles a year, according to Turkish state news agency Anadolu.

The facility is expected to create around 5,000 jobs and start production by the end of 2026.

Also last month, BYD opened an EV plant in Thailand – its first factory in South East Asia.

BYD said the plant will have an annual capacity of 150,000 vehicles and is projected to generate 10,000 jobs.

At the end of last year, BYD announced it would build a manufacturing plant in EU member state Hungary.

It will be the firm’s first passenger car factory in Europe and is expected to create thousands of jobs.

The company has also said it is planning to build a manufacturing plant in Mexico.

BYD, which is backed by veteran US investor Warren Buffett, is the world’s second-largest EV company after Elon Musk’s Tesla.

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Chinese warships off Alaska, Cambodia signal shifting seas – Asia Times

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Chinese warships were recently spotted sailing close to the Aleutian Islands, just off the Alaskan coast. Meanwhile, naval boats have begun to dock at a Beijing-built military port in Cambodia.

While these two events took place on different sides of the globe, they’re both part of an important geopolitical development – one that may lead to global war.

That may seem a little alarmist. But as I explain in my book “Near and Far Waters: The Geopolitics of Seapower,” the dynamics playing out today as China seeks to surpass the US as the world’s major sea power are reflected in the past – and have led to some of the world’s most consequential conflicts.

To understand the geopolitics of sea power, you need to understand two terms: “near waters” and “far waters.” Near waters are areas close to a country’s shoreline that are seen as important for its defense. Far waters are areas across the ocean that a country wants to be present in for economic and strategic interests.

But here’s the thing: The far waters of one country are the near waters of another, and that leads to tension. For example, the western Pacific is China’s near waters and the US’s far waters – and both countries are engaged in a battle for strategic advantage there.

Complicating matters, two or more countries may be competing for influence in the same near waters. In the western Pacific, China competes for dominance over smaller island fleets from, among other countries, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Changing tides

Competition over near and far waters changes over time. US near waters are a strategic and fluid area, rather than a legal definition that covers the Eastern and Western seaboards – the latter extended by Hawaii far into the Pacific. It also covers parts of the Caribbean and the Aleutian Islands.

The US gained control of its near waters throughout the 1800s and the first half of the 20th century. It culminated in a “destroyers-for-bases” deal during the early stages of World War II, which saw British military bases in the Caribbean and Newfoundland being transferred to Washington’s control. In return, the British were “gifted” old warships that were barely functional.

It was only later that the US projected its influence into far waters across the Atlantic and the Pacific, especially through its success in the Second World War.

China, meanwhile, lost control of its near waters in the late 1800s as European colonial powers and the US competed for access to China’s markets. It marked a humiliation for China, hampering economic growth and contributing to the collapse of traditional dynasties and the emergence of competing nationalist and communist politics – and eventually leading to civil war.

More than shipbuilding

China is a global economic power, and that requires controlling its near waters and building a presence in far waters.

Beijing sees this as a necessary and acceptable part of becoming a power equal to the US But to the US – the dominant naval power since World War II – the process represents a challenge to its presence in far waters.

China already has the largest navy in the world as measured by the number of ships. Over the past 15 years, China has built 131 ships that are capable of operating in far waters, while 144 are designed for near-water operations.

As of 2021, China was operating or fitting out two aircraft carriers, 36 destroyers, 30 frigates and nine large amphibious carriers – the type of vessels needed to truly challenge US naval dominance.

These numbers are still dwarfed by the corresponding number of US naval ships. But they are bigger than any other nation’s fleet, and without a doubt, China is developing a navy intended to project power into far waters.

But gaining sea dominance isn’t just about shipbuilding. The Chinese plan includes “island building” projects to establish a presence in the near waters of Asian countries, including the Philippines and Vietnam. Elsewhere, it seeks to use its economic might to entice countries away from Washington’s naval assistance.

Take Ream, a Cambodian military base in the Gulf of Thailand and former site of joint US-Cambodian naval exercises. The base was in line for a refurbishment under a deal with the US – an example of how Washington tries to maintain its presence in its Asian far waters.

But in a surprise move in 2020, Cambodia withdrew from the agreement.

Since then, funding from Beijing has provided for an upgraded base. There has been a continual Chinese presence at the Ream base in 2024, including the Chinese-funded construction of a pier and a large dry dock.

This naval presence serves China’s goal of defending its near waters. But it also adds to Beijing’s ability to project power into the far waters of the Indian Ocean, the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea.

A presence at Ream also gives China a prime position along a critical point of the “sea lines of communication,” the maritime routes through which much of global trade takes place. The nearby Malacca Strait is a key global choke point, through which US$3.5 trillion of trade passes annually – including a third of global trade, 40% of Japan’s and two-thirds of China’s.

Access to the Ream base in Cambodia puts China in the position to police those trade routes. China sees that policing role as positive and peaceful. The US and other countries fear that China could use it to disrupt global trade – although it isn’t clear why China would do that when its economy relies on imports and exports.

Battle for influence

Ream isn’t an isolated example; China has been trying to gain power and influence across the Pacific for years.

Over the past decade, Beijing has developed strong economic and diplomatic relations with Pacific island nations, including a deal with the Solomon Islands that sparked Western concerns of China gaining a military naval presence there.

Of course, the US is still a large and, for China, imposing presence through its bases in Japan and South Korea and its support of Taiwan. Washington has also started upping its efforts to outflank China among Pacific islands, inking a 2023 deal that would give US ships “unimpeded access” to bases there.

But the geopolitics of sea power is a process, rather than determined by current events. As such, the ebb and flow should be viewed through the trajectory of naval presence over a number of years.

Which is why the presence of Chinese warships sailing close to Alaska is an important development.

It raises the prospect of China’s ability to project power into its far waters – and near waters of the US.

Albatrosses or hawks?

To be clear, China did not breach any international law by sailing close to the Aleutians. And US officials seemingly played down the incident.

Still, it shows China has the ability and intent to take its naval rivalry with the US into uncharted diplomatic waters, so to speak, and closer to the American coastline.

It represents a new stage in the sea power competition between the US and China – and one we should all be concerned about.

In the past, the rise and fall of sea powers has played out through conflict in near and far waters and has led to major conflagrations. The Dutch fought the British and French in the far waters off the Indian coast in the 17th and 18th centuries, and a key ingredient of World War II was the challenge to British naval supremacy in its far waters in Asia and its near waters in northern Europe.

That isn’t to say that war is inevitable. It’s possible to address China-US tensions in a way that accommodates China’s global ambitions without threatening or weakening other countries.

But that is a mutual duty, incumbent on policymakers in both Washington and Beijing. Relations between the two countries have, of late, been dominated by hawkish voices in both countries. But belligerence by either country when it comes to defending near or far waters would be a dangerous option.

Colin Flint is Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Utah State University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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MAS issues prohibition order against executive director of China Capital Impetus Asset Management

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SINGAPORE: A two-year prohibition order has been issued by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) against the executive director of China Capital Impetus Asset Management (CCIAM). Sun Quan, who is also the former CEO of the fund management company, had failed to take reasonable steps to secure compliance with the SecuritiesContinue Reading

Beep raises USD 3.3 mil in Pre-Series A, expands to Thailand and Malaysia

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  • Oversubscribed fundraise led by existing investors, joined by M7 Ace Neo
  • With new partners, Voltality’s network now has over 5,000 charging stations

Beep raises USD 3.3 mil in Pre-Series A, expands to Thailand and Malaysia

Beep, a Singaporean IoT transaction platform startup, announced the close of its US$3.3 million (RM15.2 million) Pre-Series A investment. The oversubscribed fundraise was led by existing investors Granite Asia (formerly GGV Capital), Farquhar VC, SUTD Venture Holdings, Wing Vasiksiri, and new participation from M7 Ace Neo, an M7 Company.

In a statement, the startup said this aligns with the company’s expansion into Southeast Asia, starting with Thailand and Malaysia.

Beep raises USD 3.3 mil in Pre-Series A, expands to Thailand and MalaysiaKristoffer Jacek Soh (pic), co-founder & CEO of Beep, said, “We’re grateful for the continued vote of confidence from our investors who have been with us on our journey, supporting our growth to date. Our rapid progress is a result of the immense support we have received from our investors, partners, industry leaders, and government agencies.”

He added that as electric vehicle adoption continues to surge, seamless access to charging infrastructure is an increasingly crucial requirement for both consumers and businesses making the transition from internal combustion engine vehicles, yet connectivity remains fragmented across the region. “Voltality aims to empower both charging operators and mobility providers, allowing them to embed connectivity across different charging stations directly inside their own platforms, with an added option for app-less payments through credit cards and QR codes, so drivers need only one interface to charge wherever they go. From our strong foundation established in Singapore, we found a common need for the same capabilities abroad, and we are now ready to cement our presence in Thailand, Malaysia, and beyond.”

The fundraise demonstrates greater investor confidence, with US$3.3 million (RM15.2 million) of the total fundraise coming in the form of a top-up from existing investors. This also showcases the proven impact of Beep’s eMobility platform, Voltality, in Singapore and its ability to provide seamless, interoperable, and collaborative EV charging in Southeast Asia.

“The team at FVC have journeyed with Beep in different capacities for the past six years and are proud to now be investing into Beep through the FVC Green Future Fund together with other investors,” said Jason Su, managing partner & chief investment officer.

“We are glad to support Beep as they pioneer the future of EV charging gateways. Beep is a great example of why we feel Singapore startups are leaders in innovation. M7 is excited about the opportunity to partner with Beep and other Singapore startups moving forward,” said Yasmin Mustafa, M7’s senior advisor in Singapore.

There is high demand for EVs in Southeast Asia, with total EV sales in the region experiencing 894% year-on-year growth. The first phase of Beep’s regional expansion strategy focuses on extending Voltality’s charging network in Thailand and Malaysia. Presently, the platform is live with its first partners in Malaysia and will launch in Thailand in Q3 2024.

According to Beep, in Thailand, Voltality has already signed contracts with Sharge and Evolt, two of the top five charging operators in Thailand, together with WHA Group, a leading developer of fully integrated logistics, industrial estates, power and utilities, and digital solutions, and EVme, the country’s largest and fastest-growing EV rental and purchasing platform. The agreement will enable connectivity for several thousand vehicles to over 1,600 charge points locally, with the network set to continue growing in the near future.

In Malaysia, contracts have been signed with several charging operators, including Sime Darby Berhad subsidiary KINETA, a major player in Malaysia’s EV space, which announced a partnership in May with ChargEV to accelerate EV charging and roaming innovation. Beep partnered with KINETA to enable its “KINETA Charge” application with Voltality’s platform.

Voltality has also secured contracts with mobility partners to enable both local and cross-border charging connectivity within the second half of 2024. In 2023, Beep was one of the five startups to win the Petronas FutureTech 3.0 accelerator programme, which further deepens connections and credibility in Malaysia.

The startup is also exploring expanding to other regional markets such as Indonesia, Vietnam, and more for its second phase in 2025. To help navigate its continued regional expansion, Ming Maa, ex-Grab group president, will also join Beep as an advisor, bringing significant operational expertise in market development and partnerships within Southeast Asia’s complex landscape.

In 2023, Beep launched the largest electric vehicle roaming network under Voltality, spanning over 1,350 charge points and 11 operators in Singapore. Since then, the network has continued to expand, with the latest addition being an MOU signing in July 2024 with ChargEco, a rapidly growing Singaporean Charge Point Operator jointly set up by SMRT Corporation’s business arm STRIDES and integrated energy provider YTL PowerSeraya. ChargEco is one of the five operators awarded by the Land Transport Authority to collectively deploy charging stations in nearly 2,000 public Housing Board car parks islandwide. With this MOU, Voltality is partnered with four out of the five selected operators in the landmark tender to make every HDB town EV-ready by 2025.

Together with new partners in Thailand and Malaysia, this brings Voltality’s total charging network to over 5,000 charging stations from 1,350 in 2023 – representing what the company claims to be a four-times coverage growth in less than 12 months and maintaining Voltality’s eRoaming service (VoltNet) as the largest permission-based eRoaming network in the region.

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Less transparency, less faith in China stocks – Asia Times

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This week is offering quite the split screen to investors hoping China would step up efforts to raise its capital markets game.

On one screen, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) pledged to improve market operations, strengthen comprehensive research capabilities, deepen response mechanisms to manage market risks and hone regulations for trading.

On the other, signals that Beijing is increasing opacity surrounding the flow of capital. Specifically, how much capital international funds deploy into and out of Asia’s most volatile major stock market.

After August 18, analysts won’t be able to track net capital movements at the end of a trading day. The fact this follows a move in May to end intraday data flows with Hong Kong markets suggests this is no aberration.

And it generates more questions than answers about the state of Xi Jinping’s vision for making China a more attractive investment destination for the biggest of the globe’s big money.

Of course, there’s a third screen on which investors are keeping an eye. This one features a fresh round of stimulus.

On Tuesday, the Politburo, a Communist Party’s top decision-making body, signaled renewed efforts to reach this year’s 5% growth target focused on consumers.

Chinese leaders said the priority is increasing household income “through multiple channels” and increasing the “ability and willingness” of low- and middle-income groups to spend.

Yet the Politburo had less to say about financial upgrades at a moment when regulators are obscuring basic intelligence on capital flows.

True, exchanges still plan to provide data on turnover and trading volume in equities and exchange-traded funds through links with markets in Hong Kong.

But as regulatory signals go, making it harder to discern top-line levels of enthusiasm and pessimism about mainland shares isn’t likely to bolster confidence in Asia’s biggest economy.

Restoring trust on the part of global investors was a major goal of this month’s Third Plenum extravaganza. Though normally a five-yearly event, President Xi didn’t convene one in 2018.

Since the recently concluded Third Plenum was the first since 2013, expectations for bold reforms were – and still are – sky-high. Xi’s Communist Party pledged to “unswervingly encourage” the private sector in a bid to accelerate “high-quality development,” “Chinese-style modernization” and “innovative vitality.”

There’s still scope for China’s 24-member Politburo to bolster investors’ trust by detailing plans to make bigger alterations to the nation’s export- and investment-led growth model.

Suffice to say, though, announcing plans for reduced transparency the same month overseas money managers sold at least US$4.1 billion of Chinese shares might not go down well. Chinese and Hong Kong stock markets lost an epic $6.3 trillion from their peak in 2021 to January this year.

Xi’s team also faces confidence deficits on the economic front. The nation’s 4.7% economic growth rate in the second quarter amid weak consumer demand and housing prices disappointed many.

As economist Louise Loo at Oxford Economics observes, “discretionary retail spending fell at the sharpest sequential pace since the April 2022 Shanghai lockdowns.”

Hence the Politburo’s renewed focus on demand-boosting stimulus. To economist Zhang Zhiwei at Pinpoint Asset Management, it’s a sign Xi’s inner circle “recognizes that domestic demand is weak and plans to prepare some policy measures in the pipeline to address the problem.”

This backdrop explains why the People’s Bank of China surprised global markets with an interest rate cut on July 25. It trimmed the one-year policy loan rate by 20 basis points to 2.3%, the biggest move since April 2020. That came just days after the PBOC lowered a key short-term rate.

Robin Xing, economist at Goldman Sachs, is struck by the “reactive nature of easing” by PBOC Governor Pan Gongsheng. Kathleen Brooks, research director at XTB, called it a “sign that the Chinese authorities are concerned about the state of the Chinese economy, which is more worrying for stock markets and for investors.”

All the more reason to use the recent Third Plenum as an opportunity to accelerate moves to increase the quality of growth, not just the quantity.

The weeks since the meeting have left unclear the status of Xi’s pledges to get bad assets off property developers’ balance sheets to avoid defaults. The same goes for creating social safety nets to prod households to save less and spend more, the fate of internet platforms uncertain about the regulatory outlook and moves to build more vibrant capital markets.

Though Xi has been promising to prioritize capital market development since 2013, the effort seemed to get a big lift last November. That was when Xi met with a who’s-who of top chieftains in San Francisco on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit – including Apple CEO Tim Cook, Tesla chief Elon Musk and Blackstone’s Steve Schwarzman.

Other top executives on hand to rub elbows with the man leading an economy with which the US does roughly $600 billion of trade annually: Marc Benioff of Salesforce; Stan Deal of Boeing; Raj Subramaniam of FedEx; Ryan McInerney of Visa; Ray Dalio of Bridgewater Associates; Albert Bourla of Pfizer; Merit Janow of Mastercard; and Larry Fink of BlackRock.

There, Xi raised expectations for his inner circle, led by Premier Li Qiang, to strengthen capital markets in foundational ways. Since then, though, progress on the ground in China hasn’t matched the lofty rhetoric.

The speed with which capital has continued to flee China suggests that Xi’s efforts to communicate that Beijing is at the top of its myriad challenges are not getting through to investors. That includes efforts to stabilize a cratering property market and overall weak demand.

There’s confusion in international circles, too, about Xi’s commitment to giving the private sector and market forces “decisive” roles in Beijing decision-making. That 2012-2013 pledge was first called into question in 2015 when Xi’s government intervened aggressively to stabilize Shanghai stocks.

Questions only increased after Xi began cracking down hard on mainland tech platforms in late 2020, starting with Jack Ma’s Alibaba Group. The inquisition rapidly widened to Baidu, Didi Global, JD.com, Tencent and other top internet companies. It even had Wall Street banks debating whether China might have become “uninvestable.”

Now seems the time to get under the economy’s hood as rarely before. One law of economic gravity that Xi’s team has tried to beat these last 10 years is the idea that a developing nation must build credible and trusted markets before trillions of dollars of outside capital arrive.

In China’s case, this means increasing transparency, making local government officials more accountable, prodding companies to raise their governance games, crafting reliable surveillance mechanisms like credit rating companies and strengthening the financial architecture before the world shows up.

Too often during Xi’s first two terms as leader, China has tried to flip the script, believing it can build a world-class financial system after waves of foreign capital arrive. Whether fair or not, the Xi era’s efforts to communicate that a financial Big Bang is afoot continue to get lost in translation in boardrooms from New York to London to Tokyo.

The sense that Xi’s China tends to over-promise and under-deliver financial upgrade-wise set in back in summer of 2015, back when Shanghai shares plunged by one-third in three weeks. Beijing’s response was to treat the symptoms of the market rout, not the underlying causes.

Since then, Xi stepped up the pace of winning Chinese stocks places in top global indices – from MSCI for stocks to FTSE-Russell for bonds. Yet increases in access to yuan-denominated assets often outpace reforms needed to prepare China Inc for the global prime time.

Whether China can win back investors’ trust is an open question. As Chinese stocks are reminding us – the Shanghai Shenzhen CSI 300 Index is down more than 13% this year – there are certain laws of gravity that still apply to economies transitioning from state-driven and export-led growth to services, innovation and domestic consumption.

Trouble is, China’s bond market – totaling more than $23 trillion overall – is underpinned by a developing economy with limited liquidity and hedging tools, a giant and opaque state sector, and a rudimentary credit-rating system that can obscure risk and misallocate capital.

For all China’s promises, this makes it more of a buyer-beware market than many investors expected.

This gets at other split screens. On one, China’s inclusion in major benchmarks is luring bond giants like BlackRock. On screen No. 2: the crisis of confidence surrounding developers like China Evergrande Group offer a stark reminder of the mainland’s opacity and excesses. 

The prevalence of local government financing vehicles – roughly $13 trillion of such off-balance sheet LGFVs – can be a major turnoff for foreign bond funds.

Not only are they difficult to analyze but their fingerprints also touch the operations of everything from commercial banks’ wealth management units to mutual funds to hedge funds to insurers to the gamut of securities companies.

Hence the need for deeper bond markets. And, of course, for regulators in Beijing to avoid steps that spook global markets anew. Among recent missteps by Xi’s party: last year’s crackdown on foreign consultancy firms on which global investors and multinational firms rely for information and analysis.

The move, supposedly part of a nationwide anti-espionage campaign, reduced the appetite for investment from some overseas firms. When US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s team visits Beijing these days, the consultancy policy is among the examples of “non-market” practices and “coercive actions” against American firms that US officials highlight.

Deeper debt markets would help sort out the cart-before-the-horse problem that afflicts China’s economy. During the Xi era and before it, China too often believed that pulling in more foreign capital was a reform all its own. It’s been slower to strengthen China’s financial system ahead of those waves of overseas capital.

And pulling down new curtains of opacity won’t help to reverse recent capital outflows and flagging investor confidence.

Follow William Pesek on X at @WilliamPesek

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Legislation forces US firms to prepare for a Taiwan war – Asia Times

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Some American legislators have proposed a bipartisan legislative bill that will require United States-listed firms to disclose their assets and businesses in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and estimate the economic losses they will suffer if China invades Taiwan. 

The PRC Risk Transparency Act, if passed and implemented, will amend the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to require US-listed firms to annually disclose the percentage of total revenue, profits, capital investment and supply chain involvement in China and perform security analysis related to their exposures. 

The Act will require US-listed firms to make plans for a sudden loss of market access in China if the country invades Taiwan, a self-governing island over which Beijing claims to have sovereignty and has vowed to “reunite” with the mainland. 

These firms need to consider different case scenarios including a more than 80% decline in bilateral trade between the US and China, a complete cessation in the trade of goods with military end-use or dual-use applications and an extreme situation in which Beijing seizes all China-based assets of American companies that could be repurposed for military production. 

The bill was jointly introduced by the House Financial Service Subcommittee on National Security, Illicit Finance and International Financial Institutions chairman Blaine Luetkemeyer and the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party chairman John Moolenaar on July 25. 

The bill needs approval from both the US House of Representatives and Senate and the US president’s signature in order to become law. 

A spokesperson of Luetkemeyer’s office told the media that another way to push the legislation is to add this Act, together with the previously proposed Chinese Military Aggression Act, to House Speaker Mike Johnson’s coming legislation package, which aims to restrict US investments in China and punish the Chinese firms that provide material support to Russia and Iran.

Johnson said in early July that Congress targets to pass a significant legislation package by the end of this year to curb China as the country now leading an “axis” of adversaries that includes Russia, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela and Cuba. 

John Aquilino, head of the Indo-Pacific Command, said in March that he believes China’s military will be prepared to invade Taiwan by 2027. 

In April, Luetkemeyer introduced the Chinese Military Aggression Act, which will direct the Treasury Department’s Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) to analyze, study and report on market implications and vulnerabilities related to a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

The PRC Risk Transparency Act was proposed two days before US State Secretary Antony Blinken met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on the sidelines of the ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ meeting in Laos on July 27. 

During the meeting, Blinken expressed concerns over China’s support for Russia’s war in Ukraine and provocative actions against Taiwan. 

Wang countered that Taiwanese separatists are the ones creating trouble in the Taiwan Strait and that China will not hesitate to take countermeasures. He said the US has been trying to alienate Beijing and Moscow since the Russian-Ukrainian conflict broke out but China will not back down under external pressure. 

A Shanxi-based Chinese columnist says in an article published on Monday that Wang has already seen through Blinken’s tricks – Washington wanted to increase communications with Beijing but would not stop suppressing China. 

He says it was probably the last time for Blinken to visit Asia with the title of US State Secretary. He says Blinken may not be able to stay in his position after the US presidential election in November.  

Wider coverage

The PRC Risk Transparency Act covers several more sectors than the Executive Order signed by President Joe Biden last August. The latter only restricts and monitors US investments in Chinese semiconductor, quantum computing and artificial intelligence companies for national security reasons. 

The Act’s restrictions are also much wider than similar bills introduced by other US lawmakers.

Last November, US Senators Bob Casey and Rick Scott introduced the Disclosing Investments in Foreign Adversaries Act to provide transparency in investments made by American hedge funds and private equity firms in countries of concern like China and Russia.

The legislation would require these private investment funds to annually disclose any assets invested in countries like China to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Casey said it is vital to know if any US money is being used to boost the economies of some foreign adversaries who steal technological know-how and jobs from America.

In March this year, Congresspeople Victoria Spartz and Brad Sherman introduced four bills that aim to mitigate the strategic, commercial and national security threats posed by China to the American economy and financial markets. 

Among the four, the China Risk Reporting Act requires US-listed firms to disclose annually the degree to which they are dependent upon China and the risks China poses, such as supply chain disruptions, intellectual property theft or nationalization of assets. 

“If China invades Taiwan, Congress should be able to impose sanctions, knowing American companies have insulated themselves from the rupture,” Spartz and Sherman said in a press release. “Hopefully, this will deter such an invasion.”

The newly proposed PRC Risk Transparency Act demands more details, such as US-listed firms’ capital investment in China and their joint ventures’ revenues and profits. 

In recent years, many US companies have already started cutting their investments in China.

China’s foreign direct investment fell 8% to 1.13 trillion yuan (US$156 billion) in 2023 from a year ago, according to the Ministry of Commerce. The figure dropped 29.1% year-on-year to 498.9 billion yuan in the first half of this year. Chinese officials said it’s normal to have some fluctuations as FDI had grown during 2013-2022. 

‘US$1.6 trillion loss’

Before the US can estimate its economic losses from a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, Beijing has already made an estimation and used it to warn of the consequences of US decoupling from China. 

“Statistics show that ending the permanent normal trade relations with China would lead to a $1.6 trillion-economic loss for the US,” Xie Feng, Chinese Ambassador to the US, said in a speech at the Symposium in Commemoration of the 45th Anniversary of China-US Diplomatic Relations on July 27. 

He said over 70,000 American companies are benefiting from China’s development while their exports to China have supported 930,000 American jobs. 

“To our two countries, respective success means mutual opportunities, not challenges, and the two sides should help each other succeed, not undermine each other,” he said. “We need to make the list of cooperation longer and the negative list shorter.”

Xie’s speech was posted on the website of the Chinese Embassy in the US on Tuesday. 

Read: US targets Hong Kong chip transshipments to Russia

Follow Jeff Pao on X: @jeffpao3

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Commentary: Watch what China does, not just what it says, after unsurprising economic plenum

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WATCH WHAT CHINA DOES, NOT JUST WHAT IT SAYS

That said, businesses and investors should watch what China does, not just what it says.

There are useful policies that are already in place, such as the Real World Evidence (RWE) programmes for medical technology companies entering China. The first RWE programme, launched in Hainan province in 2019 and followed by the Greater Bay Area in 2020, gives medtech companies early access to the market through trials and studies for rare diseases and clinically urgent needs, and the opportunity to fast-track regulatory approvals, reimbursement listing, and/or commercialisation, potentially enabling them to influence and shape the market.

The plenum stated that it is focused on creating a “beautiful China”, by accelerating green transformation and pursuing green, low-carbon development, among others. This alone may not say much.

But if taken together with its directions of improving the mechanism for modern infrastructure construction and the resilience and security of industrial supply chains, the opportunities in environmental sustainability could be vast.

For instance, the plenum proposed deeper reforms of its railway system and further develop the “low-altitude economy” (such as drones and flying cars). This means demand for renewable energy will likely increase. The need to secure the supply chain in the production of these assets would be critical.

Perhaps the most telling sign that businesses should keep their eyes on China’s actions is that the plenum specified a timeline to achieve the reforms. In past plenums, the CCP had not set such timelines.

This time, unusually, Beijing has given clear indication of a 2029 deadline – an important year as the People’s Republic of China celebrates its 80th anniversary. Some analysts see this as an effort to focus the CCP on implementing the reforms.

This, in a way, provides a direction for businesses and markets on China’s roadmap.

While the road ahead is fraught with challenges, businesses that can navigate these complexities and leverage emerging opportunities will be well-positioned to thrive.

Thomas Kwan is Managing Director of Hong Kong at Penta Group.

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Why did US miss the China-led battery revolution? – Asia Times

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Once in a great while, Twitter X can still be a place for interesting discussions instead of breathless political screeching. July 29 was one of those times. I wrote a thread asking why America missed the battery revolution and got a lot of very interesting responses. So I thought I’d redo that thread as a blog post and expand on it a bit.

Basically, batteries are a technological revolution in progress. They’re a key part of a larger, more general revolution: the replacement of controlled combustion with electricity as the main way that human beings produce energy and move it around.

The key advantage of batteries – the thing that no other technology or energy source can really do well – is that they let you store energy, move it around, and then remove it again. They’re a way to move energy through both time and space.

I first realized the transformative power of batteries when I saw people using battery-powered leaf blowers as a weapon in the riots of 2020. But what really drove it home for me was when I invested in a startup called Impulse that makes battery-powered appliances. Once you’ve seen a battery-powered stove boil a pot of water in a few seconds, it’s hard not to think the world has changed:

YouTube video

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This kind of magic wasn’t possible even a few years ago – batteries didn’t have the power density required to do this. The technology has been advancing by leaps and bounds in recent years.

That’s why you’re seeing battery-powered drones suddenly take over the modern battlefield, e-bikes transform transportation, and China’s car companies conquer the automotive industry.

It’s why you’re seeing solar power suddenly become smooth and reliable instead of intermittent. It’s why your phone can run all day without needing to be recharged. And these are only the beginning of what batteries will be able to do, since the technology is still improving rapidly at a fundamental level.

But what’s strange is how surprising this all feels – not just to me, but to the United States as a whole. I knew about Tesla and the coming of EVs years ago, of course. And from reading climate pundits, I knew that battery storage would be an important complement to solar power. I knew about Barack Obama’s attempts to support American battery companies.

But I didn’t have any idea how many different things batteries would be used for, or how good they would get. Relatively few media outlets, politicians, or intellectuals talked about batteries as a transformative technology. This is still true today — outside of solar storage and EVs, I don’t see many people gushing about batteries.

The US government, too, seems to have been caught a bit flat-footed. Obama did support some battery companies (including Tesla!). But there was never any big government push for better batteries, the way there was for genetic sequencing, fracking or even solar power.

When you read a history of the lithium-ion battery, it’s all just a scattered network of researchers at British and Japanese universities — and, strangely, Exxon — creating the chemistries that enabled the revolution.

The key discoveries happened in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, but it wasn’t until the 2000s that US government research started making some important contributions and US policy started supporting the commercialization of batteries.

Batteries are the first big technological revolution that the US missed

The failure of both American media and the American government to anticipate the battery revolution is actually a huge historical outlier.

When it comes to any other major technological revolution I can think of, the US was very early to the party — driving the key research and development, hyping up the technology well before it was commercially viable, and making a major effort at early commercialization. Here are a bunch of examples:

Computers: The US was very early to the computer revolution, including technology, theory, and applications. It produced the first digital electronic computer and the first modern computer (ENIAC) in the 1940s. The US defense establishment recognized the importance of computing early on, and supported it over the years. No other country has done as much to advance computing technology or commercialize computers.

Space: This was the case where the US came closest to getting “scooped” on a technology. Both the US and the USSR recognized the potential importance of space and rocketry after World War 2, but the USSR’s big push in the field allowed it to get to space first.

The US made a mighty — and ultimately successful — effort to catch up and overtake its rival, and still dominates the space industry and space innovation to this day. The hype about space in the US was absolutely enormous, especially after the “Sputnik moment.”

Nuclear power: The US and USSR both developed nuclear power at around the same time in the 1950s. Both countries hyped the technology heavily and poured government funding into building and improving nuclear reactors.

Semiconductors: The US invented the semiconductor, and its potential applications for civilian computing and for military weaponry were recognized and widely discussed shortly afterwards. The US also invented the microprocessor, extreme ultraviolet lithography, and most of the other core technologies associated with semiconductors – always with heavy government support. Much has been made of Taiwan’s dominance of semiconductor fabrication in recent years but the US still holds the pole position in research, design and many key areas of tool manufacturing and software.

Solar power: The US was very early to the idea that solar power would be a replacement for fossil fuels. The Carter administration heavily promoted the technology (famously putting solar panels on the White House), more than 30 years before it became cost-competitive with fossil fuels. Popular consciousness of solar’s potential was high; my parents told me from a young age that solar would eventually power the country. US government-funded research was the main force pushing solar costs down until the mid-2000s.

The internet: The US invented and/or funded the invention of all of the key technologies of the internet up until the 2010s. It built out most of the key internet infrastructure. Excitement about the internet’s potential was off the charts for decades, and US policymakers supported the industry’s development with far-sighted laws.

Fracking: The US government heavily funded and supported the development of hydraulic fracturing technology since the 1970s, and the US is still overwhelmingly dominant in this technology.

Genetics: The US promoted research into genetics from the very start, doing much of the basic discovery work, and funding the famous Human Genome Project that unlocked a revolution in biotechnology. The US also pioneered mRNA vaccines and many other biotech breakthroughs, again with the help of far-sighted government and industry support.

AI: The basic technologies of modern AI were invented in the US, with far-sighted investments from big companies (especially Google) and heavy support from the US government. Although the big breakthroughs in the 2010s came as a surprise, US policy has always acted rapidly to make sure that the US has a #1 position in the field.

In other words, the US almost always anticipates each technological revolution, supports that technology with far-sighted government and industry action, invents many of the key technologies, innovates many of the key products, and at least attempts to commercialize the technology via American companies. This is overwhelmingly the norm.

But for batteries, the US did only some of these steps. The potential of batteries doesn’t seem to have been widely anticipated decades in advance by the US media or government.

Battery technology received a bit of support, but not a huge amount. Some of the key invention was done in the US, but more was done in Japan and the UK, and the key products were innovated and successfully commercialized in Japan.

And in recent years, it has been the People’s Republic of China that has seized the lead in battery technology. China is the leader in battery manufacturing, of course, just as it is the leader in solar manufacturing. That has allowed China to electrify its economy much faster than the rest of the world:

Source: RMI

But in batteries, China is pushing the boundaries of what’s possible. CATL, China’s leading battery company, appears to have invented a new kind of semi-solid lithium-ion battery that has enough energy density to power an airplane.

The country is launching a big effort to invent the first commercially viable solid-state batteries. There are various other cutting-edge efforts happening in the country as well.

This is not to say that China anticipated the battery revolution well in advance either. But had the US done so, we might have had a bigger head start on China.

So why did the US fail to anticipate this one technological revolution, while catching all the others? Maybe no country gets a perfect 1.000 batting average. But when I asked this question in my thread, I got a number of interesting hypotheses in the replies.

Hypothesis 1: Supply chains

The first hypothesis, suggested by Glenn Luk and some others, was that innovation in batteries comes from supply chains. Battery manufacturing is dominated by China, since it’s a low-margin, capital-intensive, heavily polluting industry.

China also dominates the upstream primary industries that create the components and materials used in batteries — graphite mining and processing, lithium processing, and so on. And China dominates the downstream electronics industries — consumer electronics, drones, and now EVs — that use lots of batteries. These factors probably helped China innovate faster than America in the space.

When you control the upstream industries that feed into batteries, you’re able to get cheaper inputs. That allows faster iteration and cheaper experimentation.

When you control battery manufacturing itself, you have a lot of knowledgeable battery engineers and scientists who sit around thinking about ways to make batteries even better. You also have big dominant companies like CATL who are motivated to invest in basic battery R&D.

And when you control the downstream electronics industries that use batteries, you get better and faster input about what kinds of battery breakthroughs would be most useful. This helps steer the direction of innovation.

I generally buy the “supply chains” hypothesis for why China is innovating faster than America in batteries right now. But it can’t easily explain why the US paid insufficient attention to the technology before it was commercialized, back in the 1980s and 1990s.

All of the points above are equally true about solar power, and yet Americans have been excited about solar power for many decades, while arguably they’re not even that excited about batteries right now.

Also, the US has long been dominant in the design of phones and laptop computers, which are some of the most important downstream industries that use batteries. And for many years, the US was dominant in EV manufacturing too, thanks to Tesla. It’s worth asking why that didn’t give the US the opportunity to steer battery innovation more than it did.

Hypothesis 2: Political and industrial opposition

Matt Yglesias suggested that Republicans blocked America from making a big push for batteries during the Obama years. In general, Americans will turn anything into a culture war, and there certainly does seem to have been quite a lot of battery-skepticism from the right:

Many others suggested opposition from oil companies. It is true that oil companies have tried to discourage adoption of electric vehicles, which probably held back an important downstream industry to some degree. But I can’t find information about whether they also tried to stop battery research.

Anyway, opposition from Republicans and oil companies is plausible, but there are reasons to doubt that this is a full explanation either. For one thing, the Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation, and other government granting agencies are neither partisan Republicans nor in thrall to Big Oil.

Neither are America’s major newspapers, TV stations and other media outlets. And yet these actors also weren’t as excited about batteries as they should have been.

Also, GOP and oil-company opposition was probably even stronger in solar, and that didn’t stop America’s writers, researchers, engineers, and bureaucrats from maintaining a strong interest in it for decades. Batteries, in contrast, were an afterthought.

Also, it’s worth noting that despite GOP domination and a strong oil industry presence, the state of Texas is charging ahead with battery storage — beating out even California:

Source: Cleanview

This may represent a sea change from 10 or 20 years ago, but I have my doubts.

Hypothesis 3: A few bad bets and some unfair competition

Much of the discourse around America’s difficulties in the battery industry revolves around the story of A123 Systems. This was a promising battery startup in Massachusetts that received a lot of support from the US government, but ultimately failed and was sold to a Chinese company in 2012.

Sam D’Amico of Impulse (the guy who made the super-powered battery stove) argues that A123’s failure, in addition to some other smart bets by Chinese manufacturers, was decisive in China pulling ahead:

Jigar Shah, the director of the Loan Programs Office at the Department of Energy, wrote a thoughtful thread in response to my own thread. He thinks that technology theft was another key reason for A123’s demise:

He also points out that like in solar, China subsidizes its producers to produce both batteries and EVs below cost, making it very hard for other countries’ companies to stay in those markets:

Screenshot

A number of other people also pointed out the case of a cutting-edge battery technology, invented in the US, that the Department of Energy licensed to China — undercutting American startups that were trying to use it, and strengthening China’s own industry.

These examples are all concerning and should prompt changes in how the US handles R&D, industrial policy, and technology licensing. They all help explain how China has managed to take the lead in batteries and related technologies.

But they don’t really explain why concerted efforts at battery research got started so late in the US, or why these efforts have still received only modest funding, or why the media and scientific establishment generally failed to anticipate how big of a deal batteries would be.

Although other countries — Germany, Japan, the USSR — all laid claim to the mantle of “country of the future” at various times throughout the 20th century, there was never any real doubt that the title still belonged to the US.

America had the institutional competence, market size, industrial prowess, and cultural foresight to almost always see the Next Big Thing well before it hit the shelves. But as the failure in batteries shows, the mantle of “country of the future” is not America’s by birthright.

The US didn’t totally miss the battery revolution – it did eventually start supporting some research and some companies and excitement built gradually.

But given the fact that batteries are pretty much the only way of storing energy in a portable form (to be joined by synthetic fuels at some unspecified point in the future), it seems pretty obvious that the US should have gotten a lot more excited about them a lot earlier than it did.

All of the potential explanations for why America didn’t see the potential of a battery-powered future, as it had seen the potential of so many other transformative technologies, fall short in some way. The true answer remains something of a mystery.

Whatever the reason, though, the US should respond by A.) playing catch-up in batteries the way we caught up to the USSR in space in the 20th century, and B.) making sure our scientific, governmental and media institutions aren’t broken in some way that causes them to miss other revolutions coming down the pipe.

This article was first published on Noah Smith’s Noahpinion Substack and is republished with kind permission. Read the original here and become a Noahopinion subscriber here.

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BEST Inc. launches DWS System in Malaysia with nearly US.1 million investment

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  • Deployment follows successful expansions in Vietnam, Thailand & S’pore
  • Aims to enhance efficiency, service quality amid M’sia’s e-commerce boom

BEST Inc. launches DWS System in Malaysia with nearly US$2.1 million investment

BEST Inc., a leading integrated smart supply chain and logistics solutions provider in China and Southeast Asia, has announced the deployment of its eleven advanced Dimensioning, Weighing, and Scanning (DWS) systems in its largest sorting centre in Southeast Asia, located in Shah Alam, Malaysia. The total investment in these systems amounts to nearly US$2.1 million (RM10 million), the firm said in a statement.

It added that this strategic initiative is a significant part of its efforts to enhance operational efficiency and service quality in response to Malaysia’s burgeoning e-commerce market.

Gavin Lu, CEO of BEST Inc. Malaysia, highlighted the importance of this technological advancement, noting that the introduction of the DWS machine in Malaysia is a significant milestone for BEST Inc. Malaysia. “As we continue to invest in cutting-edge technologies, this advanced system will streamline our operations, reduce costs, and provide superior service to our customers. Malaysia is a crucial market for us, and we are committed to supporting its growth with our innovative solutions. The DWS technology exemplifies our dedication to optimising logistics through automation and precision,” Lu said.

The eleven dynamic DWS machines are an extension of the top-side code reading version, which not only has all the functions of the top DWS, but also further improves sorting efficiency. The code reading cameras on five sides of the frame can simultaneously scan five sides of the parcel. In this case, the barcode information, dynamic volume and weight data in all directions of the package can be obtained comprehensively, which reduces the requirements for package placement and improves the identification efficiency in unit time, including improving the automation degree and sorting efficiency of enterprise logistics links.

According to the company, the newly built automated line allows each DWS to handle 20,000 parcels per hour, contributing to a daily capacity of 500,000 parcels for the KUL Hub.

“The implementation of the DWS machine marks a new era for logistics in Malaysia. By integrating this technology into our operations, we are not only enhancing efficiency but also setting a new standard for the industry,” Lu added. “This advancement will enable us to better serve our customers with faster and more accurate parcel processing, ultimately driving customer satisfaction and operational excellence. This is particularly important as Malaysia’s e-commerce market continues to expand rapidly, necessitating more sophisticated and scalable logistics solutions.”

The deployment of the DWS machine in Malaysia aligns with BEST Inc.’s broader strategy to strengthen its presence in Southeast Asia. This follows successful expansions into other regional markets, including Vietnam, Thailand, and Singapore.

“These strategic moves are driven by the company’s commitment to innovation and customer satisfaction, aiming to deliver reliable and efficient logistics services across the region. The DWS system is a testament to BEST Inc.’s commitment to providing high-quality logistics solutions that meet the demands of modern e-commerce and supply chain operations,” Lu concluded.

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