Chinese Press Digest

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 17 COMPANION Building Material's chairman Doreen Siu York-chee notes that the company is arranging for a loan to finance the set-up of a joint venture in Shanghai with an Italian concern. It is expected that the loan will be forthcoming by the end of the year. Ms Siu says Companion and the Italian concern will each own a 50 per cent interest in the joint venture and she hopes the Shanghai production facility will come on stream by the end of next year or early 1996. - SING PAO ELEC & Eltek International's chairman and managing director David So Cheung-sing says the company's printed circuit board production capacity should increase to 90,000 sq ft per month by the end of next year. This will be an increase of more than 38 per cent compared with its current production capacity. - ECONOMIC JOURNAL FURAMA Hotel Enterprises says the increase in room rates has not put pressure on occupancy, adding that its profit has jumped. Furama announced that in the six months to September 30 net profit attributable to shareholders increased 35.3 per cent and operating revenues jumped 14.3 per cent. - ECONOMIC JOURNAL FIVE representatives of Grande Holdings have been approved at a shareholders meeting of MTC Electronic Technologies Co on December 15 to sit on MTC board of directors. However, a group of shareholders who are determined to wrest control of MTC have claimed that problems existed in the voting process. - ECONOMIC TIMES A SPOKESMAN for Hang Lung Development says that after offering 28 residential units of Tuen Mun's Tai Hing Gardens for sale recently, the company put up the remaining 78 units for sale yesterday at an average of $2,629 a square foot. - ECONOMIC TIMES FIFTY residential units from the fourth phase of Hutchison Whampoa's South Horizons development in in Ap Lei Chau were bought by Chevalier Development International last month for more than $198 million, or an average of $5,075 a square foot. - ECONOMIC TIMES HONGKONG Telecom's chief executive Linus Cheung Wing-lam says the group will provide multi-media services to its customers in 1997 or 1998. He adds that Hong Kong has come ahead of Japan and Singapore in this particular area, noting that the two countries will not be able to provide full scale multi-media services until the 21st century. - SING PAO INTERFORM Ceramics says the company is in the process of raising more than $20 million to develop its mainland joint-venture production facilities. The company is also in talks with a new airport project contractor about co-operation. It says once the contractor successfully obtains construction contracts, Interform will be in a position to supply construction materials to the contractor. - MING PAO IT is understood that the Government has held discussion on Pacific Concord's application to change the use of an industrial site in Quarry Bay into commercial use. The Government is reported to be likely to reject the company's application. This is mainly because transportation in the area near the industrial site is inconvenient and that the site is too far away from the MTR station. - ECONOMIC JOURNAL SHUN Cheong Holdings director Kwok Shun-on notes that the company will spend $10 million to establish a plant in Britain which is expected to begin formal operations in the middle of next year. The core operations of Shun Cheong include the provision of electricity and machinery installation services as well as maintenance services to companies engaged in construction and engineering. - MING PAO ACCORDING to the latest issue of Business Week , Hong Kong's VTech Holdings holds 70 per cent of the US$19 billion computerised education toy market in the United States. Company chairman Allan Wong Chi-yun hopes sales of such products will increase fourfold over the next five years to reach $2 billion a year. - ECONOMIC TIMES MONDAY, DECEMBER 19 CHESTERFIELD says it was in discussion with an individual third party on Friday about the possibility of acquiring the company. However, Chesterfield says the talks are only at a preliminary stage and details have yet to be confirmed. - ECONOMIC JOURNAL GUANGZHOU Shipyard International's chairman Ren Fuwei says the delivery period of the company's shipbuilding orders on hand will now be in 1996. He also says Guangzhou Shipyard is intent on diversifying its operations to include ship repairing and maintenance. The company is also actively seeking suitable locations to set up the new operations. However, this is not expected to be achieved soon. - SING TAO FORTY-SEVEN units from the third phase as well as the remaining units from the first and second phases of Broadview Villa, developed by Hopewell Holdings in Happy Valley, were offered for sale last week at an average of about $9,100 per square foot. The developer did not announce the number of units being sold and property sources expected sales were less than satisfactory. - ECONOMIC JOURNAL