Apple Inc:
Brave new world Enthusiasm has surrounded the future of augmented reality as the iPhone giant faces speculation about where it goes from here, writes Tim Bradshaw. Apple’s new ‘‘ARKit’’ technology takes the complex combination of computer vision, tracking sensors and mapping software found in Pokemon Go or Snapchat and turns it into something that can be incorporated into any app. Yet despite the excitement surrounding ARKit, internally the company is still not sure what the most compelling application for such a headset might be. As a result, there are still several different kinds of prototype being experimented with, according to people close to the company. No final decision has been made on the product’s final formulation. Apple declined to comment. ‘‘What Apple has is the capability to work on a certain type of product – now much more so than 10 years ago,’’ says Benedict Evans, partner at Silicon Valley investor Andreessen Horowitz. ‘‘Glasses fit squarely into that capability but the selfdriving part of cars, somewhat less so’’.
Australian Pharmaceutical Industries (API):
Listed health and beauty retailer Australian Pharmaceutical Industries has emerged in the hotly contested battle for Laser Clinics Australia. Street Talk can reveal API is working with Morgan Stanley as it seeks to lob a final bid for the botox and hair removal business by an August 24 deadline. The timing of a tilt at Laser Clinics is interesting, however, given API’s shock downgrade of its earnings guidance last week which saw investors pummel the stock by 13 per cent on Thursday. API downgraded its full-year profit guidance to 5 per cent growth for the year ended August 31, citing poor consumer sentiment. API is considered a strong contender given it knows the franchising and clinics industry well and would be seeking to add another growth avenue to its Priceline Pharmacy network.
Blackmores Limited (BKL); Bubs Australia Limited (BUB):
Infant formula and organic baby food company Bubs Australia wants to strengthen its Australian domestic presence even though its share price has rocketed 70 per cent in the past week largely on demand for ‘‘white gold’’ from Chinese customers. Bubs shares climbed from 30¢ on July 27 to close at 51¢ on Friday as investors focus on some of the smaller ASX companies supplying infant formula to China. Mr Simms said it was difficult to assess how much of the local buying of Bubs also found its way on to Chinese e-commerce sites through daigou traders. But Bubs hadn’t deliberately set out to pursue the daigou traders, which have been an important part of the success of vitamins brands such as Blackmores.
Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA):
Labor said allegations that Commonwealth Bank of Australia breached antimoney laundering obligations strengthened its calls for a royal commission but the bank’s chief executive, Ian Narev, said a royal commission was not necessary because AUSTRAC’s action showed it was a tough regulator demanding high standards from banks. The current political environment made it difficult for banks to defend themselves but he said CBA wants to be transparent as this matter progresses. The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority gave a presentation to the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision in October 2001 titled Money laundering, a risk management issue . It said supervisors globally were increasingly recognising the importance of banks putting in place controls and procedures to ensure they knew their customers. AUSTRAC’s allegations paint a disturbing picture of not just a systems issue that was allowed to continue for a number of years but also a failure to act quickly even when alerts were provided by the police. Whether this was laziness, process, cultural or something else will become clearer when the defence is filed and the case plays out. But for now the statement of claim suggests wide-scale, systemic, cultural and operational dysfunction.
Dacian Gold Limited (DCN); Northern Star Resources Limited (NST); Saracen Mineral Holdings Limited (SAR):
New life is being injected into aging gold projects across Western Australia as the mining sector’s exploration efforts strike success. In what is shaping as a minirenaissance for Australia’s goldminers, new discoveries at pre-loved assets are delivering cost-effective production growth for a string of local producers. Northern Star Resources and Saracen Mineral Holdings both announced significant increases in their gold inventories last week after bumper exploration programs around their operations. Dacian Gold is just eight months away from restarting production at the historic Mt Morgans gold project and MetalsX spin-off West Gold Resources kicked the Fortnum goldmine back into production in June, after buying and refurbishing the long-idled project. And there are plenty of others – Silver Lake Resources is working to add life to its Mount Monger gold camp and Gascoyne Resources is developing Dalgaranga, first discovered in the early 1990s.
John Holland:
Chinese-owned John Holland will get a third asset in its growing investment portfolio after agreeing to take a stake in the planned $200 million Maroochydore city centre. The builder, which in June purchased the 275 George Street office tower and is close to buying its first development site in Macquarie Park – both in Sydney – is in exclusive negotiations with Sunshine Coast council to develop and then own three of five lots in the commercial precinct. ‘‘This is another example of our focus on becoming a fully integrated infrastructure and property company,’’ said Tom Roche, John Holland’s executive general manager for development and investments. ‘‘We are now involved in significant developments in Sydney, Brisbane and Adelaide and focused on a number of other opportunities across the country’’.
Tabcorp Holdings Limited (TAH):
Tabcorp could look to sell or even close its Luxbet wagering business as its $11 billion merger with Tatts Group looms. Luxbet, which made an earnings before interest and tax loss of $13 million, is under review by Tabcorp management who have previously restricted it from taking market share from its existing TAB brand. But it could be attractive to an overseas corporate bookmaker given Luxbet has a group of high-yielding customers connected to the horse racing industry and may fetch Tabcorp $50 million-$100 million. Tabcorp chief executive David Attenborough said Luxbet was a good business but it was effectively on ‘‘starvation rations’’ given it does not compete against TAB.
(Source: AIMS)
Brave new world Enthusiasm has surrounded the future of augmented reality as the iPhone giant faces speculation about where it goes from here, writes Tim Bradshaw. Apple’s new ‘‘ARKit’’ technology takes the complex combination of computer vision, tracking sensors and mapping software found in Pokemon Go or Snapchat and turns it into something that can be incorporated into any app. Yet despite the excitement surrounding ARKit, internally the company is still not sure what the most compelling application for such a headset might be. As a result, there are still several different kinds of prototype being experimented with, according to people close to the company. No final decision has been made on the product’s final formulation. Apple declined to comment. ‘‘What Apple has is the capability to work on a certain type of product – now much more so than 10 years ago,’’ says Benedict Evans, partner at Silicon Valley investor Andreessen Horowitz. ‘‘Glasses fit squarely into that capability but the selfdriving part of cars, somewhat less so’’.
Australian Pharmaceutical Industries (API):
Listed health and beauty retailer Australian Pharmaceutical Industries has emerged in the hotly contested battle for Laser Clinics Australia. Street Talk can reveal API is working with Morgan Stanley as it seeks to lob a final bid for the botox and hair removal business by an August 24 deadline. The timing of a tilt at Laser Clinics is interesting, however, given API’s shock downgrade of its earnings guidance last week which saw investors pummel the stock by 13 per cent on Thursday. API downgraded its full-year profit guidance to 5 per cent growth for the year ended August 31, citing poor consumer sentiment. API is considered a strong contender given it knows the franchising and clinics industry well and would be seeking to add another growth avenue to its Priceline Pharmacy network.
Blackmores Limited (BKL); Bubs Australia Limited (BUB):
Infant formula and organic baby food company Bubs Australia wants to strengthen its Australian domestic presence even though its share price has rocketed 70 per cent in the past week largely on demand for ‘‘white gold’’ from Chinese customers. Bubs shares climbed from 30¢ on July 27 to close at 51¢ on Friday as investors focus on some of the smaller ASX companies supplying infant formula to China. Mr Simms said it was difficult to assess how much of the local buying of Bubs also found its way on to Chinese e-commerce sites through daigou traders. But Bubs hadn’t deliberately set out to pursue the daigou traders, which have been an important part of the success of vitamins brands such as Blackmores.
Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA):
Labor said allegations that Commonwealth Bank of Australia breached antimoney laundering obligations strengthened its calls for a royal commission but the bank’s chief executive, Ian Narev, said a royal commission was not necessary because AUSTRAC’s action showed it was a tough regulator demanding high standards from banks. The current political environment made it difficult for banks to defend themselves but he said CBA wants to be transparent as this matter progresses. The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority gave a presentation to the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision in October 2001 titled Money laundering, a risk management issue . It said supervisors globally were increasingly recognising the importance of banks putting in place controls and procedures to ensure they knew their customers. AUSTRAC’s allegations paint a disturbing picture of not just a systems issue that was allowed to continue for a number of years but also a failure to act quickly even when alerts were provided by the police. Whether this was laziness, process, cultural or something else will become clearer when the defence is filed and the case plays out. But for now the statement of claim suggests wide-scale, systemic, cultural and operational dysfunction.
Dacian Gold Limited (DCN); Northern Star Resources Limited (NST); Saracen Mineral Holdings Limited (SAR):
New life is being injected into aging gold projects across Western Australia as the mining sector’s exploration efforts strike success. In what is shaping as a minirenaissance for Australia’s goldminers, new discoveries at pre-loved assets are delivering cost-effective production growth for a string of local producers. Northern Star Resources and Saracen Mineral Holdings both announced significant increases in their gold inventories last week after bumper exploration programs around their operations. Dacian Gold is just eight months away from restarting production at the historic Mt Morgans gold project and MetalsX spin-off West Gold Resources kicked the Fortnum goldmine back into production in June, after buying and refurbishing the long-idled project. And there are plenty of others – Silver Lake Resources is working to add life to its Mount Monger gold camp and Gascoyne Resources is developing Dalgaranga, first discovered in the early 1990s.
John Holland:
Chinese-owned John Holland will get a third asset in its growing investment portfolio after agreeing to take a stake in the planned $200 million Maroochydore city centre. The builder, which in June purchased the 275 George Street office tower and is close to buying its first development site in Macquarie Park – both in Sydney – is in exclusive negotiations with Sunshine Coast council to develop and then own three of five lots in the commercial precinct. ‘‘This is another example of our focus on becoming a fully integrated infrastructure and property company,’’ said Tom Roche, John Holland’s executive general manager for development and investments. ‘‘We are now involved in significant developments in Sydney, Brisbane and Adelaide and focused on a number of other opportunities across the country’’.
Tabcorp Holdings Limited (TAH):
Tabcorp could look to sell or even close its Luxbet wagering business as its $11 billion merger with Tatts Group looms. Luxbet, which made an earnings before interest and tax loss of $13 million, is under review by Tabcorp management who have previously restricted it from taking market share from its existing TAB brand. But it could be attractive to an overseas corporate bookmaker given Luxbet has a group of high-yielding customers connected to the horse racing industry and may fetch Tabcorp $50 million-$100 million. Tabcorp chief executive David Attenborough said Luxbet was a good business but it was effectively on ‘‘starvation rations’’ given it does not compete against TAB.
(Source: AIMS)
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