|By TAP Staff| Dutch bank ABN Amro said it has paid fines to regulators in the Netherlands and Dubai over “serious shortcomings” in vetting clients and managing risk at its private banking operations. The statement comes a week ahead of the bank’s proposed IPO. The Dubai investigation had put a shadow over the bank, which naturally had a bearing on the forthcoming IPO. ABN said on Wednesday […]
Boston-based enterprise storage provider ClearSky Data said it has raised $27 million in a Series B investment round led by Polaris Partners, along with Akamai Technologies. The money will be used by ClearSky to refine its managed service delivery model for enterprise storage, which the company said combines the performance and availability of primary storage with the economics and scalability of the cloud. ClearSky made a splash […]
|By TAP Staff| Emaar Properties recorded a growth in net profit of 16 per cent for the first nine months (Jan to Sept) 2015 to AED 3.048 billion (US$ 830 million) compared to AED 2.622 billion (US$ 714 million) during the same period in 2014. Revenues for the first nine months of 2015 were AED 9.849 billion (US$ 2.681 billion), a growth of 25 per cent over […]
The world is awash in crude, but big oil companies are lining up to develop new fields in Iran even as they slash spending and abandon exploration elsewhere. One thing explains this paradox: cost. The Middle Eastern country is one of the cheapest places in the world to tap new oil fields and pump from existing wells. The slump in crude prices makes Iran even more attractive […]
|TAP Special by K Raveendran| The UAE healthcare sector was the scene of high drama as the Al Noor Hospitals Group, being pursued by leading sectoral player NMC Group to form the country’s biggest private healthcare provider, apparently broke off and announced it has reached an agreement for a merger with South Africa’s Mediclinic International Ltd. Al Noor will also be renamed Mediclinic International. Al Noor said […]
|By TAP Staff| Etihad Airways and IBM announced a ten-year technology services agreement worth approximately US$700 million. The transformational agreement, one of the most important strategic collaborations by Etihad Airways, will provide access to the latest cloud-based technologies and services for the airline, its group companies and equity partners. Etihad Airways, one of the fastest-growing airlines in the world, carried 14.8 million passengers in 2014, and serves […]
Dubai government-owned Emirates National Oil Co (Enoc) said the company will expand into agricultural commodities to diversify its business and offset past losses from retail fuel sales. Initially it will be wheat and rice, Chief Executive Officer Saif Al Falasi said in an interview in Dubai. The company will give the new business about two years to become profitable, he said. ENOC decided to open the agricultural […]
|By TAP Staff| Dubai Islamic Bank is exploring an entry into India as it seeks to benefit from the funding needs of one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, it was reported. “We as part of our international growth strategy are looking into India as one of the emerging Islamic finance markets,” Chief Executive Officer Adnan Chilwan said in an e-mailed response to questions from Bloomberg News. India […]
|By TAP Staff| Mediclinic International Ltd. is in talks with United Arab Emirates health-care provider Al Noor Hospitals Group Plc about a tie-up that would create the biggest supplier of private care in Dubai and Abu Dhabi with further operations in Europe and Southern Africa. The potential deal between the two hospital owners would involve the issue of new Al Noor shares to Stellenbosch, South Africa-based Mediclinic […]
|By TAP Staff| Dubai Holding Commercial Operations Group (DHCOG) announced a net profit of AED 2.6 billion for the first half of this year ending 30th June 2015, an increase of 24 percent. Full year profits are expected to exceed AED 5.5 billion, the company said. Ahmad Bin Byat, Vice Chairman and Managing Director of Dubai Holding, said Dubai Holding will continue to reinforce its successful strategy […]
MOSCOW — Russia widened its bombings in Syria on Friday, striking Islamic State territory for the first time, but showed no hint of heeding Western demands to avoid attacks on fighters pushing to oust Syria’s weakened, Kremlin-backed president. The Defense Ministry said its warplanes had bombed seven targets in overnight raids including a command post and training camp near Raqqa, the northeast Syrian city that the Islamic […]
Middle East A vehicle at a base controlled by rebel fighters from the Ahrar al-Sham insurgent group that activists said was targeted by Russian airstrikes near Idlib, Syria, on Thursday. By ANNE BARNARD and ANDREW E. KRAMER October 1, 2015 BEIRUT, Lebanon — In a second day of raids in Syria, Russian warplanes carried out a new round of airstrikes on Thursday that once again — contrary to Moscow’s assertions — appeared […]
UNITED NATIONS — Over the last four years, as four million Syrian refugees poured into neighboring countries and slipped inexorably into poverty, António Guterres, the United Nations high commissioner for refugees, said he had pleaded in vain with world leaders to take their plight more seriously. But suddenly, at the United Nations General Assembly this week, leaders of the world’s most powerful countries want to meet with […]
UAE. In many industrial companies, services play virtually no role. Yet the service business is reporting growth rates up to 40 percent faster than sales of new products. What’s more, the gross profit margin of services is on average a good ten percentage points higher. These are the conclusions from international management consultants Bain & Company in their latest study, “Winning in Industrial Services,” in which 45 […]
A Microsoft logo is seen on an office building in New York City, July 28, 2015. The global launch of the Microsoft Windows 10 operating system will take place on July 29. Reuters/Mike Segar Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) joined Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) and Intel Corp (INTC.O) in tweaking the way it reports results, a move that will help the software giant show off its growing cloud and mobile […]
|By TAP Staff| Strong signs of recovery in Dubai’s tourism and hospitality sector are already visible and there are strong bookings from the Russian travel agents and tourists, Marc Bennett, Senior Vice President for International Operations at Dubai Corporation for Tourism and Commerce Marketing, said. Russian tourists, who dominated the Dubai tourism industry landscape over the years, had stopped coming in view of the challenging’ economic times […]
Indonesia is drawing interest from Middle Eastern banks seeking to tap the world’s biggest pool of Shariah-compliant investors as some Islamic lenders wind down or close operations in Malaysia and Singapore. Emirates NBD PJSC wants to invest at least $300 million in a new Shariah lender or acquire a stake in an existing one, Dhani Gunawan Idat at Indonesia’s financial regulator said in a phone interview. That’s […]
SANA, Yemen — Warplanes with the Saudi Arabia-led military coalition bombed a wedding party on Yemen’s Red Sea coast on Monday, killing at least 70 civilians, according to two local officials and a relative of one of the victims. The aerial attack, in Wahija, south of the port city of Mokha, appeared to be among the deadliest involving civilians since the start of Yemen’s war this past […]
AMMAN, Jordan — Mohammad Smarat sat gazing at the few plants sprouting outside the entrance of the white stone hospital here, recalling how he had collapsed in a sea of green fields after getting shot. He had been helping farmers pick tomatoes near his home in Dara’a, Syria, when a stray bullet shattered his left hip joint. Though he had obeyed his father’s orders not to join […]
INTERNATIONAL. Just four per cent of businesses are able to extract the full value from the information they hold, with over a third (36 per cent) lacking the tools and skills they need to do so, according to new research from storage and information management company, Iron Mountain (IRM) and PwC. As a result, 43 per cent of the European and North American companies surveyed obtain little […]
INTERNATIONAL. Gleaming glass skyscrapers, state-of-the-art technology, and wealthy merchant families have replaced the Gulf’s muddy towns and villages populated by traders and pearl fishers that once lacked electricity, running water or modern communications. The region’s modern day projection of a visionary cutting- edge, 21st century urban environment masks however the fact that some things have not changed. Gulf states continue to be ruled by the same families, […]
WASHINGTON — As the war in Iraq deteriorated, a senior American intelligence analyst went public in 2005 and criticized President George W. Bush’s administration for pushing “amateurish and unrealistic” plans for the invasion two years before. Now that same man, Gregory Hooker, is at the center of an insurrection of United States Central Command intelligence analysts over America’s latest war in Iraq, and whether Congress, policy makers […]
DUBAI // A woman who claimed she was tortured and threatened with rape after being mistaken for an Al Qaeda terrorist faces months of uncertainty awaiting the outcome of a legal case against the Kenyan government. Mother of three Kamilya Mohammedi Tuweni, 50, relived her 72-day ordeal this week as she gave testimony via video link from London to the high court in Nairobi. She was too […]
Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank (ADIB) has raised Dh504 million ($137 million) in its rights issue, which was nearly three times oversubscribed with Dh1.46 billion in subscriptions received. The rights issue, the first tradable rights issue for a bank in the UAE, forms part of the comprehensive capital plan to support ADIB’s strong growth plans. Following the close of the subscription period on September 10, all 168 million […]
