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Shakey’s cuts capex to P300M, expects recovery in 2 to 3 years

PRESIDENT and CEO Vicente L. Gregorio: “The worst is yet to come.” — SHAKEYSPIZZA.PH

By Denise A. Valdez, Reporter

SHAKEY’S PIZZA Asia Ventures, Inc. (SPAVI) is halving its budget for capital expenditures (capex) this year to P300 million as it delays expansion plans to preserve cash.

“From an original P600-million budget for 2020, we have cut our capex budget in half to roughly P250 million-P300 million, most of which have already been spent in the first few months,” SPAVI President and CEO Vicente L. Gregorio said in an e-mail to BusinessWorld after the company’s stockholders’ meeting on Wednesday.

This allocation is 40%-50% lower than the P500 million the company spent in 2019, which went to investments in new store openings and delivery, and digital platforms.

In the meeting, Mr. Gregorio said the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is expected to put an end to SPAVI’s 16-year streak of recording double-digit growth.

“In spite of only half month’s worth of COVID-19 impact, year-on-year numbers in the first quarter already took a significant hit… The worst is yet to come, with succeeding months feeling the brunt of the pandemic’s effects,” he said.

“More specifically, the second quarter will be our worst quarter, given the full-quarter effect of COVID and quarantine period,” he added.

Mr. Gregorio also said the company is projecting recovery to take two to three more years as the pandemic continues with still no vaccine. “We think 2022 would be a good estimate when it would be more like normal or pre-COVID, but it could extend to 2023.”

SPAVI Chairman Christopher T. Po said the plan is to keep reevaluating the business model to adapt to the current situation. “So far the recovery of our business is roughly around 55% of pre-COVID levels… We are doing many things to try and make sure that when we come out of the crisis, we’ll be in a good position to really start growing again.”

SPAVI’s earnings in the first quarter fell 35% to P114 million due to the temporary closure of 91% of its stores as of end-March. Overseas, SPAVI had already closed two of its four stores in the Middle East and is currently contemplating whether to shut it down for good.

The company was originally planning to open 38 new stores this year, but this plan is put on hold due to the economic uncertainties.

After temporarily closing 91% of its store network in March, leaving it with 24 operational stores out of 280, SPAVI has already reopened 267 stores as of end-June, or 95% of its network.

Considering the impact so far, Mr. Gregorio said SPAVI is planning to rationalize its operations to address changing consumer behavior.

“The pivot would be more towards smaller, more delivery-focused stores rather than the big boxes,” Mr. Gregorio said. He added the company wants to leverage digital platforms, which include the Shakey’s mobile application and presence in food delivery channels.

At the start of the lockdown, SPAVI had P1 billion in cash and about P5 billion in unused credit lines for emergency. It also has no maturing loans this year.

Mr. Gregorio said the priority for now is cash preservation and cash flow, and he expects to achieve cash breakeven by the second half of 2020.

“We will remain on this cash conservation mode as we weather through this crisis, suspending all non-essential expenses without putting the long-term health of our organization and brand at risk,” he said.

“This translates to a more conservative store renovation plan, temporary suspension of new store openings, agreements with partner lessors for rent waivers, coordination with suppliers for discounts and extended payment terms, and accelerated efficiency programs at both store and head office level,” he added.

SPAVI shares at the stock exchange slid two centavos or 0.33% to close at P6.10 each on Wednesday.

The en-primeur conundrum

YANN SCHYLER of Shroder and Schyler, and Chateau Kirwan

Normally during early part of Spring, between late March to first week of April, Bordeaux is bustling with thousands of wine professionals from all over the world, including wine critics, importers, sommeliers, and restaurateurs, in anticipation of the en-primeur of the previous vintage — but not this year! The COVID-19 pandemic has changed this Bordeaux tradition, perhaps forever. It is quite interesting to note that prior to the pandemic, the 2019 vintage had already been much talked about. It is, after all, coming after a great 2018 vintage. And as a shadow vintage (one that comes after a spectacular vintage), the vintage can never be all that bad — however, 2019 proved to be even better than expected. Thus, a huge dilemma. The 2019 vintage should be fetching similar prices as the previous 2018 vintage, but the menacing effect of COVID-19 caused the world economy to go into recession mode. With this in consideration, the 2019 en-primeur will go down perhaps in recent history as one of the biggest bargains of all time.

THE EN-PRIMEUR PRACTICE
En-primeur, which literally means “in first,” is the practice of purchasing a wine in advance of its commercial release. It is also known as “wine futures” and is exactly the same in principle with investing in commodity futures and hedging on price movements of assets. In this case, it involves wines normally from the most renowned chateaux in Bordeaux. The concept is quite simple and practical. The buyers want to secure the wines early (18 months ahead of release), hoping that prices will rise once the wines are bottled and released, while the chateaux get to improve their cash flow and financial position because of the advance payment, with no worries about selling the bulk of their wines when the vintage is ready. En-primeur has always worked for the top Grand Crus, but it is certainly not foolproof, as proven by the overzealous prices of 2009 and 2010 vintages that brought losses to many buyers — and these were in fact two incredible vintages.

So, with the 2019 en-primeur, the chateaux have been more cautious on their asking prices. Like when buying commodity futures or other financial instruments where you need to use brokers, when buying on en-primeur, you need negociants.

While en-primeur is a tradition, some chateaux, notably first-growth Chateau Latour, abandoned selling en-primeur. Since 2012, this renowned chateau stopped participating in the practice because it believes that this system encourages wines to end up in consumer’s hands too early, even though these wines are meant for long-keeping before consumption. And then there are Bordeaux wineries that have left the négociant system altogether, like JCP Maltus (of the Le Dome Saint-Emilion fame) — though they are very much in the minority.

THE BEST RESOURCE PERSON
In trying to understand the state of the 2019 en-primeur, I am very fortunate to know Monsieur Yann Schyler, whom I considered a friend, both in the wine industry and personally. Yann Schyler is the 8th generation head of the almost three-century old négociant Schroder and Schyler (since 1739), the owning company of third-growth Grand Cru Chateau Kirwan from Margaux.

In an interview with Yann during his Manila visit, Yann explained how négociants are so important for the chateaux, especially historically. The négociants were the ones who actually did the bottling of the wines, from the 17th century until the early part of the 20th century. The chateaux or vineyard owners’ role then was simply to make wine and put the wine in barrels. The négociants would then come in and bottle the wines in their facilities, label them and also do the selling and distribution. In fact, last year, when I visited the Schroder and Schyler office in Bordeaux, I actually saw century-old bottles of Grand Cru icons like Chateau Mouton-Rothschild, Chateau Cos d’Estournel, and others all with the Schroder and Schyler label. Yann is therefore the best resource person to analyze what happened to this year’s version of en-primeur amidst the current COVID-19 predicament.

Aside from being a négociant, Yann and Chateau Kirwan are also active members of the Union des Grands Crus de Bordeaux (UGC), an organization composed of over 130 top estate members from the best of Bordeaux. The UGC has been credited for putting the en-primeur festivity into the Bordeaux calendar, and the rest of the wine world took notice since then.

BOTH VOLUME AND PRICES DOWN
France had to shut down on March 17 because of the growing number of COVID-19 infections,

and the en-primeur festivities came to a halt. So unlike in the past when wine critics would be all over Bordeaux, visiting several chateaux, swirling wine glasses, whiffing, quaffing, and spitting barrel samples to rate the wines — this is not the case for the 2019 vintage given the travel restrictions and all the precautionary measures taken. Instead, reluctantly, even some of the most prestigious chateaux would send barrel samples to the most important wine critics, and use Zoom, Whatsapp, or other online formats to hold Q&A sessions between wine critics and the chateau owner or winemaker and do virtual taste-offs.

But in general, despite a real good consensus that this is a quality vintage year that Bordeaux could have capitalized on, almost all chateaux decided to release volumes 20-30% below normal en-primeur quantities, and at prices closer to 2014-2015 levels. And, as Yann mentioned, even at their own estate Chateau Kirwan, they are pricing their en-primeur at a bargain 2014 level. This means something like a 30% drop in price. Even first-growth Mouton-Rothschild did the unthinkable, offering its wine at 30% off from its 2018 vintage — and so did Saint-Emilion royalty premier cru Cheval Blanc.

It has had a domino effect that because of the slashed quantity offered, the 2019 en-primeur ended short and sweet. Yann reminded me that there is really no official start and end to en-premier as all chateaux are free to do what they want. But this year, the en-primeur came six weeks late, and most started early June and ended unofficially on June 23.

COVID-19 has been a humbling experience for even the biggest names in Bordeaux, and the 2019 vintage situation may be the reset button needed in the new normal, where life, and being alive take precedence over some of the best luxuries in life. I am just happy drinking my old Grand Cru wines knowing that at this point, my enjoyment far exceeds any profits I will derive from engaging in “wine futures.”

The author is a member of the UK-based Circle of Wine Writers (CWW). For comments, inquiries, wine event coverage, wine consultancy, and other wine related concerns, e-mail the author at protegeinc@yahoo.com or via Twitter at www.twitter.com/sherwinlao.

Eagle Cement targets completion of Bulacan expansion by yearend

EAGLE CEMENT Chief Finance Officer Monica L. Ang says the company is reducing its capital spending this year. — EAGLECEMENT.COM.PH

By Denise A. Valdez, Reporter

EAGLE Cement Corp. is targeting to finish its new plant in Bulacan before the year ends to increase its capacity for cement manufacturing.

During the company’s annual stockholders’ meeting on Wednesday, Eagle Cement President and CEO John Paul L. Ang said the company’s Bulacan expansion is under way.

This involves the construction of a new cement mill, which will give Eagle Cement an additional capacity of producing 2 million metric tons of cement per annum.

“This plant was supposed to have been turned over and commissioned this second quarter of this year. But because of the pandemic, management is committing to deliver this plant by end quarter of this year,” Mr. Ang said.

The company’s cement plant in Bulacan currently consists of three production lines that have a combined capacity of producing about 7.1 million metric tons or 180 million bags per annum.

Eagle Cement also has a grinding and packaging facility in Bataan that has a capacity of processing 12 million cement bags per annum.

During the meeting, Eagle Cement Chief Finance Officer Monica L. Ang said the company is reducing its budget for capital expenditures (capex) this year, but did not specify the figures.

“For 2020, we are revising our capex and operating expense budgets by trimming non-critical projects and activities. However, our expansion-related capex will continue,” she said.

The company’s earnings in the first quarter declined 25% to P1.2 billion due to a slowdown in construction activity when a lockdown was implemented since mid-March.

Meanwhile, Eagle Cement Chairman Ramon S. Ang said the company will be providing the needs for the construction of San Miguel Corp. (SMC)’s airport project in Bulacan.

“Eagle Cement… is very near our Bulacan airport. So definitely it’s an advantage to buy from Eagle Cement all the cement requirements for the airport and all the building facilities,” he said during the stockholders’ meeting.

He is referring to the P734-billion international airport project of SMC subsidiary San Miguel Holdings Corp., which involves the construction of four parallel runways, eight taxiways and three passenger terminal buildings on a 2,400-hectare space in Bulacan.

Shares in Eagle Cement at the stock exchange ended flat on Wednesday at P9.80 apiece.

Learn about banana catsup through a museum’s digital tour

THE Catsup Museum, an interactive educational museum created to “immortalize the story of banana catsup,” has gone digital as it now offers virtual tours for children for free.

Established in 2017 by food company NutriAsia in partnership with the Mind Museum, the Catsup Museum is located at the company’s Cabuyao plant in Laguna. The museum features a hall dedicated to the origins of the banana plant and the subsequent creation of banana catsup in the Philippines by food technologist, chemist, and war heroine Maria Ylagan Orosa after a tomato shortage during the Second World War.

The virtual tour will include all of the museum’s halls, including the Manufacturing Hall which features factories and equipment used by NutriAsia to create its banana catsup brands: UFC, Papa, Jufran, and Mafran.

The tour has in-depth commentary and mini-quizzes per area. The Catsup Museum also released an interactive module called Banana 101 where children can do a series of entertaining activities that “will teach them everything about the banana, from its history and life cycle, to how they are grown and processed into the food they eat,” according to a company release.

NutriAsia will soon be releasing other educational materials via its brands Locally and Papa.

The Catsup Museum virtual tour can be accessed using Android phones and laptops via https://youtu.be/i0wOEsFFXMY while those with iPhones can access the virtual tour via the Catsup Museum website at https://nutriasia.com/catsup-museum/. More information can be found on the Catsup Museum website. — ZBC

SM Investments plans P30-billion bond program

The initial issuance of the bonds is up to P15 billion. — SMINVESTMENTS.COM

SM INVESTMENTS CORP. (SMIC) is applying for a debt securities program with an aggregate amount of P30 billion with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

In a disclosure to the exchange on Wednesday, the Sy-led conglomerate said it had filed with the corporate regulator its registration statement for a P30-billion bond program under a shelf registration of three years.

It plans an initial issuance of the bonds of up to P15 billion, of which P5 billion will be the oversubscription option.

It said the initial tranche of the bonds had been rated PRS Aaa by local debt watcher Philippine Ratings Services Corp. (PhilRatings), which is the highest credit rating it gives to corporate bonds.

With this rating, the obligations are considered to be of the highest quality with minimal credit risk, and SMIC is deemed to have an “extremely strong” capacity to meet its financial commitment.

The company did not specify on Wednesday the purpose for the proceeds of the debt securities program.

During the first quarter, SMIC’s earnings fell 16% to P9 billion due to declines in its retail, property and banking segments with the imposition of a strict lockdown in mid-March. It is allocating P94 billion-P98 billion for capital expenditures this year.

As of end-March, the company’s net debt stood at P318.6 billion, with net debt-to-equity ratio at 49:51. It has bonds maturing in May 2021, July 2022, December 2023, May 2024 and June 2024.

The listed property arm of SMIC, SM Prime Holdings, Inc., said in June it was allocating P100 million to enhance its e-commerce channels as part of the so-called “new normal.” This will help the company adapt to limited mall operations due to the coronavirus disease 2019 outbreak.

Shares in SMIC at the stock exchange dropped P24 or 2.57% to P911 each on Wednesday. — Denise A. Valdez

Diageo to launch Johnnie Walker whisky in paper bottles in 2021

JOHNNIE WALKER scotch whisky will be available in plastic-free bottles from early 2021, Diageo Plc said on Monday, as the world’s biggest spirits maker ramps up efforts to tackle plastic waste.

The new bottle, developed in partnership with venture management company Pilot Lite, will be made from wood pulp that meets food grade standards and is fully recyclable, the Guinness and Tanqueray Gin maker said.

Diageo and Pilot Lite have launched a sustainable packaging company called Pulpex Ltd. to develop the paper bottle and collaborate on research and development.

Pulpex will also create branded paper-bottles in non-competing categories for companies including Lipton team maker Unilever Plc and soda maker PepsiCo, which are also expected to launch next year.

Consumer product companies have come under increased scrutiny for the amount of plastic they use in packaging food and other household items. In Europe, for example, 8.2 million tons of plastic were used to package food and drink in 2018, according to ING analysts.

Diageo uses less than 5% of plastic in its total packaging, but along with Unilever and PepsiCo, has set targets to reduce and recycle plastic in their packaging as part of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals program by 2025. — Reuters

Online accounts seen lifting stock market participation

ONLINE INVESTORS continue to lift participation in the local bourse in 2019, and more of these are expected to come on board this year, the Philippine Stock Exchange, Inc. (PSE) said.

In its Stock Market Investor Profile report released Wednesday, the bourse operator said the total number of stock market accounts grew 12.7% to 1.23 million last year, which it attributed to the rise in online accounts.

Online accounts expanded by 25% to 782,118, making up 63.7% of total stock market investors. The remaining 36.3% are accounts by traditional stock brokerage firms.

“Online accounts have been the reason for the steady rise in total stock market accounts in the last 10 years,” PSE President and CEO Ramon S. Monzon said in a statement.

“The shift in trading format preference of investors have encouraged stockbrokerage companies that cater to retail investors to start offering online trading services to their clients,” he added.

This trend is expected to benefit the market this year, as Mr. Monzon said investors are afforded an easier process to participate in the market during the lockdown. Online stock brokerage firms are now validating client applications through videoconferencing.

“[W]e expect the online investor population to increase in 2020 mainly due to investors opening online accounts during the community quarantine period and as investors participate in initial public offerings through PSE Electronic Allocation System,” he said.

These benefits, along with the decline in market prices due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, are expected to help drive increased participation in the bourse, including from those in areas outside Metro Manila.

“With the stock market still trading way below pre-COVID levels, we may see new investors who are looking for good buying opportunities open trading accounts. This may also help prop up our investor count for the year,” Mr. Monzon said.

The PSE index closed at 6,016.51 on Wednesday, down 156.30 points or 2.53% from the day prior. Its 52-week high is 8,311.92.

Based on the report, local participants made up 98.4% or 1.21 million of the 1.23 million stock market accounts last year, while 1.6% or 19,558 were foreign accounts.

Most of the accounts were retail investors, which took up 97.7% of the pie, while 2.3% were institutional accounts.

In terms of age group, most investors belonged to ages 30 to 44, accounting for 45.5% of the total. Those aged 18 to 20 made up 21.7%, those aged 45 to 59 accounted for 20.3%, and those aged 60 and above made up 12.5%.

Most of the investors are employed locally, making up 80.1% of the total. The rest are either self-employed (7.7%), retired (5.3%), unemployed (4.8%), studying (1.2%) or working abroad (1%).

About 75.7% of investors are living in Metro Manila, 13.9% are from other areas in Luzon, 5.3% are from Visayas, 3.3% are from Mindanao and 1.8% are from overseas locations.

In terms of foreign nationals, the top investors in the local bourse are Chinese (20.7%), Americans (13.8%), Japanese (12.2%) and those from ASEAN member countries (11.8%). — Denise A. Valdez

UK to purge Huawei from 5G by end of 2027, siding with Trump

LONDON — Prime Minister Boris Johnson ordered Huawei equipment to be purged completely from Britain’s 5G network by the end of 2027, risking the ire of China by signalling that the world’s biggest telecoms equipment maker is not welcome in the West.

As Britain prepares to cast off from the European Union (EU), fears over the security of Huawei have forced Johnson to choose between global rivals the US and China.

He had been under intense pressure from US President Donald Trump, while Beijing had warned London, which has sought to court China in recent years, that billions in investment would be at risk if it sided with Washington.

Reversing a January decision to allow Huawei to supply up to 35% of the non-core 5G network, Mr. Johnson banned British telecoms operators from buying any 5G equipment from Huawei by year-end and gave them seven years to rip out existing gear.

“This has not been an easy decision, but it is the right one for the UK telecoms networks, for our national security and our economy, both now and indeed in the long run,” digital minister Oliver Dowden told parliament.

“By the time of the next election, we will have implemented in law an irreversible path for the complete removal of Huawei equipment from our 5G networks.”

The reason given for the about-turn was the impact of new US sanctions on chip technology, which Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre, part of the GCHQ eavesdropping agency, had told ministers meant Huawei was not a reliable supplier.

White House National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien said Britain’s action reflected a growing consensus that Huawei and other untrusted vendors posed a threat to national security because they remained “beholden to the Chinese Communist Party.”

According to a law introduced in 2017 under Chinese President Xi Jinping, Chinese companies have an obligation to support and cooperate in China’s national intelligence work.

China’s ambassador to Britain Liu Xiaoming called the decision “disappointing and wrong.”

“It has become questionable whether the UK can provide an open, fair and non-discriminatory business environment for companies from other countries,” he said.

The ban will delay the roll-out of 5G — cast as the nervous system of the future economy — by two to three years, and add costs of up to 2 billion pounds ($2.5 billion).

The Dec. 31, 2027 deadline was not as bad as British telecoms operators such as BT, Vodafone and Three had feared. They were concerned that they would be forced to spend billions of pounds to rip out Huawei equipment much faster.

BT said 500 million pounds already earmarked to comply with the earlier cap would cover its costs. Its shares closed up 4%.

5G PROXY WAR?
Hanging up on Huawei marks an end to what former Prime Minister David Cameron cast as a “golden era” of ties which saw Britain pushed as Europe’s top destination for Chinese capital.

But London has been dismayed by a crackdown in Hong Kong and the perception China did not tell the whole truth over the novel coronavirus outbreak.

Huawei said the decision was more about US trade policy than security. “It threatens to move Britain into the digital slow lane, push up bills and deepen the digital divide,” a spokesman said.

In what some have compared to the Cold War antagonism with the Soviet Union, the United States is worried that 5G dominance could lead towards Chinese technological supremacy.

After Australia first raised alarms about the risk of 5G being hijacked by a hostile state, worries in the West about Huawei have mounted.

The United States calls the company an agent of the Chinese Communist state — a view widely supported in Mr. Johnson’s Conservative Party. Huawei denies it spies for China and says the United States wants to frustrate its growth because no US company offers the same technology at a competitive price.

In a tweet, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the British decision “advances Transatlantic security in the #5G era while protecting citizens’ privacy, national security, and free-world values.”

HUAWEI ALTERNATIVE?
British ministers say the rise to global dominance of Huawei, founded in 1987 by a former People’s Liberation Army engineer, has caught the West off-guard.

Mr. Dowden said Britain was working with its allies to foster stronger rivals to Huawei, naming firms from Finland, Sweden, South Korea and Japan.

“The first thing we need to do is ensure that we protect the other two vendors in this market, so Nokia, and Ericsson,” Mr. Dowden said. “Secondly we need to get new suppliers in, that starts with Samsung, and it starts with NEC.”

Nokia and Ericsson said they stood ready to replace Huawei gear.

By allowing Huawei’s equipment to remain in the 5G network until end-2027 and in older mobile networks, Mr. Johnson stopped short of demands from some lawmakers for a ban in four years.

Chinese imports to Britain doubled in the 15 years to 2018, to about 9% of all goods imported, worth 43 billion pounds. — Reuters

More gin Ma’am? British royals offer palace tipple for sale

LONDON — Britain’s royal family has begun selling dry gin infused with lemon, verbena, hawthorn berries and mulberry leaves collected from Queen Elizabeth II’s gardens at Buckingham Palace.

The “small batch” gin is on offer for 40 pounds ($50) a bottle from the Royal Collection Shop, but only for delivery in the United Kingdom.

“Hand-picked botanicals from Buckingham Palace’s exceptional garden have been combined to create this unique and flavorsome gin,” the bottle says beside a picture of the queen’s London palace.

“For the perfect summer thirst-quencher, the recommended serving method is to pour a measure of the gin into an ice-filled short tumbler before topping up with tonic and garnishing with a slice of lemon,” the site says.

Elizabeth’s favorite tipple is a gin and Dubonnet, though she drinks in moderation. — Reuters

PXP Energy stands by to resume drilling of Recto Bank oil block

PXP Energy Corp. has set its eyes on exploring an oil block within the disputed West Philippine Sea that is estimated to bear as much as 3 trillion cubic feet of gas resources.

Led by businessman Manuel V. Pangilinan, the listed gas and oil firm operates the area through Forum (GSEC 101) Ltd., a unit of Forum Energy Ltd., which in turn is one of its subsidiaries.

The block is located within the Department of Energy’s (DoE) Service Contract (SC) 37 in Recto Bank. Exploration activities in the area are currently suspended upon declaration of a force majeure.

Once the moratorium in site activities within the area is lifted, the company will immediately conduct a 2,600-square-kilometer (sq km) 3D-seismic survey “to further evaluate the [oil] prospect which could eventually lead to the drilling of an exploratory well,” according to PXP Energy President and Director Daniel P. Carlos during the company’s stockholders’ meeting, Wednesday.

The future exploration site is located 70 km northeast of the Sampaguita gas field.

Last year, the company crafted a drilling program for the 8,800-sq-km Sampaguita gas field in west Palawan to determine possible oil wells. “These wells will be drilled once we get the permission from the government to resume exploration activities on the block,” Mr. Carlos said.

Meanwhile, a block in the Galoc oil field under SC 14 C-1 in northwest Palawan, which the company holds a minority stake via Forum Energy Philippines Corp., is set to suspend operations starting Sept. 24. Continued operations in the block have become “unviable” with the slump in oil prices since March, it said.

“We remain optimistic though that the field will be operational again [in] the near future once the price of crude rebounds to profitable levels,” Mr. Carlos commented.

In the first three months of 2020, PXP Energy shed P40.4 million, compared with the P7 million it earned in the same months in 2019, as oil revenues dropped with the decline in output of its wells.

Oil revenues plunged by 79% to P6.1 million in the first quarter from P29.7 million in the same period a year ago. The company attributed the drop to the 38% cut in production and 60% decrease in crude oil price in the Galoc field.

Shares in PXP Energy fell by 7.29% to close at P5.72 apiece on Wednesday. — Adam J. Ang

Lenovo launches 64-core PRO tower workstation

By Zsarlene B. Chua, Senior Reporter

LENOVO has launched worldwide the newest addition to its tower workstation portfolio, the ThinkStation P620, which uses AMD’s newest Ryzen Threadripper PRO processor, as the company remains bullish about its workstation solutions despite seeing a shift towards mobile devices for remote setups amid the ongoing pandemic.

“On the mobile side, we have definitely seen an uptick…for a lot of remote workers but I don’t think we’ve seen as much of a drop on the desktop side as we expected,” Jenni Ramsay, worldwide desktop workstation product manager, said in a digital press conference on July 7.

While she did not disclose how much of the current demand has shifted towards mobile devices such as laptops, she said 2020 is an “interesting year.”

“I think that we may see some, not necessarily a decline in business but maybe a shift a little bit to the mobile side,” she explained before adding that while many industries have shifted to work-from-home or other remote setups, many industries such as those in the media, architecture, and engineering, would still prefer tower workstations and desktops.

“There are still going to be a lot of workflows that require a desktop…we’ve already talked to some customers that just now that they will have end users that are going to continue to have desktop workstations at their houses. That is definitely what we see going forward. I think that we will still see the need for desktop workstations, even in the current environment,” Ms. Ramsay said.

The newest addition to the ThinkStation family will be operating using the new Ryzen processor, a 64-core processor promising reduced render times and achieving “seamless 8K streaming in real-time” in one single-socket platform, according to a press release.

Ms. Ramsay noted the P620 will be placed in the mid-range category with the higher-end P720 and P920, which currently retail at $2,703.35 and $3,028.35, respectively. No pricing details for the P620 have been announced as of this writing.

“[The P620 is] going to be something that can really fit in a lot of different areas…instead of having to buy something on the higher end like the [P720 or the P920]… I think this platform is going to let us continue to grow even in a difficult year for everyone,” she said.

Aside from having 64 cores, the P620 will have support for up to two NVIDIA Quadro RTX 8000 or four RTX 4000 graphics cards, up to 1TB of memory and 20TB of storage, 10GB of built-in Ethernet, and a custom-designed heat sink. It is also a PCIe 4.0 workstation.

The Lenovo ThinkStation P620 will be available starting September.

Shock and ale: Electric fence keeps drinkers back from the bar in English pub

ST. JUST, England — Man walks into a bar, and into an electric fence. It’s not a joke, but rather the novel measure taken by one Cornish pub to enforce distance rules to stop the spread of COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019).

The landlord of Star Inn in the village of St. Just, south-west England, has installed an electric fence in front of the bar to make sure that social distancing guidelines are followed.

“If I had put a little bit of rope there I don’t think anybody would have taken this much attention as they have to an electric fence,” pub landlord Jonny McFadden said.

Pubs in England were allowed to reopen on July 4, but must implement social distancing measures. That includes minimizing staff contact with customers, and reducing the time pub-goers spend at the bar.

McFadden said the rules represented a big culture change for his pub.

“I run a very small bar. Everybody is accustomed to sitting at the bar, pushing at the bar. They can’t do that now. Things have changed,” he said.

Although the fence is not turned on, McFadden said that the same logic which works in the nearby farms of rural Cornwall works for the local drinkers too.

“As long as there’s a warning sign on an electric fence and you are warned about it, it’s totally legal. And there’s the fear factor — it works,” he said.

“People are like sheep. Sheep keep away, people keep away.” — Reuters

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