COMPANY NEWS IN BRIEF

SAA wants four planesSAA is trying to rebuild its fleet of available planes, but on a timescale and with financial terms that suppliers say are so improbable that the exercise will likely be extremely expensive.The airline issued a request for bids for four Airbus A320-200 passenger planes configured to carry 138 passengers, 24 of them in business class.Ideally it wants to lease those planes for three years, on a "power by the hour" basis, which would mean the craft are fully serviced and maintained, and SAA pays only for the time they spend in the air, but it will also consider paying a monthly fee.What it will absolutely not do is involve the government in the deal."SAA will not consider [proposals] for leased aircraft if any security is required over and above security usually requested and provided in respect of aircraft leases," the state-owned company told potential bidders."In particular, SAA will not consider leases where any shareholder support/guarantee is required."In fact, according to the score sheet for the deal, SAA has a strong preference to pay no deposit at all, taking control of the planes with nothing but a promise to pay later.It also wants the planes "in a short time frame"; the first next month, two more in July, and the last in August. Anything after September, its documentation suggests, will not cut it.-Fin24SAB warns on energy crisis Global beer producer Anheuser-Busch InBev has added to the chorus of businesses lamenting South Africa's energy crisis, warning that the poor state of electricity generation is hitting its ability to produce beer."We cannot talk about a sustainable business environment without addressing the negative impact that electricity and water shortages have on our productivity," said Richard Rivett-Carnac, the South African Breweries CEO, in response to an emailed enquiry."Without water and electricity, we cannot manufacture beer, therefore the increased water outages due to infrastructure challenges and load shedding affect the water supply and production at our breweries."The comments come after AB InBev reported record volumes in SA in its first quarter to end-March, boosted by a 20% jump in sales of Carling Black Label, SA's number one beer.South Africa has been suffering an increasing deficit in power generation capacity since 2007, resulting in electricity rationing that has resulted in businesses and households running without power for up to 12 hours a day at Stage 6 load shedding.-Fin24Adidas sales beat expectationsAdidas said its first-quarter numbers came in better than expected, although sales dipped 1% from a year-ago period, as investors hope for the German sportswear giant to turn its fortunes around.Adidas, which last year ended a lucrative partnership with Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, gave no update on what it plans to do with its stock of unsold Yeezy shoes.The Yeezy crisis hit sales in the reported quarter by around 400 million euros (US$441.56 million), Adidas said, mainly affecting revenue across the North America, Greater China and EMEA regions."The decline in Lifestyle and the loss of Yeezy are of course hurting us," said CEO Bjorn Gulden.Still, Gulden was optimistic about the rest of the year. The Terrace shoe style is doing well in all markets, he added, and Adidas has started to make more Samba, Gazelle, and Campus shoes.Sales came in at 5.274 billion euros, down from 5.302 billion euros seen in the first quarter of 2022. Analysts expected sales to fall by 4%, according to consensus estimates compiled by the company.-Fin24Rising iPhone sales help Apple beat forecastsApple said iPhone sales and money made from services powered quarterly earnings that beat forecasts, despite inflation pressure and the slowing global economy.The iPhone maker's bottom line capped a successful earnings season for US tech giants, with Meta, Google and Amazon also beating expectations after suffering a painful spell of lower sales and profits.The smartphone titan reported profit of US$24 billion on revenue of US$94.8 billion in the first three months of this year.The overall revenues for the period were lower than a year before, though this was expected and Apple's shares were up about one percent in after-market trading."We are pleased to report an all-time record in services and a March quarter record for iPhone despite the challenging macroeconomic environment," Apple chief executive Tim Cook said in an earnings release.Sales of iPhones were up two percent and tallied US$51.3 billion in the quarter, according to earnings figures.-Fin24MTN Rwanda reports profit slumpMTN Rwanda said its profits fell almost a third in its first quarter to end March, with the company hit by higher interest rates and losing market share, even though it grew subscribers 7%.Mobile subscribers increased by 7% year-on-year to 6.9 million and Mobile Money (MoMo) subscribers grew almost 18%, but the company said increased competition in the industry saw its market share fall 0.5% to just over 64%. Data revenue grew more than a fifth however, while fintech revenue was up by more than a third.Profit fell 31% to 2.8 billion Rwandan Francs (about R46 million) with business hit by a surge in interest rates, which pushed up finance costs almost 42%.Rwanda's central bank has set a target of consumer inflation of between 2% and 8% for 2023, but inflation was at over 19% in March.-Fin24Shopify to cut 20% of workforceOttawa-based Shopify announced it was cutting its global workforce by 20 percent and offloading its logistics business to Flexport in order to focus on its core e-commerce activities.In a memo to its more than 11 000 staff, company founder and chief executive Tobias Lutke said: "We are changing the shape of Shopify significantly today to pay unshared attention to our mission.""This is a consequential and hard week," he said. "It's the right thing for Shopify, but it negatively affects many team members who we admire and love working with."Lutke, who launched the online platform in 2006, said the company should focus on its core mission of e-commerce.He said that the company's "side quest" of building out logistics and order fulfillment operations over several years to rival such e-commerce giants as Amazon and Walmart had become a distraction.Shopify's plunge into transporting and warehousing, and cross docking its e-commerce clients' goods in recent years mirrored similar moves by rivals. All of them expected that a boom in demand through the pandemic would last.-Fin24

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