Lenovo mulls expansion

Lenovo Group Ltd, the world's fourth-largest computer maker, is considering acquisitions to expand outside Asia into markets including the Middle East and Turkey, an executive said yesterday.

Lenovo, which bought IBM's loss-making PC arm in 2005, wants to expand into countries where computer use is less widespread as a slowdown in the US economy threatens to curb spending on technology products.

"We can make big acquisitions, we can do it by cash, selling shares or notes," Senior Vice-President and Chief Financial Officer Wong Wai Ming told reporters on the sidelines of a conference in Dubai, the commercial hub of the Arab world.

China Gas Oman JV

China Gas Holdings said yesterday its joint venture (JV) partner Oman Oil Co will begin supplying liquefied natural gas (LNG) to China from the second half of this year.

"We have a JV with Oman Oil Co. Different partners have different roles. We will be marketing the gas and Oman Oil Co will be responsible for supplying LNG and LPG," Managing Director Liu Minghui said.

He did not say how much LNG Oman Oil will supply.

SMIC's new investor

Shares in chipmaker SMIC ended 42 percent higher yesterday amid persistent talk that the struggling firm is close to selling a stake to a major investor to tide it through an expected downturn in the global chip sector.

SMIC said in a statement late yesterday that it knows of no reason for the share price surge and was in no discloseable talks related to acquisitions.

In March, the mainland's largest contract manufacturer of semiconductors, which posted losses in 2006 and 2007, said it was in advanced talks to sell shares to a strategic investor.

Brokers said there was talk in the market that the chipmaker was about to finalize a deal to sell stock to strategic investors.

SMIC's shares closed up 42.27 percent at HK$0.69.

$96m stake sell-off

An institutional investor of Cosco Pacific Ltd was selling $96 million worth of shares at a 5.2 to 6 percent discount to the firm's Tuesday closing price, according to a term sheet obtained by Reuters.

The unidentified holder was selling 56.69 million shares at HK$13.08 to HK$13.2 each, in a deal handled by Citigroup.

The company's shares closed at HK$13.92 yesterday, up 1.02 percent, outperforming a 0.38 percent gain in the Hang Seng Index.

Shenhua sales, output rise

Shenhua Energy, the world's most valuable coal miner, produced and sold about a fifth more of the fuel in the first quarter of 2008 to feed the world's largest market for the resource.

Shenhua cranked out 44.6 million tons of coal, versus 37.3 million tons a year ago. Sales rose 22 percent to 56.7 million tons. Of that total, it exported 4.6 million tons, down 22 percent from a year ago.

Huaneng's coal supply

The parent firm of Huaneng Power International Inc plans to produce 45 million tons of coal a year by 2010 as China's largest electricity producer tries to mitigate the impact of sky-high prices for the hydrocarbon.

Huaneng Group, which consumed 137 million tons of coal last year, with much of that bought in the market, will need 200 million tons of coal by 2010, Assistant President Hu Shihai said yesterday.

But Hu said the company hoped to supply 45 million tons, or around 20 percent of that total, by itself.

To help safeguard cheaper supply for its electricity generators, the firm plans to invest "quite a large amount" to buy mining assets in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Shanxi and some western regions, the executive said without elaborating.