KUALA LUMPUR: Oil and gas support services provider Steel Hawk Bhd aims to raise RM3.2mil from a listing on the LEAP Market of Bursa Malaysia to fund its expansion plans. Steel Hawk, via its subsidiary Steel Hawk Engineering Sdn Bhd, began in October 2012 as a provider of engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning services for chemical injection skids at offshore exploration and production platforms. Following an expansion, the group is now primarily involved in oil and gas support services, which include EPCC services, facilities improvement and maintenance and the maintenance and supply of oilfield equipment. "On behalf of Steel Hawk’s board of directors, I would like to express my profound commitment to our clients, advisors, various stakeholders and our talented team to take Steel Hawk to the next level. Article type: metered User Type: anonymous web User Status: Campaign ID: 46 Cxense type: free User access status: 3Join our Telegram channel to get our Evening Alerts and breaking news highlights

I was just becoming an "infectious disease" person. The fact that "Contagion" predicted Covid-19 so eerily with its fictitious MEV-1 pandemic does not serve as credit to conspiracy theorists. Instead, it was a credit to the infectious disease people who were consulted. Already we see the trend of disparity in access to Covid-19 vaccines. We may not get the neat happy ending that the infectious disease people dreamed of for "Contagion".

PYONGYANG (Bloomberg): North Korean leader Kim Jong-un held centre stage at a military parade, showing off to a national television audience a thinner frame, a trace of a tan and a haircut reminiscent of his grandfather -- state founder Kim Il-sung. The North Korean leader may have dropped at least 20 kilograms (44 pounds) over the past several months, according to a South Korean lawmaker briefed by a spy agency official in July. At the parade, Kim also appeared to paying homage to his grandfather with a haircut similar to one sported by Kim Il-sung about 70 years ago. In June, state media cited a citizen as saying North Koreans broke down in tears over seeing a dramatically thinner Kim Jong-un. Kim has been looking to rally support as North Korea is facing one of its worst food shortage in years.

NEW DELHI (Xinhua): At the 13th BRICS summit held virtually on Thursday (Sept 9), the five nations - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa acknowledged that in an interconnected and globalised world, no one was safe until everyone was safe. At the summit, the five emerging economies recognised that the production of Covid-19 vaccines had provided the greatest hope to conquer the pandemic and that Covid-19 extensive immunisation was a global public good. "We regret the glaring inequity in access to vaccines, diagnostics and therapeutics, especially for the world's poorest and most vulnerable populations," said the "New Delhi Declaration" issued at the conclusion of the BRICS summit. They also welcomed the contribution made by BRICS countries in providing over a billion Coivd-19 vaccine doses, including grants and donations, bilaterally, to international organisations and to the Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access (Covax) facility. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in his address that BRICS made many achievements in the last one and a half decades.

AUSTIN (Sept 10): A decision by Samsung Electronics on the location of its new $17 billion U.S. chip plant was imminent, the judge for Texas' Williamson County, which is in the running for the new factory, said on Thursday. My experience with Samsung is that they move nimbly and swiftly," County Judge Bill Gravell said during an interview with Reuters. Samsung has said it would start construction on the new 6-million-square-foot (557,418-sq-meter) plant in January, with production up and running by the end of 2024. Gravell is the county's top elected official and has been in charge of the local negotiations with Samsung. County officials in January presented Samsung executives with custom-printed jerseys at the local baseball stadium and finished a splashy video presentation with fireworks, the judge said.

The executive branch is on strong footing to require staff vaccinations, particularly since the Pfizer Inc.-BioNTech vaccine received full approval, rather than just emergency authorization, according to Glenn Cohen, a law professor at Harvard Law School. Biden’s order for federal workers goes further than requirements he announced on July 29, which included an option for on-site federal contractors to choose testing instead of vaccination. Psaki said it would take effect when Biden signs it, with a “ramp up” period of about 75 days. The executive order for federal workers, also issued Thursday, called for guidance to be released within 7 days. But Biden pointed out that leaves a quarter of eligible Americans -- some 80 million people, he said -- without a shot.

“We encourage the government to explore the practices of countries adopting a ‘mental health first’ perspective on suicide and suicide prevention,” said the group, renewing its call to decriminalise attempted suicide in conjunction with World Suicide Prevention Day today. In Singapore, deaths by suicide went down by 45.4%, from 304 cases between January and September in 2019 to 166 in the same period last year, according to reports. The law to criminalise attempted suicide was kept after most people at that time suggested that the status quo remained. However, the group said the intent behind the present law – which is to deter suicide – is no longer being served. Those suffering from problems can reach out to the Mental Health Psychosocial Support Service at 03-2935 9935 or 014-322 3392; Talian Kasih at 15999 or 019-261 5999; and Befrienders Kuala Lumpur at 03-7627 2929 or email sam@befrienders.org.my.

(Reuters) - Alphabet Inc's Google aims to replenish 20% more water than its offices and data centers use by 2030, the company said on Thursday, addressing concerns about water-guzzling tech facilities amid record droughts. "We are pledging to a water stewardship target to replenish more water than we consume by 2030 and support water security in communities where we operate," Google Chief Sustainability Officer Kate Brandt wrote in a blog post https://blog.google/outreach-initiatives/sustainability/replenishing-water. "This means Google will replenish 120% of the water we consume, on average, across our offices and data centers." Google uses water to cool its data centers' stacks of computers that store and process search queries, YouTube videos and other data. Microsoft Corp a year ago announced a goal of being water positive by 2030 without specifying a replenishment target.

PUTRAJAYA (Sept 9): The approach of accepting Covid-19 as endemic should not be viewed as admitting defeat to the pandemic, but as an adaptation move, said Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin. “That is why we (Malaysia) accept the fact that maybe the endpoint is the endemic stage. “My assumption is that with the high vaccination rate at the end of October, we (Malaysia) can begin the transition to the endemic stage. “I don't think any country will view that adapting to Covid as endemic is admitting defeat to the pandemic,” he said. Meanwhile, Khairy said the Covid-19 vaccination exercise for teenagers, aged 12 to 17, will run simultaneously with the reopening of schools, which will begin on Oct 3.

(Reuters) -Facebook Inc launched its first smart glasses on Thursday in a step toward its aim of offering true augmented-reality spectacles. Facebook said the glasses line, called "Ray-Ban Stories," would start at $299. Snap, which unveiled its smart Spectacles in 2016, this year launched AR glasses but they are not for sale and are offered only to AR creators. Snap's CEO, Evan Spiegel, said in 2019 that he expected it would be a decade before consumers widely adopted AR smart glasses. The glasses include an optional virtual assistant so photos and videos can be captured hands-free through voice commands.

(Reuters) - Facebook Inc is developing a machine learning chip to handle tasks such as content recommendation to users, The Information reported on Thursday, citing two people familiar with the project. The company has developed another chip for video transcoding to improve the experience of watching recorded and live-streamed videos on its apps, according to the report. (https://reut.rs/3E0NlVN)In a 2019 blog https://engineering.fb.com/2019/03/14/data-center-engineering/accelerating-infrastructure, Facebook said it was building custom chip designs specially meant to handle AI inference and video transcoding to improve performance, power and efficiency of its infrastructure, which at that time served 2.7 billion people across all its platforms. However, The Information's report suggests that Facebook is designing these chips completely in-house and without the help of these firms. "Facebook is always exploring ways to drive greater levels of compute performance and power efficiency with our silicon partners and through our own internal efforts," a company spokesperson said.

PUTRAJAYA (Sept 9): Former premier Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his son Datuk Mohd Nazifuddin have failed in their appeal against a court decision to allow a summary judgment against them over unpaid taxes of RM1.69 billion and RM37.64 million respectively. “We find no merit in these two appeals and no error in the judgment of the two High Court judges which should be corrected by this court. “Thus both appeals are dismissed with costs of RM10,000 each,” said Court of Appeal judge Datuk Abdul Karim Abdul Jalil in a unanimous decision. Shafee then asked the Court of Appeal for an interim stay of today’s judgment pending further appeal at the Federal Court. The government through the IRB also filed bankruptcy proceedings against Najib at the High Court in April.

In stark contrast, you are seeing liquefied natural gas (LNG) spot prices coming to even the mid-teens, and that is a really, really good departure, given that we have a gas-heavy portfolio. All the oil and gas (O&G) majors recorded improvements [this year] with both profit and cash flow from operations surging upwards. And in the ESG and renewable energy (RE) scene, will it be hydrogen, solar or wind? On the ESG route — the Europeans, the Shells and the BPs are moving at a faster rate compared with the Americans. And for the time being, we still see natural gas being part of that equation.

KUALA LUMPUR (Bernama): The government is looking at further revising down the price of Covid-19 self-test kits by end of this year to make them accessible to everyone. Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz (pic) said the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry and the Ministry of Health were looking into the matter. "To expand testing efforts, the Ministry of Health has recognised RTK Antigen and approved several Covid-19 self-test kits which can be bought in pharmacies nationwide. "In making the self-test kits accessible to everyone, the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs and the Ministry of Health have set the ceiling price at below RM20 per set," he said in a special address during the virtually-held National Recovery Plan Summit on Thursday (Sept 9). The government has set the retail ceiling price for the Covid-19 Antigen Rapid Test Kit at RM19.90 per set and RM16 per set for wholesale price, effective Sept 5.

KUALA LUMPUR (Sept 9): The Malaysian economy is now on the path to recovery supported by the reopening of more economic sectors and it is estimated to chart better growth for 2022, said Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Abdul Aziz. “We see the reopening of the economy and we expect this to support gradual recovery in the fourth quarter of this year. Against this backdrop, Tengku Zafrul is hopeful that Malaysia’s economy will show signs of positive economic growth this year, and post stronger growth next year as predicted by the IMF and the World Bank. “Without a doubt, Covid-19 has shown that public healthcare is an important foundation to enable other sectors to operate. “Such reforms will ensure the protection of lives and livelihoods while keeping the economy open for business,” he said.