Comex draws 700,000 visitors who spend $51m

Comex draws 700,000 visitors who spend $51m
By Alfred Siew, Technology Correspondent
MORE than 700,000 people squeezed their way through a jam-packed Suntec City last week, hunting for the best deals in LCD TV sets, memory cards and other gadgets at the Comex show.
By the end of the four-day event, which began last Thursday, they had splurged a cool $51.7 million.

This is higher than last year, when 678,000 people turned up and spent $35 million, said organiser Eastern Directories yesterday.

Retailers say the bullish sentiment was a reflection of pent-up demand, after the GST hike from 5 to 7 per cent - which kicked in on July 1 - dragged sales down at IT haunts like Funan DigitaLife Mall and Sim Lim Square.

Mr Ng Fun Wen, sales manager at retailer Cybermind, said his Comex booth sold 550 Philips LCD monitors - up from the 20 to 30 screens he sells at his Sim Lim store on a weekend. But he attributed this to thinner margins at the show.

While some shoppers came to browse, others zoomed in on gadgets they had been eyeing.

Project manager Edward Chong, 33, for example, waited for weeks to buy a $699 Canon camcorder so he could get freebies like an additional memory card and travel bag. ‘It’s not cheaper than outside, but if you add the freebies, it’s worth it,’ he said.

Two bestsellers were fingernail-size memory cards and external hard disks used to store pictures and videos.

At the show, a 500GB external hard disk that can pack in about 100 DVD movies went for $199 - $30 cheaper.

Meanwhile, products for computer gaming were sold in more attractive bundles. A Razer Tarantula keyboard went for $169, its usual price, but with a free mouse worth $39.

Within hours, posts appeared on popular online forums like VR-Zone.com, from people trying to sell off the mouse.

But not everything was cheaper than usual. For example, a Logitech keyboard and mouse bundle costing $199 could be had for the same price at some Sim Lim Square stores.

And the jams caused by these tech bazaars, which are held every three months, are beginning to annoy some shoppers.

Said IT consultant Elvin Chan, 34, who stayed away from the buying frenzy: ‘If the discount is not that great, why get into the jam?’

Source : Straits Times - 04 sept 2007

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Soon all you need is a phone

Soon all you need is a phone

Buy a drinkPay for a bus or train ride
By Alfred Siew, Technology Correspondent
TAP AND GO: In Japan, more than 20 million users already have ‘wallet phones’ that can be used to make purchases. — PHOTO: AP

THE mobile phone, already a veritable Swiss Army knife, may soon have one more use - to pay for train rides and other ’small-ticket’ items.
In a flurry of announcements yesterday, rival telecom and payment companies said they were testing a new wireless technology that could turn mobile phones into sophisticated electronic purses.

SingTel and Nets are testing phones that could let people pay for, say, drinks at a cafe, in the same way they would with a stored value card like the CashCard.

StarHub and EZ-Link have started a trial to use the same technology - Near-Field Communication (NFC) - to let commuters tap specially made phones on a fare gate to pay for train or bus rides.

Besides paying for items at 20,000 ez-link terminals islandwide, these phones, which use the same chips as those in ez-link cards, also let a user check the amount they have left with a quick glance at the screen.

To top up their phones, users can go to the usual ez-link top-up points, like the fare machines at train stations.

Rivals SingTel and Nets are launching a similar tie-up today.

Their trial service lets a user tap his phone at a special reader at a store to pay for an item.

To top up the amount stored on the phone, he can draw on a credit card account he already has with DBS, OCBC or UOB.

This is done electronically by connecting to the banks using a mobile phone network - a first in Asia, said a Nets spokesman.

The trials represent the latest attempt to provide mobile payments here.

Previous attempts to produce gadgets that allowed people to pay for movie tickets, for example, were unsuccessful partly because of a lack of phone models and immature technology.

Mr Gregory Danker, vice-president for marketing communications at EZ-Link, told The Straits Times: ‘The new technology is logical because everyone has a cellphone these days.’

But he stressed that the trial is still in its early stages and at present involves only one model of mobile phone.

While the technology seems exciting, all parties cautioned that it still needs to be developed further before being offered commercially.

Though such mobile payment technologies have been tested worldwide for several years, the only place where they have gained widespread use is in Japan.

There, more than 20 million people tote NTT Docomo’s osaifu-keitai, or wallet phones, which can be used to pay for anything from train rides to instant noodles at convenience stores.
Source : Straits Times - 04 sept 2007

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Apollo Centre up for sale for over $200m

Apollo Centre up for sale for over $200m

Price tag amounts to $1,345 psf of net lettable area
By UMA SHANKARI
APOLLO Centre, a commercial building in Havelock Road, is for sale for more than $200 million, the property firm marketing it said yesterday.
Apollo Centre: In-principle approval has been granted to change the use of the 2nd storey from retail to office
The 99-year leasehold property is being sold by Singapore-listed Apollo Enterprises.

And since the sale was announced, there have been many enquiries from potential investors, said marketing agent Knight Frank.

‘Given the lack of similar investment buildings in the market and the many interests expressed, a transaction price in excess of $200 million is not unexpected,’ it said.

At $200 million, the price would work out to $1,345 per square foot (psf) of net lettable area.

There are shops in the basement and on the first and second storeys and offices on upper floors.

By comparison, almost a whole floor of nearby Chinatown Point was sold recently for about $1,250 psf of net lettable area.

The Apollo Centre, a seven-storey office and retail building, has a land area of about 54,600 sq ft, and a gross floor area of around 217,500 sq ft. At present, the net lettable area is 148,700 sq ft.

There are shops in the basement and on the first and second storeys and offices on the upper floors.

Because of the limited supply of office space in the central business district, Apollo Enterprises has obtained in-principle approval to change the use of the building’s second storey from retail to office.

If the whole floor is converted to office space and targeted at a single occupier, the lettable floor area could increase by about 11,000 sq ft, Knight Frank said.

It said rents in the area range from $7.50-$8.00 psf per month (psf pm) for office space and $8.00-$8.50 psf pm for retail space.

The tender for the Apollo Centre is open until 3pm on Oct 16.
Source : Business Times - 04 sept 2007

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Mindy Yong
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