SINGAPORE, Oct 19 (Reuters) – India’s No.2 software services exporter, Infosys (INFY.NS: Quote, Profile, Research), aims to double the revenue share from Europe to 40 percent of its total sales by the end of its 2014 financial year, as cost-strapped global companies step up outsourcing.

The Bangalore-based company, a pioneer in India’s $76 billion IT sector, has grown rapidly by employing thousands of engineers in low-cost Indian centres and catering to overseas firms, mainly based in the United States.

“Our target is by 2014, our business will be 40 percent from Americas, 40 percent from Europe and 20 percent from Asia,” Ashok Vemuri, Head of Americas and member of the company’s board told Reuters in an interview at Infosys’ office in Singapore.

Vemuri heads Infosys’ financial services and insurance business, which accounts for about a third of Infosys’ revenue. The firm employs more than 140,000 staff and aims to add a total of 45,000 people globally this year.

Valued at nearly $32 billion, Infosys competes with top ranked Tata Consultancy Services (TCS.NS: Quote, Profile, Research), Wipro (WIPR.NS: Quote, Profile, Research) and global firms including IBM (IBM.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and Accenture (ACN.N: Quote, Profile, Research) for large It outsourcing deals.

Vemuri said companies in Europe were taking a longer time to decide on IT services contracts due to the eurozone debt worries, but the long-term outsourcing trend was intact.

“Today, unlike in the past, they are looking over their shoulder. They are saying, ‘let me get one more approval from my boss. They want to throw this to the top of the house’”.

SEOUL/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Just a few doors down from the Apple store in Sydney, where a long line of fans eagerly awaited the sale of the new iPhone 4S, another throng was gathering at a Samsung store.

Samsung was ambushing Apple at a temporary “pop up” store offering its new Samsung Galaxy S II smartphone for just A$2 to the first 10 customers each day in the run-up to the rival iPhone launch.

The guerrilla marketing tactic is the latest flare-up in the intensifying competition between two of the biggest players in the mobile devices industry that has also seen them battle in courts across the world over patents.

What makes the battle so captivating is that the two companies are such contrasts. Apple is known for innovation and big ideas that create whole new markets. What Samsung lacks in ideas, it makes up for with a sleek production system that is lightning fast in bringing new products to market.

Still, Samsung Electronics delayed the unveiling of its latest smartphone, the Nexus Prime, by a week to Wednesday as a sign of respect following the death of Apple’s co-founder Steve Jobs — Apple is Samsung’s biggest customers for microprocessors.

The Nexus Prime has been much anticipated because it is based on the latest version of Google’s Android operating system, named “Ice Cream Sandwich” after previous versions also named after foods, such as Gingerbread and Honeycomb.

Graphic on new iPhone vs Galaxy S II, click link.reuters.com/pym44s

SEOUL/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Just a few doors down from the Apple store in Sydney, where a long line of fans eagerly awaited the sale of the new iPhone 4S, another throng was gathering at a Samsung store.

Samsung was ambushing Apple at a temporary “pop up” store offering its new Samsung Galaxy S II smartphone for just A$2 to the first 10 customers each day in the run-up to the rival iPhone launch.

The guerrilla marketing tactic is the latest flare-up in the intensifying competition between two of the biggest players in the mobile devices industry that has also seen them battle in courts across the world over patents.

What makes the battle so captivating is that the two companies are such contrasts. Apple is known for innovation and big ideas that create whole new markets. What Samsung lacks in ideas, it makes up for with a sleek production system that is lightning fast in bringing new products to market.

Still, Samsung Electronics delayed the unveiling of its latest smartphone, the Nexus Prime, by a week to Wednesday as a sign of respect following the death of Apple’s co-founder Steve Jobs — Apple is Samsung’s biggest customers for microprocessors.

The Nexus Prime has been much anticipated because it is based on the latest version of Google’s Android operating system, named “Ice Cream Sandwich” after previous versions also named after foods, such as Gingerbread and Honeycomb.

But the war for smartphone dominance is one Samsung appears to be winning for now, just. Third-quarter figures are expected to show it has overtaken Apple as the world’s biggest smartphone vendor in terms of units sold.

Oct 14 (Reuters) – Promoted to CEO just two weeks ago, Michael Woodford was a star at Japanese camera and endoscope maker Olympus Corp , where he joined as a salesman in a British subsidiary more than three decades ago.

His bosses were so impressed by the Briton’s cost-cutting efforts and deep understanding of the local culture that they made him CEO, adding to the role he took in April of President – the first non-Japanese to run Olympus.

In a glowing tribute on his appointment, the Board’s Chairman said Woodford’s change initiatives had an “extremely positive effect” and Olympus praised him for showing “great sensitivity and understanding of the different cultures.”

On Friday, the same board fired the self-confessed “loud-mouthed” and “strong-headed” executive, saying he had shaken up 92 years of the firm’s management culture.

The announcement marked an astonishing fall from grace for someone only months into his role as president and week’s into his role as CEO.

When Olympus appointed Woodford as CEO, it said the board had been “extremely pleased with progress under Mr. Woodford’s leadership in this role (president), which has exceeded the expectations at the time of his appointment.”

It was also surprising because Japanese boards rarely fire top executives and the status quo is encouraged.

SEOUL/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – South Korea’s LG Electronics hasn’t been so smart with its smartphone business. Its mobile phone division has suffered five consecutive quarterly losses, cutthroat competition is pressuring it to overhaul the business and its shares have plummeted.

The money-losing phone unit has also been a major value destroyer for LG shareholders. LG’s market value is only $7.5 billion, roughly one-third that of global rivals HTC Corp and Nokia, even though it also has sizeable TV and home appliances divisions.

LG’s handset division is the company’s biggest capital sinkhole and the shares have more than halved this year, making it the worst performer even when compared to HTC and Nokia.

LG says it is committed to its phone unit and is racking up successes, but investors aren’t really listening.

“Selling the loss-making business is probably what investors want,” said Harrison Cho, an analyst at KB Investment & Securities. “But even with that option, LG wouldn’t get much from the sale. They should have sold it long ago before the overall landscape got tougher.”

“They simply missed the boat,” said Cho.

Setting up ventures with the likes of Philips and Nortel to share risks is what LG has done in the past in flat-screens and telecom gear. But analysts say there may not be many potential partners keen to team up with the loss-making mobile phone business.

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Asian equities, metals and commodity currencies rallied on Wednesday as investors piled into risky assets after China’s economic growth data reassured markets that the world’s second-largest economy was maintaining its growth momentum.

The euro found some reprieve from a plunge since the start of the week and Australian dollar gained 0.3 percent to $1.0630 as the data comforted market participants fretting that the euro zone debt crisis could spiral out of control.

European stock markets opened weaker with the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares down 0.3 percent, its fourth straight day of falls.

China’s annual gross domestic product grew 9.5 percent in the second quarter of 2011, above 9.4 percent forecast by a Reuters poll, as a spate of monetary tightening measures from Beijing begins to take effect.

Retail sales in China grew 16.8 percent in the six months ended June, showing that domestic demand still held up relatively well despite policy tightening, China’s statistics bureau said.

“What today’s numbers are telling us is that higher rates are not having a sharply negative impact. We’ve seen the economy ratchet down a gear,” said Adrian Foster, head of Asia Pacific financial markets research, at Rabobank in Hong Kong.

China’s GDP has grown expanded at an average annual pace of 10 percent in the past three decades and has in recent times underpinned a fragile U.S. economy as Europe struggled with debt problems.

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Asian stocks, metals, and the Australian dollar jumped on Wednesday after Chinese economic growth data soothed some worries over a global slowdown at a time when euro zone debt worries are also deterring investors.

The MSCI index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan extended early gains to trade 0.8 percent higher by 3:30 a.m. British time, with stock markets in Australia, and South Korea .KS11 both up 0.5 percent.

China’s annual gross domestic product grew 9.5 percent in the second quarter of 2011, above market whispers of 9.0 percent ahead of the release and 9.4 percent forecast by a Reuters poll.

“With GDP growth slowing to a more sustainable pace of just over 8 percent annualised in the first-half of the year, the monetary authorities should be encouraged that the tightening over the past year has been effective,” said George Worthington, economist at IFR in Sydney.

“The data should also help to dispel the wilder fears of an economic collapse in China as a result of the anti-inflation fight,” he added.

Copper on the London Metal Exchange extended early gains after the Chinese data, and was up 0.5 percent at $9,698 a tonne.

EURO, AUSSIE

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Asian stocks, metals, and the Australian dollar jumped on Wednesday after Chinese economic growth data soothed some worries over a global slowdown at a time when euro zone debt worries are also deterring investors.

The MSCI index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan extended early gains to trade 0.8 percent higher by 0230 GMT, with stock markets in Australia, and South Korea .KS11 both up 0.5 percent.

China’s annual gross domestic product grew 9.5 percent in the second quarter of 2011, above market whispers of 9.0 percent ahead of the release and 9.4 percent forecast by a Reuters poll.

“With GDP growth slowing to a more sustainable pace of just over 8 percent annualized in the first-half of the year, the monetary authorities should be encouraged that the tightening over the past year has been effective,” said George Worthington, economist at IFR in Sydney.

“The data should also help to dispel the wilder fears of an economic collapse in China as a result of the anti-inflation fight,” he added.

Copper on the London Metal Exchange extended early gains after the Chinese data, and was up 0.5 percent at $9,698 a tonne.

EURO, AUSSIE

SINGAPORE, July 13 (Reuters) – Asian stocks, metals, and the Australian dollar jumped on Wednesday after Chinese economic growth data soothed some worries over a global slowdown at a time when euro zone debt worries are also deterring investors.

The MSCI index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan extended early gains to trade 0.8 percent higher by 0230 GMT, with stock markets in Australia, and South Korea both up 0.5 percent.

China’s annual gross domestic product grew 9.5 percent in the second quarter of 2011, above market whispers of 9.0 percent ahead of the release and 9.4 percent forecast by a Reuters poll.

“With GDP growth slowing to a more sustainable pace of just over 8 percent annualised in the first-half of the year, the monetary authorities should be encouraged that the tightening over the past year has been effective,” said George Worthington, economist at IFR in Sydney.

“The data should also help to dispel the wilder fears of an economic collapse in China as a result of the anti-inflation fight,” he added.

Copper on the London Metal Exchange extended early gains after the Chinese data, and was up 0.5 percent at $9,698 a tonne.

EURO, AUSSIE

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – The euro declined to a four-month low on Tuesday after new IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde said the fund was not yet ready to discuss terms of a second Greek bailout, while equity markets tumbled on concerns more countries will be engulfed by the euro zone’s debt problems.

European stock index futures pointed to a sharp decline in equities, extending the previous session’s steep sell-off. By 0605 GMT (7:05 a.m. British time), futures for Euro STOXX 50, for DAX and for France’s CAC were 1.1 to 1.3 percent lower.

Growing worries about Europe stoked investors’ flight from riskier assets into bonds, extending a rally in U.S. Treasuries and sending Japanese government bond prices to a two-week high.

In a bid to keep Italy and Spain from the same fate as Greece, Portugal and Ireland, euro zone finance ministers promised on Monday cheaper loans, longer maturities and a more flexible rescue fund. They said new measures would be announced “shortly,” but set no deadline.

“Even if they agree on a multi-billion dollar package for Greece and other affected peripheral countries, if we don’t see a continuation of implementation of the austerity cuts, all bets are off,” said Thomas Lam, group chief economist at OSK-DMG in Singapore.

The euro fell as low as $1.3932 — its lowest since March 17 — after a slew of stop-loss orders were triggered below $1.3980. The single currency fell broadly, dropping to an all-time low of 1.1660 Swiss franc.

The euro extended its early losses against the dollar in Asia and was down 0.6 percent by 0605 GMT after Lagarde said the IMF and its European partners were not yet ready to discuss conditions or terms of a second bailout package for Greece. She said the contagion currently hitting Italy was tied to market-driven forces.