<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR>SingTel may cut spending, rates
</TR><!-- headline one : end --><TR>It expects business clients to delay orders amid gloom </TR><!-- show image if available --><TR vAlign=bottom><TD width=330>
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->SINGTEL, South-east Asia's largest telephone company, may spend less than planned in its domestic market and cut rates as slowing economic growth and financial-market turmoil curb customer spending.
'The tea leaves are indicating that things are going to be very uncertain,' Mr Allen Lew, chief executive officer of SingTel's operations in the city-state, said in a Bloomberg Television interview broadcast yesterday.
<TABLE width=200 align=left valign="top"><TBODY><TR><TD class=padr8><!-- Vodcast --><!-- Background Story --><STYLE type=text/css> #related .quote {background-color:#E7F7FF; padding:8px;margin:0px 0px 5px 0px;} #related .quote .headline {font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:10px;font-weight:bold; border-bottom:3px double #007BFF; color:#036; text-transform:uppercase; padding-bottom:5px;} #related .quote .text {font-size:11px;color:#036;padding:5px 0px;} </STYLE>TOUGH TIMES
'We've a lot of corporate banking customers and you know these are the areas where there're a lot of challenges right now.'
Mr Lew, on SingTel's outlook for its business clients
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>The company will 'start to curtail some of our unnecessary spending and be a bit more cautious', he said.
SingTel, whose operating expenses in Singapore rose 14 per cent in the quarter ended June, said it plans to cut costs and reduce some fees on concerns that clients will delay orders.
The United States government bailed out American International Group for US$85 billion (S$122 billion) and Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy this week, following the collapse of Bear Stearns in March.
'SingTel will have to be very aggressive in trying to cut costs and minimise the impact on margins as everyone else looks to delay orders now,' said Mr Voon San Lai, an analyst at Cazenove Asia in Singapore, who rates the company as 'underperform'.
The phone operator 'could also cut handset subsidies and staffing might be reduced', he said.
Mr Lew, 53, declined to elaborate on the cost cuts. The company's operating expenses in Singapore rose to $743 million in the three months to June 30, from $652 million a year earlier.
SingTel, on May 14, projected capital spending in Singapore will rise to a 'mid-teens' percentage of revenue as the company adds mobile capacity and upgrades its fixed-line network. It spent 8.8per cent of sales for the year ended March 31, compared with 8.5per cent a year earlier.
The company had 10,651 employees in the Republic at the end of June, or about half of its total workforce.
'We've a lot of corporate banking customers and you know these are the areas where there're a lot of challenges right now,' Mr Lew said.
SingTel is seeing some companies 'being more cautious in terms of their capital expenditure and their expansion plans', he said.
The operator will consider cutting charges for business clients on a case-by-case basis, he said.
Global economic growth will slow to 4.1 per cent this year and 3.9 per cent next year, from 5 per cent last year, the International Monetary Fund predicted in July.
SingTel joins Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys Technologies, India's largest software-
services companies, in expecting financial firms to delay orders.
Nortel Networks, North America's biggest phone-equipment maker, on Wednesday said sales will fall this year as companies hold back investments.
Almost half of big corporations globally have curbed technology budgets for the next year to help cope with the economic slump, Forrester Research said last week.
About 43 per cent of businesses have reduced spending plans, said the researcher, which is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. BLOOMBERG
</TR><!-- headline one : end --><TR>It expects business clients to delay orders amid gloom </TR><!-- show image if available --><TR vAlign=bottom><TD width=330>
</TD><TD width=10>
<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->SINGTEL, South-east Asia's largest telephone company, may spend less than planned in its domestic market and cut rates as slowing economic growth and financial-market turmoil curb customer spending.
'The tea leaves are indicating that things are going to be very uncertain,' Mr Allen Lew, chief executive officer of SingTel's operations in the city-state, said in a Bloomberg Television interview broadcast yesterday.
<TABLE width=200 align=left valign="top"><TBODY><TR><TD class=padr8><!-- Vodcast --><!-- Background Story --><STYLE type=text/css> #related .quote {background-color:#E7F7FF; padding:8px;margin:0px 0px 5px 0px;} #related .quote .headline {font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:10px;font-weight:bold; border-bottom:3px double #007BFF; color:#036; text-transform:uppercase; padding-bottom:5px;} #related .quote .text {font-size:11px;color:#036;padding:5px 0px;} </STYLE>TOUGH TIMES
'We've a lot of corporate banking customers and you know these are the areas where there're a lot of challenges right now.'
Mr Lew, on SingTel's outlook for its business clients
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>The company will 'start to curtail some of our unnecessary spending and be a bit more cautious', he said.
SingTel, whose operating expenses in Singapore rose 14 per cent in the quarter ended June, said it plans to cut costs and reduce some fees on concerns that clients will delay orders.
The United States government bailed out American International Group for US$85 billion (S$122 billion) and Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy this week, following the collapse of Bear Stearns in March.
'SingTel will have to be very aggressive in trying to cut costs and minimise the impact on margins as everyone else looks to delay orders now,' said Mr Voon San Lai, an analyst at Cazenove Asia in Singapore, who rates the company as 'underperform'.
The phone operator 'could also cut handset subsidies and staffing might be reduced', he said.
Mr Lew, 53, declined to elaborate on the cost cuts. The company's operating expenses in Singapore rose to $743 million in the three months to June 30, from $652 million a year earlier.
SingTel, on May 14, projected capital spending in Singapore will rise to a 'mid-teens' percentage of revenue as the company adds mobile capacity and upgrades its fixed-line network. It spent 8.8per cent of sales for the year ended March 31, compared with 8.5per cent a year earlier.
The company had 10,651 employees in the Republic at the end of June, or about half of its total workforce.
'We've a lot of corporate banking customers and you know these are the areas where there're a lot of challenges right now,' Mr Lew said.
SingTel is seeing some companies 'being more cautious in terms of their capital expenditure and their expansion plans', he said.
The operator will consider cutting charges for business clients on a case-by-case basis, he said.
Global economic growth will slow to 4.1 per cent this year and 3.9 per cent next year, from 5 per cent last year, the International Monetary Fund predicted in July.
SingTel joins Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys Technologies, India's largest software-
services companies, in expecting financial firms to delay orders.
Nortel Networks, North America's biggest phone-equipment maker, on Wednesday said sales will fall this year as companies hold back investments.
Almost half of big corporations globally have curbed technology budgets for the next year to help cope with the economic slump, Forrester Research said last week.
About 43 per cent of businesses have reduced spending plans, said the researcher, which is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. BLOOMBERG
