Corporate Bits | Katy Perry’s world tour events in Macau to feature the dolls

The internationally renowned American singer-songwriter Katy Perry will invite the female DJ duo The Dolls to be her special guests at her upcoming “Prismatic World Tour” events in Macau, which will be held at the Venetian Macao’s Cotai Arena on May 1 and May 2. The duo will also open Perry’s concerts in Tokyo, Manila, Jakarta, Singapore and Bangkok later, while Ferras will open her Taipei show.
Since May last year, Perry has played 129 shows and has toured throughout the United Kingdom, North America, Australia, New Zealand and Europe.
Having spent the last three years DJ-ing around the world, The Dolls recently released their debut single “Summer of 93,” which featured Margot on vocals. Their follow-up single, “Southern Swing,” features The Original Pinettes Brass Band, the only all-female brass band, which hails from the New Orleans. Together, The Dolls have curated musical performances inside both The Louvre and the Guggenheim museums, have opened for Diana Ross and Stevie Wonder, have toured the US with Eve, and have landed on the Billboard charts for their remixes of songs by Katy Perry, Cat Power, Robyn and Rye Rye. The duo was named “Paper” magazine’s DJs of the year, and garnered accolades from the “Wall Street Journal,” “Teen Vogue,” “Elle” and “Billboard Magazine,” which referred to their musical debut as a “Nostalgic, moody, and gorgeously crafted indie-pop tune.”

Samsung shows signs of emerging from earnings slump

Samsung’s quarterly operating earnings have fallen 31 percent from a year ago. The drop wasn’t as big as expected, signifying that the smartphone and computer chip giant may be emerging from its profit slump. The company yesterday estimated its January-March operating profit at 5.9 trillion won (USD5.4 billion), exceeding the average 5.5 trillion won that was forecast in a FactSet survey of analysts.
Samsung did not give a breakdown of its financial performance.  Analysts have noted the robust demand for Samsung’s mobile chips, and that improvements in its smartphone business were the driving force behind the company’s relative improvement. It will release its full quarterly results later this month.
The company’s operating profit was an improvement from the previous two quarters, when its mobile business – which accounts for two-thirds of Samsung’s income – suffered a slowdown in sales. Samsung estimated that its sales fell 12 percent to 47 trillion won (USD43 billion) during the first quarter.
Analysts believe that the South Korean company’s profits reached their lowest point during the third quarter. They expect a recovery in Samsung’s bottom line in the current quarter, as the company is set to launch the latest version of its flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S6, this Friday.
After criticism about the cheap appearance of their phones and the fact that they are far from user-friendly, Samsung ditched plastic, opting instead to use aluminum and glass for the body of the new flagship smartphone. The company also removed many apps installed on the phones that critics said cluttered screen space and lacked usefulness.
Solid demand for semiconductor devices that are used as components for mobile gadgets will continue to help drive a recovery in Samsung’s profits, according to analysts. Samsung is the world’s largest maker of memory chips. For the upcoming Galaxy S6 smartphone, the company is supplying its own mobile processor that works as the brain of the phone. Samsung’s share price remained unchanged in Seoul trading.