With tech industry eyes trained on the fate of the Jan. 6-9 CES 2021 in Las Vegas amid COVID-19, CTA with little fanfare announced Monday it was canceling all CES Asia shows. The pandemic forced the mid-March cancellation of the 2020 CES Asia that was set for June 10-12 in Shanghai (see 2003110036). “We evaluate our events in light of the changing needs of our industry and the priorities of our members and exhibitors,” said CTA. “Given the pandemic, the economy, and our visible role as an American trade association, we have decided to focus on other CES related programs.” The State Department issued a "China -- Level 4: Do Not Travel" advisory June 4 for U.S. nationals. The Shanghai government mandates a 14-day quarantine for foreign visitors.
COVID-19 stay-at-home mandates didn’t have the same invigorating effect on May smartphone imports to the U.S. as on connectivity tools like laptops and tablets (see 2007100025), show Census Bureau data we accessed Saturday through the International Trade Commission. U.S. importers sourced 12.5 million smartphones from all countries in May. That's up 8.9% from April, down 23% from May 2019. May smartphone imports had $3.01 billion in customs value, down 1.9% from April and 25% from the same year-earlier month. The average May smartphone import was worth $240.56. China generated 79% of May smartphone imports to the U.S., up a few points from April and May 2019. Vietnam, the world’s largest country of origin for smartphones worth less than $200, ceded share to China in May, falling a few points to 14.5%.
During COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns, the 10.37 million laptop and tablet imports to the U.S. in May rose 10.8% sequentially and 21% from May 2019, show Census Bureau data we accessed Friday through the International Trade Commission. May shipments had $4.58 billion in customs value, up 6.5% from April and 25.7% from the same 2019 month. China sourced 93% of the imports. Stay-at-home mandates spurred global shipments of “traditional” PCs to an 11.2% year-over-year increase in Q2 to 72.3 million, reported IDC Thursday. Work-from-home and remote-learning mandates sparked demand growth that “surpassed previous expectations,” said IDC: COVID-19 is returning computers to “the center of consumers' tech portfolio."
Switzerland’s Federal Office of Civil Aviation and the FAA reached agreement on harmonizing domestic and international safety standards for drones. “This agreement builds on U.S and Swiss efforts to ensure that the fastest growing and broadest segment of aviation is integrated safely, efficiently and seamlessly around the world,” said a news release. Civil drone shipments will nearly double from 2020 pre-pandemic forecasts to reach 13,400, and nearly 80,000 shipments will take place in 2025, ABI Research said. Both announcements came Wednesday, as a drone conference was held (see 2007080070).
Vizio “objects” to the Sharp allegations in the International Trade Commission’s Tariff Act Section 337 investigation that its TVs infringe five Sharp LCD display patents, said the vendor in an “Exhibit A” filing (login required) posted Tuesday in docket 337-TA-1201. Sharp’s accusations are “vague and overboard,” said the heavily redacted filing, which supplemented Vizio’s June 30 response to the investigation (see report, July 2). Blacked out in the public version were Vizio’s estimates on the “quantity and value” of its imports and the “relative significant of the U.S. market to Vizio’s operations.” Vizio "continues to gather information" for this investigation and "reserves the right to supplement the information in this exhibit as necessary," it said. Sharp is seeking an import ban on the allegedly infringing Vizio TVs.
Nielsen expects to save $250 million annually by exiting “several smaller, underperforming markets and non-core businesses” and cutting 3,500 jobs, about 8% of the global workforce, said the company Tuesday. Nielsen expects to incur up to $170 million in 2020 pretax restructuring charges, about half attributable to severance costs, it said. The downsizing should be “substantially completed” this year, it said. It plans to provide more detail on its Q2 call Aug. 3, it said. The company closed 2019 with about 46,000 employees, said its Feb. 27 annual report.
Google and Sonos “meaningfully narrow[ed] the claim construction disputes” in the International Trade Commission’s intellectual property probe into Sonos allegations that Google devices infringe five Sonos multiroom audio patents (see 2002060070), Google said (login required) Thursday in docket 337-TA-1191. “Several critical differences remain with respect to terms.” Google filed to persuade Chief Administrative Law Judge Charles Bullock to resolve the disputes in its favor. Sonos didn’t comment Monday. Two of the Sonos patents “purport to present a solution to two alleged problems in the audio synchronization field,” said Google. The patents “overstate their technical contributions” because they rely on “well-known techniques,” said Google: “Synchronization concepts” used in a local area network “long predate the patents’ claimed inventions.” Sonos “now seeks to narrowly interpret the claims” about LAN to avoid “the abundance of prior art,” said the brief. Google proposes defining a LAN by its “plain and ordinary meaning,” and ITC staff agrees, it said. Sonos proposes regarding a LAN as a data network that links devices within a limited area, said Google. The sides agree another of the patents describes different techniques that might be used to perform “equalization of audio data,” said the brief. “Dispute lies in whether each of these techniques necessarily result in equalization every time.”
Warehouse staffing, consumer expectations for delivery and the Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods are among challenges Sonos is juggling as the company ratchets up e-commerce amid the novel coronavirus, said John Hills, senior manager-logistics, America. Hills told a webinar hosted by freight logistics company Flexport that during the pandemic, which slammed brick-and-mortar sales worldwide, Sonos is “not only dealing with the impact of COVID, we’re still navigating some of the waters with these 301 tariffs” imposed last year by the Trump administration on goods imported from China. Higher tariffs led Sonos to steer production of most U.S.-bound goods to Malaysia. Sonos CEO Patrick Spence highlighted a spike in direct-to-consumer sales (D2C) in April when consumers turned to e-commerce to buy goods they couldn’t get when stores temporarily closed. More people are required to move 1,500 units in a D2C model vs. a “handful” of pallets destined for one retailer, Hills said Wednesday. Forecasting D2C sales fluctuations can be unpredictable, said the executive: “It’s much more challenging to capture spikes in demand for D2C than it is for B2B.” An online article or blog can drive a surge, or a successful promotion can produce an unexpected order spike, he said. Sonos is also competing with big box retailers that have bigger warehouse staffing needs due to the pandemic-fueled jump in e-commerce business. FedEx also is getting more e-commerce consumer interest (see 2007010052).
The Interagency Labor Committee under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on free trade seeks comments by Aug. 15 on the procedures it should use to review complaints about alleged violations of the treaty’s labor provisions, said Tuesday’s Federal Register. USMCA takes effect Wednesday and gives organized labor in the U.S. a process for filing grievances with the Trump administration alleging breaches of Mexico’s new labor laws revamp (see 2006240043). The revisions give Mexican workers collective bargaining rights for the first time and protect them against retaliation for joining unions or refusing to join. The interagency committee, co-chaired by U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia, will have 30 days to review a complaint and has the authority to rescind a product's duty-free status or bar its importation if it finds serious violations. The committee will accept comments at Regulations.gov in docket USTR-2020-0028.
The COVID-19 pandemic is harming Sony “production, development, sale and distribution” of products and services in all segments, said the company’s annual report posted Monday at the SEC, saying Sony expects “this negative impact” to continue well into the future, but it doesn’t risk delaying the holiday launch of the PlayStation 5. Sony-owned factories in China and Thailand making digital cameras and smartphones “are currently operating as usual,” it said. Sony’s retail sales are down “significantly due to the closure of retail stores globally,” said the report. Work-from-home orders and the ban on international flights due to the coronavirus “presented some challenges” in bringing the PS5 to market in time for the holiday, said the report. Sony encountered delays in the PS5 “testing process and the qualification of production lines,” it said. Development is “progressing” well, and “no major problems have arisen in the game software development pipeline,” it said.