Blogroll

The coronavirus-driven global shift to working from home is set to have boosted demand for Samsung Electronics' memory chips from laptop makers and data centres, but first-quarter profits are likely to remain flat as the outbreak weakened consumer electronics sales.

United Arab Emirates agriculture technology start-up Pure Harvest Smart Farms has raised $20.6 million in fresh funding and secured commitments for a further $100 million, it said on Monday.

The United States on Sunday entered one of the most critical weeks so far in the coronavirus crisis, with government officials warning that the death toll in places such as New York, Michigan and Louisiana was a sign of trouble to come in other states.

President Donald Trump expressed hope on Sunday that the United States was seeing a “leveling-off” of the coronavirus crisis in some of the nation's hot spots, saying Americans were starting to see "the light at the end of the tunnel."

UK-based biopharma company Izana Bioscience said it was testing its antibody therapy namilumab for the treatment of patients with rapidly worsening COVID-19 at the Humanitas Research Hospitals in Bergamo and Milan in Italy.

Barbados on Sunday reported its first death from the new coronavirus after an 81-year-old man with diabetes died from pneumonia, the country's health minister said.

Haiti on Sunday reported its first death linked to the coronavirus outbreak, with 21 confirmed cases of the respiratory disease in the impoverished Caribbean nation, the Health Ministry said.

Lockdowns and travel retrictions prompted by the new coronavirus have been a boon to JOOX, Chinese tech giant Tencent's international music streaming platform, driving traffic to its karaoke services up by as much as 50%, an executive said.

Germany is ramping up efforts to purchase facemasks in an effort to contain the coronavirus, the country's vice chancellor, Olaf Scholz, told the Anne Will television show on Sunday.

Greece has quarantined a second migrant facility on its mainland after a 53-year-old man tested positive for the new coronavirus, the migration ministry said on Sunday.

Millions of Indians turned off their lights and lit up balconies and doorsteps with lamps, candles and flashlights on Sunday, in response to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's appeal to "challenge the darkness" spread by the coronavirus crisis.

France's daily death toll from the novel coronavirus fell in the past 24 hours and admissions into intensive care also slowed, the health ministry said on Sunday, thanking citizens for largely respecting a lockdown to halt the spread of the virus.

Some 1,000 African migrants were placed under mandatory quarantine on Sunday after an outbreak of COVID-19 and their camp at Hal Far in the south of Malta was surrounded by police and army trucks to ensure compliance.

The United Arab Emirates will reinforce its stockpile of strategic goods and waive residency visa fines for the rest of the year in response to the coronavirus outbreak, its vice president said on Sunday.

British postman Glen Walton has delivered letters and parcels dressed as a robber, a wrestler, a princess and Pokemon character Pikachu to cheer up residents stuck in their houses while social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic.

Britain will be forced to impose more restrictions on outdoor exercise if people flout lockdown rules designed to curb the spread of the coronavirus, the health minister said on Sunday.

Norway will send a team of medical and logistical staff to Italy's Lombardy region to help fight the COVID-19 pandemic, the Oslo government said on Sunday.

Millions of Indians switched off their lights and came out onto their balconies and doorsteps with lamps, candles and flashlights on Sunday, responding to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's call to "challenge the darkness" of the coronavirus crisis.

The United States enters one of the most critical weeks so far in the coronavirus crisis with the death toll exploding in New York, Michigan and Louisiana and some governors calling for a national stay-at-home order.

Italy reported its lowest daily COVID-19 death toll for more than two weeks on Sunday as authorities began to look ahead to a second phase of the battle against the new coronavirus once the lockdown imposed almost a month ago is eventually eased.