Southeast Asia’s dominant ride-hailing company Grab has launched an open-platform strategy, allowing third party services including content providers to operate within its app as it aims to become an “everyday superapp”.
The open-platform, dubbed GrabPlatform, will allow more “highly used everyday services” to be incorporated into the Grab app via a suite of application program interfaces (APIs), the company said. The home screen has also been redesigned to give…
Elon Musk visits Thai cave where boys are trapped, delivers kid-size submarine – just in case
American space entrepreneur Elon Musk tweeted that he was in Thailand on Tuesday with a prototype mini-sub, at the flooded cave where five members of a youth football team remained trapped.
“Just returned from Cave 3,” Musk said.
“Mini-sub is ready if needed. It is made of rocket parts & named Wild Boar after kids’ soccer team. Leaving here in case it may be useful in the future.”
On Instagram, he published video of a flooded cave, with rescuers.
Cave Three is…
Financial services register will be complemented by new directory of staff
A new directory of those working in financial services will be introduced alongside the existing financial services register, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has announced.
Executed cult founder Shoko Asahara is cremated in Tokyo, as family feuds over his remains
The body of executed Aum Shinrikyo cult founder Shoko Asahara was cremated in Tokyo on Monday, a source familiar with the matter said.
To whom the remains will be handed over has been a focus of concern following Friday’s executions of Asahara and six former senior members of the cult for crimes including the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin gas attack, which resulted in the deaths of 29 people and sickened over 6,000 people.
A different source close to the matter has said that Asahara told a…
Four Thai boys have been freed from cave – but rest remain trapped as dramatic rescue is paused
Rescuers have freed four boys who were trapped in a flooded cave in Thailand for more than two weeks, but have had to pause the operation, leaving eight other boys and their 25-year-old coach underground. The fourth boy left Tham Luang Nang Non cave in Chiang Rai Province shortly before 8pm local time on Sunday, the Thai navy Seals Facebook page announced. How a young ex-monk kept the Thai cave boys alive – and won locals’ hearts Efforts to rescue the others – who…
Malaysia’s 1MDB scandal: a Razak family affair?
The big question in post-election Malaysia right up to this week was when the defeated prime minister Najib Razak would be arrested and charged for his alleged involvement in the 1MDB financial scandal.
With charges formally filed against him and a “not guilty” plea entered on Wednesday, the focus is now on whether attorney general Tommy Thomas’s dragnet will extend to others close to the leader. One person who has faced intense scrutiny in recent days is Riza Aziz, the son…
‘Free Najib’: Can Malaysia’s disgraced leader weather one last storm?
He’s calm, he’s cool and he’s going to weather this storm.
These are the fighting words from loyalists to the fallen Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak as the 64-year-old stares at the prospect of spending his sunset years in jail.
Najib’s arrest and arraignment this week for criminal breach of trust and abuse of power linked to the multibillion-dollar 1MDB scandal lays bare the extent of his stunning fall from grace following the election victory of Mahathir Mohamad,…
Why are Japanese torturing cats and posting the videos online?
When Tokyo police eventually arrested Makoto Oya, a seemingly respectable tax counsellor from Saitama City, he attempted to justify pouring scalding water over stray cats and torturing them to death with a blowtorch. “The excrement and urine of cats smells bad,” he told the officers who took him into custody. “They have sharp nails that are designed to injure. I did not realise that exterminating these sorts of harmful animals was a violation of the law.” Oya, 52,…
Tesla’s Elon Musk sends team to help save Thai boys trapped in underground cave
Elon Musk is sending a team of engineers to Thailand to explore ways to help rescue a boys’ soccer team stuck in a cave.
The billionaire’s companies could assist by trying to pinpoint the boys’ precise location using Space Exploration Technologies Corp or Boring Co technology, pumping water or providing heavy-duty battery packs known as Tesla Powerwalls, a spokesman for Musk said earlier.
Ex-Seal dies in Thai cave during rescue dive for trapped boys
The Thai government…
HMRC defends employment status tool
The UK’s HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has said that its ‘check employment status for tax’ (CEST) online tool does not need to consider mutuality of obligation as this will already have been established before the tool is used.