The most-recent news, analysis, features and opinions from Insightsphere.
Schneider Electric has agreed to acquire industrial software company PTC for approximately $22.6 billion, marking its largest acquisition to date. The deal brings PTC’s product design and lifecycle-management software together with Schneider’s industrial automation, energy management, and software capabilities, strengthening its push to build an integrated industrial technology and AI platform.
India has notified the third phase of its Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE-III) norms, which will apply to passenger vehicles from April 2027 to March 2032. The framework introduces progressively tighter fleet-level efficiency targets while giving manufacturers different compliance avenues through EVs, hybrids, alternative fuels and efficiency technologies. EVs get the strongest compliance benefit, with battery-electric and range-extended vehicles getting a 3x volume factor.
Lithium carbonate futures on the Guangzhou Futures Exchange have lost about a quarter of their value in September, falling below 120,000 yuan a ton from more than 160,000 at the start of the month. The drop follows a year of recovery from 2025 lows. Below, we look at what unsettled the market, how new tax and capacity measures fit in, and why analysts are questioning demand later in the year.
Gujarat Themis Biosyn has lined up private credit to pay for its ¥21.5 billion purchase of MicroBiopharm Japan, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. Orion Capital Asia supplied ¥9.2 billion ($58 million), and Indian private credit funds bought the ₹585 crore of rupee debt it issued. The acquisition closed this month. The disclosed terms show how the deal was put together, and what they leave out is just as telling.
The US and China have published lists of goods worth about $30 billion each that are in line for lower tariffs, the first concrete product of the new US-China Board of Trade. Released on September 28, days after Xi Jinping's state visit to Washington, the documents list 77 entries for Chinese goods entering the US and 1,619 for US goods entering China. They say nothing about how deep the cuts will be. Here is what is on them and what is still missing.
London-based HSBC is stepping up its push into India's affluent banking market, with plans to expand from 34 branches to 46 across 34 cities over the next two years. The bank is targeting wealthier customers beyond India’s biggest metros while building around wealth management, transaction banking and cross-border services. Its India chief executive, Hitendra Dave, says HSBC wants to become one of the country’s top four or five private banks by 2030. The expansion shows how global banks are positioning for India’s growing pool of wealthy, internationally connected customers.
Bloomberg reported this week that Chinese ports had just handled their heaviest container traffic on record, days before Donald Trump and Xi Jinping sat down in Washington. It follows August customs data already showing exports 25% higher than a year earlier, with the trade surplus running at $805.5 billion for the first eight months of the year. Last year's full-year surplus hit $1.1 trillion. Whether the latest surge reflects genuine demand or exporters getting ahead of the next tariff deadline is harder to say.
SoftBank Group is set to price one of the largest junk bond deals on record this week, with guidance pointing to yields as high as 9.875% on more than $11 billion raised for its expanding bet on OpenAI. The deal underscores how far Masayoshi Son is willing to lever the balance sheet to keep funding artificial intelligence. What it reveals about investor appetite and about the risk SoftBank is now carrying is worth examining closely.
Chinese capital is helping drive strong growth for Deutsche Bank's private banking business in Hong Kong, with the city emerging as the bank's best-performing emerging-markets region in 2026. The bank has seen strength across several parts of its Hong Kong business, particularly in real estate. The trend comes as Hong Kong strengthens its role as an offshore hub for mainland Chinese fund flows.
Texas is putting new data centre permits on hold as state agencies examine the industry’s demands for electricity and water. Governor Greg Abbott directed the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) on September 21, 2026, to stop processing permits while the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) and Texas Water Development Board gather more information on the projects. The review comes as developers continue to plan large computing facilities across the state, raising questions about how much additional demand the power and water systems can handle.
