Singapore tire-maker
teams with Wal-Mart
Giti Tire Group said Wednesday that it will create 1,700 jobs in South Carolina as part of Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s commitment to purchase an additional $250 billion in products that support American jobs by 2023.
The Singapore company made the announcement after opening its first tire factory in the United States in Richburg, S.C. Giti said it will invest $560 million and create new jobs over the next decade to meet the growing demand for tires from Wal-Mart and the North American market.
The factory will produce an estimated 100,000 units of Dextero brand tires for Wal-Mart through the remainder of 2017. It will produce "several million tires" in 2018.
Wal-Mart announced its commitment to source additional American-made products in 2013. The plan is estimated to create 1 million U.S. jobs by 2023, according to the Boston Consulting Group.
-- Robbie Neiswanger
Voice shopping now
online at Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. customers now can order products through Google Home simply by using their voices.
The Bentonville retailer, which announced a partnership with Google in August centering on voice-shopping capabilities, said more than 2 million Wal-Mart items are available for shoppers using the platform. Google also introduced a new product as part of the rollout, the Google Home Mini, that is available for $49.
Wal-Mart said any customer who buys a Google Home or Google Home Mini device from the retailer will receive up to $25 off an order when they link Wal-Mart accounts to Google Express. Customers who link their accounts can receive recommendations from Google's voice-activated assistant based on previous purchases at Wal-Mart.
The Google-enabled service is a response to online retailer Amazon.com, which provides customers with voice-command shopping capability through its Alexa device.
-- Robbie Neiswanger
Broader indexes up,
but state's dips 0.62
The Arkansas Index, a price-weighted index that tracks the largest public companies based in the state, dropped 0.62 to 369.37 Wednesday.
"Stocks moved higher today with the S&P 500 Index closing up for the seventh-straight day as utilities and real estate outperformed the broader market," said Leon Lants, managing director at Stephens Inc. in Little Rock.
Total volume for the index was 33 million shares.
The index was developed by Bloomberg News and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette with a base value of 100 as of Dec. 30, 1997.
Business on 10/05/2017