SembCorp Marine's wholly owned subsidiary Sembawang Shipyard has secured the upgrading of the passenger ship Diamond Princess from the Princess Cruise, one of the leading brands within Carnival Corporation, a global cruise company and one of the largest vacation companies in the world. The Diamond Princess is scheduled to enter Sembawang Shipyard on 12 March 2014. Princess Cruises will also become a long-term customer of SMM under the Favoured Customer Contract which Carnival Corporation has with Sembawang Shipyard for its future dockings in Singapore. This should

contribute positively to SMM's repair segment. The value of the contract is not disclosed. In any case, we do not take into account ship repair and upgrading projects in our order win assumption. No change to HOLD call and TP: S$4.70.

ST Engineering announced that its electronics arm, ST Electronics has secured about S$416m worth of contracts for rail electronics, satellite communications (satcoms) and communications projects in the third quarter of 2013. These contracts are not expected to have any material impact on ST Engineering for the current financial year.

Cordlife Group has introduced an advanced non-invasive metabolic screening service known as MetaScreen in India. MetaScreen allows detection of as many as 110 metabolic disorders from urine samples. MetaScreen allows Cordlife to further capitalise on the fast-rising India middle class, whose population is expected to grow 67% to 267 million by 2015.

Global Logistic Properties plans to increase space at new projects by 20% to 25% annually in the next two years as e-commerce grows and retail chains expand in China. It is beginning construction of 2.5 million square metres of warehouse space in China this year, compared with two million sq m a year earlier. The company has a portfolio of about eight million sq m in China.

CNA Group bags S$18m EPC project for Thailand property development at Sriracha. This is the first contract in Sriracha Development after the MOU was announced on 1 July 2013. This project will increase the group's orderbook of S$63.6m as at 30 June 2013 to S$92.2m, inclusive of the Vietnam Airport win announced on 2 September 2013.

Sino Construction expects to report a loss for 9M2013, mainly due to: 1) Declining financial performance arising from deteriorating business environment mainly due to intense business competition in the construction industry; 2) Impairment for long outstanding debts and 3) Repair and maintenance expense.

Singapore's IPO market raises US$1.7b proceeds in Q3. This is up 39% from Q2 and the second highest globally after the United States, despite QE fear. In the coming months, SGX has a healthy IPO pipeline; but much of it depends on the market conditions being supportive, according to Simon Lim, Singapore Exchange's head of listings for South-east Asia.

The US$2-billion cruise tourism market in Asia is poised to see an unprecedented 14% growth annually to 3.8 million passengers by 2020, with almost half of that market coming from China, according to an industry report. The report estimated that in 2012 alone, the 12 primary Asian source markets delivered 1.3 million passengers. At present there are 21 international cruise lines serving Asia in 2013, operating a collective 43 ships, either year-round or seasonally.

Source: DBSV