INDIGENOUS INNOVATION: Engineers operate on a 1-gigawatt nuclear power plant's full-scale simulator in Ningde, Fujian Province (WEI PEIQUAN)

Soaring Yuan

China's currency, the yuan, strengthened to an all-time high of 6.5651 per U.S. dollar on March 7, according to the China Foreign Exchange Trading System.

The central parity rate of the yuan against the U.S. dollar was 20 basis points lower than the previous record of 6.5671 set on March 4.

The yuan has appreciated 3.84 percent since June 19, 2010, when the People's Bank of China, the central bank, announced it would further reform the exchange rate formation mechanism to improve its flexibility.

Charity Boom

In 2010, the China Charity Federation received 6 billion yuan ($909 million) worth of donations from domestic and foreign entities and individuals, while the sum was 4.6 billion yuan ($697 million) in 2009, said Fan Baojun, at the Third High-Level Forum of Enterprises' Social Responsibility on March 9 in Beijing.

Fan said in recent years, the awareness of citizens, especially entrepreneurs, in participating in charity has increased.

At present, the federation operates 10 charity programs, each worth 100 million yuan ($15 million). But he said eight of the 10 programs are from foreign multinational companies' donations while only two are from domestic donations.

Coke Futures

Dalian Commodity Exchange will launch coke futures trading this year to provide new hedging tools for the industry, said Liu Xingqiang, General Manager of the Dalian Commodity Exchange.

The coke industry has witnessed frequent price fluctuations in recent years. Enterprises have an urgent need to stave off the risks, Liu said .

Preparation work for the trading is underway, he said.

The coke industry plays an important role in China's booming economy, with annual output and consumption both above 300 million tons in recent years, said Liu.

Lenovo's LePad

The Chinese computer giant Lenovo Group plans to launch the second version of its tablet computer LePad this year, as part of its efforts to compete with Apple's latest iPad 2.

China is the world's second largest computer market after the United States, and Lenovo's CEO Yang Yuanqing is optimistic that LePad will be able to outperform that of the iPad.

Lenovo unveiled LePad at the Consumer Electronics Show 2011 in Las Vegas in January. Yang said Lenovo will launch its LePad tablet in China in March and plans to launch the LePad 2 by the end of this year.

Refrigerator Base

Siemens home appliance department is planning to set up a second refrigerator base in Chuzhou, Anhui Province. The foundation for the new factory was laid on March 1 with estimated investment reaching 800 million yuan ($121 million).

The new factory is expected to be completed in December this year and will be put into production in 2013. By then, the factory will be able to produce 5.2 million high-end refrigerators a year. Siemens built the first refrigerator base in Chuzhou in 1996, mainly producing freezing compartments and side-by-side combination refrigerators.

In 2010, Siemens refrigerators sales revenue grew 26 percent compared with that of 2009.