:00:00. > :00:16.Now on BBC News all the latest business news live from Singapore.
:00:17. > :00:22.Samsung's group leader offers an apology before he takes the hot seat
:00:23. > :00:30.as a suspect in South Korea corruption scandal. It is a $3
:00:31. > :00:41.billion industry, as parents spend big time for high-tech smart toys -
:00:42. > :00:47.sales are growing fast. Good morning, Asia. Hello, world. It is
:00:48. > :00:50.Thursday. Lagutin during us for this edition of Asia Business Report. We
:00:51. > :00:57.start with Samsung and the group leader Lee Jae-yong has arrived at
:00:58. > :01:00.short time ago with the South Korean prosecutor office for questioning
:01:01. > :01:05.over bribery suspicion is, it is part of a scandal that may
:01:06. > :01:10.permanently unseat the president. Samsung is accused of giving
:01:11. > :01:15.donations to non-profit foundations to a confidant of the President in
:01:16. > :01:21.return for assistance in a business transaction. Mr Lee apologised.
:01:22. > :01:26.TRANSLATION: I am very sorry to the South Korean people. Samsung has
:01:27. > :01:33.denied any wrongdoing, so what do prosecutors hope to find? I put the
:01:34. > :01:38.question to our Korea correspondent, Steve Evans. The prosecutors have
:01:39. > :01:45.got hold of a second laptop, and tablet, rather, owned by the mentor
:01:46. > :01:52.of the President, a crucial figure in this whole thing, and it is
:01:53. > :01:57.alleged there are notes of a meeting between the President of this
:01:58. > :02:02.country and Mr Lee, the chief of Samsung, in effect, the man running
:02:03. > :02:10.Samsung, and the details of those meetings seem to indicate that
:02:11. > :02:18.President Park expected money for her friend's funds in return for the
:02:19. > :02:23.pension fund backing something, and internal change within Samsung, a
:02:24. > :02:28.very important big deal within Samsung, so what the evidence,
:02:29. > :02:36.prosecutor things he has got, is hard disc evidence of a meeting
:02:37. > :02:41.where promises were exchanged. It should be said that Samsung
:02:42. > :02:48.emphasises it is absolutely innocent of corruption. This is an
:02:49. > :02:52.investigation that the prosecutor has said he is being interviewed as
:02:53. > :02:57.a suspect, rather than a witness. All right, this whole new evidence
:02:58. > :03:03.basically makes this investigation more complex. What could be the
:03:04. > :03:09.repercussions for Lee Jae-yong and the Samsung group? We are not there
:03:10. > :03:12.yet. We have some way to go. But clearly, if Samsung is criminally
:03:13. > :03:17.indicted and found guilty of corruption, and the man at the top
:03:18. > :03:21.of Samsung is found guilty of corruption, that reflects on the
:03:22. > :03:28.Samsung brand, there is no doubt of that. But, having said that, there
:03:29. > :03:34.are lots of chaebol heads in this country found guilty of corruption,
:03:35. > :03:39.it is as blunt as that, and people say, well the product seems good, I
:03:40. > :03:44.am going to keep buying it. The US justice department has
:03:45. > :03:48.charged six volts wagon executives it says are responsible for the
:03:49. > :03:52.scandal over cheating on emissions standards -- Volkswagon. The company
:03:53. > :03:57.agreed to pay for $.3 billion in fines to settle the issue and that
:03:58. > :04:01.is in addition to the $17.5 billion already agreed in settlements with
:04:02. > :04:06.car owners, dealers and for the environmental cleanup. VW also
:04:07. > :04:11.agreed to plead guilty to three criminal charges relating to the
:04:12. > :04:14.scandal. Earlier, I spoke with an auto analyst. I think it is very
:04:15. > :04:18.significant because it obviously indicates that it is not just
:04:19. > :04:22.companies as a whole but individuals within companies that will be held
:04:23. > :04:25.responsible for these kind of activities, I think that is where
:04:26. > :04:29.the government wants to go with it. And what kind of impact do you think
:04:30. > :04:33.will this have on the automotive industry? Well, you know, there are
:04:34. > :04:38.a lot of companies that have faced tough scandals in the past, and I
:04:39. > :04:42.think that there was always a fee to be paid at a fine and some public
:04:43. > :04:47.image damage, but there were never any individuals held accountable. I
:04:48. > :04:50.think every executive knows now that it is not their company only but
:04:51. > :04:54.themselves and everyone underneath them that can be held accountable
:04:55. > :04:57.when something like this happens. I think that is the example the
:04:58. > :05:02.government wants to set this time around. All right, but does this
:05:03. > :05:05.really set the stage for a big lesson for the auto industry with
:05:06. > :05:10.this $4.3 billion fine for Volkswagon? Yes, this is a huge
:05:11. > :05:14.pay-out, it is the biggest one, the biggest removal find that a company
:05:15. > :05:17.has ever had to pay and I feel like it reflects not just, you know, a
:05:18. > :05:21.problem with the company but one that is seen as kind of carefully
:05:22. > :05:24.engineered as opposed to something like a mistake or a failure in a
:05:25. > :05:32.part, but one that was actually designed and engineered in right
:05:33. > :05:39.from the start. What about Volkswagon, will car sales be
:05:40. > :05:43.impacted? The truth is, every other company has come back from larger
:05:44. > :05:47.scandals that have been anything like this, they have always bounced
:05:48. > :05:50.back. Especially if the product is good and you don't see any kind of
:05:51. > :05:54.recurring theme going along these lines, the public doesn't have a
:05:55. > :05:59.very long memory and they don't look back and by the product again. Auto
:06:00. > :06:03.analyst Karl Brauer joining us earlier from Detroit.
:06:04. > :06:07.Well, the US President-elect Donald Trump has held a fiery first press
:06:08. > :06:11.conference where he announced he will hand over control of his
:06:12. > :06:16.business empire to his two sons to avoid any conflict of interest as
:06:17. > :06:20.president. Well, in recent days he has been hitting out at China and
:06:21. > :06:27.Japanese carmaker ToyotaA, but he has also met with the founder of
:06:28. > :06:30.Alibaba, Tony Maher -- Jack Ma, and earlier I asked an analyst if Asian
:06:31. > :06:36.businesses should be concerned about his approach to trade. It's
:06:37. > :06:40.interesting, I was looking at trade data between Singapore, Malaysia,
:06:41. > :06:44.Indonesia and so on, and the US. Trade with those nations and the US
:06:45. > :06:48.has been declining for about six years, OK. The only place in South
:06:49. > :06:53.East Asia where trade has risen with the US is Vietnam. So, you know, it
:06:54. > :06:57.couldn't possibly get any worse than it is right now. So, as you look at
:06:58. > :07:01.the bilateral approach that Trump will take, and his administration
:07:02. > :07:05.will take on the there are expectations that things will
:07:06. > :07:10.improve, so the discussion about a Chinese trade war is fictitious, it
:07:11. > :07:13.is not going to happen. Tony Nash from Complete
:07:14. > :07:18.Intelligence. Each year, thousands of buyers flock
:07:19. > :07:21.to the Hong Kong police air despite an uncertain economic environment.
:07:22. > :07:27.The global toy industry is expected to expand 7% in 2017. This is
:07:28. > :07:33.according to Euromonitor. There is one category that is growing much
:07:34. > :07:36.faster than any of the categories in the toy market, and that is
:07:37. > :07:45.high-tech smart toys. Our correspondent went to take a
:07:46. > :07:51.look. Welcome to Asia's largest toy show,
:07:52. > :07:58.it is full of sights, sounds and of course toys. Some not yet available
:07:59. > :08:04.to the general public. Thousands of buyers, most of wholesalers, here on
:08:05. > :08:08.the hunt for the next blockbuster. Globally, the industry was worth
:08:09. > :08:18.almost $190 billion last year, and likely to expand by 7%. All eyes are
:08:19. > :08:24.on smart toys, still a macro -- niche market, expected to triple in
:08:25. > :08:29.four years. So, this is a great example of what a smart to is, it
:08:30. > :08:34.looks like a traditional plain that for kids but it has got just a
:08:35. > :08:37.little bit of something extra -- play mat for kids. Yes, exactly, so
:08:38. > :08:46.with the device you can scan any animals on the mat and you can teach
:08:47. > :08:51.children how to spell, L-I-O-N. Lion. And then it has this, so the
:08:52. > :08:57.children understand animal sounds. We have been making regular play
:08:58. > :09:00.mats for 13 years but it is tougher to make money, so now with the
:09:01. > :09:04.technology advancing to where it is, we find that we can offer a higher
:09:05. > :09:08.end Rodarte where children can learn from it. So, smart toys are normally
:09:09. > :09:14.embedded with some kind of technology that responds to a
:09:15. > :09:18.device. And increasingly it is not just traditional toymakers who are
:09:19. > :09:25.entering the market. TRANSLATION: We started out making electronic cots
:09:26. > :09:29.mainly for overseas manufacturers but the business isn't big and not
:09:30. > :09:33.growing, so six years ago we found the educational toy industry has
:09:34. > :09:39.good prospects, so that is why we decided to make innovative toys. It
:09:40. > :09:44.is still a relatively small market, but high-tech toys are growing in
:09:45. > :09:54.popularity. Soon it may be commonplace to sing your phone or
:09:55. > :09:57.tablet with a digital toy -- sync your phone or tablet.
:09:58. > :10:02.And, before we go, a look at the market. As you can see, a mixed bag
:10:03. > :10:10.so far for the regional boards, the Nikkei 245 down 1.1% due to the
:10:11. > :10:16.weaker dollar against the Japanese yen, and this is impacting the
:10:17. > :10:22.export companies. As for the All Ordinaries index, with a rise in oil
:10:23. > :10:26.prices of 2.5% overnight, well, that is pushing oil and commodity prices
:10:27. > :10:33.higher, and stocks on the All Ordinaries index gaining about 19.2.
:10:34. > :10:35.Thank you so much for