SYDNEY, July 27--AsiaNet/InfoQuest NZ PUNTERS... SYDNEY: Centrebet's Kiwi punters are betting on Labour'sstudent loans policy being an election winner. The electionbookmaker's odds on Labour providing the prime ministerfollowing the September 17 election have fallen from 1.90(10-11) to 1.83 (5-6) since Helen Clark's policyannouncement. http://www.centrebet.com FINANCIAL RESULTS... NEW YORK: Hudson Highland Group, Inc., one of the world'sleading providers of specialized professional staffing,retained executive search and human capital solutions, hasannounced financial results for the second quarter and sixmonths ended June 30, 2005. http://www.hhgroup.com PHILIPPINES TOURISM... LAS VEGAS: WoW! Technologies, Inc. a privately held providerof pre-paid, PIN-activated debit cards, has signed a Memorandumof Agreement with the Philippine Department of Tourism for thejoint promotion of the Philippines as a prime touristdestination in Asia. http://www.wowcardservices.com ADDITIONAL FINANCING... MOUNTAIN VIEW: PeerMe, Inc., a peer-to-peer communicationstechnology company enabling secure internet communications, hasannounced that it has secured an additional $1.5 million in newfinancing from Japanese and North American angel investors. http://www.PeerMe.com SAMOA RUGBY... BOSTON: PUMA has announced the signing of the Samoa RugbyUnion National Team,Manu Samoa. Starting October 15, 2005, PUMAwill be the official supplier to all the teams associated withthe Samoa Rugby Union. http://www.puma.com HEDGE FUNDS... NEW YORK: Which brokerage firms do hedge funds believeprovide the best Asian equity research? To find out, Alpharetabulated the results of Institutional Investor's 2005All-Asia Research Team, counting only those votes cast by hedgefund managers. The voting, by representatives of funds with anestimated aggregate gross exposure to Asian equities of almost$55 billion, turned up winners in 17 of the 29 industry,country and macro research categories in the complete All-AsiaResearch Team. http://www.institutionalinvestor.com/alpha FICOSA ACQUIRES... BARCELONA: Ficosa International, a multinational automotivesystems and components company, and Fractus, the pioneerdeveloper of fractal antenna technology, have negotiated anagreement in which Ficosa has become sole proprietor ofAdvanced Automotive Antennas (A3), a joint venture companycreated by Ficosa and Fractus in 2002 to develop fractal-basedantennas for the automotive sector. http://www.fractus.com http://www.ficosa.com FLO FORUM... FREMONT: The FLO Forum, a non-profit industry associationwith its members, has announced the creation of the FLO Forum,an organization composed of wireless industry leaders that willwork together in order to promote the development of productsand services related to the delivery of advanced multimediaservices to wireless devices around the world using FLO(Forward Link Only) technology. www.floforum.org OFFICIAL PARTNER... NEW BRUNSWICK: Johnson & Johnson has announced that theCompany and its subsidiaries have made a multi-nationalcommitment to the Olympic Movement and have become an OfficialPartner of the Beijing 2008 Olympic and Paralympic Games, theOfficial Health Care Products Sponsor of the Torino 2006Olympic Winter Games, and the Official Health Care ProductsPartner of the United States Olympic Committee. F1 AGREEMENT... SINGAPORE: ESPN STAR Sports, Asia's number one sportsbroadcaster has once again captured pole position winning afive-year deal to broadcast the FIA Formula OneTM (F1) WorldChampionships across all its major territories in Asiaexcluding China, in addition to full and exclusive TV rightsfor India. S.KOREA'S RATINGS... HONG KONG: Fitch Ratings, the international rating agency,has affirmed South Korea's Long-term foreign and local currencyratings at 'A' and 'AA-' (AA minus), respectively and theShort-term rating at 'F1'. The Country Ceiling was alsoaffirmed at 'A+'. The Outlook on the ratings is Stable. www.fitchratings.com (AsiaNet is a consortium of leading news agencies distributing unedited, translated news releases for worldwide clients. Visit www.asianetnews.net for full-text versions.)