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Kony, a provider of enterprise mobility solutions, plans to launch a new Next Generation Digital Banking solutions for better omnichannel experience.
The new suite of digital banking applications, which will be released starting in Spring of 2018, will include digital banking apps for retail banking, business banking, loans, new account onboarding and digital wallet.
The new platform will offer faster time-to-market, complete control over the banks’ own apps, and delivers differentiated experiences based on innovative digital technologies such as biometric authentication, chatbots and augmented reality, claims Kony.
The platform will also deliver mobile and web experiences without limitations from a single code base, resulting in faster delivery and easier maintenance.
The point-and-click tools of the platform enable business users to extend apps, along with continuous integration, delivery, and automated testing capabilities to accelerate deployment cycles for IT.
It also features an open banking architecture with pre-built, third-party integrations, reducing the time and effort associated with integrating with back-end systems and third-party services.
In addition, Kony also plans to introduce the Digital Banking Marketplace, which will include an ecosystem of partner services and components to accelerate app development.
Kony chairman and CEO Thomas Hogan said: “The new Kony Digital Banking Platform, combined with our growing portfolio of banking applications, and our strategic partnership with Diebold Nixdorf, will enable us to achieve our vision to facilitate banking anytime, anywhere, and through any channel – both physical and digital.”


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- The oil-to-telecom conglomerate of Billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries was ranked second-biggest brand after Apple on the FutureBrand Index 2020.
The oil-to-telecom conglomerate of Billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries was ranked second-biggest brand after Apple on the FutureBrand Index 2020. “Reliance Industries excels on every attribute this year’s highest entrant at number two,” said FutureBrand, releasing its 2020 Ranking.
One of India’s most profitable companies, Reliance, it said, is “very well known” and “seen as ethically behaving” as well as being synonymous with “growth,” “innovative goods” and “great customer service.” “People particularly have a deep emotional link to the organization.”
FutureBrand, a global brand transformation firm, said part of the success of Reliance could be due to the recasting of the firm by Mukesh Ambani as a one-stop-shop for Indians. “Building on the existing petrochemical company, the chairman transformed it into a digital behemoth built to meet every customer need.
“Today, this company is active in various sectors including oil, petrochemicals, textiles, natural resources, retail, and telecommunications. Now that the firm is taking equity stakes from Google and Facebook, we may see Reliance jostling in the next index for the top spot, “it said.
Six years on from the first FutureBrand Index, FutureBrand said the environment has changed drastically, priorities have shifted and the world’s top 100 businesses are facing unprecedented obstacles, also 12 months ago.
“The FutureBrand Index is a global perception study that reorders the perception strength rather than financial strength of PwC ‘s Global Top 100 Companies by Market Cap,” it said. “While the FutureBrand Index 2020 has revealed several seismic shifts in how businesses work and how they present themselves to the outside world, one key theme has emerged: individualism.”
Apple tops the 2020 list, Samsung sixth, followed by Nvidia, Moutai, Nike, Microsoft, ASML, PayPal, and Netflix.
“A host of new entrants to our List include ASML Holdings, PayPal, Danaher, Saudi Aramco, and American Tower Corporation. In all, this year there are 15 new entrants, seven of which make it the top 20, including Reliance Industries slotting in number two,” she said.
The FutureBrand Index is not focused on interviews with customers. Unlike several other rankings, the Index offers a detailed overview of how influential companies are performing, and are expected to do so in the coming years. “We are living in extraordinary times,” it said, noting that the world is going through a century’s worst health-care crisis.

domain: news


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On Monday, Kroger pharmacies officials announced that their stores will start selling naloxone without a prescription throughout West Virginia.
The Kroger company is a retailing company. Founded in 1883, it is based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Kroger is one of the largest supermarket chains and retailers. It also one of the United States’ biggest companies.
Kroger’s operates in various sectors. It has multi-department stores and supermarkets. The former includes a food and drug stores combination. Their brand names vary according to state.
In West Virginia, they are known as Kroger pharmacies. And they will now be introducing a new feature. The change was announced on January 30. It was released by the company’s Mid-Atlantic Division officials.
West Virginia-based Kroger pharmacies will start selling naloxone without a prescription. This feature is already being used in the chain’s Kentucky and Ohio stores. These have been offering prescription free naloxone for almost a year. The change was introduced in early 2016.
Now, Kroger’s will be expanding this same service to West Virginia. The prescription free drug should be available in all of their stores. There are 34 Kroger pharmacies spread throughout the state.
Back in 2016, West Virginia adopted a new law. Its Legislature started allowing pharmacies to dispense prescription free naloxone. Since then, several pharmacy chains have already adopted the measure. Kroger pharmacies will just be the latest.
CVS, Walgreens, and Fruth Pharmacy are already offering such a service. And they just some examples from the list.
Michele Fountain offered some details. She is the Kroger’s Mid-Atlantic Division pharmacy clinical sales manager. According to Fountain, Kroger pharmacies will start offering a life-saving tool. This will start being available for anyone that may need it.
Fountain pointed out naloxone’s various uses. It could be a preventive measure for people affected by a chronic opioid pain management. This can develop based on various previous health issues. Injuries or cancer pains are amongst the more common.
Company officials stated that the Kroger pharmacists received an additional training. They were also offered extra guidance. As such, they should now be better prepared to dispense the medicine.
Prescription free naloxone pharmacies will still have some regulations. Pharmacists will still have to fill a request. This will be the same as filling a prescription. And they will still have to provide customer information. These latter will be offered medicine details and treatment options. They may be offered a device training.
Kroger pharmacies officials also pointed out the following. Customers should not waive away these consultations. The information offered by the pharmacists will benefit them. According to a coordinator, purchasing naloxone has an educational component.
This latter targets two main points. One is how to properly recognize and define overdose signals and signs. The other is the proper product administration procedure.
The educational component is also a law requirement. West Virginia laws called for the development of such a program. This had to include educational materials, documentation, and patient counseling.
Naloxone will be a prescription-free drug. At the Kroeger pharmacies, it will still be behind the counter. Those wishing to purchase the medicine will go through a slightly longer process. It will be somewhat longer than a routine prescription.
But the educational part is both required and should also be helpful. Naloxone is an easy-to-use, safe variant against possible overdoses. However, it does not substitute emergency care.
Image Source: Flickr


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After ruling its plans last week of bringing the OPPO F3 FCB Limited Edition, OPPO Camera Phone has announced an exclusive Barcelona official gift pack to every FCB F3 sold starting from 1st September 2017, the official selling date of the device.
The selfie focused OPPO F3, aka Selfie Expert, was launched in the first quarter of the year to rave reviews and acclaim. Now the mobile giant is taking up several notches with the introduction of the F3 Barcelona Limited Edition, a customized with group selfie features, attractive appearance in red, topping it all off, with the club’s 18K Gold insignia features on the body of the phone, while the user interface is themed in FC Barcelona’s bold and fashionable colours which will be distributed across the country in limited units.
OPPO Brand director, Mr. Jesse Wu said, “OPPO is a leading international camera phone brand known for its exquisite product design and state of art camera technology. The partnership between OPPO and Barcelona football club is not only because of their status as an iconic football club, but because they represent the art of football.’’
OPPO has comfortably positioned itself as a force to be reckoned with, not just in terms of brand penetration and market sustenancein Kenya, but also in terms of its quality, use of high-end tech, the input of advanced features, and some of the most innovative designs in the mobile phone industry globally. And with the brand’s partnership with the Barcelona Football Club and launch of the limited F3, the brand is strategically expanding beyond Africa into the global mobile market.
Retailing at 39,990 Ksh, the limited sets are now available at authorized outlets.


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SINGAPORE – Sypher Labs today announced that it has raised S$589,000 in seed funding, led by Get2Volume with co-funding from Singapore’s National Research Foundation (NRF), under its Technology Incubation Scheme. This investment will be used to scale up Sypher Labs’ logistics operations system and expansion into the South East Asia market. The company’s flagship solution is VersaFleetTM, a cloud-hosted one-stop portal, designed to help fleet operators effectively manage their operations.
Shamir Rahim, CEO & Founder of Sypher Labs, said: “Logistics is an evergreen industry, but it is having trouble coping with the boom of e-commerce, resulting in a bottle-neck in the flow of goods from one point to another. VersaFleetTM aims to solve this problem, in a simple, user-friendly and cost-efficient manner. Today’s investment from Get2Volume and NRF is crucial for VersaFleet’s next phase of development, which will include advanced logistics business analytics, electronic proof-of- delivery, and integration with a wider range of in-vehicle on-board sensors.”
Through VersaFleetTM, logistics operators can effectively modernise how they manage their fleet, using a cloud-based central operations portal. VersaFleetTM provides a full-suite of operations management, including managing job orders electronically, 24/7 real-time tracking of vehicles via GPS systems, and automatic billing and invoicing upon job completion. It is easily scalable and can be integrated with other systems, such as warehouse management, parcel tracking or Electronic Data Interchange systems. It also uses encrypted cloud databases, ensuring data is secure.
“There are currently some 30,000 logistics companies in Singapore and Malaysia alone, with an estimated 70% resorting to traditional ways of managing their fleet, such as manually generating bills and invoices, or even using whiteboards and paper. By leveraging upon VersaFleetTM, fleet operators can automatically generate and capture a huge amount of logistics operations data that has largely been done offline or limited to larger players in the logistics industry. This will allow them to improve their efficiency significantly, providing a better service to their clients,” said Jan Donyada, who heads business development at Sypher Labs.
“The Internet of Things is a significant opportunity and one of the largest segments is asset and fleet tracking. Sypher Labs has a great solution to improve the efficiency of logistics companies with its IOT asset management solutions,” said Mike Holt, CEO Get2Volume. “We are excited to be a part of Sypher Labs’ next phase of growth”.
Sypher Labs’ entrepreneurial journey
Sypher Labs was founded by Shamir Rahim in 2012, who currently heads the team of four. His interest in entrepreneurship began when he embarked upon the NUS Overseas Colleges (NOC) program in 2006 and interned for a year in a Philadelphia-based VC firm. In 2012, Sypher Labs received the ACE Startups Grant, a grant for first-time entrepreneurs to support their innovative business idea. It was also supported by NUS Enterprise, beginning operations at the NUS Enterprise Incubator and benefiting from mentorship assistance and access to shared resources. Sypher Labs participated in IDA’s iSTART@Indonesia Programme in 2013 and will be at TechCrunch Disrupt at San Francisco in Sep 2014. Sypher Labs currently services clients in Singapore and Malaysia, and intends to expand to Indonesia and Thailand by 2015.


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Price cuts have been brought in on fuel by the big four supermarket groups.
On Monday August 1 Asda said it was cutting the price of unleaded petrol and diesel by 2ppl with its new price cap of 105.7ppl on unleaded petrol and 106.7ppl on diesel, and this was matched by Morrisons.
Andy Peake, Asda’s senior director for petrol, said: “It’s the start of the summer holidays and we know families will be getting out and about all across the country which is why we’re dropping the price of fuel.
“At Asda we always pass on any savings we can make to our customers, so it’s great to see that costs have dropped despite early predictions that the cost of fuel would increase following the outcome of the EU Referendum.”
Tesco reduced its prices by 2ppl from 5pm on August 1 and Sainsbury’s introduced the same cut on August 2.
Commenting on the cuts RAC fuel spokesman Simon Williams said: “We wonder how long motorists would have had to wait for a decent forecourt cut had the RAC not drawn attention to the fact that wholesale fuel costs had reduced substantially in the last month.
“This price cut takes us back to a supermarket price that was last seen in early May.”


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Capital Press reveals that Washington legislators tucked $100,000 to market hemp and license farmers and processors into a new state budget passed March 8. The amount is less than half the $287,000 department requested, but ensures Washington remains among the states trying to build a hemp industry.
The department is discussing exactly what it can do with the money and has not set a timetable for issuing and renewing licenses, an agency spokesman said Tuesday.
The state’s hemp program, a necessity to stay within federal law, has been on hold since late last year. The agriculture department said it couldn’t continue overseeing hemp unless lawmakers appropriated funds to augment license fees.
Bonnie Jo Peterson, founder of the Industrial Hemp Association of Washington, said that she found lawmakers still backed hemp.
“Across the board, the reception was positive,” she said. “On both sides of the aisle and both sides of the mountains, there is support of hemp.”
Cory Sharp, who cultivated about half the 180 acres of hemp grown in Washington last year, said Tuesday that he will forgo planting this year. He said his company, HempLogic, was too busy developing a mobile hemp processor in partnership with a Colorado equipment maker. He said he has plans to take the decorticator to about 20 states.
A license to grow hemp in Washington costs $750, including an application fee. Oregon has a grower registration fee of $1,300.
Peterson also said Washington could make hemp more attractive by allowing the production of cannabinoid, commonly known as CBD, an oil marketed as a nutritional supplement. CBD is widely available, though the Drug Enforcement Administration maintains it is illegal.
The department issued seven one-year licenses to grow or process hemp before suspending the program. Two licenses went to Washington State University researchers and two went to tribes. The department reported collecting $8,139 from license holders, while spending $146,000 on oversight.


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Spotify does not just want more podcast listeners. It also wants more podcast advertising. So in an effort to grow its ad revenue Spotify has refocused and rebranded its Spotify for Brands division as Spotify Advertising. The Wall Street Journal says the move is geared toward bringing more small and mid-sized advertisers onboard. It is pitching ad packages that start at as little as $250.
Dawn Ostroff, Spotify’s Chief Content and Advertising Business Officer, said the aim is to pull dollars away from other big digital companies that have banked billions by working with scores of small and local businesses. “Our goal is to start to really compete with Snap and Twitter and deliver on the expectations advertisers have, including small businesses,” Ostoff told the Journal.
Spotify reported its ad revenue totaled $325 million during the second quarter, a 110% increase compared to a year ago. It was also up 28% from the $255 million in ad revenue logged during the first quarter. Spotify does not release podcast-specific revenue, but it said revenue from podcasts soared 627% compared to a year ago, driven largely by the acquisition of Megaphone last year.
Yet CEO Daniel Ek also conceded advertising was an area of the business where, in the past, he has not spent much time, but that has changed. “It’s becoming impossible to ignore. It’s now safe to say it’s becoming a second big revenue driver for Spotify,” he said during a July conference call with analysts.
To raise the profile of Spotify advertising, the company is launching its first branding campaign targeting marketers. The ads will run in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Australia, Spain and New Zealand both on Spotify and in other media. The streamer worked with the ad agency FCB New York to create the campaign that looks like this –
Executives tell the Journal that Spotify is also working to bring more podcast publishers into its advertising marketplace, including independent creators, in a concession that the reach of its ad inventory is too narrow.
The Spotify Audience Network, which the company launched in the U.S. in April, is said to be helping. It allows marketers to buy advertising to connect with listeners across a broad range of content on- and off-Spotify, including Spotify Originals & exclusives and content from third-party Megaphone publishers. Spotify says it has allowed it to increase its monetizable podcast inventory in the U.S. by nearly three-times. Podcast publishers that have opted-into the network have seen a double-digit increase in fill rates, an increase in unique advertisers, and a double-digit lift in CPMs, according to Spotify.
Based on that success, Spotify expanded the Spotify Audience Network to Australia, Canada, and the U.K. this summer.


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- Kam @ Addify
- 283 views
The car manufacturer BMW has just opened a centre dedicated to additive manufacturing: the Additive Manufacturing Campus in Oberschleissheim, north of Munich. Announced in 2019, this opening should enable the German group to accelerate the adoption of additive manufacturing in its activities, both for prototypes and series production. Having benefited from an investment of €15 million, the centre will also focus on research into new 3D printing technologies and associated training for the global roll-out of tool-less production. In this way, the group hopes to become a leader in 3D printing technologies in the automotive sector.
BMW has been focusing on additive manufacturing for more than 25 years, with very promising results, claiming to have 3D printed more than one million parts by the end of 2018. In fact, a number of projects including 3D printed parts, such as the BMW i8 Roadster, are worth mentioning. Milan Nedeljković, member of the BMW AG Board of Directors and responsible for production, explains: “Additive manufacturing is already an integral part of our global production system today, and is established in our digitisation strategy. In the future, new technologies of this kind will further reduce production times and enable us to exploit the potential of tool-free manufacturing even more fully“.
In addition to production and rapid prototyping, a unit at the BMW centre will be dedicated to research and optimisation of new materials, technologies and processes: the aim of the German group is to automate the additive manufacturing process as much as possible in order to make it even more viable and economical in the long term. To this end, it has begun the Industrialisation and Digitisation of Additive Manufacturing for Automotive Series Production (IDAM) project, which consists of reproducing the entire production chain, from the preparation of digital production to the manufacture and reprocessing of components. Production is expected to reach at least 50,000 series components per year, with more than 10,000 individual and spare parts.
For full official press release by BMW CLICK HERE


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Allurion Technologies Unveils Transformed Allurion™ Weight Loss Program and New Corporate Brand
Allurion Technologies announced today two major milestones with the launch of the transformed Allurion Weight Loss Program and new worldwide brand for the company and its program.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210706005001/en/
Allurion began commercial sales of its flagship Elipse® Gastric Balloon in 2016. Over the past five years, the company has treated over 50,000 patients across 40 countries. In that time, the company’s weight loss solution has evolved from a single device to a comprehensive program that combines medical, digital, and nutritional approaches to jumpstart weight loss and form lifelong healthy habits.
The new Allurion Program unveiled today features:
- The Allurion® Balloon, rebranded to reflect its synergistic role with other features in the program
- The Allurion® Virtual Care Suite, enabling end-to-end patient management through the Allurion Health Tracker, Connected Scale, and App
- Allurion Insights, offering providers real-time patient analytics and telehealth features
The Allurion Balloon is the world’s first and only procedureless™ medical device for weight loss that leads to 10-15% total body weight loss in approximately 16 weeks. Over 50,000 patients have been treated with the Allurion Balloon, and its re-branding not only reflects its role within the Allurion Program but also device improvements that have been made to optimize the patient and provider experience.
The Allurion Balloon works hand-in-hand with the Allurion ® Virtual Care Suite. The Virtual Care Suite includes tools for the patient and the provider to have a 360-degree weight loss experience designed to deliver lifelong results. The patient receives the Allurion Health Tracker, Connected Scale, and App to track, monitor and support their progress while providing real-time data to their healthcare team. Allurion Insights seamlessly integrates this data with the provider and facilitates end-to-end patient management by providing real-time patient analytics and telehealth features.
The new branding launched today includes new messaging, identity, logos, and other design elements that have been incorporated across all products to deliver a consistent and unified experience to patients and providers around the globe.
“The launch of our transformed Allurion Program and our new branding is the culmination of an initiative we began over a year ago to reimagine the future of weight loss and evolve from a company that offers a product to one that offers a revolutionary experience that delivers lifelong results,” said Shantanu Gaur, M.D., co-founder and CEO of Allurion Technologies. “We worked closely with our patients and providers to develop an experience that meets their needs, and we look forward to seeing the positive impact it will have on patient outcomes around the world.”
About Allurion Technologies
Allurion Technologies is dedicated to ending obesity. The Allurion Program is a 360-degree weight loss experience featuring the Allurion Balloon, the world’s first and only swallowable, procedureless gastric balloon for weight loss, the Allurion Virtual Care Suite including the Allurion Connected Scale, Health Tracker, and App, and Allurion Insights. Learn more about Allurion online at www.allurion.com. Allurion is a trademark of Allurion Technologies, Inc. in the United States and countries around the world.
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Russia, China and some other countries have withdrawn a draft proposal at the World Conference on International Telecommunications, that according to some accounts aimed to bring the Internet under the control of the International Telecommunication U...
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Change in any industry involves conflict. Evolution and revolution in tech this year took place not only in the marketplace but also in the courtroom, the factory, and on the Web. Here are the top news stories of 2012 as selected by the editors of th...
Many mobile apps aimed at children collect and share personal data without notifying parents, potentially violating U.S. law, the Federal Trade Commission said in a report released Monday.
Cisco Systems plans to expand its services business over the next several years, seeing a more important role for itself in a world of connected machines and devices.
Chinese networking vendors Huawei Technologies and ZTE are competing unfairly in the European mobile infrastructure market, according to an analysis being circulated by the European Commission, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
The four largest mobile carriers in the U.S. -- AT&T, Verizon, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile -- have agreed to accelerate the availability of emergency texting, or text-to-911.
How "public" are public Facebook posts?
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- FTStudio Design ManagerVIC
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- FTAccount ExecutiveNSW
- FTMarketing Solutions ManagerNSW
- FTProgram Manager - Integration & SolutionsNSW
- CCTech Support | IT Services Firm - Ad hoc Projects - Port Augusta / Whyalla AreaSA


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Not the best news out of Tokyo: Less than a month after the Shangri-La Tokyo opened, it will now close down until the end of April due to the Japan earthquake.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the hotel's general manager, Wolfgang Krueger, and about 11 other people from the hotel are now working out of Fukuoka, in southern Japan. "This is not a decision we have made lightly," said Maria Kuhn, a spokesperson for the hotel. "As soon as we feel it is safe and we can run the hotel at our normal standards, we will open again."
Here is the official statement fromt he hotel's website:
Following the natural disasters in Japan on 11 March 2011 and the resulting logistical difficulties and hazards Shangri-La Hotel, Tokyo will not be accepting any new guests until further notice. Bookings will resume as soon as the energy supply and normal hotel operation can and has been restored.
Other luxury hotels in Tokyo have also been affected. Here is the statement from The Mandarin Oriental:
Following the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan on March 11, Mandarin Oriental, Tokyo has provided a safe and fully intact environment for guests and employees. The hotel has been able to keep most of its facilities operational, including guest rooms, the spa and fitness centre, as well as the all day dining restaurant and lounge.
In light of the stabilization of the city's power supply and product supply chain, Mandarin Oriental, Tokyo will re-open all temporarily closed hotel facilities effective Saturday, March 26. The hotel will also continue to implement a variety of appropriate measures to support the government's directive to conserve energy.


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Fourth Annual VeganFest Slated for June 8-10
May 31, 2018 10:10AM
Also, workshops are set for Friday and panel discussions on Saturday. On Sunday, the festival goes outdoors to Pack Square Park with 100-plus vendors showcasing vegan food, beer, lifestyle products and more. There’ll also be live evening music at the legendary music hall.
The free festival is hosted by the largest state no-kill animal rescue organization, Brother Wolf Animal Rescue, with its new Asheville Vegan Outreach campaign. More than 10,000 attendees are expected, providing many connections with many vegans, activists and others interested in living a more compassionate and environmentally friendly lifestyle.
Locations: June 8-9: The Orange Peel, 101Biltmore Ave. June 10, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., Farmers Market /Vendor Festival, Pack Square Park, 80 Court Plaza. Visit VeganFest.BWAR.org for schedule and parking information. Dogs not allowed; backpacks and coolers not allowed in event spaces.


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We’d like to offer a toast to Missouri’s wine industry, which recently had a grape harvest estimated at 20% to 25% higher than anticipated.
That’s great news for a Show-Me State industry that adds $3.2 billion to the economy.
That’s a reflection of the industry’s successes, from the vineyards to the bottling and retailing. More and more, Missouri is gaining a reputation as having products that are among the best in the nation.
In a Nov. 6 Washington Post story by Dave McIntyre, the author wrote: “Missouri is best known for bold, spicy reds made from norton, but I’m drawn to the wildly flowery-yet-dry wines made with vignoles, a hybrid white grape. Some wineries also work with chardonel, another white hybrid that makes a nice, full-bodied wine. A little history: Missouri’s Augusta region, west of St. Louis, was the first in the nation to become an official AVA, in 1980. Stone Hill for norton and Augusta Winery and Montelle Winery for vignoles are standouts. An insider tip has me hoping to visit Les Bourgeois Vineyards as an emerging star.”
As Missouri Agriculture Director Chris Chinn said in a recent column, Missouri has a rich history in winemaking, with wineries almost as old as the state.
Since the 1840s, she said, Missouri wineries have been producing award-winning wines. Today, it has more than 125 wineries “and is proud to have norton as its official state grape, which makes an excellent dry red wine.”
The wine industry supports more than 28,000 jobs, she said, adding: “As grape harvest in Missouri wraps up, it’s an excellent time to recognize the hard work being done year-round by the Missouri Wine and Grape Board to serve and promote our wineries. That mission is carried out by a team of dedicated people who are housed within the Missouri Department of Agriculture.”
We congratulate everyone involved in our state’s success in the wine industry. We also encourage mid-Missourians to visit our wineries — often set in beautiful vistas where you can see the vines that produce the wines you’re drinking.
This was originally published by the Jefferson City News Tribune and is reprinted with permission.


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Last orders for England's pubs?
The Castle pub in the Leicestershire town of Hinckley must have been a rather splendid establishment in its day.
Anyone heading into the town centre would have been attracted by its ornate gatework and alluring entrance.
Sadly, the corner pub is now boarded up and getting derelict day by day.
Over the last four years 5,800 pubs - like the Castle - have closed down. Last year alone, pubs were shutting at a rate of 18 a week. That's according to Camra, the beer drinkers' consumer group.
At the nearby New Plough, I met some real ale campaigners. They want to preserve their local and the thousands of other pubs threatened with closure.
"To be able to buy drink from the supermarket is great," one of the New Plough regulars, Elizabeth Lewin told me.
"But on the other hand, I like to come out, socialise and meet up with people. That's what you get in the pub."
Since the start of the recession, pub beer sales in the Midlands are down by a third, according to the British Beer and Pub Association.
So is cost the main reason? The average price of a pint in the most parts of the Midlands is between £3 and £3.50.
Tax has increased by 40% since 2008, when Gordon Brown introduced a 2% above inflation annual rise. The so-called beer escalator now means 30% of what you pay goes direct to the government.
A housing estate just outside Hinckley illustrates another growing trend.
The area used to have a local pub. Some thought the beer at the Galaxy was out of this world, but not enough it seems.
It closed down last year and is now a Co-op supermarket.
Local Lib Dem councillor David Inman led a campaign and organised petitions to block a supermarket sweep of so many pubs.
"The pub owners told me they no longer required the premises and simply allowed a supermarket to move in," said Mr Inman.
"There was no need for planning permission and they didn't take into account the wishes of the local people."
In the last two years alone, 200 former pubs have been converted into convenience stores.
It's one of the issues that's prompted MPs to debate the future of the pub industry.
"Britain's pubs are economically vital," Labour's Shadow Business minister Toby Perkins told the Commons.
"Last year, beer and pubs contributed £21bn to the UK's GDP."
Now the government's proposing to introduce an industry adjudicator to referee between the six big pub companies, their tenants and the consumer wanting a wider range of beers.
"We want to introduce a relationship that is market based," said the Business Secretary Vince Cable.
"We want genuine competition and a real choice for people entering the industry."
But will that be enough?
"We accept that pubs will close," David Finn of Camra said.
"But the situation is not helped when legislation is against us and beer prices are rising above inflation.
"Let's freeze duty and legislate, so pubs cannot be demolished or changed for retail use without permission."
Tax, rising prices and supermarkets: for England's traditional pubs, the pressure is on.


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Soft robots composed of flexible materials have the potential to carry out tasks that require a high level of dexterity and flexible range of motion. But their increased flexibility compared to rigid-body robots demands a much more involved sensor system to accurately detect their location in the environment and track complex movements.
Researchers have looked for ways to improve soft robotic sensor systems but many of those methods have limitations, ranging from cost of sensor materials to complexity of data processing and delayed response times. In a new paper published in Electronics, Baskin Engineering researchers present a novel, cost-effective soft robotic sensor system that can efficiently detect and control movement of soft robotic devices.
“The aim for soft robotics is to build something that moves more like an octopus or squid and less like a crab. If we can install and operate a robust sensor system for soft robotic devices, we can greatly improve the mechanical performance of these robots and further develop this relatively new field for many different applications,” said Michael Wehner, senior author on the paper and visiting assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the UC Santa Cruz Baskin School of Engineering and assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
In the article, Wehner and his coauthors—Keng-yu Lin, electrical and computer engineering Ph.D. student, and Arturo Gamboa-Gonzalez, robotics engineering undergraduate student—highlight how their system improves processing time and provides a simplified and cheaper method for soft robotic device sensing and control.
Existing soft sensor systems require every point on the surface of a soft robot to have an electronic sensor in order to detect state awareness and movement. A soft robotic arm, for example, needs a myriad of sensors just to detect simple changes like bending, twisting, and moving up and down. The need for one sensor per dedicated data acquisition channel to pick up changes in the robotic environment results in hundreds of electrical circuits. As the number of sensors increases, so does the complexity of data acquisition and computation.
“Keng-yu and Arturo came up with a clever yet simple way to capture changes from multiple channels at the same time,” said Wehner.
The “clever” method removes the need for hundreds of electrical circuits and immense computer processing power and instead uses far fewer, much cheaper, and less complicated parts to detect changes in the soft robotic device’s environment. The developed system is a network of just nine fiber-based cable sensors and two microfluidic transmission sensors capable of detecting pressure, elongation, bending, and twisting. To record movement and contact forces in real-time from various states in the soft robot’s environment, the system deploys a low-cost, small USB camera.
The camera, which has wireless and bluetooth capabilities, connects to an external computer system that then controls the response of the soft robotic device, also known as an actuator. This new sensor array acts as a multi-channel data acquisition system that is more reliable and efficient and requires significantly less computation than standard soft robotic sensors.
“Our sensor is a simpler, cheaper, and safer solution to standard soft sensors, and a major benefit is the response time,” said Lin, who went on to explain how their system immediately responds to changes while standard soft robotic sensors often experience delayed responses.
In addition to publishing their findings, the researchers have filed a provisional patent with the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The team is most interested in deploying their system in wearable devices for people with limited mobility. In the short term, they hope to connect their sensors to an actuator such as a wearable soft robotic glove that would enable a person with limited hand mobility to grasp, move, and let go of objects, eliminating the need for assistance to do everyday tasks.
A long term goal for the researchers is to build an entire soft robotic system from the ground up. In addition to wearable devices, other future soft robotic applications include assisting with complex surgery, search and rescue operations, and warehouse order fulfillment.


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How Gaming can Help People Discover New Music William Morris, head of gaming at Red Light Management comments on gaming's place in music discovery and why the gaming industry's future growth is dependent on China and India's middle class.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
You're reading Entrepreneur Asia Pacific, an international franchise of Entrepreneur Media.
The growth in the video game market has been nothing less than astounding. In 2018, the global video game industry generated a record $138 billion in revenue, with territories like China, India and the U.S. showing double-digit revenue growth, according to the consulting firm NewZoo. What's even more impressive is that this growth in the category is likely just the tip of the iceberg.
In 2019, Pew Research estimated that there are now more than 5 billion people globally that have smartphones, and as the Internet and 5G are further introduced in Eastern territories like China and India, there will be millions of more people who will be able to leverage smartphones and the Internet to tap into the global gaming ecosystem.
As video games have become a critical part of the global media landscape, both brands and music artists are asking very similar questions around the best strategies to tap into the gaming community. This is where William Morris, head of gaming at Red Light Management, comes in. With over 10 years of gaming and e-sport experience, Morris has been a pioneer in bringing together brands, video games and music to territories all across the world. His early entrance into the gaming industry positioned him to broker some of the most important deals in gaming with brands like Twitch and artists including MurdaBeatz, Zedd and more.
I got a chance to sit with Morris in his Los Angeles office where we talked about his first experiences in entertainment and why he and his team are betting big on Eastern growth in smartphones to drive the gaming industry to new heights.
Walk us through your first experience in the gaming world. How did you recognize so early in the age of Esports and online gaming that this was going to be a space that the music industry and brands alike needed to tap into?
I had some very close friends of mine introduce me to Twitch during its conception and immediately saw how the younger generations were interacting on this platform. It really sparked my interest and made me think of the realm of possibilities behind bridging the world of music into a live stream, interactive platform that was all about gaming.
Around the same time, I met the founders of Esports Arena in Orange County and heard about the many events they were putting on and how they wanted to throw an after-party type of series. We eventually partnered to launch a gaming/lifestyle vertical to support a business model we called "EMX" (Esports Music Experience), which brought together entertainment and music to celebrate Esports. This was also the first time where I saw the impact we could make culturally by plugging in music into a brand new ecosystem and community. For reference, our first couple of live-streamed events to the Smash community drew 150,000 viewers on the first couple of events, which at the time was unprecedented.
Before Marshmello did his deal with Fortnite, you were a part of Deadmau5's team, where you ran his gaming partnerships and brokered some of the earliest music gaming activations with brands like E3 to Twitch Prime. Walk us through how those deals with Deadmau5 came to be and the impact they had on your perspective of the gaming landscape.
We had the opportunity to really start building a vehicle to help drive Joel's (Deadmau5) passion between music and gaming through a partnership with Twitch Prime. While building Twitch Prime's Prime Day with Deadmau5 as a strategic partner, we ended up developing in-game skins for PUBG – Joel's favorite game at the time– which helped tell an organic story to his fans and the PUBG Community. We also ended up allowing fans to grab these for a limited time during Prime Day if you were a Prime member.
At the same time, Deadmau5 was releasing a series of new music called Mau5ville which we plugged into Twitch Prime Day commercials and segments of the livestream. This was all followed up by him performing a 45-minute live show to close out Prime Day, all while live streaming to hundreds of thousands of concurrent viewers.
By injecting Deadmau5 into these gaming activations, we saw tangible growth in his fanbase and the consumption of his music. This really set the groundwork for how I approach deals in the gaming space moving forward.
Speaking of Marshmello, after he did his deal with Fortnite, it seems like every artist is now looking to get into the gaming space: Post Malone, Major Lazer, etc. What in your mind allows an artist to successfully enter the gaming world, especially when it seems like the gamers themselves can sniff out inauthentic partnerships in a heartbeat?
I think generally speaking, like anything, you have to be authentic to the gaming space. Marshmello, Post, and all these artists have a huge passion for gaming since many if not all grew up in the era of Nintendo, Sega and PlayStation.
With platforms like Twitch, it's an opportunity to give artists and brands a new digital touchpoint while creating a vehicle to help drive initiatives around music releases. Moreover, and perhaps most importantly, it gives brands and artists an opportunity to connect with fans in new foreign and domestic markets. It's an incredibly exciting time for any artist or young kid to get into gaming.
I will say, artists like Deadmau5, Marshmello and Post have certainly helped pave a path when it comes to music and gaming, but at the end of the day though, it's still about being organic and authentic to the community because gamers will sniff you out very quickly.
The Asia-Pacific region is now the world's highest-spending app market, ahead of North and South America. For instance, it was reported that by 2021, the Asia-Pacific region will be home to 250 million mobile gamers and bring in $2.4 billion in revenue. What is your take on the importance of this region in the gaming world, and how can artists, labels, managers and brands successfully navigate it and tap into this exponential growth?
I think it's incredibly important. The Asia-Pacific region was home to e-sports well before North America, and the reach in that region is arguably the biggest in the world. With that said, these regions have multiple live streaming platforms, some with huge territorial control over users. That is why one must have institutional knowledge of the culture and the gaming market for this territory to work for an artist rather than against them. If done right, there is no doubt that the next global superstars could build their fanbase through gaming in these high growth music and entertainment markets.
What are trends you are watching in the gaming ecosystem right now that labels, managers, and brands should be aware of?
I think a huge question people in the industry are asking is how the younger generation is discovering music.
If you take a quick poll yourself, you'd find that one of the top three answers will likely be through video games. Live streaming platforms like Twitch are playing a major role in the way Gen Z and millennials discover content, so much so, that they are now adapting their consumption habits to merge these platforms with their favorite activities such as watching sports, playing video games and even streaming music.
From here, the industry needs to recognize the power gaming has in live as well. Esports teams are filling up arenas and there are so many new ways to inject music and entertainment that have yet to be explored. This also opens so many avenues for brands to be the first in certain games or try certain activations. This is truly an exciting time for global brands to tap into a medium that is growing exponentially. I am personally very excited to see this space grow.
Walk us through what a typical day may look like at Red Light and how you are using your years of experience in gaming, music and entertainment to help such a variety of artists that touch multiple types of genres successfully tap into the gaming ecosystem.
In terms of my day to day, when I'm not taking meetings, I'm strategizing on how to create a bigger pulse for our artist's in the gaming space. We look for crossover opportunities to move tickets, licensing music, place new releases into Esports events and create strategic partnerships that help tell the story of musicians who have a passion for gaming.
On the brand side, I have also had the pleasure of working with incredible companies like Twitch Prime, SCUF, AK Racing and even non-profit organizations to help with some amazing causes such as "Gamers Outreach" and many more that we will be public soon.


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The past few years have presented people with unprecedented challenges. This difficult period has pushed people to reflect more deeply on what truly matters in life. Purpose is more relevant than ever.
Kantar’s ongoing consumer studies in India have shown that, in a post-pandemic world, consumers continue to look to brands to provide practical solutions in their everyday lives: from promoting nutrition and hygiene, to saving time and managing stress. In India and across the world, purpose has emerged as one of the most important pillars of brand growth and, equally, of brand marketing.
This new report looks broadly at the impact of the pandemic on brands in India, with a focus on FMCG, non-FMCG, and technology brands. For the first time, we are shining a spotlight on India’s most purposeful brands across these business segments.
Retail and telecom brands have outperformed most other categories and seen their brand value increase in the 2020 BrandZ Top 75 Most Valuable Indian Brands ranking.
At a time of near-unprecedented economic challenges, the total value of the BrandZ India Top 75 fell by 6 percent in 2020, resulting in a total brand value of $216 billion.
Despite the overall decline, 26 brands increased in value and five were new entrants. India’s top brands also performed well against other countries where declines in total brand value were much greater.
And, in especially difficult times, BrandZ provides the proof that valuable brands deliver superior shareholder returns: the stock portfolio of the BrandZ India Top 75 has recovered more of its pre-pandemic value, at a faster rate, than India’s SENSEX.
For the seventh year, HDFC Bank remained the top-ranked brand in India with a total brand value of more than $20.2 billion. LIC reached the no.2 spot, with Tata Consulting Services at no.3.
With a 102 percent year-on-year increase in value, the fast-expanding brand Reliance Retail led this year’s crop of Top Risers.
Discover more about India’s most valuable brands and how they have created pathways to growth through agility, flexibility and clear-eyed action in our latest report.
HDFC holds the top spot as India’s most valuable brand for the sixth year in a row as businesses shift their focus from disruption to long-term growth and stability.
BrandZ data shows trust is key for long-term growth as the most trusted brands in the Top 75 – including notable consumer-facing tech platforms like Flipkart, Oyo and Swiggy – are 129% more valuable than lesser trusted brands.
Read the report to discover which brands made this year’s ranking, what the rise of 'middle India' means for businesses and learn from the brands successfully navigating the country’s changes.
Kantar and WPP have published the 2018 BrandZ™ Top 75 Most Valuable Indian Brands ranking and report.
The report tracks the value of India’s most valuable brands and provides insights into how to develop a strong and valuable brand in India. To reflect the strength of India’s growing economy and a marketplace where more local brands are emerging to present consumers with increased choice, the ranking has grown from 50 to 75 brands. New categories are also included for 2018 including privately owned and unicorn brands resulting in 30 new brands in this year’s ranking, seven of which are in the top 15.
Take a look at the report and ranking to learn more about most successful brands in India and how this exciting and dynamic market has changed over the past five years.


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At Skyline, we are a follower and contributor at Tech In Asia. They recently shared an inspiring story of Indonesia’s ride-hailing and on-demand services startup Go-Jek, which officially became a unicorn, at a US$1.3 billion valuation after its recent US$550 million fundraise.
In its original form in 2010, the startup founder Nadiem Makarim had a fleet of motorcycle drivers that could be called up to give passengers rides, do courier services, or deliver food. For the first couple of years, it didn’t get significant traction, but its fortune changed when it launched an app in January 2015. Finally, Go-Jek needed only 1.5 years from launching its mobile application to receiving that prestigious title.
Since then, Go-Jek added more and more drivers, launched new services,and expanded to more cities. Now you can see Go-Jek drivers’ ubiquitous green jackets anywhere in big cities in Indonesia.


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Computer crime: Top threats in 2007Date: January 03, 2007
IT World Canada asked several industry experts for their take on these and other issues. And here’s what they had to say.
Right on target
The closing year saw a remarkable slow down in worm attacks and widespread malware assaults, according to Internet and mobile security services provider F-Secure Corp. based in Helsinki, Finland.
The firm says in 2007 we’re likely to witness an increase in targeted attacks against organizations, with backdoors, booby trapped documents and rootkits.
A 'backdoor" is a method of bypassing normal authentication, or of securing remote access to a computer, while attempting to remain hidden from casual inspection. The backdoor may take the form of an installed program, or could be a modification to a legitimate program.
"Instead of transmitting millions of e-mails with infected attachments, attackers are sending as few as five infected e-mails to a single target," said Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at F-Secure.
In this scenario, he said, hackers use a cloaking device such as a rootkit to conceal a backdoor and extract valuable information from the target company. The forged e-mails may include booby-trapped Microsoft Office documents, or Excel spreadsheet files that appear to come from a legitimate source or even the company itself.
Hypponen also warns of an increase in phishing scams and the use of bogus domain names.
"Obviously phishing works since the attacks continue to build in force and complexity," he said.
Crafty social engineering schemes and counterfeit but well-constructed Web sites or phishing e-mails will separate the unwary from their money or private information, according to industry observers. Scam artistes, increasingly, are deploying sites with a lifespan of just an hour, to entice users and then disappear.
PayPal and EBay continue to be the most targeted outfits by phishers, but some German banks are also becoming popular targets, said F-Secure.
Some sites deploy bogus login boxes that ask users to type in valid PayPal user names, passwords and credit card numbers.
Despite the growing threat, a recent survey found a large number of Canadian companies have limited or no security training for their employees.
Our apologies to Kermit the Frog, but IT insiders say vendors are increasingly finding out that being green can help them remain in the black.
This awareness has triggered a growing concern about the cost of maintaining IT assets such as data centres, with a power efficiency as low as 70 per cent, according to Mike Thompson, director, business practices management at research firm Butler Group in London.
Anything affecting the bottom line is a matter of concern and that goes for power consumption by IT resources, according to George Bulat, director of data driven products at IDC Canada Ltd. in Toronto.
He said companies are devising various strategies to lower power cost to cut overall energy bills. These include adoption of energy efficient processes that benefit the environment and conserve valuable resources.
Bulat predicts more companies will be employing server-based computing and virtualization to save energy by shifting power consumption from the office to the machine room these computing models lower the cost of managing IT services and reduce energy bills. "Blade servers and virtualization reduce the number of physical machines that consume energy."
More vendors will be touting manufacturing and recycling processes that are kinder to Mother Earth.
For one, the Restriction on Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive took effect earlier this year in Europe. The directive bans companies from selling on the EU market electronic equipment containing more than agreed levels of several toxic substances such as lead and mercury. Several U.S. states and Canadian provinces have either set up or are at work on their own RoHS flavours. "This is the start of a new way of manufacturing," says Joe Cala, director of operations for global RoHS compliance at Celestica Inc. in Toronto.
Some companies such as Hewlett-Packard Inc. (HP) intend to reduce toxic emissions from their facilities, as well as used products sent to landfills, said Frances Edmonds, director, environmental programs at HP Canada. She said HP has a program to reduce plant emissions by 15 per cent by 2010, and aims to recycle as much as 1 billion lbs. of hardware and supplies in 2007.
"One of the strongest drivers for greening IT is customer demand and enterprise savings," said Edmonds.
Researchers recently discovered a novel way of saving energy – the "off button"! The province of British Columbia, for instance, can save as much as $30 million a year in electricity costs if business and home users turned off their computers when not in use, according to David Rogers, technology and project management specialist with BC Hydro.
We are the world
Collaboration will stake its claim as a business production application in 2007. "Workers are finding a lot of reasons not only to share information but also to work together on certain applications," said Carmi Levy, senior research analyst, Info-Tech Research Group Inc. in London, Ont.
Among collaborative apps, Microsoft's SharePoint continues to be a leader but there are other notable players such as IBM's WebSphere and Groove Network Inc's. Groove.
Meanwhile expect to see start-ups such as ConceptShare tackle more intriguing applications around the notion of collaboration. The Subdury, Ont-based company recently unveiled a product that helps the likes of designers, artists, marketing executives and clients share and work on complex materials such as posters and other art materials. "In 2007 we will see greater adoption of collaborative tools and their eventual evolution into built-in features of end-user products," said Levy.
Computing without borders
In 2007 organizations will continue to resort to outsourcing but expect more companies to allocate projects to multiple vendors rather than a single supplier.
"As existing deals reach their renewal stage, companies will gravitate towards agreements of shorter duration with a greater number of outsourcing suppliers," said Alan Rodgers, research analyst, Butler Group. He said the key advantages of this strategy are flexibility, speed in implementing changes and risk avoidance. "By splitting work among numerous suppliers, companies can reduce the risk in case something goes wrong with one outsourcer."
Rodger also sees enterprises cutting spiraling data centre costs by using remote infrastructure management strategies. He said companies will increasingly transfer tasks such as network management, application development and maintenance, and business processes development to offshore locations.
India will continue to be among the bigger players in the outsourcing market as it maintains a hold of over 50 per cent of outsourced assignments, but other countries in South America, Africa and Asia are carving out their own territory, according to Rodger.
Compliance and BI
Analysts foresee compliance becoming a strong driver for the development of business intelligence (BI) tools that provide greater transparency and reporting.
"We will see the emergence of pre-packaged applications for monitoring corporate performance as measured against industry directives such as the Market in Financial Industry Directive that will take effect in the European Union in 2007," said Sarah Burnett, senior research analyst, Butler Group.
Companies will look to extend that visibility to operations they have outsourced, said Tom Eid, research vice-president at Gartner Inc. in Stamford, Conn.
When it comes to big ticket IT expenditures, large enterprises will be putting service-oriented architecture (SOA) adoption at the top of their to-do list, according to industry analysts.
"SOA vendors will have a strong year in 2007," according to Josh Greenbaum, principal of Enterprise Application Consulting in Berkley, Calif. Greenbaum did not provide any numbers but said he foresees a growing trend towards SOA deployment driven by "low implementation costs and high return of investment (ROI)."
He agrees with Burnett that compliance-driven specific reporting tools with be in demand in the coming year. "Customers will be looking for applications that monitor performance against specific industry requirements."
"Leaders in this space will be IBM, SAP, Microsoft and Oracle," said Greenbaum.
Large companies are also planning to purchase new BI software and upgrade existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, according to Forrester Research Inc. in Cambridge, Mass. A Forrester survey of 1,078 IT decision makers found as many as 13 per cent plan to purchase new BI software.
"ERP will remain the top upgrade, while messaging, e-mail and collaboration software will lead the pack in minor upgrades," according to Forrester.
Virtualization brings real benefits
Virtualization will continue to gain momentum in 2007 but the trend leans towards products that enable the management of...
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Global rice shortage looms as top exporter India’s supply woes worsen amid Red Sea attacks
Exports of premium Indian basmati rice last month were half of what they were a year ago, with traders blaming freight rates that have doubled following a series of attacks on commercial ships by Iran-backed Houthi militants.
Indian basmati prices currently sit at around US$950 to $1,800 per tonne, traders say.
Meanwhile, the price of exported parboiled rice – which is partially boiled in the husk before sale – from India skyrocketed to a record high of between US$533-US$542 per tonne this week on limited supplies and steady demand from Asian and African buyers.
Purchases from rice farmers by the state-run Food Corporation of India have hardly left any stocks for private traders, who say more supplies are likely to be kept at home to rein in domestic prices as the nation prepares to head to the polls later this year. Food inflation has historically been a key issue for voters in India.
India’s exports of non-basmati varieties are also being affected by the limited quantities available to private traders, as well as the long shipping times and more expensive freight costs to parts of Africa and other places, said Prem Garg, national president of the Indian Rice Exporters Federation.
High freight costs have also resulted in disputes as exporters push to negotiate their contracts with buyers.
“Old contracts with buyers are being disputed. Many people want to cancel their orders,” Garg said, adding that the cost of booking a single container on ships to Africa had tripled to US$4,000.
“India and Pakistan’s exports are more affected. Thailand and Vietnam exports are in a lull period and will pick up after Ramadan [expected to end on April 9],” said a Thailand-based rice trader who asked not to be identified.
Vietnam’s benchmark 5 per


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MUBI and Asian film producer Dong Ping's Huanxi Media Group are set to launch the popular video-on-demand service in China as part of a joint venture, Telecom Asia reports.
With plans aiming to launch the video streaming service throughout the country during this year, a total sum of $50m will be invested in MUBI by Huanxi.
While MUBI, headquartered in London, is currently available in more than 200 territories across the globe, the launch of their service in China will mark another significant landmark for the global film website.
Under the agreement, 70% of the joint venture entity will be Huanxi's as a result of a $40m investment in MUBI China. MUBI will contribute to the remaining equity through the license of their intellectual property and knowhow into MUBI China.
A strategic investment of $10m will be made in MUBI by Huanxi for 8% of the global film website. This will value the company at $125m.
Once the service is launched in China, subscribers will be introduced to one film a day via the SVOD model. The service will be accessible across multiple devices through a monthly or yearly subscription.
"Through our partnership with Huanxi, we will be able to introduce a curated film offering in the country with the largest population in the world and soon the largest film market in the world," founder and CEO of MUBI, Efe Cakarel said.
Executive director of Huanxi, Dong Ping, said the joint venture with MUBI would allow the company to combine its expertise in creating and acquiring original content in China with MUBI's user-friendly platform.


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Made for Music, the brand's first push using music as a platform, features the superstars as dual celebrity centerpieces. The two 30-second spots are set to Hova's "PSA" (watch above) and Rihanna's latest single "Right Now" (below); both were shot by director Mark Romanek.
"Budweiser Made for Music is a tribute to those who continue to put their energy and passion everyday in the pursuit of their dreams," said Ricardo Marques, Budweiser's global advertising director, in a statement. "Jay-Z and Rihanna represent these values and are therefore an incredible source of inspiration to us all."
In their respective spots, Jay-Z, Rihanna and others showcase creativity; both ads are punctuated by the statement, "It begins and ends with what you make." Jay-Z's involvement comes on the heels of Magna Carta Holy Grail's release, and Rihanna is busy on the road with her Diamonds World Tour.
The campaign also includes limited-edition packaging, out-of-home advertising, digital extensions and sponsorships of the two aforementioned artists worldwide. It was inspired by last summer's Budweiser Made in America festival, which Jay-Z curated and headlined in Philadelphia. (Made in America is returning this year with Beyonce, Nine Inch Nails, Phoenix and Queens of the Stone Age.) Made for Music strives to bring fans closer to Rihanna through a series of collaborations to be announced later this year.
Budweiser promises to bring live music to fans around the world with more than 160 events in 25 countries, including the Diamonds World Tour, Jay-Z concerts and the Budweiser Made in America festival, on place Aug. 31 and Sept. 1 in Philadelphia.
Images courtesy of YouTube, Budweiser


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Nabil Mattar is unable to fulfill his family’s needs.
Until recently, he sold cellphone accessories in Gaza’s markets. The restrictions introduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic have left him without an income.
“I used to earn $10 per day,” Mattar, a father of seven, said. “It was too small an amount to be able to save anything. I have no money to feed my children since I have stopped working.”
The loss affects his sense of dignity. “You cannot imagine how it feels for a father to stand helpless in front of his children,” he said.
Unemployment was already a major problem before the first cases of the new coronavirus were confirmed in Gaza during March.
The official unemployment rate in Gaza was 43 percent during the last few months of 2019. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, that meant more than 208,000 people were without work.
A further 130,000 have now been made jobless since the pandemic broke out, according to Gaza’s economy ministry.
The ministry has estimated that 25,000 people working in hotels, restaurants and coffee shops have been laid off since the lockdown began.
Ibrahim al-Dali is one of them. He used to be a waiter at a hotel on the Gaza City seafront.
“Losing my job was a shock for my family,” he said.
Al-Dali has long been their main breadwinner. With his salary, he has supported his parents and two of his brothers.
His father used to work in Israel but has been unemployed because of the full blockade imposed on Gaza for the past 13 years.
“It is difficult for a young man like me to sit at home,” al-Dali said. “But the most difficult thing is that I can no longer help my family.”
Gaza’s residents are marking Ramadan in a low-key manner. Normally, restaurants and coffee shops are busy during the holy month as many families go out in the evenings to end a day of fasting.
This year, however, the catering sector has almost ground to a halt. Rather than facilitating tourism and leisure activities, hotels are now being used as isolation centers.
Gaza’s labor ministry has allocated $1 million to aid people who have been made jobless during the pandemic.
Ibrahim al-Dali, the unemployed waiter, applied for a $100 payment from the ministry’s website. He was turned down on the basis that he is not married.
In total, the ministry deemed approximately 40,000 applicants eligible for the payment. Yet it was only able to aid 10,000.
Ahmad Younis, a taxi driver, did receive the $100 payment. But the payment was “very small and does not cover the amount I have lost,” he said.
“The transportation sector is normally very active,” he said. “But when I go out in my car these days, the streets are almost empty. I have so few passengers that I can barely make ends meet. I fear the situation will continue like this for months. That would be a disaster for me.”
The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics has estimated that the new coronavirus could result in the gross domestic product for the West Bank and Gaza being 14 percent less in 2020 than last year. That would mean a total loss of approximately $2.5 billion.
Some businesses are striving to meet the challenges posed by COVID-19.
Several textile companies in Gaza have begun making protective masks, particularly for clients in Israel.
The garment sector used to be a key player in the local economy but was badly damaged when Israel imposed a ban on textile exports in 2007. That ban was only eased in 2015, leading to a partial resurgence of Gaza’s clothing trade.
Perhaps it is too early to say if mask production will give the textiles sector a sorely-needed boost. And in any event, such a boost would not be sufficient to compensate for the deeper problems afflicting Gaza’s economy – problems caused by Israel acting in concert with the world’s most powerful governments.
Fedaa al-Qedra is a journalist in Gaza.


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“In the past year, despite the pandemic, I’ve put almost 200,000 transactions into SYSPRO. It simply wouldn’t have been humanly possible before.”
-John Surdy – Controller, Nardone Bros. Baking Company
Nardone Bros. maximizes productivity with integrated SYSPRO/Nomad solution
Since 1942, Nardone Bros. Baking Company has been committed to making the finest pizza and bringing the most nutritious, high-quality products to schools and retailers across the United States. The company remains family-owned and operated.
The Business Challenge
Nardone Bros. needed to replace an outdated DOS-based system with a fully integrated ERP solution capable of meeting its specialized requirements, including high-level, robust reporting.
Nardone Bros. selected SYSPRO and Nomad eCommerce, an SYSPRO-integrated eCommerce solution from Sniperdyne, an authorized SYSPRO companion solution provider. This all-in-one website and eCommerce shopping cart platform enables seamless sharing of data between SYSPRO and the Nomad eCommerce shopping cart platform.
Nardone Bros. selected the SYSPRO solution based on a demonstration that showed how easily and comprehensively the integrated system could be customized to meet its highly specialized requirements.
John Surdy, Controller of Nardone Bros says: “I loved the SYSPRO solution from the start. It’s exactly what we were looking for. The system is so flexible, feature-rich, and robust, we were able to create a system that exactly fits our needs. There was no need to look elsewhere.”
Nardone Bros. currently has 25 users on the integrated SYSPRO 7/Nomad eCommerce solution.


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Amazon is playing hardball with its third-party Marketplace sellers, limiting warehouse space with little warning, Bloomberg reports.
Sources said that Amazon is denying new Marketplace sellers access to its free two-day Fulfillment by Amazon shipping service until Dec. 19, which prevents them from sending their inventory to its fulfillment centers ahead of the holidays.
“[Amazon is] preparing for a very busy holiday, and given the constraints they’ve had in the past, I think they are being more careful about what they are taking,” Robert W. Baird & Co. analyst Colin Sebastian told Bloomberg. “The concern around this news is that they won’t have the capacity they need over the holiday.” Amazon declined to comment.
The Draconian step applies only to new sellers, but is nevertheless a sign that Amazon is struggling to accommodate the swell of merchandise sent to its warehouses and fulfillment centers ahead of the holiday season. The move comes after other changes the e-commerce giant made to its fulfillment systems for the holidays: Amazon recently changed its fees in order to penalize sellers who have slow-selling or off-season goods during the busy holiday time while rewarding those with faster-moving goods, Bloomberg notes.
Cutoff dates for storing goods at its fulfillment centers is nothing new for Amazon, but for new sellers this year, it was the first time that the e-commerce giant moved to deny all categories of merchandise (and not just best-selling holiday goods like toys). Vendors can still sell on the site, but they must fulfill and send their goods themselves and won’t enjoy the benefit of the Fulfillment by Amazon program, which allows Prime members to take advantage of free two-day shipping perks.
While Amazon has made assertive moves to expand its fulfillment centers and warehouses to provide speedy delivery to its Prime members, its shipping and fulfillment costs are growing faster than its revenue. But rather than scaling back, so far the company has focused on making those operations more efficient: In addition to air cargo leases, Amazon’s efforts include an Uber-like crowdsourced ground delivery network it calls Amazon Flex, thousands of semitrailers and, of course, drones. That has prompted several analysts to believe that Amazon aims ultimately to become a shipper in and of itself.
Experts have told Retail Dive that Amazon’s shipping services could indeed expand to serve third parties, following the path of its cloud services. While the retailer built the Amazon Web Services unit to serve its own needs at first, outside parties from Netflix and the U.S. Central Intelligence Service now employ its services as well.
“They’ve built this enormous platform that enables them to service customers with this logistics network — inventories they own, inventories they hold and inventories they direct,” Mark Cohen, professor of retail studies at Columbia University, told Retail Dive last month. “[A]t the end of the day, there’s a lot more to Amazon than just this tremendous array of merchandise.”
Financial research firm Cowen & Co. questions the viability of a full-fledged Amazon shipping service. In a note this spring, Cowen analyst Helane Becker argued that Amazon lacks the density and reach of shipping incumbents UPS and FedEx, and contended that rival retailers would be unlikely to support a delivery service owned and operated by any competitor, especially Amazon. If Amazon is restricting capacity this year, unable to accommodate its own sellers, a full-fledged shipping service clearly would be still far in its future.


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Nick Foles, Backup Quarterback, Named No. 1 in Player-Branded NFL Merchandise Sales
As if the Eagles winning the Super Bowl wasn't already enough to increase Philadelphian craniums ad infinitum, it’s been reported that backup-quarterback-turned-hero Nick Foles currently leads all NFL players in apparel and officially licensed merchandise sales.
Coming in second—though he comes in last by every standard here in the city of brotherly love—was all time great quarterback and wannabe Bond villain Tom Brady. Carson Wentz, despite injury and a lack of Super Bowl-related hype, managed to come in third place for merch sales.
According to the NFL Players Association, player-branded merchandise includes jerseys, bobbleheads, socks, pet products and even cake decorations, to name only a few examples.
Here at Promo Marketing, we’ve known Nick Foles to be a first class merch mover for a while now. Before the big game even happened, demand for a Nick Foles bobblehead managed to drive prices up by 900 percent, reaching a total of nearly $300 per item.
Same goes for the Eagles, who sold more merchandise than any other Super Bowl champion ever following their defeat of the New England Patriots back in February.
Needless to say, when it comes to supporting our favorite team, Philadelphia fans don’t mess around. Because if there’s anything Philly loves, it’s being better than Boston... uh, oops, excuse me, I meant great branded merchandise.


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“The Redmi Note 8 is said to be a budget offering with dual rear cameras”
Redmi Note 8 has been certified by the Chinese regulatory authority TENAA. The phone has received the certification under the model number M1908C3IC. The listing of the Redmi Note 8 on the agency’s website has revealed the images of the smartphone. Sadly, Redmi Note 8 specifications are not available in the database at the moment. Notably, the smartphone has received the certification from TENAA, soon after it was certified by 3C recently. The images on TENAA suggest that the phone will come with a dual primary camera setup at the rear and an all-screen fascia with a waterdrop notch to house the selfie camera.
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 8’s images on TENAA show that the phone will have a tad thick chin with the Redmi brand. The smartphone will feature a single selfie camera and its earpiece will be placed on the top edge. The device’s power button and volume rocker will be placed on the right side, while the left side will not have anything. The dual-camera setup of the phone will be placed vertically at the back with an LED flash unit sitting above it. There will also be a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor will be placed below the camera module.
Notably, the images on TENAA have a different design than what an alleged press render of the smartphone, which was leaked recently. The leaked photos indicated that the handset will come with four rear cameras and a dual-LED flash unit. However, it’s possible that the leaked render is of the purported Redmi Note 8 Pro, which is expected to come with a 64MP Samsung Bright GW1 sensor.
The Redmi Note 8 specifications are not available at the moment. However, the budget offering is expected to be powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and boot MIUI 10 based on Android Pie out of the box. Sadly there’s no word on the pricing and availability at the moment. The TENAA certification indicates that the phone will be launched soon.


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Mixing some business with a family vacation is the perfect combination for those attending EXPO 2009 – the 30th Forest Products Machinery & Equipment Exposition – to be held June 11-13 in the New Orleans Convention Centre.
“Since the show returns to New Orleans for the first time since 1991, it’s a great vacation destination for families too,” comments exposition director Eric Gee. “In addition to the historical sites, New Orleans offers many locations and attractions of interest to youngsters of all ages,” he said.
Recently, New Orleans has reclaimed itself as a leading travel and entertainment destination. Areas frequented by visitors are virtually fully recovered from the 2005 storm damage. “Many of the attractions have been upgraded and remodeled, putting even more NEW back into New Orleans,” Eric notes. Exhibitors and attendees alike can plan to enjoy a vibrant, revitalized New Orleans. Attractions in close proximity to the convention center include the new Audubon Institute’s Insectarium, located in the historic U.S. Custom House on Canal Street. Also close to the show site: the Aquarium of the Americas and its IMAX theatre, the National Word War II Museum and (just a short streetcar ride away) the Audubon Park Zoo. “New Orleans is open, and it’s better than ever!,” notes Eric Gee.
A truly international exposition, EXPO 2009 will showcase the latest products and services for the wood products industry. EXPO, held every two years, is sponsored and produced by the Southern Forest Products Association.
For information about the upcoming show, contact Eric Gee, Exposition Director, 2900 Indiana Ave., Kenner, LA 70065; 504/443-4464 (ext. 214); [email protected]; or fax to 504/443-6612. Online, complete details about EXPO 2009 can be found at www.sfpaexpo.com.


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The damages could exceed €10 billion if the legal proceedings are successful, the NGO filing the cases said.
Two multinational data processing firms are facing legal action that could amount to billions of euros for alleged breaches of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
The Privacy Collective, a non-profit Foundation that pursues claims for violations of privacy rights, is suing Oracle and Salesforce in action representing millions of individuals objecting to the use of their personal data.
The damages could exceed €10 billion if the legal proceedings are successful, the NGO said.
A case was set to be filed on Friday at the District Court of Amsterdam and similar case was due to be filed later this month at the High Court in London England, it added.
The Dutch case is the biggest-ever class action in the Netherlands over a violation of the GDPR.
Both firms deny the claims.
The action concerns a process called real-time bidding — a behind the scenes auction in which consumer profiles are put up for sale.
When a user consumer visits a website, ad tech companies place a cookie on the user’s device to track and monitor their behaviour online.
While The Privacy Collective acknowledges hundreds of companies collect personal data of internet users and share it in this way, it alleges in the actions that Oracle and Salesforce without the proper consent or knowledge of the user.
The EU General Data Protection Regulation came into effect on May 25, 2018 and from this point on tech companies were required to get informed consent from consumers in any European country to collect and share their personal data through cookies and other technologies.
'Far from harmless'
"Everyone who has ever used the internet is at risk from this technology," said Dr Rebecca Rumbul, class representative and claimant in England & Wales.
"It may be largely hidden but it is far from harmless. If data collected from internet use is not adequately controlled, it can used to facilitate highly targeted marketing that may expose vulnerable minors to unsuitable content, fuel unhealthy habits such as online gambling or prey on other addictions."
Oracle EVP and General Counsel Dorian Daley refuted The Privacy Collective's allegations in a statement to Euronews, saying the NGO "knowingly filed a meritless action based on deliberate misrepresentations of the facts."
"As Oracle previously informed The Privacy Collective, Oracle has no direct role in the real-time bidding process (RTB), has a minimal data footprint in the EU, and has a comprehensive GDPR compliance programme," he added.
The EVP said his company "will vigorously defend against these baseless claims."
"The claim applies to the Salesforce Audience Studio service and does not relate to any other Salesforce service," the data management platform provider told Euronews.
Adding it helps its clients "comply with their own obligations under applicable privacy laws - including the EU GDPR - to preserve the privacy rights of their own customers."
"Salesforce disagrees with the allegations and intends to demonstrate they are without merit," the company said.
The General Data Protection Regulation is a regulation in EU law that concerns data protection and privacy in the European Union and the European Economic Area. It also addresses the transfer of personal data outside the EU and EEA areas.


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What you need to know
- The UK's Competition and Markets Authority is investigating Google and Apple over potential anticompetitive behavior.
- The body will look into whether both companies and their effective duopoly are reducing innovation in tech.
- It will also investigate the power both wield over developers.
The UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is investigating the duopoly of Google and Apple and the effects on the mobile tech market. Between Android and iOS, the Play Store and the App Store, Chrome and Safari, both companies wield control over a large swathe of tech in the UK and other markets. While this control may be organic as platforms ranging from Windows Phone to BlackBerry 10 crumbled in the past from lack of developer support, the effect remains that both companies do wield incredible power, and developers are unhappy about it.
In an announcement today, the CMA said it would investigate whether this control is "stifling" to competition across digital markets. The CMA does not directly reference higher subscription prices for apps like Spotify, Tinder, and others that rely on Apple and Google for in-app purchases, but the implication is clear.
Andrea Coscelli, Chief Executive of the CMA, said:
Apple and Google control the major gateways through which people download apps or browse the web on their mobiles – whether they want to shop, play games, stream music, or watch TV. We're looking into whether this could be creating problems for consumers and the businesses that want to reach people through their phones.
Our ongoing work into big tech has already uncovered some worrying trends and we know consumers and businesses could be harmed if they go unchecked. That's why we're pressing on with launching this study now, while we are setting up the new Digital Markets Unit, so we can hit the ground running by using the results of this work to shape future plans.
An adjacent part of this investigation is diving into Chrome's Privacy Sandbox and Apple's own efforts in this area. Apple and Google have recently pivoted towards more privacy-focused features in the past couple of months in response to consumer demand. However, this has manifested in a way that involves more power being handed over to both firms as they mediate over open standards such as the email and the web.
The Privacy Sandbox would effectively create a Google-owned walled garden that would close down the competitive, vibrant open web. Providing more directly identifiable, personal information to Google does not protect anyone's privacy.
Or, we can look at iOS 15's continued push for privacy, or leadership as Apple calls it. Owen Williams over at OneZero argues that "Apple [is] moving toward a world where the only acceptable business model is the company's: building apps that monetize through platforms owned by Apple."
It's scenarios like that where platforms, no matter how well-meaning, end up dictating the experience and business model even for creators who don't work within their framework. This is what the UK's CMA wants to delve into.
Commenting on this recent investigation, a Google spokesperson said:
Android provides people with more choice than any other mobile platform in deciding which apps they use, and enables thousands of developers and manufacturers to build successful businesses. We welcome the CMA's efforts to understand the details and differences between platforms before designing new rules.
According to Google, Android apps have generated up to £2.8 billion in revenue for UK developers, and have supported 240,000 jobs across the UK. Google has also made changes to encourage user choice, as evidenced by the recent search selection screen, as part of its concessions to regulators and rivals alike.
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