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Every time China’s military forces advance with a territorial claim in the East or South China Seas or in India’s Arunachal Pradesh or across the Taiwan Strait, foreign direct investment into China retreats. As Senator Everett Dirksen once said, “a billion here, a billion there,” and pretty soon it’s real money.
If a strong economy is key to survival of the Chinese Communist Party, Beijing’s brain trust has made a huge strategic blunder in abandoning its “peaceful rise” in favor of a rapid military buildup and pursuit of territorial claims throughout Asia. Naked aggression by the People’s Liberation Army, coupled with Beijing’s hard, bullying line on a host of disputes, is not just driving most of the rest of Asia into America’s arms. The specter of a new Imperial China is also raising very real questions in corporate boardrooms around the world as to the wisdom of long-term capital investment in China.
Make no mistake about the importance of foreign direct investment (FDI) in China’s economic development and transformation. In the wake of Deng Xiaoping’s 1978 economic “second revolution,” first a trickle and then a flood of FDI transformed China into the world’s largest factory floor and drove double-digit GDP growth for more than three decades.
Today, however, China’s flood of FDI may have reached its high-water mark. In 2015, India overtook it as the world’s top FDI destination, while FDI into China has plateaued since 2011.
Even more ominous for China’s growth and job-creation prospects, the mix of FDI has significantly shifted from in-flows to build factories to that for financial services; and it’s no secret as to what is going on here: Once-naïve business executives are now slowly but surely beginning to reevaluate the mounting risks of locating factories or parts of their supply chain in China—or even opening new markets on the mainland.
In fact, once the rose-colored glasses are lifted, this is a simple risk calculation. On the one hand, China continues to dangle the prospects of cheap labor, lax regulations, illegal export subsidies, and one of the world’s largest masses of humanity spending like drunken sailors in an orgy of consumption.
On the other hand, Beijing’s autocrats are imposing increasingly onerous conditions of market entry. These include the requirement of a local “joint venture” partner, the forced transfer of one’s technology, and stringent currency controls. In addition, wages that used to be cheap are rising, already severely polluted water is in increasingly short supply, and air quality continues to deteriorate further from abysmal levels. Dickensian England never looked this grim or gray.
There is also this stark risk factor: Any company that does business with China risks having all forms of its intellectual property stolen. Sadly, this risk starts from the moment a business executive takes a laptop or a cell phone through Chinese customs and has one’s data stripped clean—most S&P 500 companies don’t even allow their executives to bring their laptops or phones to China. And of course, once one factory gets built to foreign specifications, it is a simple matter to replicate that factory under a Chinese flag.
The newest and biggest looming risk, however, is purely geopolitical. To understand the nature of such geopolitical risk, look no further than the debacle of revanchist Russia’s taking of the Crimea and large chunks of Eastern Ukraine at gunpoint. In the wake of Russia’s gambit, its trade with the West has been sharply curtailed, tough economic sanctions remain in force, the Russian economy is in recession, and, most importantly from a geopolitical-risk perspective, any foreign company with a major Russian exposure—from Poland and Italy to Germany—has taken a very heavy hit.
For anyone who thinks this geopolitical risk scenario can’t repeat itself with an equally revanchist China, think again. Indeed, the canary in the coal mine for a much larger economic catastrophe may be found in the aftermath of the violent 2012 anti-Japanese riots across more than a hundred cities in China.
The 2012 riots (as well as less raucous protests in 2010) were over China’s historical claim to five small islets that comprise less than two square miles of territory—Japan’s Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea. While Japan has held this territory for more than one hundred years, Beijing’s revanchists claim the islets as the “Diaoyus,” and at least the rabid nationalist element of China appears willing to go to war over them.
After these nationalists burned Japanese factories, smashed storefronts, stormed the Japanese Consulate General’s headquarters, and tipped over Japanese cars in 2012, the business community of Japan collectively got the message that the better part of wisdom might be to take their FDI elsewhere. In the wake of that 2012 meltdown, Japanese FDI in China has fallen sharply, while it is popping up all over the rest of Asia, e.g, for the third straight year Japan’s FDI in Southeast Asia has risen and the pace is accelerating.
Japan is hardly alone in diverting its FDI to, if not richer, than certainly far less risky geopolitical climes. Writ large, Japan’s FDI gambit may, in fact, be the far better bet for much of the rest of the world.
Here, while it is true that China has 1.3 billion potential consumers on paper, almost half of that rapidly aging population remains stuck on peasant farms living at subsistence levels. At this rate, Carrier air conditioners, GM Chevys, or even Kentucky Fried Chicken do not appear to be in these peasants’ Hobbesian future.
In contrast, Southeast Asia alone has 650 million people in a far more vibrant demographic. India’s 1.3 billion consumers and workers are, on average, significantly younger than China’s. And Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, and Japan are all strong and stable democracies with a relatively high income per capita.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist or a Harvard MBA to realize that it is just plain stupid locating a new factory or large parts of your supply chain in a country that looks increasingly like it is willing to go to war in order to rewrite the maps of Asia. That’s way FDI is increasingly being diverted from China to other destinations in Asia—and at least partly why the Chinese economy remains stagnant.
That said, for some corporations like Apple and Cisco and GE that have fallen too deep into the Chinese risk pool, there appears to be no going back. Rather than retreat or hedge, these lemming-like corporations are simply doubling down—hoping against hope that a single spark in the East or South China Seas won’t start a prairie fire that burns their factories and dreams in China down.
It will be interesting to see how this all turns out—keeping in mind the Chinese curse “may you live in interesting times.” At a minimum, Beijing’s aggression is taking an ever bigger bite out of its FDI apple—with severe collateral damage to its economy.
The lesson here—which may be too late for the Chinese hegemon—is this: Sometimes, the best economic policy is peace and the status quo, not aggression and revanchism.
Peter Navarro is a professor at the University of California-Irvine. This article is excerpted from Crouching Tiger: What China’s Militarism Means for the World (Prometheus Books). www.crouchingtiger.net.
Image: (Aug. 18, 2007) SHANGHAI, China - A boarding team, from the U.S. Coast Guard 378-foot High Endurance Cutter Boutwell, demonstrates along with the Chinese Coast Guard their specific boarding techniques and procedures on Saturday here. The crew from the Boutwell is representing the U.S. Coast Guard here and other foreign ports to help increase international maritime security and safety in the Northern Pacific Ocean and its borders as part of the North Pacific Coast Guard Forum. (Coast Guard photo by Petty Officer Jonathan R. Cilley)


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Want to join the conversation?
Matthew Borsch of Goldman Sachs asks about the outlook for the Group Disability and Life business. $CI said it is seeing improvements in this business and it expects the improvements to continue throughout 2016 and going forward into 2017. The company is making operational changes and expects the improvements to continue.
$TGT Not expecting anything right to happen for quite some time to this stock.
America becomes great again!! $GM plans to move automobile production from Mexico to US, adding thousands of jobs.
$KMI will report its 4Q results today. Any idea what to expect?
Music enthusiasts get a late Christmas present from $AAPL! GarageBand and Logic Pro X both will get updates and it is big! While it won’t have a huge impact on the stock price, Apple is up a little nevertheless.
$UNH finishes 2016 Strong. Having high hopes for UnitedHealth in 2017.

domain: news


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Maria Luisa Frisa, the eclectic and bright individual is the Director of the Fashion Design Faculty of Iuav University in Venice. She is a fashion critic, an author and a fashion curator. Recently I sat down with her and she told me about her new project, a fashion exhibition that she is curating along with Judith Clark. The exhibition is supported by the Venice Civic Museum Foundation and the Diana Vreeland Estate and will be held in Venice starting 9th March to 26th June 2012 at the Fortuny Museum.
The exhibition will pay homage to the genius of Diana Vreeland – the legendary fashion editor of


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Volkswagen has announced that it has decided to invest in its own battery cell factory. Many automobile companies manufacture electric vehicles and hybrids, but most of them rely on batteries purchased from a few existing battery manufacturers. This means that there are limited differences in the underlying energy storage technology when it comes to choosing an electric vehicle.
The best chance to decrease air pollution and curb the need for hydrocarbon fuels in the decades to come is the innovation of better battery technology. We have the ability to generate power through renewable energies (solar, wind, thermal, and hydro) or nuclear—none of which contribute significantly to air pollution—but we lack an effective means to store the electricity for future use or for portable use. The batteries currently used in electric vehicles have limited range (generally 350 miles or less), take an exceedingly long time to charge, can lose their efficiency with use and are expensive.
The typical electric vehicle business plan has called for car manufacturers to purchase batteries from a battery company. For example, Tesla obtains its batteries from Panasonic. Though Tesla and Panasonic have a long-standing relationship and even partnered on a joint factory five years ago, Tesla relies on Panasonic’s expertise and manufacturing.
Volkswagen, originally pursued similar strategies. According to electrek, which tracks the transition from fossil fuel transportation, Volkswagen originally pursued long term battery contracts with suppliers and even considered a joint factory operation with a Korean supplier, similar to the Tesla-Panasonic partnership. Now, Volkswagen has concerns about the supply from outside battery vendors, so it has decided to invest $1.1 billion to build its own battery factory in Germany.
More companies manufacturing batteries means more potential for new ideas and revolutionary technologies. More research and development departments focusing on battery technology will fuel the drive for auto (and other) manufacturers to differentiate themselves with better batteries. If batteries improve significantly, oil could be replaced as the primary fuel for transportation, and we could instead use power generated by renewable or alternative energies. If battery technology makes significant leaps, we might someday see large-scale batteries capable of storing excess solar power to be used at night on a grand scale.
There should be no illusions that Volkswagen will produce drastically improved or radically innovated batteries when this plant opens. But this could be the first step toward fostering more competition and incentive for major battery technology advancement.
Source: Forbes – Energy


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Import of medical equipment almost double amid pandemicParticularly, the import from China had surged by around 104.8 percent to Rs2.9 billion in the first 11 months of fiscal 2019-20 on a year on year basis.
The import of medical equipment doubled during the first 11 months of the fiscal year 2020-21 that ended Thursday as the country faced a devastating second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.
According to Nepal Rastra Bank statistics, the country imported medical equipment worth Rs15.24 billion during the first 11 months up from Rs8.08 billion during the same period in the fiscal year 2019-20.
Nepali imported these items mostly from China and countries other than India as the medical equipment became one of the country’s top import items. No significant import of medical equipment was recorded from India as it faced its own second wave earlier this year.
The country imported medical equipment worth Rs6.61 billion from China with imports by 128 percent compared to the same period in the previous year. Likewise, the import from third countries also increased by 66.4 percent to Rs8.62 billion, according to central bank statistics.
In fact, ever since the pandemic hit the country in early 2020, the import of medical equipment had started to grow.
Particularly, the import from China had surged by around 104.8 percent to Rs2.9 billion in the first 11 months of fiscal 2019-20 on a year on year basis while imports from third countries had declined by 12.2 percent to Rs5.18 billion during the same period, according to the central bank.
Medical equipment suppliers say that the pandemic was mainly responsible for fuelling the import of these items in the last one and half years. Particularly the crisis the country faced in the second wave of pandemic starting from April, fuelled the import of medical equipment, suppliers said.
According to the medical goods suppliers, supply of oxygen concentrators, oxygen plants, oxygen cylinders, antigen test kits, oximeters, intensive care units and high dependency units of hospitals among others were mostly imported during the second wave of pandemic.
Besides commercial supplies of medical goods, the country received 4126 oxygen concentrators of different capacities, 6945 oxygen cylinders, 1.48 million oxygen kits, 13,820 dead body bags, 218 ventilators among others from different foreign governments and domestic and international agencies during the period from April 14 to July 4, according to the Department of Health Services.
Such was the demand that importers that did not use medical goods changed their focus.
“Not only the medical equipment distributors but also garment and footwear importers also imported the medical equipment such as oximeters, oxygen concentrators and infrared thermometers (or thermal guns) contributing to high growth in supply of these items in the country,” said Suresh Ghimire, president of the Chemical and Medical Suppliers’ Association Nepal, grouping of the medical equipment.
“Now, there is a good stock of the medical goods which may be important if the country is hit by the potential third wave of pandemic.”
Nepali health officials are suspecting that the third wave of pandemic could hit the country in the upcoming autumn season. As a part of preparation, the ministry has asked the hospitals to arrange 20 percent of beds for the people aged below 18 years who have not been vaccinated.
Meanwhile, several federal, provincial and local government agencies and hospitals have started the procurement process to set up or improve medical facilities ahead of the end of last fiscal year. Many made efforts to procure the medical goods to spend the allocated budget in the last fiscal year.
“With the arrival of more equipment procured by these agencies, the overall import of medical equipment will be much bigger in future,” said Ghimire.
But of late, according to medical goods suppliers, the demand for medical goods has come down along with decrease in Covid-19 cases. But, they said that available goods or more might be necessary if the country is hit by the potential third wave of pandemic.
“The government has itself announced constructing several hospitals and adding medical facilities in hospitals and demand for medical equipment will remain good even in the new fiscal year,” said Kumar Dahal, manager of Subarna Shristi Private Limited, a Kathmandu-based medical equipment importer and supplier.
Through the budget for the current fiscal year, the government has announced completing the construction of 5-15 bed hospitals in 397 local units within the next two years.
Budget has also been allocated to build a 300-bed infectious disease hospital in Kathmandu Valley and 50-bed infectious disease hospitals in each province. The federal government has allocated Rs4 billion to procure ICU and HDU beds, ventilators, test kits among others, according to the budgetary provision.
“Even in the normal times, demand for medical equipment has remained steady and the demand will grow along with the government’s plan to increase medical infrastructure,” said Dahal.
Besides government hospitals, private hospitals are also expected to increase demand for medical equipment. For example, the budget for the current fiscal year made it mandatory for hospitals with more than 100 beds to have their own oxygen plants.
Even though supply of the medical equipment increased in the last fiscal year, the suppliers complained about the high freight charge they have been forced to pay.
“Both airfares and the sea freight charges have become very expensive for the delivery of the medical goods,” said Dahal.
“Most of the medical equipment comes under the category of dangerous goods because of the presence of batteries inside them and they have to be transported through certain carriers who charge high. For importing goods, we have to rely on a single airline—Cathay Pacific from Hong Kong which makes things expensive.”
According to him, sea freight has also become expensive with ships charging as high as $5600 per container from just $1200 per container in the normal times.
“So, it is also vital that road transportation linkage with China is good,” he added.
While the Tatopani customs point in Sindhupalchowk district remains closed, import through Rashuwagadi of Rasuwa district has not been smooth since the pandemic began last year.


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Without a shadow of a doubt, sporting events offer up some of the most exciting feats of drama and athleticism in the world. The world of online sporting broadcasting has grown and grown in the past few years, and still, key developments are in constant motion.
Of course, with this level of entertainment comes mass popularity.
Much like other thriving industries, from motor vehicles to fintech and health care, the tech giants are jumping on board the sports entertainment industry thick and fast. The likes of Google, Amazon, Facebook and much more are expanding beyond their respective core businesses and sprinting towards live sports broadcasting.
The sporting realm is predicted to look very different in 10 years time due to the input of these tech giants. Established players, including broadcasters and cable suppliers, will be forced to navigate these new and choppy waters, going head to head with tech companies that have colossal budgets.
Deals between today's tech leaders and sports leagues are ramping up in frequency and value - and Facebook, in particular, has been busy in recent times. Back in February, the social network giant announced a deal to stream 46 pro football matches from Mexico's Liga MX in the USA. And this deal is just one of many to come in the near future.
Of course, this means exciting times for sports fans, who will benefit from a host of new and innovative ways to follow their favorite teams.
Speaking recently on the emergence of tech companies in sports broadcasting, Mark Cuban had a clear and simple message: "Give them what they want."
He followed by stating, "It's a very competitive environment; it's how we reach people and how they consume it. The biggest challenge isn't the methodology of distribution; it's the kids."
A clear sign of the times, and something that traditional broadcasters are certainly wising up to.
Broadcasters including Sky, BT and Eurosport treat the social platforms as friends, not enemies. This year, Sky has focused its efforts on channels for particular sports, a strategy that should help it understand the value of niche audiences when deciding what rights to renew and indeed, go after. Meanwhile, the NFL is developing a Netflix-style streaming service for all its live games, a handful of which will also be shown through commercial broadcasters.
According to the new survey by PwC, broadcasting will become the fastest expanding business segment within the next three to five years, with a projected 8% growth suggested by experts. In addition to this, professional football will continue to dominate the world of sports broadcasting. And when you consider this, it's clear that there's still everything to play for.
Like emerging industry, it comes with its fair share of disruption - and in this case of sports, some of them are fan-driven...
- The proliferation of new platforms such as OTT, digital media, apps and more to deliver content to fans.
- The expansion of the mobile internet and ubiquitous access to sports content through mobile devices.
- The rights holders evolving their distribution strategy to establish direct relationships with fans, including the adoption of social media.
With disruption comes opportunity and those that roll with the punches, keep up the pace and continue to innovate have absolutely everything to gain.
Sports broadcasting is an industry on the rise and as new trends emerge, both fans and broadcasters are in for a thrilling and potentially rewarding white-knuckle ride. Stay tuned.
Learn more about the developments in sports OTT broadcasting:


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With so many limited release shoes and hundreds of silhouette variations, it's easy to lose focus on the macro view of the sneaker game, but the industry is changing. Brands like adidas and Nike, which have been synonymous with the sportswear industry, have ventured into the middle ground occupying the merging gap between sport and fashion.
This past fall, adidas released the Tubular: a modern, innovative, and commercial silhouette heavily influenced by the high-fashion Y-3 Qasa Shell. The shoe's designer and now VP of Global Design, Nic Galway, recently sat down with Nice Kicks to discuss the shoes design as well as how adidas plans to navigate the current intersection between style and sport. Check out an excerpt of the conversation below as well as the accompanying video, and for a full read head here.


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LEON launches new sourdough loaf in Sainsbury's
Naturally Fast Food brand LEON has announced its rollout into 62 extra Sainsbury’s in-store bakeries, whilst also launching a brand new addition to the range, the Brown Seeded Sourdough, which will be available exclusively at Sainsbury’s supermarket stores.
Expanding from 32 to 94 sites, the LEON Sourdough range will now roll-out across 62 extra Sainsbury’s bakery departments, "allowing even more customers to enjoy LEON at home".
In addition to the rollout in in-store bakeries, LEON is expanding its sourdough range with the new Multigrain Seeded Sourdough, available in 94 Sainsbury’s supermarket stores now.
Charlotte Di Cello, Chief Commercial Officer and MD of Leon Grocery, said, “We’re excited to be rolling out across an extra 62 in-store bakeries within Sainsbury’s stores. It’s been our mission to make food that tastes and does good, more widely available and this expansion will allow even more customers to access LEON’s delicious bakery products – a staple for everyone’s table.”


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As Disney stock drops to its lowest price in nine years, Nelson Peltz is once again planning to push for seats on the company’s Board of Directors, unnamed sources told the Wall Street Journal.
Peltz is a founder and CEO of Trian Fund Management, one of Disney’s largest shareholders, with stakes valued at over $2.5 billion. Trian is expected to request multiple board seats, including one for Peltz.
If Disney refuses the seats, Trian may nominate directors. The window for shareholder nominations is from December 5 through January 4. These nominations would then be voted on at Disney’s annual meeting next spring.
Peltz and Trian previously pushed for him to have a seat on the board after Disney privately turned down his request to join. He launched a public run for the seat in January 2023 but ended the “proxy war” with Disney the next month.
Peltz thinks that Disney shares are significantly undervalued and that they need a more accountable board aligned with shareholders. He ended his first push for a seat after Disney announced a major reorganizing and cost-cutting plan. The stock price did rise around this same time, reaching $113.21 on February 2. This was after a boost in late 2022 when CEO Bob Chapek was fired and Bob Iger was reinstated in the role.
Unfortunately, the stock price has been dropping since February, closing at $79.32 on October 4, 2023.
Disney stock was at its highest on March 8, 2021, closing at $201.91, following the news that Disneyland would soon reopen after a year-long closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Disney is set to hold its next earnings call on November 8, in which the company will discuss the full year and fourth quarter 2023 financial results.


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Google+, Google’s effort to turn the entire search engine entity into one giant social network saw success for personal Google+ accounts. Although, Google has requested businesses to postpone creating Google+ profiles for the time being while they further develop + features for business profiles. Even so, several major brands including Ford, Mashable and Breaking News created profiles anyway.
Google had not planned on reviling their business profiles for Google+ until later this year but due to the frenzy of businesses pressuring Google for business profiles Christian Oestlien, group product manager at Google announced on his blog they are running a test phase that businesses can apply for to be part of the testing. Be sure to apply for your business to be part of the test by going to http://goo.gl/zq95C. Applications to be part of the test phase end this Friday. We at Organik SEO have applied and so should your business.


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For the third iteration of its Not in Paris exhibit, Highsnobiety has created a capsule collection in collaboration with brands including Thom Browne, Bape and Bstroy, and will host a pop-up during Paris Men’s Fashion Week.
Highsnobiety first introduced Not in Paris, a multimedia fashion, art and music showcase, in June 2020 to bring brands and their audiences together after physical shows were canceled, turning Paris Fashion Week into a digital event. It has introduced new facets with each edition.
This season, Highsnobiety is releasing exclusive content and product collaborations such as suits, apparel, accessories and NFTs with 15 designers. Among the other participating brands are A.P.C., Kenneth Ize and RTFKT Studios for product and content by Gucci, Rick Owens, Patta and more. The pop-up offering the product collaborations is scheduled to open from June 19 to 26 at 198 Rue de Rivoli.
“In the first two editions, our collaborations with brands and artists happened on the level of content, but when you incorporate physical items into the mix it adds a whole new layer to the project,” said Highsnobiety editor in chief Thom Bettridge. “Everything we do with Not in Paris is about pushing the boundaries of what fashion can be — and even pushing the boundaries of reality itself — so we tried to take that energy into the products we’re putting forward.”
Bettridge noted some boundary-pushing collaborations like skateboard decks made with The Skateroom commemorating Paul McCarthy’s “Tree,” a sculpture shaped like a butt plug that was installed on Place Vendôme and vandalized shortly afterward, forcing the artist to withdraw it. Highsnobiety has also made products with Café de Flore, a popular Paris hangout for its editors and peers, and its first NFTs with RTFKT Studios, the digital fashion company that produces sneakers as NFTs.
“We were super excited about the extent to which the drops we did for Not in Paris 1 and 2 sold out. We were very confident in the project and the products we were creating, but making merchandise for a digital exhibition isn’t exactly a well-trodden path,” Bettridge explained. “I think the spirit of Not in Paris — and this idea that creativity can exist anywhere — is something that people connected to. Now that we’re collaborating on products with other brands and creators as part of the program, we see that as a way of continuing to spread this idea.”
Bettridge described the pop-up Not in Paris souvenir shop as a “physical extension” of the concept.
“Aside from launching products as part of the program, we decided that this was going to be the edition where we would bring Not in Paris back to Paris,” Bettridge said. “This is our first time doing it. To have Not in Paris return to Paris in the form of this souvenir shop is ironic considering the name, but it’s also something we celebrate because it’s a sign that the world is in a better place and that the shared experiences that we love are becoming possible again.”
He continued, “The concept of Not In Paris launched during the first Paris Men’s Fashion Week post-COVID-19. Normally, June was a time when many of us at Highsnobiety would go to Paris to cover the shows, but with in-person presentations cancelled, we created Not In Paris as a way of recreating the explosion of creativity that we would usually see on the runway.”
Will Not in Paris head to other cities? Bettridge said, “Being borderless and being anywhere and everywhere at the same time is central to Not In Paris, so I could totally see it happening in other cities. I could see it happening in the middle of the ocean, or on top of a mountain as well.”


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2015 was a big year for ASUS, that sold 20 million smartphones and is gunning for 30 million this year. They are going to join the high end game in 2016 and they’ll do that through the ASUS ZenFone 3 series, that has just leaked via the info below.
Sources from Taiwan mention that in May or June we’ll witness the debut of the ASUS ZenFone 3 series, bringing a fingerprint scanner into the scene and high end specs. Apparently, ASUS general manager Jerry Shen has confirmed these things already. Meanwhile, we get a leak of one of the newcomers, codenamed ASUS Z010D and detailed via a leaked benchmark.
It packs a 5.9 inch HD screen, a Snapdragon 615 processor and 3 GB of RAM, as well as 32 GB of storage. There’s also a 13 MP back camera and 5 MP front shooter in the mix. The more high end units are still a mystery and we expect to be amazed by Quad HD screens, curved edges, big batteries and more.


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About six times a week, Pete Lindsay walks into any one of four gyms on his way to work, uses the facilities, and leaves without paying.
But it is all above board – he is entitled to as a member of a lifestyle club which allows him to use several gyms free of charge and receive discounts on everything from restaurant bills, insurance and more.
Sounds like something worth signing up to? Forget it, unless you work in a handful of roles in the aviation industry.
Mr Lindsay, 51, is a member of Aviation Professionals Club (APC), formerly Emirates Pilots Club, which is bound by a set of constitutional rules that bars all but certain groups from joining. It is one of a handful of groups of its kind in the UAE that offer membership cards to those working in specific professions.
“Our constitution doesn’t allow us to open the door per se to all aviation professionals but select groups,” says Mark Eadon, the chief financial officer of APC.
“So what we want to do is we want to invite professionals, particularly in the areas of management, to apply for membership for the club as well as other airline pilots who may be visiting or working in the UAE other than the ones we currently represent.”
New Zealander Mr Lindsay, a 777 training captain with Emirates Airline, joined the non-profit group soon after it was founded 15 years ago.
“There was no package for us like other expats had in Dubai at the time. They had club packages built in and we didn’t,” says Mr Lindsay, who is member number 318 and says back then expats often socialised at hotel clubs before prices became too high.
A fellow pilot, Mike Park, also a Kiwi, had an idea to start a group which would negotiate discounts on behalf of its members. Pilots were often free in the weekdays when the clubs were quiet and he thought they could negotiate a good deal.
“They have increased the options available over time. It started off as a way of purely belonging to a few clubs,” says Mr Lindsay. “Then it expanded to providing equipment to us when we were overseas with days off, like bikes and bits and pieces cheaper than having to rent and buy them. Then as it got larger it expanded into medical benefits, insurance benefits.”
Back when he joined, membership for his family cost around Dh100 a month. Today he pays double that – a family membership costs Dh200, while a single is Dh100 – but he estimates that saves his family in excess of Dh20,000 a year in gym memberships and dining out.
He is one of 9,500 members whose combined monthly income is estimated to be Dh475 million per month, based on an average salary package of Dh50,000. The vast majority, 75 to 80 per cent, are based in Dubai, as are most of the deals, but APC has members and deal partners all over the Emirates.
And it estimates its members spend a minimum of US$68.4 million in its 800 domestic deal partners, which include gyms, leisure clubs and restaurants, every year.
“Based on a series of different algorithms we can generate an understanding for how many members can use a particular club at a particular time. And we will buy memberships according to that algorithm,” says Mr Eadon.
“But the advantage to the partner in giving us these memberships is the amount of money that the member will spend during the time they’re at that venue.”
And that can be considerable.
During July and August, 850 members dined at The Meat Co during a special promotion. APC estimates that each member spent on average Dh500, delivering Dh725,000 in revenue for the chain. The club has also calculated that members spend about Dh2.5million at the Westin Hotel in Dubai each year.
“We do not just offer the lifestyle club benefits and the tangible benefits at discounts at hotel bars and so on. We have a dance ball and we have a group gathering where we put on a buffet dinner and have a live band at no charge to them,” says Mr Eadon.
In addition it offers a range of different insurances as well as discounted car leasing packages.
Aviation Professionals Club is unique in the UAE for the range of benefits it offers, but it is not the only lifestyle membership club in the country.
Suki Van Den Berg was working as a flight attendant for Emirates Airline in 2008 when she decided to set up a card, called Club Exec, also for those working in the aviation industry.
“I started flying part-time for the Royal Family with [Dubai] Air Wing on secondment and the crew couldn’t have the Face Card [a club for flight attendants working for Emirates]. So I had an idea to start another card because none of the other airlines that were around then had one,” she says.
“I remember my first big presentation I gave to a company and the first thing they asked was how do you compare to Emirates Pilots Club? I said to them, ‘well, I can’t compare because they have thousands of members but five years down the line you are going to ask why you never bought a membership’. They bought a membership,” adds Ms Van Den Berg.
Today it has about 2,500 members and is now also open to teachers. The card’s most popular programme, Club Exec diamond, costs around Dh3,000 a year and entitles members access to a beach club and gym on The Palm, as well as several other Dubai fitness venues, and 10 to 40 per cent discounts on food and beverage outlets. Joining the gym and fitness clubs separately would cost upwards of Dh35,000.
The benefits enjoyed by these types of profession-based clubs inspired another lifestyle card called DuNight Destinations, however, it is open to all.
DuNight Destinations, which has in the region of 10,000 members, offers discounts of 20 to 50 per cent, but no free access, to between 200 and 300 venues in the UAE for Dh400 to Dh500 a year. Most of its deals are in Dubai.
“I used to work in the hotel industry so I could see the number of people coming in with this Face Card and getting 40 per cent discount on drinks,” says Wendy Smith-Williams, the founder of DuNight Destinations.
“Why should they get 40 per cent discount off [while I get nothing] just because I am Joe Public? It’s obviously there to be had if you have the right demographic. That was what spurred me on to do it,” she adds.
Ms Van Den Berg and Ms Smith-Williams, who jointly promote their respective clubs, have now teamed up to launch a lifestyle membership card together with two others called Safira, which is specifically designed for the under-17s. From January 1, it will offer free access to six venues in Dubai in addition to discounts.
And they could be on to something. The lifestyle club membership card industry appears to be on the rise, with talk of a similar concept on its way for Abu Dhabi.
“There is a great of opportunity ahead for clubs of this type,” adds Mr Eadon. “There’s quite a lot of interest in that kind of business moving forward.”


text: Chennai: The information technology and services sector to reach around $70 billion (around Rs 3.2 lakh crore) by the end of current fiscal, an increase of 41.5 per cent compared to last year, when it stood at $49.7 billion (around Rs 2.26 lakh crore). Nasscom president Som Mittal said the growth rate exceeded industry’s expectation and the top IT companies reported around 20 per cent growth during the first half of the year. “The growth is due to the improved performance in the banking and financial services segment and the exports to US. We are looking to the third quarter results to confirm this,” he said. The industry is expected to reach $225 billion (around Rs 10.26 lakh crore) by the year 2020. The engineering service industry has also seen a tremendous growth, reaching $10 billion (around Rs 45,585 crore) market, he added. “Going forward, we expect around 80 per cent of the opportunities would come from unexplored segments, including the new customers and new verticals which may also bring up challenges,”said Mittal.


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The 'fresh pledge' showed the company's commitment to providing quality fresh produce at affordable prices, said John Sharpe, managing director of central distribution trading & logistics.
He added that the move also supported the government's 5-a-day initiative to improve the nation's health by encouraging consumers to eat five or more pieces of fresh fruit or vegetables a day.
The offer, which started on July 30, begins with 100% extra free on 250g Heritage Select runner beans, rrp £1.49; Heritage Select vine tomatoes at 99p; Heritage plums 500g for £1.19; and peaches and nectarines at £1.19 for eight.
"We are delighted to be able to help consumers get on their way to eating five fresh products a day," said Sharpe.
"The more we can do to help guide consumers into better eating practices through promoting the 5-a-day healthy eating initiative and providing our retailers with a complete fresh range through our central distribution and six-days-a-week Premier delivery service, the better."


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Aluminum company will target the beverage can market with high recycled-content aluminum product.
The Atlanta-based aluminum rolling and recycling firm Novelis has announced the commercial availability of what the company says is the aluminum industry's first independently certified, high-recycled content aluminum designed specifically for the beverage can market. Novelis’ evercan is made with a minimum of 90 percent recycled aluminum.
"We are excited to be able to deliver yet another tangible result of our commitment to sustainable aluminum product innovation," says Phil Martens, Novelis’ president and CEO. "Our Novelis evercan high-recycled content beverage can body sheet, backed by the industry's first independent certification program, represents tremendous progress in sustainable consumer products packaging. As the world's leading supplier of aluminum beverage can sheet, this is an important step toward delivering on our ultimate vision of an aluminum can with up to 100 percent recycled content."
Novelis says the evercan aluminum sheet has been certified for high-recycled content by SCS Global Services, a third-party auditing firm. Novelis is initially offering aluminum can body sheet guaranteed to contain at least 90 percent recycled content. When combined with the can end made of a different alloy during the can-making process, the evercan will enable beverage companies to market beverages in standard 12-ounce aluminum cans certified as made from a minimum of 70 percent recycled content. The evercan is now commercially available in North America and Europe, and will be available worldwide later this year.
"This first phase of the Novelis evercan high-recycled content initiative serves as a critical catalyst for Novelis to work more closely with consumer brand customers, our supply chain partners and other community stakeholders to increase end-of-life recycling of used beverage containers," says John Gardner, Novelis’ chief sustainability officer. "We encourage wide participation from other aluminum suppliers, beverage and packaging companies, retailers and distributors, recyclers, municipalities, environmental groups and consumers themselves in promoting the use of more sustainable consumer packaging through aluminum recycling."


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Published in the Current
Hidden away on Ross Road is a medium-size farm behind a big business. Started in 1992 with a few dozen animals, Bayley Hill Elk and Deer Farm now has 1,200 head of Rocky Mountain elk and red deer serving several different markets.
Owned by Fred and Kathleen Bayley, the farm is open to visitors through Christmas Eve, and when families buy a tree at Bayley’s Campground on Pine Point Road, they get a free bag of apples to feed the elk and deer on the farm just down the road.
Many families come back year after year, Farm Manager Nick Richardson said. “It’s become a tradition.”
Behind the scenes, the farm is a serious business.
One big market it serves, according to Richardson, is producing velvet, or new growth antlers for an arthritis supplement the farm sells as nearby as Lois’s Natural Marketplace on Route 1 and as far afield as China. “China is starting to look at buying a lot,” Richardson said.
The horn is harvested every 60 days, Richardson said, and is dried and sent to Canada for further freeze-drying – shrinking fresh antlers to about one third their original weight – before being made into pills. The pills can sell for as much as $150 per pound, Richardson said, and the farm’s best producer of antlers, a bull elk, has put out over 30 pounds of fresh antler per year.
The farm used to ship more to the Far East, where velvet antler is used in traditional Chinese medicine. That market has slumped recently, allowing
Richardson to grow out the antlers on many bulls to see if they would do well for a second market, which is trophy animals.
Ranchers in Texas, Ohio and Florida buy live bull elk and deer to take to their land for hunters to stalk, paying big fees for the privilege. The ranches will pay up to $5,000 for a bull, Richardson said, and Bayley Hill will sell about 110 animals to ranchers this year.
And though the animals are fenced in on private land, the hunt isn’t necessarily easy. “In Texas a ranch can be 100,000 acres,” Richardson said.
Closer to home, the animals’ meat sells well. The farm deals with a restaurant supply company in Boston that serves high-end hotels and restaurants throughout New England. The farm sells “several tons” of fresh venison and elk meat each year, slaughtered and processed in Guilford.
“We ship all over New England,” Richardson said.
The fourth segment of the business is the most complex and also the most profitable. Bayley Hill provides breeding stock for other deer and elk farms.
Bayley Hill, Richardson said, is one of the top breeding farms in the U.S., and the top bull can bring in as much as $400 per straw – the unit in which bull semen is sold – with hundreds of straws possible per year.
“The beauty of it is that you don’t actually have to bring the animals here,” Richardson said. Rather than shipping animals, breeders send cases of straws around instead. It’s cheaper and easier, especially with the international fears of spreading hoof-and-mouth disease.
Now there are restrictions on animals entering and leaving countries, for fear the disease would be transported along with them, unbeknownst to the owners.
In 1997, Bayley Hill inseminated 240 females, and this year will inseminate 1,000 females, with the goal of improving the farm’s stock.
There is a general rule: “Fast-growing animals that produce huge horns are valuable animals,” Richardson said. But other attributes also up the value of an animal or a line of offspring.
Lean meat is what the meat buyers want, and large antlers are good for the velvet antler market. The largest bull, which would provide the most meat, does not necessarily produce the biggest antlers, Richardson said, meaning lines have to be separated by their intended use.
Females are bred not for size but for mothering skills and quality of milk. A small female may be the one with the most successful offspring, Richardson said, because it’s a better mother than a larger female.
“Each successive generation gets better,” Richardson said.
Ease of birthing is also a factor. Unlike cows, which cannot give birth without human assistance, deer and elk still have unassisted births most of the time. That’s an attribute Richardson and his counterparts at farms around the world want to keep.
Richardson has been doing this sort of work for 20 years, first in New Zealand and then in Britain, where he managed the largest deer farm in the country for five years before coming to Bayley Hill in 1997.
Elk and deer, he said, are intelligent animals that are also very strong. They are kept in fields with six-foot-high fencing around them, but Richardson said some animals could jump even that if they wanted to. Instead, they stay and get 20 to 30 pounds of food a day, which they rapidly turn into meat. At 17 months, the elk can get close to 600 pounds. They eat hay and brewers grain, a byproduct of the Budweiser brewery in Merrimack, N.H.
The animals do have to be handled with caution, because of their size and their wildness, despite living on a farm. “We’re very very careful, but it’s still a high-risk business to be in,” Richardson said.
In the barn, where they are taken for shipping or harvesting of antlers, there is a sophisticated system of hydraulic-powered chutes to keep them moving along properly and under control.
Despite the danger, the animals do play a lot, running around their fields and romping with other animals.
“I truly do believe they have a sense of humor,” Richardson said.


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VENDING MACHINES in America will soon carry information about the calories in the drinks on offer.
The new Calories Count Vending Program will be launched in municipal buildings in the cities of Chicago and San Antonio next year before being made available to vending customers nationwide.
Building upon previous industry initiatives that removed full-calorie beverages from schools and placed new calorie labels on the front of every bottle, can and pack, the new scheme will provide clear calorie information on vending machines, encourage lower-calorie beverage choices and remind consumers that calories count in all the choices they make.
The vending machines will display a Calories Count graphic reminding consumers to consider calories in their beverage choices with messages such as Check then Choose and Try a Low-Calorie Beverage. Calorie labels will be added to the selection buttons to show calorie counts per beverage container.
Drinks companies including Coca Cola, Dr Pepper Snapple and PepsiCo will also work with government leaders, foodservice operators, vending companies and other customers to increase availability of lower-calorie beverages in vending machines.
According to the American Beverage Association, the non-alcoholic drinks industry in the US has a proven track record of providing meaningful solutions to help reduce obesity.
National School Beverage Guidelines, for example, helped to remove full-calorie soft drinks from all schools and replace them with lower-calorie, smaller-portion choices. The initiative has resulted in a 90% reduction in beverage calories shipped to schools between 2004 and the end of the 2009-2010 school year.


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HTC is entering the virtual reality arena with a new headset called the HTC Vive. It’s made in partnership with game developer Valve, and it’s basically HTC’s answer to the Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear VR (as well as Google Cardboard, I guess).
HTC and Valve plan to launch the virtual reality headset by the end of the year, with a developer kit coming this spring.
Speaking at the company’s Mobile World Congress press event today, HTC officials said the device will support 360 degree views, 90Hz refresh rates, and it will support motion controls and two wireless handheld controllers which you can use to interact with apps, videos, or other content displayed on the HTC Vive.
HTC says a group of content partners are already working on apps, games, videos, and other content for the platform. Some of those partners include HBO, Lionsgate, and Google.


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Halo showtime series was announced a while ago with Steven Spielberg as a producer, however, this was even before the launch of Halo: The Master Chief Collection and since then the Halo TV series has been in a limbo. However, Showtime has noted that the Halo TV series is still in active development.
Speaking with TV Guide, Showtime boss David Nevins noted that Halo Showtime series is not dead and is actively moving forward and assured that Halo fans will be satisfied with the TV series along with the casual network audience.
[It] is absolutely still in development, still moving forward and I’m encouraged by what we’ve seen so far. It’s still live action, and it will definitely satisfy the fans of Halo and I think also satisfy the drama audiences of Showtime.
However, he didn’t reveal when we will see the Halo TV series or a trailer for the Halo Showtime series. But given that it is moving forward we can expect a trailer later this year.
Halo franchise is among the most popular exclusive franchises for Xbox but, according to FPS control designer at Bungie, Jaime Griesemer, Microsoft hated the name Halo for its mega FPS franchise.
Halo 5 launched in 2015 with a mixed reception, however, developer 343 Industries has noted that Halo 5 was a learning experience for the upcoming Halo 6 and Halo 5 mistakes will not be repeated.
We very much realized that people wanted Master Chief’s story of Halo 5. We definitely marketed in a way that we hoped was going to bring surprise, but for some fans and certainly fans of Master Chief, it was a huge disappointment because they wanted more Chief.
What do you want to see in the upcoming Halo TV series? Let us know in the comments.


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According to figures from the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board, since the onset of the marketing season in February, Tobacco Sales Floor (TSF) has sold 20 944 321 kg with a value of US$65 761 614 with a daily average price US$2,66. The Zimbabwe Tobacco Auction Centre (Zitac) sold 19 036 76 from which US$51 831 114 was realised translating into a daily average price of US$2,72.
An agriculturalist, Thomas Nherera, said when the tobacco selling season started this year buyers did not have money resulting in a drop in the average seasonal price. “The average seasonal price has this season dropped from US$2,98 a kg to US$2,94 per kg because the marketing season this year started on a very high note and buyers were not prepared to buy because they did not have money. And because the season started on a high note, this also explains why crop deliveries have surpassed last year’s figures by more than 60 per cent to date,” he said.
More than 39 981 082 kg were also delivered to Zitac and TSF through the auction system, generating US$107 592 758. About 67 887 858 kg with a value of US$209 964 166 were delivered through the contract system. As of 2 August, US$317 556 975 had been realised from the sale of 107 868 940 kg. In 2009, 58 190 352 kg of tobacco were sold resulting in the country earning US$173 523 216.Post published in: Economy


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Biggest week in gaming returns as digital showcase
E3, one of if not the biggest gaming events of the year, is just around the corner. Some of the biggest gaming announcements of all time have come from E3, and this year likely will be similar.
Officially, E3 is scheduled from June 12-15 and is going all digital. Unofficially, there will be E3-adjacent digital showcases going on through mid-July, with several publishers opting to skip the show in favor of their own events.
While the schedule isn't finalized, we do know when most of the big publishers are holding their events.
If you're wanting to keep up to date on all the big announcements, here are the dates and times for the major events announced and what to expect:
Summer Game Fest, which was started by the "Game Awards" producer Geoff Keighley last year after E3 was canceled because of the pandemic, returns this year on YouTube at 1 p.m. (all times listed will be Central) June 10. The event will include more than 30 announcements and updates from 30-plus game publishers, including Activision, Epic Games, PlayStation and Xbox.
Ubisoft Forward is scheduled for 2 p.m. June 12 on YouTube, Twitch and the official Ubisoft Forward website. Rumor has it that Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed franchise is taking this year off, so instead "Far Cry 6" and the next Rainbow Six titles probably will make an appearance.
I don't want to get my hopes up, but what I'm really wanting to see from Ubisoft is an update on its open world Star Wars game that was announced earlier this year. EA's exclusive license to publish Star Wars games doesn't expire until 2023, so I don't think it will be released anytime soon, but I would love to get an early look at it.
The Xbox Showcase, which this year will include Bethesda after being acquired by Microsoft, will be one of the biggest shows of E3. It's scheduled for noon June 13 and will be available on Twitch, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook.
The big game most people will be looking out for will be "Halo Infinite." Gameplay of the sixth main game in the Halo series was shown off last year to disastrous results. Despite being the flagship title for the new Xbox Series S/X consoles, the game's graphics looked dated and fan backlash was swift. As was the game's delay so that developers 343 Studio could rework the game's design. E3 will be our chance to see if that added year of development time paid off.
We also should get our first look at gameplay from "Starfield," Bethesda's follow-up to the now classic "Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim." While it would be great to see something from Bethesda's upcoming Indiana Jones game, I'm not expecting to see or hear anything about it this year.
Nintendo's E3 showcase is scheduled for 11 a.m. June 15 and will be available on YouTube. The two games just about everyone is wanting to see are the sequel to "The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild," which was announced a couple years ago and hasn't been seen since, and "Metroid Prime 4," which was announced four years ago, but that version of the game was scrapped and development restarted in 2019 by Retro Studios, which created the first three games in the series. Speaking of those games, this also would be a great time to release a collection of the Metroid Prime trilogy that people have been asking for for years.
This year's EA Play is skipping the craziness of E3 and has been scheduled for July 22 (time TBA). "Battlefield 6," which is being revealed on June 9, probably will be a big focus of this year's EA Play, as will the next installments of the FIFA and Madden games. EA has a new golf franchise starting soon and is bringing back its college football series, so both of those likely could get reveals as well.
It's possible we could get two Star Wars games revealed at EA Play this year. Respawn Entertainment is working on a sequel to 2019's "Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order." Many of the main cast members of the "Star Wars Battlefront 2" campaign tweeted late last year that they were working together again doing motion capture work, so the story of Inferno Squad likely will continue in another Star Wars game as well. Although I would love that to be "Star Wars Battlefront 3," the rumor is it is going to be a smaller scale game like last year's "Star Wars: Squadrons."
PlayStation has not announced its plans for a digital showcase in June or July, but I would be shocked if we didn't get one.
Dusty Ricketts can be reached at firstname.lastname@example.org. He is currently playing "Marvel's The Avengers." You can find him through his PlayStation Network ID: DustRAG316.


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In an article titled “Vietnam emerging as Southeast Asia's new tourist hot spot” published on July 5, the German media outlet Deutsche Welle (DW) noted that Vietnam has fast become one of the most popular destinations in Southeast Asia, and its improved visa policy is expected to boost tourism.
DW noted Vietnam is emerging as a new tourist hot spot in Southeast Asia.
According to the article, as tourism rebounds after COVID-19 pandemic, industry experts said Vietnam is becoming a favored destination for travelers to Asia, where tourists enjoy diverse landscapes, beaches, mountainous rice terraces and bustling cities.
According to a report by Google Destination Insights, Vietnam was the seventh most searched destination from March to June, and the only country in Southeast Asia in the top 20, quoted DW.
DW also forecasts Vietnam can welcome 10 million international visitors in 2023, surpassing the target of 8 million.
Hoi An is a favorite destination of international tourists. (Photo: DUY HAU)
DW quoted Bobby Nguyen, chairman of Rustic Hospitality Group, a tour agency, that the boost in tourism is coming mainly from the Republic of Korea, Chinese, and Indian tourists.
His assessment was made based on the fact that in March 2023, China allowed travel groups to Vietnam, while the Indian market has increased since 2022. In addition, Bobby Nguyen highly appreciated Vietnam’s use of social media to boost Vietnam's international popularity.
"Having many online communication channels such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok or promotion channels on Google or other networking channels is also the fastest way to promote Vietnam's image to the world," he said.
Spending half of the article on the change in visa policy recently approved by the National Assembly of Vietnam, DW said Vietnam's new visa policy will boost tourism and attract more international visitors to Vietnam.
Vietnam’s National Assembly has adopted the policy of increasing the electronic visa duration from 30 days to 90 days, with single or multiple entries and tripling visa waivers for temporary stay at the border gate under the visa exemption category from 15 days to 45 days. This policy will take effect from August 15, 2023.
DW quoted Gary Bowerman, a tourism analyst based in Kuala Lumpur, said the visa changes will boost the tourism sector. "It's picking up, and over the next six months, you will see travelers to Vietnam increase. I think it's going to be very strong, and you'll see growth particularly now the Chinese market is back," he told DW.
INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL EXPO HO CHI MINH CITY 2023
Venue: Saigon Exhibition and Convention Center (SECC)
799 Nguyen Van Linh Street, District 7, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.


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Traditional sports have been tagged along since the early years as a physical and mental exertion of the mind and body, amongst the popular ones include ball games such as basketball, baseball, and football to name a few. As years go by the definition of an activity considered as a sport had grown a wider audience and understanding.
Esports players are also now considered professional athletes and pro gamers can now get their own visas to play overseas. Moreover, viewership of Esports compared to traditional sports has reached a multitude of audiences, with the recent 2017 Worlds Finals (LOL) whose online viewers reached 57.6M. Due to the eSports industry becoming so big over a short period of time, it’s not surprising that plenty of people are looking to start betting on esports in order to try and win money when placing bets on their favorite games or teams.
Esports since then had been in the heat of debate, traditional sports analysts are slowly opening their doors to the possibility of having Esports as part of the general category of sports, others still mock the idea as it defeats the real essence of sports as an activity that focuses on physical movement.
Either way, Esports considering as a sport or not is up to everyone’s perspective, we’re expanding our horizon of understanding, changing the ideals we’ve accepted as such and embracing new methods in societal and cultural differences.
In the lighter note here’s an esports infographic by iBUYPOWER that may help you decide, whether you consider esports as a sport or not.


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Gartner expects $3.7T in 2013 IT spending
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- Lisa Ward
- Web contributor- Silicon Valley Business Journal
Research firm Gartner expects $3.7 trillion in worldwide IT spending in 2013, a 4.2 percent rise from 2012.
Worldwide device spending is expected to be $666 million, up 6.3 percent from 2012 but down from earlier predictions, according to a Gartner release.
Gartner also reduced its long-term device spending expectations to 4.5 percent a year between now and 2016 due to a "a sharp reduction in the forecast growth in spending on PCs and tablets" because of lower tablet prices and an expectation that the drop won't be offset by increased spending in mobile phones and printers.
Some of the overall rise in worldwide IT spending is due to "projected gains in the value of foreign currencies versus the dollar," and would be 3.9 percent in "constant dollars," according to the release.
Gartner said in the release that it expects worldwide enterprise software spending to hit $296 billion in 2013 and global telecom services to remain the largest IT spending market.
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- July 26, 2023
- Posted by: EBAN Team
- Category: News, Uncategorized
Brussels, 26th July 2023
The partnership between EIT Digital and EBAN signifies a powerful collaboration to foster innovation and drive growth within Europe’s tech ecosystem. By combining the strengths of EIT Digital’s expertise in digital innovation and open-innovation ecosystem with EBAN’s extensive network and representation of the early-stage investor community, the partnership aims to accelerate early-stage investments in startups and share best practices. By nurturing digital ventures, supporting technology scale-up, and providing growth support, the partnership aspires to bolster Europe’s competitiveness on a global scale, creating wealth and jobs and further establishing Europe as a competitive, inclusive, and sustainable force in the digital era.
“The partnership between EBAN and EIT Digital is a testament to the commitment of both organisations to nurture and grow the tech ecosystem in Europe, accelerating early-stage investments in startups and sharing best practices. Our combined strengths will allow us to have a significant impact on the European deep tech and digital entrepreneurial landscape and go as far as bolstering Europe’s competitiveness on a global scale.” said Diva Tommei, Chief Innovation, Education and Marketing Officer.
“EIT Digital is a catalyst for digital innovation and entrepreneurship in Europe, forging collaborations and driving meaningful change. Their integrated approach to education, research, and business equips individuals with the skills to shape the future. By addressing societal challenges and fostering innovation, EIT Digital is a vital force for economic growth and progress in Europe.” said Jacopo Losso, EBAN General Director.
EBAN, the European Business Angels Network, is the pan-European representative for the early-stage investor community gathering over 100 member organisations in more than 50 countries today. Established in 1999 by a group of pioneer angel networks in Europe with the collaboration of the European Commission and EURADA, EBAN represents a sector estimated to invest 11.4 billion Euros a year and play a vital role in Europe’s future, notably in the funding of SMEs. EBAN fuels Europe’s growth through the creation of wealth and jobs.
EIT Digital is working for a competitive digital Europe that is inclusive, fair and sustainable. EIT Digital embodies the future of innovation by mobilizing a pan-European multi-stakeholder open-innovation ecosystem of top European corporations, SMEs, startups, universities and research institutes, where students, researchers, engineers, business developers and investors address the technology, talent, skills, business and capital needs of digital entrepreneurship. They build the next generation of digital ventures, digital products and services and breed digital entrepreneurial talent, helping businesses and entrepreneurs to be at the frontier of digital innovation by providing them with technology, talent, and growth support. EIT Digital answers specific innovation needs by, for example, finding the right partners to bring technology to the market, supporting the scale-up of digital technology ventures, attracting talent and developing their digital knowledge and skills.


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Zhoghovurd: Ruble’s depreciation causes damage to Yerevan Beer
11:06 06/12/2014 >> DAILY PRESS
Yerevan Beer company is suffering great losses due to the depreciation
of the Russian ruble. Company’s deputy director Armen Hayiryan told
Zhoghovurd that the company has been exporting its production to
Russia for a long time, but it had to cut the export volumes due to
the ruble’s devaluation.
“Several problems arise when purchasers realize the products on the
spot and the purchasing ability of people is declining. Otherwise we
could export a larger volume of beer to Russia,” Hayiryan said.


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The launch of the Singapore-Hong Kong Air Travel Bubble will be deferred for two weeks due to the spike in Covid-19 cases in Hong Kong, said Singapore’s transport minister Ong Ye Kung this afternoon.
In a Facebook post published an hour ago, Ong explained that although the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore had announced this morning the commencement of the travel bubble as planned on Sunday, further discussions between him and Hong Kong secretary Edward Yau determined that it would be prudent to defer the launch of the arrangement.
“We will review within two weeks on the new launch date and update again,” said Ong in his post.
“I can fully understand the disappointment and frustration of travellers who have planned their trips. But we think it is better to defer from a public health standpoint. The airlines will be contacting the travellers individually.
“This is a sober reminder that the Covid-19 virus is still with us, and even as we fight to regain our normal lives, the journey will be full of ups and downs. But we will press on and look forward to when we can safely launch the ATB,” he said.
In response to the update, Singapore Airlines has issued a statement, saying that it “supports the decision by the Singapore and Hong Kong authorities to defer the launch of the Air Travel Bubble”.
The airline spokesperson said: “The health and safety of our customers remain our top priority. Affected customers are being contacted by Singapore Airlines. Customers who no longer wish to travel due to the deferment of the ATB can request for a full refund of the unutilised portion of their ticket, and have the cancellation fees waived.”


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It is no secret anymore that the majority of the collection lawsuits are entirely bogus or are based upon false information — the amount owed, etc. Debt collectors (debt buyers) don’t have proof that the consumer owes the debt collector.
A Judge recently commented that 90% of the collection suits are based upon faulty proof.
This has led to a firestorm and the debt collection industry is scrambling to fight back because once the public knows that the same nonsense that occurred in the mortgage industry is occurring in the credit card industry, the public will turn on the credit card companies and the debt buyers.
Notice what the collection industry spokesperson says — and his attempt to be clever and change the focus. I will give him credit, he was trained very well for this. It is still bogus and not particularly skilled but he was trying. Expect to see more of this as the industry marches lock step on this lie.
REHM10:15:59 What do you — or how do you respond to the New York judge who said that 90 percent of the credit card debt cases have fraudulent documentation or generic witnesses?
BARTLETT10:16:16 I respond with an incredulous shake of my head. I don’t know the judge, and I read that case — or read that judge’s comment. The idea that 90 percent of transactions could be fraudulent just is — defies any — the most bizarre science fiction you could — imagination. So test it yourself. Call tonight, look on your credit card statement, call the 800 number and say, hey, this third item on the bill, I want to know what it’s all about.
BARTLETT10:16:40 Credit card company will tell you, just from that phone call, what you bought, when you bought it, what time of day, whether you left a tip and when it’s due, so it defies imagination that so — take this fifth item on your account or take another account, and you get the same answer. So the idea that 90 percent or even 9 percent would be fraudulent makes no sense. The borrower bought a washing machine and is using the washing machine.
REHM10:17:07 Steve Bartlett, he is president, chief executive officer of The Financial Services Roundtable.
The judge talked about fraudulent documentation in the lawsuits.
Not that the transactions listed on your current credit card statement are fraudulent. The industry can’t argue about all of the bogus lawsuits. That is a losing argument.
So the industry is trying to rewrite what the judge (and many others over the past few years) actually said. The issue is bogus documentation. The issue is debt buyers who don’t own the debt suing.
Sure Joe Blow may have defaulted on a Citibank account.
But does that mean he owes Midland or LVNV or Portfolio Recovery?
Only if they truly own the debt.
So why don’t they prove they own the debt when they sue?
They either don’t have the proof or, just like in the mortgage industry, they are so sloppy and care so little for the intergrity of the judicial system that it is unimportant to them.
Peter Holland, a great consumer attorney and professor, points this out:
HOLLAND10:20:47 That consumer should pay for it. We are not talking here, Diane, about people who owe money and the so-called, you know, will they owe the money anyway? What we’re really talking about — and judges have coming out more and more — we’re talking about an assault on the integrity of the judicial process itself by filing incomplete paperwork, by filing sometimes false paperwork, forged paperwork, robo-signing. So just like I believe that every person should pay what they owe, a parallel American value is don’t stake a claim to something that you don’t own.
HOLLAND10:21:28 And what happens in these cases, because of the incomplete documentation, OK, no contract is filed with the lawsuit, yet they want 30 — 29 percent interest rate. They want a $39 late fee every month. They want a $39 over-the-limit fee. They want lawyer’s fees. Well, if you’re going to ask me to pay all of those, what I call, junk fees, but — if you want to make me to pay those fees, don’t you think you ought to have the contract that contains the provisions that says I owe them?
You can read the entire interview by Diane Rehm here — it also includes some excellent comments from Thomas Pahl of the Federal Trade Commission and Kathy Kristof of Kiplinger’s Personal Finance.


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In a bid to increase revenue, travel search engine Rome2rio has accelerated its transition to an e-commerce site, signing multiple affiliate booking agreements with rail, bus and air operators.
This strategic shift from the site – which advises travellers on how best to get from A to B – will enable Rome2rio to better capitalise on its surging popularity.
More than 100 million annual visitors are projected to visit the site this year.
The move has been a long time coming.
Rome2rio has had a long-term affiliate relationship for hotels with Booking.com and started selling UK rail via a partnership with SilverRail several months ago.
US operator Amtrak is now on board and an agreement with Trenitalia means Italian rail bookings will be available within the next six weeks.
Rail operators in Germany, France and other key European markets are set to go live early next year.
Buses are another area of focus.
“Partnerships with Busbud and Distribusion bring booking capability for key European and North American coach operators including National Express, Greyhound, Eurolines, Alsa and Flixbus,” the company said in a press release.
“Finally, a recent deal with Travelport will see the site offering direct flight bookings in selected markets by early 2017.”
Rome2rio CEO Rod Cuthbert said the move makes sense.
“We’re seeing growing demand from users to find an online resource they can rely on for booking all of their trip components; air, ground, accommodation and activities.
“We expect to see continued strong growth in both traffic and revenue, and expect to become the global leader in the multi-modal bookings sector.”


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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Renowned Kurdish-German rapper and entrepreneur Xatar plans to franchise his newly-established kofta restaurant, aiming for multiple locations in Germany and elsewhere, including the Kurdistan Region.
Giwar Hajabi, known to many by his stage name Xatar, opened Haval Grill in Germany’s Bonne on July 3.
The establishment, which serves Kurdish kofta and yoghurt drink (“mastaw” in Kurdish), has had queues of people waiting for their turn to taste Xatar’s new brand since its opening.
“We will have it in Cologne, Berlin, Hamburg, Stuttgart, and elsewhere as franchises. We will make it grow in Germany. Inshallah, we will come to Kurdistan’s Erbil and Sulaimani as well after the coronavirus ends,” he told Rudaw on Friday.
On July 16, he claimed that “there is high demand for Haval Grill throughout Germany and elsewhere like Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Istanbul,” announcing that he would welcome tenders from people who want to open franchises of the restaurant throughout the world.
Born in 1981 to a Kurdish family in Iran’s Sanandaj city, Xatar and his family fled to what is now the Kurdistan Region. Like many other Kurds in Iraq, he and his family were tortured and imprisoned by Saddam Hussein’s regime, Xatar told Rudaw, adding that he himself was imprisoned in Iraq for three months.
Migrating to Germany, Hajabi began using the nickname Xatar, which is an Arabic term for “dangerous” using Kurdish spelling. He began rapping and achieved relative fame in 2012 after releasing his second album Nr.415.
Since its opening, many, including German social media figures, have visited the restaurant to take a photo or video with the rapper and post it online, leading to an influx of customers. The restaurant’s chef told Rudaw that more than a thousand people eat their kofta every day.
“We sell between 1,000-1,500 kofta every day … The visitors are very happy and they say that the food is new to them. Everywhere sells doner but we have made something new,” chef Mazloum Heval said.
Xatar says he tries not to disappoint his fans that travel from far to see him.
“I am glad to hear that some people come from distant areas like Berlin, Austria and Switzerland. My friend, [chef] Mazloum, always gives me a phone call, saying that someone has come from Austria and wants to see you. So I come here to see them,” he said.
He added that he has brought fame to the word “Haval,” which is the Kurdish word for “friend.”
Borcu is one of Xatar’s fans who visited the grill to see the rapper and taste his brand. “I am very glad for the opening of this brand. I have come here to try the food and enjoy it,” she told Rudaw.
The entrepreneur is also the founder and owner of a number of other brands, including Alles oder Nix Records and Groove Attack TraX.
Additional reporting by Aalla Shaly from Germany


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Published On: Monday, 16 October 2017
Comox Valley Chamber Joins National Campaign for Genuine Tax Consultation
COMOX VALLEY - Delegates from hundreds of chambers of commerce across Canada overwhelmingly endorsed a call for genuine consultation on tax reform at the Canadian Chamber’s annual policy conference in Fredericton, NB.
Having been raised in a family business, I understand the challenges faced by small business owners during both profitable and not-so-profitable times. Small business owners are the backbone of our economy and invest in their local communities. Our Chamber, mainly comprised of small businesses has spoken out against this proposed tax.
At the Chamber AGM, delegates opted to move up a late-stage resolution calling on the government to extend its 75-day consultation period and to establish an independent commission to recommend ways to modernize and simplify Canada’s tax laws.
The resolution, titled “Stop the Harmful Tax Changes on Private Corporations” passed with 98.8 per cent support. The resolution can be found on the Canadian Chamber website.
Hon. Perrin Beatty, President and CEO of the Canadian Chamber stated, “This isn’t just about dollars and cents. It’s about the survival of tens of thousands of small businesses and family farms across Canada.
The Canadian Chamber appreciated hearing from the Minister of Finance at the AGM but remains convinced that his proposed tax changes pose a clear threat to small businesses and that the government’s consultation process is totally inadequate.”
Small businesses are the largest employers in Canada. The products and services they provide and the taxes they pay are responsible for our country’s standard of living. We have a responsibility to protect their growth. When provincial governments of all different affiliations and hundreds of tax professionals all express their concerns, it’s time for the government to listen.
The Comox Valley Chamber of Commerce is a member in good standing of the Canadian Chamber. The Chamber is the Comox Valley’s largest and most influential business association, your Business Champion. The Chamber powers the people who power the Comox Valley and beyond.
We are listening to what Businesses want: More exposure, highly focused networking, professional learning opportunities, business leadership, and solid connections. For more information on the Comox Valley Chamber of Commerce, please visit the following link.
The Canadian Chamber of Commerce is the vital connection between business and the federal government. It helps shape public policy and decision-making to the benefit of businesses, communities and families across Canada with a network of over 450 chambers of commerce and boards of trade, representing 200,000 businesses of all sizes in all sectors of the economy and in all regions. News and information are available at Chamber.ca or Twitter @CdnChamberofCom.
* Parts of article courtesy of Canadian Chamber of Commerce.


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What Can the Re-Regulation of Other Industries Tell Us About Open Banking One Year On?
UK Open Banking just reached its first birthday milestone (on January 13 to be precise) and given my own commentary – including in the ACI blog – on this topic, the first anniversary of Open Banking in the UK certainly won’t pass without a debrief on the progress that’s been made and what challenges lie ahead.
When it first went live in early 2018, Open Banking was treated by the mainstream press with a mixture of well-meaning curiosity and mild suspicion; was it really safe to sign up with a new Third-Party Provider (TPP) to access your existing bank accounts on your behalf? There was also a distinct lack of consumer excitement, perhaps because flexible, secure access to multiple banks through a single app was still an alien concept for UK account holders. And without an obvious public-awareness campaign there was little to engage consumers, let alone excite them about the possibilities.
However, by the end of 2018, there were signs of progress. Figures published by Open Banking Limited (the company set up by the Competition and Markets Authority to deliver Open Banking) in December showed that there were 64 new companies registered as Open Banking Third Party Providers. 12 of these were already operating with live customers, while 32 account providers (mostly banks) had signed up to offer API-access to their services; this was quite eye-opening because only 9 account providers were obliged to open up by the CMA.
In November, The Independent >highlighted a report that said 22% of consumers had heard of Open Banking. This was reported as a sign of sluggishness, but despite the negative sentiment, I’d consider more than one in five to be a remarkable success. The same report also suggests that 9% of citizens had used Open Banking services. If accurate, I think that figure is astonishingly high. Given that neither banking nor government public policy typically make for scintillating dinner party conversation, it’s something of a surprise that Open Banking has made it into the UK’s public consciousness at all.
What can we learn from telecom transformation?
Before declaring Open Banking as the “revolution that never was” (as The Independent titled its report), we need to contrast it against similar market restructuring exercises. Open Banking is not entirely unlike previous public policy revolutions that have reshaped other industries. Thus, it may be worth comparing the progress of ‘Open Banking’ with, say ‘Open Telecoms,’ or ‘Open Energy.’
The UK Telecoms industry commenced its deregulation in the early 1980s, with the privatization of British Telecom, the previous monopoly provider. Incidentally, the term ‘deregulation’ sounds odd today when we consider the growing list of compliance obligations faced by today’s financial services industry, but the term was coined at a time when the government saw the reduction of regulations as a vote winner. ‘Re-regulation’ may be a more accurate term for Open Banking, but the objectives of stimulating competition, increased innovation and better outcomes for UK citizens and businesses still hold true.
The re-regulation of Telecoms in the 1980s preceded innovations that were barely comprehensible at the time – remember the first web browsers didn’t appear until the 1990s, the first mobile phone browsers not until we were almost into the next millennium, and the iPhone didn’t appear until 2007. There was a telecoms revolution, but it wasn’t measured over the course of one year’s worth of deregulation – it’s still evolving four decades later!
The Telecoms sector was characterized by obvious technical changes and innovations in both products and services. Mobile telephony, the availability of broadband and competition for pay TV were all major drivers of investment in alternative telecommunications networks, creating new competitors and encouraging customers to switch between accounts.
Two decades on, what does Open Energy tell us about the trajectory of Open Banking?
Dynamic innovation might be more difficult to spot in Open Energy, which makes it perhaps an even better comparison for the emergence of Open Banking. In the early 1990s, consumers of electricity had no option but to buy energy from their local supplier (one of the Regional Electricity Companies - RECs). The market was opened up so that any REC could compete in another territory, with the idea that customer service as well as pricing would become competitive differentiators.
This re-regulation exercise also coincided with early public policy initiatives aimed at shifting the energy generation market towards sustainable sources (backed by UK government commitments to international agreements on climate change), so that new energy supply companies would be encouraged to start up with so-called “Green” propositions.
The early adopters of this re-regulation were not consumers: larger business users moved quickly to take advantage of lower-priced account switching offers. Apparently one-third of the UK’s largest companies changed their energy provider within the first year. Structural changes to the retail market followed in 1998, but it took until 2009 – a decade later – before half of all consumers had changed their supplier.
One conclusion from this pattern of adoption is that although a lot of interest and commentary is generated by retail market observers, businesses are usually better placed to generate real benefits (in terms of lower costs, better service, innovation, etc.) from this kind of re-regulation.
Some observers may argue today that Open Energy was an unnecessary process, resulting in no sustainable price decreases or genuine customer service improvements. Detractors could also argue that it did not generate more competition; today the UK energy market seems to be dominated by a handful of six big suppliers (of which, incidentally, four are non-UK companies) that control around 80% of the market. Furthermore, 2018 also saw a lot of bad publicity for the national Smart Meter installation scheme, with some estimates saying that the over-budget program would generate an extra GBP 0.5 billion in costs for UK users.
However, the Open Energy process has changed the consumer experience, and it has reshaped the whole energy industry; from creation, through distribution and consumer supply. While a handful of companies might dominate, in 2017 there were 60 suppliers offering electricity and/or gas, which is 16 more than one year earlier. Competition is benefiting those consumers who are able and willing to shop around.
It created the possibility for new companies to offer electricity supply with links to sustainable sources, or for users to be able to generate and sell their own energy through innovations like the Feed-in Tariff scheme, introduced in 2010 to encourage UK users to invest in renewable energy-generation methods such as solar panels. An "Energy Tech” export industry has developed on the back of this, although probably not as well marketed as the corresponding fintech industry.
So, whilst Open Telecoms has had about 40 years, Open Energy has had around 20 years, and the initiative is still a work in progress. Open Banking, by comparison, has had just 1 year – it is very much still in its infancy. Bearing in mind that public awareness of Open Telecoms and Open Energy is still in flux, it may be a little premature to jump to conclusions about Open Banking just yet.
But will Open Banking be equally slow to gather pace?
Open Banking does have advantages that may accelerate the process of change:
- Availability and understanding of price/service comparison sites and apps
- New regulations to reduce the cost/hassle of switching (specifically the principles of personal data retrieval and exchange)
- Behavioral biases and defaults of new customers (digital-first and familiarity with aggregation/intermediary models) provides a higher propensity to adopt new services
- Unprecedented levels of investment into consumer-facing start-ups and "challenger bank” organizations
- The need for smart financial and payment instruments to be integrated into the digital value chains envisaged by the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution – these may sound like somewhat fanciful innovations, but they sound no less likely than web-based services envisaged by early Open Telecoms activists
- The maturity of collaborative development tools and Application Programming Interface (API) methods
- The financial incentives of using real-time account access and immediate payment methods (like UK Faster Payments)
The UK Open Banking revolution will still not be concluded overnight but, rather like Open Energy, the earliest and biggest steps might be from those businesses taking advantage of new data aggregation and payments handling services, in combination with gradual adoption by consumers.
One of the observations of a recent annual Ofgem (the UK regulator for electricity and gas markets) report warned of the polarization of markets with customers who fail to engage in new propositions being left to overpay for their services and funding the 50% who did take advantage. Unfortunately, many of the customers left with higher prices are those less able to afford them, so more needs to be done regarding education and awareness. The same will hold true in Open Banking too.
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This blog was co-authored by ACI’s Jay Floyd and Iain Swaine, head of Cyber Strategy for BioCatch in the EMEA region
Have you ever received a text from your bank asking you to confirm a transaction by replying Yes or No? You then realise you don’t recognize the transaction, reply No, and receive another text instructing you to call a telephone number to discuss this unknown payment further. Suddenly you’re hit with the fear that someone has hacked into your bank account. But, do you ever consider that the text you received was, in fact, a scam?
Helping Merchants Protect Themselves: Cybersecurity Tips from a Former White House CIO
In a world full of open technology, the devices that make our lives easier also leave us vulnerable to being hacked, according to Theresa Payton, former White House CIO and star of the CBS series Hunted. Payton recently joined me for an exclusive ACI cybersecurity webinar, sharing expert insights into how merchants can enable growth, enhance the customer experience and prevent greater instances of fraud.
Why India's Payments Players Need to Fight Fraud with Machine Learning
By 2023, experts are predicting 60 billion UPI (Unified Payments Interface) transactions annually, accounting for more than 50 percent of India’s total digital payments transactions. And it’s estimated that today nearly 50 percent of all real-time payment (RTP) transactions globally are processed in India. It’s an exciting market for payments innovation, with a wide range of digital overlay services available to consumers and merchants, thanks to the introduction of UPI.
The Untapped Opportunity of Machine Learning for Real-Time Payments Fraud Prevention
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Why Banks Must Democratize Machine Learning for Fraud Prevention and Payments Intelligence
Banks are already actively on the path to digital transformation, considering new technologies, new customer experiences and new business models. A critical piece of this digital transformation centers on better understanding the wealth of data within the banks’ systems and mining it for improved customer insight. In the New Payments Ecosystem, data is as valuable to the bank and its customers as the deposits held in their accounts, and it should be protected, and leveraged for the benefit of the customer.
Payments and Fraud: The Paradox Twins
Digital commerce through web and mobile is where merchants predominantly experience shopper growth today. This has become a hugely important domain for their focus. It offers a means for international growth, new market penetration and a way to engage with shopper-hungry Millennials in their culture. Merchants frequently adopt a Digital-First, eCommerce-First or Mobile-First strategy to ensure full corporate buy-in to this strategy.
Building Trust in Open Banking with Behavioral Biometrics and Machine Learning
Strategies for fraud prevention in payments are having to evolve quickly, as new technologies emerge and digitalization of the banking ecosystem continues at pace. I spoke with Giselle Lindley, Principal Financial Crime Consultant at ACI Worldwide and Tim Dalgleish, Head of Threat Analytics, Asia Pacific at BioCatch to understand how financial institutions can use payments intelligence to build trust in this challenging environment.


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NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- ESPN is arguably the most valuable player in the media industry -- a gift to parent Walt Disney that keeps on giving.
If Wall Street's forecasts come true, ESPN will be even more valuable to Disney
Anthony DiClemente, an analyst for Barclays Capital, pointed out that ESPN is "likely to realize (an) auto ad sales uptick" and "a recovery in TV advertising directly benefits the pace of recovery of Disney's Cable networks operating income."
Long story short: The rich get richer.
Naturally, ESPN will be a conspicuous presence this quarter as the World Cup unfolds.
That should hardly be a surprise. ESPN is a model division and a role model for media properties. Disney's handling of it has been masterful, to the point where ESPN's claim of being "The Worldwide Leader in Sports" seems to be a confirmation of a belief, not a fanciful boast.
Disney has steered ESPN shrewdly, becoming a major presence in the broadcasts of the National Football League, National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball, among its prime attractions. Over the years, Disney has added a well-regarded magazine and radio network, showcasing the ESPN brand.
If every one of its divisions could perform as well as ESPN, Disney would have no worries at all.
-- Jon Friedman


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The secret’s in the resin – or lack of it, the company said. Silgan reported its new polyethylene tubes require far less resin to produce than the typical tube. They come with low-profile snap-on heads that are compatible with polypropylene flip-top closures made by Italian manufacturer Giflor and sourced by TricorBraun. The tube closure is a new, low-profile model that weighs 50 percent less than a traditional closure with a similar diameter.
Silgan claimed the resulting tube weighs up to 30 percent less than traditional tubes, improving efficiency. It projected that this eco-friendly packaging would provide a savings of more than 10,000 pounds of plastic per million tubes produced. Savings depend upon tube length and the tube/closure combination that is used.