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· 3 min read
Morgan Stanley CEO on Bitcoin, Urgent Crypto Regulation, Digital GBP & Ripple + More News
Get your daily, bite-sized digest of cryptoasset and blockchain-related news – investigating the stories flying under the radar of today’s crypto news.
- Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman is less critical of crypto than some of his fellow investment banking executives. “I don’t think crypto is a fad. I don’t think it’s going to go away,” Gorman said during the bank’s third-quarter earnings call on Thursday, Bloomberg has reported. “I don’t know what the value of bitcoin should or shouldn’t be. But these things aren’t going away,” the CEO added.
- American venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) said it is setting up a new USD 515m fund “to invest in crypto networks and businesses.” The fund will have a special focus on the following areas: Next-generation payments, modern store of value, decentralized finance, new ways for creators to monetize, and web 3.0, they added.
- Aurora Labs, which develops an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) scaling solution for decentralized applications on NEAR, announced on Thursday it has raised USD 12m in its first funding round. The round was joined by several well-known venture capital funds, including Pantera Capital, Electric Capital, Dragonfly Capital, and others.
- Charting platform TradingView has announced a new USD 298m investment round led by Tiger Global, which brings its valuation to USD 3bn. The company also recently reported a 400% increase in created accounts, and a 237% increase in visitors to the platform in the last 18 months.
- Crypto regulation “needs to be pursued as a matter of urgency,” said Jon Cunliffe, Deputy Governor for Financial Stability at the Bank of England (BoE). He added that regulatory oversight could help the large potential of the crypto industry flourish in a sustainable way. "Technology and innovation have driven improvement in finance throughout history. Crypto technology offers great opportunity," Cunliffe said.
- The Digital Pound Foundation has launched, as an independent forum to support the implementation of a well-designed digital British pound and digital money ecosystem. The foundation intends to work towards establishing an ecosystem that encompasses both CBDCs and privately-issued forms of digital money. Projects such as Avalanche, Quant, and Ripple are among the originating members of the group.
- The G7 has published a set of Public Policy Principles for Retail Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC) alongside a G7 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors’ Statement on CBDCs and digital payments. The report covers a range of important matters such as financial stability, operational resilience and cyber security, energy efficiency, privacy, inclusion and tackling illicit finance, said the announcement, adding that: “These factors should all be considered when designing and potentially delivering a CBDC that would be fit for the future.”
- UK crypto trader Sanjay Singh, 40, has been jailed after he was caught bypassing the electrical mains to power the machines he used for his financial dealings, The Leicester Mercury reported. Singh admitted to 'abstracting' electricity worth up to GBP 32,000 (USD 43,841) at two Leicestershire sites where he operated bitcoin mining machines, Leicester Crown Court heard on Tuesday. Investigations suggested he had cheated the power provider out of tens out thousands of pounds of electricity.
- The US-listed Bitcoin mining firm Cipher Mining has said it will purchase 28,000 to 56,000 next-generation Bitcoin mining machines from Bitfury for a price of USD 6,250 per rig, a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Monday has revealed.
- Payment card giant Visa said it has partnered with non-fungible token (NFT) artist Micah Johnson to support “the creator economy.” “We’re excited about the future of NFT commerce and what this technology can offer to small and micro business owners in the creator economy,” the company added.


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Today we’re bringing you LOTS of construction updates on upcoming restaurants we CANNOT wait to try, new holiday items coming soon, and more! Join us on this “virtual” trip to Disney Springs!
Disney Springs Food Updates
The Spice & Tea Exchange
The Spice & Tea Exchange recently opened their very own tea bar and we got the chance to test out some samples not too long ago. If you’re in Disney Springs and looking for some delicious tea or spices, you’ll definitely want to check out this spot!
During our most recent trip, the Cast Member working there told us that the store will be putting out their holiday stock on Monday, November 9th! We can’t wait to see what festive creations they come up with.
Goofy’s Candy Company
We’re keeping track of ALL the holiday treats we taste in Disney World and reviewing them so you know which ones to grab and which ones to skip. We’ve got a page set up that we’ll be updating constantly with all the latest, so definitely visit it regularly to see what new things we’ve tried!
Disney Springs Construction Updates
When Gideon’s Bakehouse opens its Disney Springs location, we have a feeling we will be stopping by there daily for their GIANT, delicious cookies! No opening date for their store has been announced yet, but we did see them making some progress in terms of construction recently.
We could see some individuals working on what appear to be some awnings above the entrance and windows on the building.
The outside of the building really appears to be coming together. In early September, Gideon’s announced that they were hiring for their Disney Springs location, so it seems like we’re definitely getting closer to entering cookie heaven very soon!
Late last year, it was announced that an M&M’s Store would be coming to Disney Springs in 2020. We recently noticed that they have actually very quietly delayed that grand opening to 2021, but, as far as we can tell, construction on the store location does appear to be moving forward.
During our last trip to Disney Springs, we saw some people working on the building.
We could see some large insulation rolls in the building and it looked like that is what the workers were focusing on at the moment.
We could see one of the workers putting the insulation between the steel framing.
So, even though the grand opening has been delayed, we are hoping that we’ll see this location finally open up in 2021!
Everglazed Donuts & Cold Brew
Everglazed Donuts & Cold Brew is another spot we’ve been keeping a close eye on. They recently made a hiring announcement and shared photos of some of the donuts they’ll have available when they open, so it definitely looks like we’re getting closer to eating our weight in donuts from this spot soon!
In terms of construction, we couldn’t exactly see anyone working in this area, but we could hear some construction noises. We also noticed that the sidewalk between Everglazed and Splitsville Luxury Lanes has now been blocked with some construction walls.
Once Gideon’s Bakehouse, the M&M’s Store, and Everglazed Donuts & Cold Brew all open, someone is going to have to ROLL us out of Disney Springs!
Disney Springs Decoration Updates
With the holiday season set to officially begin in Disney World on November 6th, we’ve been keeping an eye on ALL the holiday decorations and merchandise popping up everywhere! At Disney Springs, there’s a mix of fall and winter decor. We found fall decor still up in several stores, although some holiday window decorations have started to appear.
We also saw that the “Fall into Magic” signs have been removed, and that the fall bench photo op in front of the PhotoPass Studio was also gone! During our last trip, we felt like Disney Springs was fairly empty, but we expect crowds will increase as the holidays get closer.
Well, that’s all for us from Disney Springs! We’ll keep stopping by Disney Springs, the Disney hotels, and the Disney World theme parks to see what’s new. Be sure to come back for all the latest updates!
Join the DFB Newsletter to get all the breaking news right in your inbox! Click here to Subscribe!
Will you be going to Disney Springs soon? Let us know about your plans in the comments!

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ISLAMABAD: The weekly inflation for the week ended on August 10 for the combined income groups increased by 0.51 percent as compared to the previous week.
According to the data released by Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) on Friday, the Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) for the week under review in the above mentioned group was recorded at 219.92 points against 218.80 points last week.
As compared to the corresponding week of last year, the SPI for the combined group in the week under review witnessed increase of 0.64 per cent. The weekly SPI has been computed with base 2007, 2008=100, covering 17 urban centers and 53 essential items for all income groups.
Meanwhile, the SPI for the lowest income group up to Rs 8,000 increased by 0.74 percent as it went up from 208.32 points in the previous week to 209.86 points in the week under review.
As compared to the last week, the SPI for the income groupsfrom Rs 8001 to 12,000, Rs 12,001 to 18,000, Rs 18,001 to 35,000 and above Rs 35,000, also increased by 0.67 percent, 0.62 percent, 0.54 percent and 0.37 percent respectively.
During the week under review, average prices of 13 items registered decrease, while 11 items increased with the remaining 29 items’ prices unchanged.
The items, which registered decrease in their prices during the week under review included tomatoes, diesel, petrol, bananas, mash pulse, moong pulse, potatoes, tea (packet), gram pulse, wheat flour, chilly powder and eggs. The items, which registered increase in their prices during the week under review included onions, sugar, chicken, LPG Cylinder, gur, beef mutton, garlic, mustard oil milk (fresh) and vegetable ghee.
The items with no change in their average prices during the week under review included wheat, rice (basmati broken), rice (irri-6), bread, curd, milk (powdered) cooking oil (tin), vegetable ghee (tin), salt, cooked beef, cooked daal, tea (prepared), cigarettes,long cloth, shirting, lawn, georgette, gents sandal, gents chappal, ladies sandal, electricity charges, kerosene oil, firewood, electric bulb, washing soap, match box, telephone local call and bath soap.


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Cxrus launches the all-new Bank Mandiri Corporate Website
INDONESIA, 19 March 2018 — Bank Mandiri engaged Cxrus to revamp and redesign Bank Mandiri’s corporate website – built on Liferay Digital Experience Platform (DXP). On top of having a fresh and new user interface design, the purpose of this revamp is to improve the quality of customer service via digital means. This step is carried out by Bank Mandiri to facilitate the public to interact and seek information in the website, with regards to products, services and other corporate information.
“As one of the leading banks in Indonesia, I believe that the successful launch of the new website will boost the quality of customer service and help to satisfy the needs of customers easily,” said Alvin Teo, Executive Director of Cxrus Solutions.
Bank Mandiri currently has 21.9 million savings customers and 1.8 million credit customers with an average visitor website of Bank Mandiri recorded at 155 thousand visitors per day.
With this new revamp and enhanced customer service features implemented, Cxrus foresees a steady growth in visitors and customer interactivity in the website.
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By The Washington Post · Taylor Telford
The phase one agreement signed last month quelled the protracted trade conflict that tied up the world's two most powerful economies, imperiled global growth and caused chaos for multinational corporations. The terms required both nations to de-escalate tariffs, and compelled China to buy an additional $200 billion in American goods over the next two years.
Levies will be slashed from 10% to 5% or from 5% to 2.5% on hundreds of U.S. products starting Feb. 14, China's finance ministry said. The tariffs on cars, oil, soybeans and other goods date back to September and had been implemented in response to additional tariffs the U.S. had applied in the fall.
The widely expected move comes as China is paralyzed by the coronavirus, which has infected more than 28,000 in the mainland and killed more than 500. It has also brought China's powerful manufacturing industry to a standstill, as travel restrictions freeze China's workforce and major companies such as Boeing, Apple and Nike have been forced to close factories until at least mid-February. McDonald's, Starbucks, KFC, Levi Strauss, H & M and Samsung have closed stores across China. Casinos in Macao, the world's biggest gambling market, are shutting down for two weeks.
"The recent cut in Chinese tariffs is more about containing the economic damage to China from the coronavirus than it is about trade relations between the two countries," Brad McMillan, Chief Investment Officer for Commonwealth Financial Network, said in commentary Thursday. "Along with the recent moves by the PBOC to inject money to protect their markets, this is aimed at managing the risk."
China is the world's leading oil consumer, and the country's lockdown has sent shock waves through crude markets. Brent crude prices hit a one-year low earlier this week, and BP has warned the virus could reduce global oil demand by as much as 80% this year. OPEC and its allies have been meeting to discuss oil output in the face of declining demand.
Even if the virus is contained soon, economists are predicting China's growth rate will fall to between 3% and 4% this quarter.
"Reducing tariffs and importing more food from the U.S. makes a lot of sense for the Chinese. The Chinese government is facing a number of homegrown problems, the major one being the outbreak of the coronavirus," said Ed Yardeni, president of Yardeni Research. "They are clearly in need of importing more food. The swine flu epidemic last year decimated their pork supply. Now there is evidence their chickens are facing a virus. They need our food. Food inflation is soaring in China. There have also been disruptions in their transportation system, further complicating the food supply."
China's ministry of agriculture and rural affairs announced an outbreak of the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus that wiped out 4,500 birds on a poultry farm in the Hunan province earlier this week. The World Health Organization said the virus "does not infect humans easily" and that the person-to-person spread is unusual. But H5N1 compounds dangers for China's poultry industry, as the coronavirus has made it difficult for farmers to receive chicken feed. Hubei poultry farmers said they were "very distressed" about the situation in a letter to the China Animal Agriculture Association last week.
Experts are skeptical about China's ability to deliver on the additional $200 billion in American purchases it is supposed to make, and the likelihood seems slimmer given the outbreak. But the pact includes a disaster clause which allows for some leniency in the event of a crisis like the coronavirus. The U.S. is slated to follow suit and cut tariffs on certain Chinese imports from 15% to 7.5%, also on Feb. 14.
In an interview with Fox Business earlier this week, White House National Economic Council director Larry Kudlow acknowledged that the outbreak could delay China's purchases. But he said the effect on the U.S. economy would be minor.
"We're just trying to help China right now," Kudlow said Tuesday. "It's not going to be that big a deal for us."
China has agreed to buy an additional $76.7 billion in U.S. goods and services in the first year of the deal - a 41% jump from the $187.5 billion it spent in 2017, according to the office of the U.S. trade representative. The Chinese have agreed to dollar targets for services, as well as for farm goods, energy products and manufactured goods. New sales for American farmers alone are expected to near $40 billion in the first year, up from $24 billion.
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said Wednesday that the U.S. should be patient with China if it struggles to hit these targets amid the outbreak, Reuters reported.
"If they're really trying and it really just blows the economy out of the water, then we would have to be understanding of that," Perdue said, speaking to reporters at a cattle convention in Texas."
Farmers were among those hit hardest by the trade war, and the U.S. government has tried to stem the losses with a $28 billion bailout. American farm bankruptcies jumped 20% in 2019, hitting an eight-year high, according to recent analysis from the American Farm Bureau.
Fresh data from the Commerce Department on Wednesday showed that the U.S. trade deficit with China narrowed in 2019 for the first time in three years, as both nations slapped tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars worth of imports. The deficit with China fell $73.9 billion to $345.6 billion last year.
"China hopes that both sides will abide by bilateral agreements and make an effort to implement relevant provisions so that we can boost market confidence, promote bilateral trade relations and global economic growth," China's State Council Tariff Commission said in a statement.
The sign of de-escalation lifted overseas markets, with Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index closing up 2.5% and Europe's benchmark Stoxx 600 index on track for its best week of trading since 2016. But Wall Street, which has been on a tear all week, seemed to shrug, with the Dow Jones industrial average flat in early trading.


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Filtermist International's parent company, Absolent Group, has registered a new company in India.
Absolent Filtermist India Pvt Ltd will serve as a basis for sales of all Absolent and Filtermist prod... [More]
When Cornish-based company Daften Die-Casting was looking to fit oil mist filters on to the machine tools in its new purpose-built site, there was only one company for the job – Filtermist.
UK oil mist collectors manufacturer Filtermist International is pleased to report that its participation in the Qingdao International Machine Tool Exhibition last week was extremely successful.
The c... [More]
UK based oil mist collectors manufacturer Filtermist International is pleased to announce that it has appointed a National Sales Manager to oversee all sales in Germany.
Dominique Ullmann joined Filt... [More]
UK oil mist collectors manufacturer and specialist, Filtermist, will be exhibiting its range of compact, quiet and efficient oil mist filters on stand S4馆 A108展位 at the Qingdao International Machine T... [More]


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coalition of travel sites that want to make their opposition known to Google's acquisition of ITA Software. Google announced its plans to buy ITA back in July, but the acquisition likely faces regulatory scrutiny as ITA technology powers the organization of price and schedule information for the major airlines, travel booking companies, and search engines. And the Fairsearch.org coalition argues that if Google buys ITA that competition and innovation surrounding the online travel industry will be stifled.Microsoft has joined a
Microsoft uses ITA software to help power Bing, and the fear of Microsoft and others is that by acquiring ITA Software, Google will control the software that powers most travel-related searches. The $700 million price-tag for ITA points not just to the strength of its technology and predominance in the industry, but also to Google's desire to make its search data better - more accurate, more real-time.
But Microsoft, along with the UK search engine Foundem, the French online travel agency Level...com, and the Singapore-based travel agency ZUJI, join existing Fairsearch.org members Expedia.com, Hotwire, TripAdvisor, and Kayak in urging the Justice Department to challenge the acquisition deal.
"Competition in online travel search over the last decade has not only created more choices and innovation for travelers, but has also driven prices lower around the world for consumers," says ZUJI president Roshan Mendis. "We are concerned that less competition in flight search in the U.S. will result in less innovation in travel search globally, and more importantly, less pressure on travel service providers to offer the lowest price for consumers regardless of where they are located."
For its part, Google has said it has no plans to sell airline tickets or set prices. The purchase is aimed to "provide better results for our users," says Google.


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Google Photos is being updated with a revamped Memories feature, after the changes were recently announced by the company. The rollout is part of a larger upgrade to the Memories feature, which was first introduced to users in 2019. With the latest update, the Memories feature now sports a cleaner aesthetic, smoother vertical scroll gesture for switching between the AI-generated images. Users can also take advantage of video flipbooks, a subtle zoom effect, bolder title font, and re-positioned photo details. Google has also added a quick exit button replacing the vertical swipe, and the ability to create a share-link for friends and family called Shared Memories.
According to a 9to5Google report, Google has begun rolling out the updated Memories feature to users. The company is yet to release the remainder of updates promised in its initial announcement. The promised bundle is intended to build on user-friendly creator tools and a cinematic audio-visual experience through an inbuilt collage editor called Styles, AI-powered story creation, and instrumental background music integration capabilities, according to Google.
Cinematic photos, a feature launched in 2020 that utilises AI to create 3D rendered representations of users’ photos shown in Memories, is also expected to have added capabilities that transform multiple still photos into an end-to-end cinematic experience, the company confirmed. This update will bring the user experience on Memories closer to that of Stories and Memories on Instagram and Facebook, at a time when social-media companies are increasing their focus on audio-visual content.
The in-built collage editor, Styles, which is yet to be rolled out, draws its inspiration from old scrapbooks and will allow users to automatically add graphic art to memories, according to the company.It is reportedly expected to be rolled out sometime in October.
Google One subscribers and Pixel phone users will also be able to use additional editing features such as Portrait Light or HDR within their collages and access more than 30 additional designs.
The company also earlier confirmed that users will continue to have control over hiding photos of certain people or time periods from showing up in Memories and that the latest updates will be rolled out to Google users in a phased manner.
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Elon Musk announced the release of the third part of the “Tesla Master Plan”, among the key provisions of which is assigned to artificial intelligence.
Main Tesla subjects will be scaling to extreme size, which is needed to shift humanity away from fossil fuels, and AI.
But I will also Include sections about SpaceX, Tesla and The Boring Company.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 21, 2022
“Tesla’s main themes will be the extreme scaling needed to move away from fossil fuels and artificial intelligence,” Musk wrote.
He added that the development strategy also included sections on SpaceX and The Boring Company.
In the plan, the company can detail what “extreme size” looks like for Tesla and lay out a plan to scale production and supply chain amid the pandemic and the global transportation crisis.
The businessman announced the release of the new plan the day before the first batch of electric vehicles produced at the new Gigafactory in Germany rolled off the assembly line. Musk is expected to personally take part in the launch of the new plant.
Recall that in January, the businessman said that the automaker could play an important role in creating general AI, as well as preventing a potential rebellion of machines against people.
In April 2021, Elon Musk said that Tesla will become one of the largest AI companies in the world. Cryplogger AI – all the news from the world of AI!
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In Portland, entrepreneurs have created an infrastructure for "deconstructing" rather than demolishing houses and selling the carefully recovered material at the non-profit ReBuilding Center.It is a great idea- building owners pay Deconstruction services to dismantle the building, donate the materials to the Rebuilding Center, get a tax receipt for the donation and save the dumping fees.
Customers get old wood that looks great in exposed beams at better prices while saving trees. Everybody wins.
This is a great example of how being a recycling society creates jobs, opportunities and quality products while saving trees and promoting local production and consumption. Treehugger brownie points all round!


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14 Oct 2014, 10:52 am
UK-based Royal Mail said on 9 October that “whilst a settlement has been agreed in principle”, the French regulator (Autorité de la Concurrence) is continuing its investigation.
By agreeing to settle and provide compliance commitments now, Royal Mail said it “will benefit from a reduction to any fine”.
Royal Mail, which listed on the UK stock market one year ago, said last July that it had received a notice from the French regulator that GLS may have breached competition laws during the period before the end of 2010.
According to Royal Mail, the allegations against GLS were “in connection with a broader investigation into alleged activities within the industry in France”.
“The amount of any fine is not expected to be determined until the second half of the 2015-16 financial year,” Royal Mail said. The financial provision it has made for the half-year ended 28 September 2014 comprises £12 million “in respect of the current estimate of any fine and £6 million in respect of estimated legal costs associated with the investigation and the costs of the compliance commitments”.
According to logistics analysis firm SCLI, Royal Mail entered the European parcel sector in 1999 through the acquisition of German Parcel via GLS. SCLI said that for the financial year ended 31 March 2013, GLS reported revenue of nearly £1.5 billion.


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Ginger’s Comfort Emporium brings its wild flavours and naturally produced ice cream to Manchester’s Afflecks.
There are people who like their pudding. And then there are people who live and die for it. You can put Claire Kelsey firmly in the second category. She’s the creator of Ginger’s Comfort Emporium, a retro-styled ice cream van hawking her artisan flavours that has achieved cult status across the North. Anyone who has ever been served a scoop of her salted caramel and peanut butter “Chorlton Crack” ice cream melting into the warm bosom of a toasted brioche will never forget the experience.
I met Kelsey on a sunny November day when she was frantically trying to get her new space at Afflecks ready for opening, in between scraping gunk off the floor-to-ceiling windows and meeting with restaurant supply reps. A dark-haired whirlwind of talk, quicksilver ideas and enthusiasm, Kelsey knows that Afflecks is a place that her core customer base – foodies who track her van obsessively via Twitter – may not have set a Doc Marten-clad foot inside since their teenage years. But she’s hoping they’ll make the trip through the rackety emporium to her café space on the first floor, which she’d dubbed the Afflecks winter ice cream den.
Absinthe, white truffles, her breakfast toast and marmalade – as taste inspirations, anything goes
Opening a premises in the Northern Quarter (however bijoux) is a big gamble – but a necessary one. Though the Ginger’s van will still be roaming the country come spring, “it felt like we’d gone as far as we could with street food,” Kelsey said. “We need to keep moving forward, or we could be yesterday’s news.”
Drawn to a career in food, Kelsey initially worked as a chef and then put in seven years as a food stylist before launching Ginger’s in 2010. “I thought about having a restaurant but it just felt crazy looking at leases, business rates and knowing all the work that goes into it. Around then, I was looking at Olive or Delicious magazines and I read a piece about street food trucks in London. That was really inspiring.” Kelsey thought of doing a roaming patisserie, “but then I started making ice cream and I got hooked, because you can’t get bored of it. It’s a blank canvas; you can put all your ideas into it.”
Those ideas of hers are pretty wild. Absinthe, white truffles, her breakfast toast and marmalade – as taste inspirations, anything goes. The resulting flavours are unlike anything else. She took the dessert prize at the British Street Food Awards (where Ginger’s was also crowned 2012’s Best of the Best) with a dish of extra virgin olive oil ice cream topped with smoked salt, strawberry sauce and a black olive chocolate “flake.” Mr. Whippy, eat your heart out.
Last year saw the publication of her original recipes in a beautiful cookbook, Melt (Simon and Schuster). Since then, things have happened fast. Dan Manicolo, who previously drove the Ginger’s van, left his day job and came on as partner full time in May. After landing the first stint in a rotating street food space at Manchester Airport, they quickly graduated from making ice cream in Kelsey’s Chorlton home to a rented industrial kitchen on Corporation Street. The step up to larger batches has forced them to make some tough decisions about the product. Even with less cream than they used before, the more powerful kit occasionally means a little frozen butter gets churned up in the mix. This would be the point where some producers would start using emulsifiers and other additives for a more consistent texture that can stay in storage longer. But this just didn’t feel right for Ginger’s. Kelsey says she hopes her customers won’t be fazed by the odd bit of frozen butter.
It’s a big commitment opening up a permanent space, but if it’s successful it will allow Ginger’s to make the transition into a year-round business. They were all set to move into a smaller unit at Afflecks when the management offered them the first floor cafe space (formerly Pinky’s), overlooking the corner of Oldham and Church streets. They took a deep breath and said yes, even though they’d have just two weeks to get it ready and had no fitting out budget. With the help of a small army of friends and well-wishers, Ginger’s Comfort Emporium opened on 22 November. It’s doing a brisk trade in malted milkshakes, take-home tubs, affogatos and stratospheric dessert concoctions such as the French Elvis, a French toast, peanut butter, banana and ice cream sandwich that we’ve heard has already changed a few lives.
Kelsey’s the first to admit that they’re in uncharted territory, which is both exciting and a little bit terrifying. “We’ve not done this before,” Kelsey says. “We want to find our feet. But if this works, it’ll be for good.”


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Police are cracking down on shoplifters and yobs during the Christmas and New Year celebrations.
Initiatives around retail crime, opportunist theft, street-drinking and begging have been drawn up as part of Operation Lapland, the force’s campaign to cut crime during the festive season.
The operation, which started at the beginning of the month, is already paying dividends in Corby where shoplifting had presented a problem to traders.
PC Rod MacKenzie, of Corby Safer Community Team, said: “We moved swiftly to deal with this problem in the town.
“Operation Lapland patrols, together with the opening of the Cop Shop, have seen a decrease in shoplifting with fewer thefts from stores compared with the same period last year.”
In East Northamptonshire, high-visibility uniformed and plain-clothes patrols are on Rushden High Street at various times of the day.
Insp Vaughan Clarke said: “We hope this will deter shoplifters and provide reassurance to shoppers using the town’s car parks.
“We will be out and about talking to shoppers at Asda, Waitrose and Lidl in Rushden and officers will also be visiting the Co-op stores in Raunds, Thrapston and Oundle.”


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Six Continents Hotels Inc., one of the world’s leading hotel companies, announced today that Mike Fegley has been named vice president of field sales and has responsibility for leading the field sales team for Six Continents Hotels’ Americas region.
In this role, Fegley will develop worldwide business opportunities from key market segments and drive revenues for all Six Continents Hotels brands, including Inter-Continental Hotels, Crowne Plaza Hotels, Holiday Inn,Holiday Inn Express, and Staybridge Suites by Holiday Inn. Fegley assumed his new role in Atlanta on Nov. 26 and reports directly to Chuck Brownfield, senior vice president of marketing and sales, Americas, Six Continents Hotels.
“Mike brings a wealth of experience in sales and leadership to Six Continents Hotels,” said Ravi Saligram, brand president, Americas, Six Continents Hotels. “He is a veteran of the industry who has been working with hotel brands specializing in franchises for more than 20 years. I have every confidence that he will prove to be a valuable addition to the company.”
Prior to joining Six Continents Hotels, Fegley held senior management sales positions with the Holiday Inn, Ramada, Inter-Continental Hotels, Renaissance, and Wyndam hotel brands. His most recent position was vice president of sales with Radisson Hotels & Resorts, where he was responsible for the global sales organization.


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However, the curb on cash proved to be a disaster for Indian handset makers such as Micromax, Lava and Karbonn. All of them were pushed out of the top five smartphone player rankings in India, said Singapore-based market research agencies Counterpoint and Canalys and International Data Corporation (IDC), in their separate reports.
“Apple achieved a landmark, crossing 2.5 million units in a calendar year, with a 1/3 of its total shipment coming alone from the record fourth quarter driven by seasonality and the launch of iPhone 7,” Counterpoint said in its report.
It added that Apple captured 10th position in the smartphone rankings during the fourth quarter, but led the premium segment (above $450) with 62% market share, replacing Samsung which ended the period with 35% share, hurt mainly by its Galaxy Note 7 debacle. Google’s Pixel had a 5% share. Samsung had led the segment in the third quarter with a 58% share to Apple’s 37%.
The premium segment itself grew 27% over same period last year and 20% over the last year as buyers bought more iPhone 7 devices through cash. Upasana Joshi, senior market analyst at IDC India, said: "Interestingly, the premium smartphone segment saw some growth during the weeks following demonetisation, wherein consumers were seen rushing to buy higher priced smartphones using the demonetised currency, with reports of these high priced models being sold at a premium."
IDC also said that India-based vendors were hit the most due to demonetisation, with a drop of 37.2% in November 2016 across top 50 Indian cities as compared to China-based vendors with 26.5% drop and global vendors with 30.5% drop over previous month.
According to Counterpoint, the overall smartphone market share of home-bred handset makers plunged to 20% in the quarter ending December 31 from 54% share during the same period last year.
Canalys’ analyst Rushabh Doshi said that local brands’ target customers typically buy in cash and from independent retailers. With the short-term liquidity crunch caused by demonetisation, these retailers are suffering a slowdown in consumer spending.
Counterpoint also said the Chinese players continued to expand their presence throughout India, riding on aggressive portfolio strategies and substantial marketing spends. Chinese brands OPPO, Vivo, Lenovo and Xiaomi continued to grow at the expense of Samsung and Indian brands. The share of Chinese smartphone brands went up to 46% in the fourth quarter of 2016 calendar year, against just 14% in a year earlier period, the data suggested.
The agency ranked China’s Vivo and Oppo at second and fifth spots with 10% and 8% market shares, respectively, in a market led by Samsung, with Xiaomi at No. 3 and Lenovo at fourth. However, Canalys ranked Oppo at third and Vivo at fifth spot. Samsung was the leader with Xiaomi at No. 2 and Lenovo at fourth.
“Oppo was the best-performing vendor in the top five, shipping 2.6 million units (in the fourth quarter), up from 150,000 a year ago, and a 150% increase from the previous quarter,” Canalys said.
According to Counterpoint, India’s smartphone user base topped 300 million with smartphone market achieving 18% on year growth in the whole 2016 as compared to the global smartphone market which grew a modest 3%.
- Front Page
- Pure Politics
- ET Markets
- Tata Trusts Opt for Endowment Funding Route
Tata Trusts are setting up endowment funding entities on the lines of the US-based Burroughs Wellcome Fund that can invest in alternative avenues, as they look to increase the amount spent on philanthropy.Adani Group CFO: Founders not Involved in Speculative Activity
Following the release of the Hindenburg Research report last week and a short-selling attack on Adani Group stocks, ₹4.2 lakh crore ($51 billion) was wiped off their market value in two trading sessions.Answers to Hindenburg’s 65 Queries in Public Domain, says Adani Group
The Adani Group on Sunday said answers to 65 of the 88 questions raised in the Hindenburg report have already been disclosed by the Adani Portfolio companies in annual reports available on their websites, offer memorandums, financial statements and stock exchange disclosures from time to time.
ETPrime stories of the day
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"Aston Martin of the Seas": British Powerboat Manufacturer Invades the U.S.
The British are coming...and many boat lovers in the U.S. cannot wait!
British-powerboat manufacturer Hunton, which is referred to as the "Aston Martin of the seas," recently announced that it is going to begin selling its high-performance luxury powerboats and tenders in the USA. Connecticut-based company Total Marine will be the exclusive U.S. distributor of the Hunton line, with the XRS37 model being the very first distributed.
"The XRS37 is the ideal first boat to bring. A true performance boat, it perfectly reflects the fantastic design and bespoke features that make Hunton such a legendary brand in the UK and Europe," said Fiona Pool, managing director of Hunton. "We've had a fantastic year both at home in the UK and in the South of France, but to cap the year off with our official partnership with Total Marine is the icing on the cake. We have seen the success of great British brands, such as Aston Martin and Range Rover in the U.S., and we're thrilled to think that we're taking our first steps along the same line."
The XRS37, which is actually longer than 37 feet, has a top speed between 50 and 60 knots and a range of 250 nautical miles. Its handcrafted interior is designed in the style of fine British furniture, according to the company. The exterior of the ship is charcoal grey.
In addition to the XRS37, the Hunton product line includes three other models: the XRS43, the 1005, and the 830 tender. The firm also conveyed that a new model, the EQ52, is slotted to make its debut in 2014. Every Hunton boat is hand-built to the customer's specifications, allowing a client to collaborate with the firm's design team to build each watercraft uniquely.
The XRS37 is going to be introduced to the media officially today at the Delamar Hotel in Greenwich, Connecticut.


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neXt Curve was in Nice, France attending the premier global event for digital transformation in the telecommunications industry held from May 14th through May 16th and hosted by TM Forum. Leading vendors and operators converged to discuss what it will take help the telecom industry reinvent itself and aid telecom service providers in becoming digital service providers. Now that 5G has arrived in select markets around the globe, the pressure is on for telecom operators to transform their operating models to capture the value promised by the next generation network.
As the IoT and 5G have evolved the models have moved from a simple Sensor to Gateway, to Cloud, to Edge, to near Edge, to Mobile Edge hype and perhaps one to two more terms that are circulating out there in the hype cycle. The terminology is confusing and typically is market speak or used to hype a specific technology and location between the Cloud and endpoint device that will be used for the majority of the collection, compute, response, and storage of the data.
neXt Curve attended the largest consumer electronics trade show on the planet with over 180,000 in attendance to identify the deeper technology and market trends that are driving the rapid evolution of our digital lives and are expressed in the new digitally-enabled consumer applications from smart home, 3D sound to emotionally-aware robots.
The original telco central offices of the past had legacy mainframe-like telephone switches with legacy voice features, which was ideal in the 1980’s and 1990’s but are archaic today. With VoIP over LTE in the cloud, these local offices can be re-architected into 5G nano-datacenters that provide very low latency fixed and mobile access and distributed edge computing that will enable new and innovative hyperconverged IT/CT applications and services that avail new business models and network monetization opportunities for operators.
neXt Curve attended the North American version of Mobile World Congress held in Los Angeles, California. This year, CTIA partnered with GSMA in hosting an event focused on the coming-together of the media and telecommunications industries into an important megatrend that promises to make MWCA (now Mobile World Congress Los Angeles) a special event among the Mobile World Congresses held around the world.
On 8/14/2018, Intel revealed another security flaw has been exposed called “Foreshadow”, whereby a botnet could bypass the safeguards and create a “shadow copy” at an unprotected location of the computer’s CPU rendering Intel’s security measures inert.
Business leaders need to tread carefully. The Blockchain gold rush is on and there is plenty of fool’s gold out there. However, just like the Internet, technologies such as Blockchain can have significant implications for your business and industry and should be taken seriously.


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Nike splits opinion by showing female model with armpit hair - women's sports bra
This is something that should not cause debate-
How others choose to deal with their own body hair.
But when Nike released a photo of an underarm hair model this week, thousands of people had some perspective on it.
Sports brands have set off an Instagram spat on their Nike women's accounts, showing a model wearing a scratch-free sports bra.
Nike released a photo of the model Annahstasia on Wednesday and stated in the title of the photo: "happy mood ".
More than 183,000 people like this post and some share their love for the image.
One person commented: "This picture is beautiful on such a multi-faceted level and likes the confidence of bras and models.
Another netizen said: "Thanks to Nike for its support for nature.
However, a lot of people are not so impressed with the photo, putting it on the label of "disgusting.
"It's not freedom, it's not a type of 'I love my body,'" declared an angry user, "it's bull, shaving . ".
The second wrote: "The terrible public relations move.
Less than 1% of the target market for women do not shave.
The third added that "it's disgusting" that Wtf is doing ".
This backlash has prompted others to fight back at haters.
"Don't belittle her because she has body hair!
For men with hair under their arms, you won't say that.
One user responded: "Her body, her choice . "
Someone posted: "I'm embarrassed because most of the negative comments I see come from other women, and it doesn't matter if you personally choose to shave.
Don't humiliate others anymore, it won't make anyone sick or less because you're hairy.
"I see a lot of people saying don't try to turn this into something anymore, it's not a pint.
The key is to have an option, which is not a bad thing if you choose not to shave.
The third said: "Some of you have not even shaved their armpits now, so be quiet.
Nike was contacted for comment.


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STOCKHOLM (AP) -- Swedish fashion retailer Hennes & Mauritz AB says unfavorable weather conditions and a tough economic climate contributed to a 10 percent fall in its fiscal first-quarter net profit to 2.46 billion kronar ($380 million) compared to a year earlier.
Net sales during the December to February three-month period were 28.4 billion kronar, up from 27.8 billion kronar.
H&M says the international retail industry was hit by bad weather during the period, particularly in Europe and North America, and cautioned that an unusually cold start to the current quarter will delay the start of the spring collection.
CEO Karl-Johan Persson said Thursday that 2013 would remain challenging as the company plans to expand its outlets to five new countries, bringing the total number of H&M stores worldwide to some 350.
- Investment & Company Information


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Amazon will report first-quarter earnings after the bell on Thursday.
Here’s what Wall Street is expecting:
- Earnings: $8.36 per share, according to Refinitiv
- Revenue: $116.3 billion, according to Refinitiv
Here are some other key revenue numbers:
- Amazon Web Services: $18.27 billion expected, according to StreetAccount
- Advertising: $8.17 billion expected, according to StreetAccount
Amazon and Apple, which also reports results on Thursday, are the last of the Big Tech class to update investors on their start to the year. So far it’s been a mixed bag, with ad-supported businesses struggling due in part to macroeconomic conditions and the war in Ukraine.
On Wednesday, Facebook parent Meta exceeded expectations on earnings and daily active users, but missed on revenue and gave weak guidance. A day earlier, Google missed on the top and bottom lines. Both companies said their ad businesses were impacted by issues like inflation as well as increased competition.
Amazon started disclosing advertising revenue for the first time in its fourth-quarter report, when it disclosed a $31 billion annual online ad business. Analysts expect to see 29% growth for the first quarter, faster expansion than Facebook or Google saw in ad sales during the period.
Amazon’s total revenue is expected to have increased 7.2%, which would mark the slowest rate for any quarter since the dot-com bust in 2001 and the second straight period of single-digit growth. Among other issues, the company is contending with slowing e-commerce momentum as physical stores reopen.
Growth is expected to tick back up in the second quarter, with analysts predicting expansion of 11% to $125.6 billion, according to Refinitiv.
Beyond e-commerce and advertising, Amazon’s results will give a sense of how the company is navigating a host of economic challenges, including rising inflation, higher fuel and labor costs, global supply chain snarls, and the ongoing pandemic.
Amazon has been working to offset many of those costs. Earlier this month, it introduced a 5% surcharge for some of its U.S. sellers, the first such fee in its history. And last quarter, Amazon hiked the price of its U.S. Prime membership for the first time in four years to $139 from $119.
Amazon still faces the specter of rising labor costs, especially after workers at one of its Staten Island warehouses voted in the company’s first U.S. union earlier this month. Another election is underway at a second Staten Island warehouse, and labor organizers have signaled interest at additional Amazon facilities. The company has challenged the union win, arguing the election results were tainted by interference from the union and the National Labor Relations Board.
Amazon shares are down roughly 14% so far this year, while the Nasdaq has dropped 18%. In 2021, Amazon was the worst-performing Big Tech stock, gaining just 2.4%.
Still, analysts like Wedbush Securities’ Michael Pachter remain bullish as consumers continue to rely on Amazon for so many goods, including groceries.
“In Q1, we expect that these products likely saw around a 5% increase in prices, assuming the new 5% surcharge is being implemented in order to cancel out the negative impact of inflation,” Pachter, who recommends buying the shares, wrote in a report last week. “Additionally, we believe inflation did not result in a material impact to revenue in Q1 due to robust consumer spending.”
Amazon’s cloud-computing segment could continue to be a bright for the company. Revenue at Amazon Web Services likely increased by 36% from a year prior. Cloud peers Microsoft and Google both beat analysts’ expectations for their cloud businesses earlier this week.
Investors will also key into Amazon’s investment in electric vehicle maker Rivian, which produced an almost $12 billion gain in the fourth quarter after the company held its IPO and saw its stock prop. The shares reversed dramatically this year, losing half their value as of March 31, and more since then.
On Wednesday, Ford recorded a loss of $5.4 billion on its 12% stake in Rivian. Amazon owns close to 18% of the company, according to FactSet.
This story is developing. Check back for updates.
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People get into debt for a variety of reasons. Whether you ended up there through a job loss, unexpected illness or injury, or some other monetary calamity, you now need to find a debt relief option that allows you to get back on your feet financially.
Here's a great article by Kristina from credit sesame:
The answer is yes. Bankruptcy will get rid of the debt but will not stop your mortgage company from taking your home back via the foreclosure process.
From Milwaukee to Racine, Saukville to Waukesha, people in Wisconsin are coming to Miller and Miller, eliminating or reorganizing their debt, and getting the fresh start they deserve. One way of rebuilding credit after a bankruptcy is obtaining a prepaid credit card. If you are considering this option, keep reading the article below by John Ulsheimer:
The credit report dispute process is fairly mysterious, which means most people don't actually know what happens when they file a dispute with a credit reporting agency. Here's a step by step process that should help clear things up a bit.
1099-C In the Mail? How to Avoid Taxes on Cancelled Debt (via Credit.com)
The Huffington Post chronicles this incredible story in which a debt collector allegedly called 911 on an 85 year old woman:
There is no perfect time to file for bankruptcy. Ideally, you should wait to file at a point when you have not touched your credit cards for several months and your credit card charges over the past year have not taken a big jump. Further there is less chance that you will face any objection if you have made at least the minimum payment over the past 6 months or longer.
Over at the MintLife Blog they recently had a great article on overpriced children's items. After getting a fresh start through bankruptcy it is important to look for ways to keep costs down so that you are able to build a strong financial future. We all want to give the world to our children, but if you can do that while saving a buck it's even better.
C. Lazarus from the Savings Experiment has a great article here on one way to manage your finances called the 50/20/30 budget. It's a great read and a great idea. After getting a fresh start through bankruptcy, many of our Wisconsin clients are able to build on that clean slate by savvy budgeting.


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New South Wales today unveiled its new single customer account for accessing state government services.
The system, dubbed MyServiceNSW, will be progressively rolled out across all NSW government services and transactions.
“Too often online services for different government agencies require different websites and multiple accounts,” finance minister Dominic Perrottet said in a statement.
“But good service means putting the customer at the centre of the experience.
“Our citizens should only have to ‘tell us once’, and that’s what we are aiming for with MyServiceNSW.”
In mid-2015 the state government foreshadowed the launch of a single digital identity for government services, with the expectation that it would go live later that year.
Currently MyServiceNSW supports some transactions from Roads and Maritime Services and the Office of State Revenue.
The federal government in 2013 launched its myGov platform, which allows users to sign on to a number of online services from agencies including Medicare, the Australian Taxation Office, Centrelink, the National Disability Insurance Scheme and the Department of Veterans' Affairs.
Last year, then communications minister Malcolm Turnbull indicated he would like to see the platform potentially extended to state and local government bodies.
NSW has rolled out its new payment platform for government services, Perrottet said.
Perrottet last year announced the new Service NSW payments platform, which includes support for Apple Pay and PayPal.
“Streamlining the back-end payments infrastructure is an important waste-cutting reform, but it also looks to the future, opening up the possibility of incorporating payment methods like PayPal, Apple Pay, MasterPass, and Visa Checkout,” Perrottet said.
The NSW government has also announced an updated version of the Service NSW smartphone app, which Perrottet said would allow drivers to use their smartphones to pay fines, track payments and review photos of traffic infringements.


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John Lewis Direct is using new search tools for its web site John Lewis Direct, the online division of leading UK retailer John Lewis Partnership, has implemented a new search tool to support a 78.5...
It's not just politicians who are increasingly eschewing knowledge and expertise - business is too, warns Peter Cochrane
Google responds to anti-trust fine over bundling of apps with Android by levying licence fee for apps in the EEA
A core team met every day to ensure the transformation stayed on track
The hotel giant is revamping its IT systems as it acquires multiple new brands


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About 100 people gathered at Highland on Saturday night for a black-tie optional meet-and-greet and beer dinner. Highland teamed up with culinary teams from the Grove Park Inn and Biltmore Estate for the six-course meal. Highland’s Little Hump, Cedric’s Pale Ale, Centennial Ale, Oatmeal Porter and a new 20th Anniversary Scotch Ale were paired with some amazing food, including a confit duck and crispy sweetbreads appetizer and a pan-seared barramundi fish dish.
The guests included who’s-who of owner Oscar Wong’s long-time business partners, friends, supporters and, of course, his family. His daughter, Leah Wong, is gradually learning the ropes of the family business and shared the duties of delivering speeches and chatting up guests on Saturday night. She had just arrived in Asheville, back from Craft Brewers Conference in Denver.
The dinner was served at a group of tables set among Highland’s beer-making equipment. A cellist played for the guests during an hour-long reception before the food started arriving and guests settled in to enjoy the meal. The Wong’s clearly enjoyed the evening and expressed gratitude for the support of all over the years.
Next up is a big public party on April 19 at Highland. It’s dubbed the Plaid Party, and the public will have the chance to try four of Highland’s 20 special beers that it will brew this year in honor of its anniversary. Some details:
Twenty years has passed since we first opened our creaky basement door! We’re celebrating our anniversary with you on April 19th at the PLAID PARTY where you can get our limited edition Highland 20th Anniversary Scotch Ale. In addition to the Scotch Ale, three more beers in the series of 20 will be released that night. The series is a masterpiece of brewing delights:
Ten recipes from their archives honor the past and ten new recipes look to the future
Four beers will be brewed on the 50-barrel system and packaged in kegs and 22-ounce bottles, forming a collectible mini-series. Each of these “Big Batches” will be developed by a Highland different brewer or brewers
Sixteen beers will be kegged
Three beers are collaborations with the other most senior breweries in town: Wedge, Green Man and French Broad
With 20 beers from April to December, releases will occur every couple of weeks on average, and visitors are likely to find an anniversary brew on tap no matter what day they walk in. Beers will be revealed online, one by one, just prior to their releases.
Oscar Wong, John Lyda and John McDermott bet long on a fledgling industry. In the US, there were 537 craft breweries in 1994. Today there are around 2,800 and it’s growing fast. Since 1994, the dream of being Asheville’s hometown brewery has changed, and it hasn’t.
Click over to read the full press release. Congratulations to Oscar, Leah and the Highland gang. I can’t believe I’ve known Oscar for 20 years, having first been introduced to him through my buddy the Beer Guy, Tony Kiss, who paved the way for beer news in this town. Here’s to 20 more, y’all.


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Hot stone massage is the latest luxury trend that has the potential to revolutionise the way people approach their skin.
The spa treatment is being touted as an alternative to the usual treatments such as oil, mineral oil and lasers, and can also help with acne scars.
According to Dr Paula Dehaas, a clinical psychologist at the University of Oxford, the idea of a massage was popularised in the 1960s, when people were starting to use their hands in a similar way to massage machines.
“We can see a very similar pattern between modern massage and traditional massage,” she said.
“There’s this sort of ‘hand on body’ feeling.”
The spa treatment involves rubbing the skin on your hands and fingers with an electric hand-held device, where the practitioner rubs on a massage pad, creating a suction effect.
The pad also has a small hole for the water to come out.
The pad is placed over a patient’s skin to massage it.
Dr Dehaes said that the pads were originally marketed as being suitable for people with oily, damaged skin.
However, the popularity of the technology has also led to concerns that they are being used by people with less-skin-tight skin.
“People are using it for all sorts of reasons, such as ‘I don’t want to rub my face in a puddle of water’, or for ‘I just can’t tolerate the pressure on my skin’,” she said, adding that it has also been marketed as a way to treat acne scars and acne-prone skin.
“It’s actually a pretty common treatment for acne, but people are sceptical about its effectiveness, and are not sure it is the right one for everyone,” she added.
However, Dr Deaas said that it was important to remember that it is not necessary to use a special treatment to remove acne.
“In most cases, there are no immediate side effects from using a hand-washing method such as a lotion or shower gel,” she explained.
“If you’re using a natural product, there is a lot less chance of irritation or irritation to the skin and the underlying condition will be treated naturally.”
A number of beauty products have been developed specifically for hand-wiping, such the Handwipe Duo by Cleopatra, which has a sugared, cotton applicator, a cotton-like applicator and a handwash with hyaluronic acid.
Dr Joanna Macdonald, a dermatologist at The Royal College of Physicians, told The Independent that the hand-wash was a natural treatment for those with oily skin.
She added that many people would also benefit from a moisturiser.
Dr Dehaaas explained that she would encourage people to try a different type of hand washing, such a hand scrub, or the hand scrub by a professional, before buying a hand washing pad.
“I would encourage consumers to consider a more natural hand washing technique, such an oil scrub, as a good alternative for people who may be uncomfortable with a traditional hand washing method,” she concluded.


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The Ritz-Carlton's Plan for World Domination
By now, we’re used to hearing the big news that Trip Advisor has acquired some smaller company—it seems to happen about once a week. But the past couple months, we’ve also been hearing big news almost every week from a very different type of company: the Ritz-Carlton.
The luxury hotel company has unleashed a flurry of new properties on the world in the past couple months, opening three in October (Chendgu and Tianjin in China, and Bangalore, India) and two in November (Almaty, Kazakhstan and Aruba), with another on the way mid-December (Herzliya, Israel).
The timing of this unprecedented pace is coincidental, said Ed French, the company’s new Chief Sales and Marketing Officer (who sounded remarkably calm over the phone with everything that’s going on); after all, these are no pop-up hotels—they’re years in the planning, and lots of factors can influence the opening date. But the focus on developing markets is very much on purpose. The luxury travel market is growing, and some of the biggest growth is in technology centers like Bangalore.
So yes, these new properties are “business hotels,” but aimed to appeal to leisure travelers as well, said French. Herzliya, just north of Tel Aviv, may be a business and technology center, but the hotel’s spot in a quiet marina overlooking the Mediterranean says “unwind.”
Interestingly, this hotel is the company’s first in Israel (and Bangalore is its first in India) and, not surprisingly, opening in a new country is what French called a “great endeavor.” But the launch of any hotel with a reputation like the Ritz-Carlton’s is a huge undertaking. Employees are groomed years in advance, and the opening itself involves a formal (and, one would guess, frantic) 10-day “countdown.”
The start-to-finish process isn’t just about maintaining standards; making a connection to the destination is essential, too, said French. That means hiring locals, working with local businesses, and connecting to the new area through design. Horses and apples, for example, are important in Almaty, the largest city in Kazakhstan (the surrounding area is thought to be the apple’s ancestral home), so the hotel features both (the horses are in the artwork; the apples are for eating).
Whatever its formula for opening new hotels, the company will be using it plenty—20 more new properties are planned by 2016. It’s one that’s been working for a long time. I’ll never forget my experience at the Ritz-Carlton in Kuala Lumpur, where I stayed not long after it opened in late 1997. I had been on assignment for another magazine, following hunter-gatherers around Borneo for a week, and didn’t have time to change my clothes before flying to KL. I showed up at the hotel covered—caked, actually—in mud. Amazingly, no one blinked an eye: not the white-gloved bellman when he hoisted my muddy backpack, and not the front-desk staff when they heard my still-squishing waterlogged hiking boots.
It wasn’t meant to be a test of their new staff, but it turned out to be a pretty good one. The “exceptional guest”…hm…it’s a role I may just have to reprise at some of these new hotels.
Rich Beattie is Travel + Leisure's Executive Digital Editor.


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Balancing benefits and drawbacks of social media at work
MACKAY businesses are jumping on the Facebook bandwagon and experiencing the benefits, and pitfalls, of using social media in the workplace.
Greg Neill Jewellers manager Simon Neill said his business was in the early stages of using Facebook and had "hit and miss" results with the social media website.
"At the moment it's quite hard figuring out what posts work and what doesn't," he said.
"With Facebook what we've learnt is that it's less about trying to sell people things and more about trying to keep them engaged in your business and aware of your operations."
He said social media websites like Facebook were a less valuable tool for marketing in Mackay than they were in bigger cities.
"Obviously in bigger areas it costs more to advertise in other ways so they depend on Facebook a lot more.
"But you've got to have a page, you'd be silly not to be engaging in social media."
Elders Mackay principal Sally Richards said social media was an effective tool for real estate agents to promote their properties.
But she said the use of sites like Facebook came with strict company guidelines.
"We do have a policy, as most other businesses do, that our employees need to be careful with what they put up on Facebook about anything in particular because if people know they work for Elders it can be associated with our business.
"When used properly though, I think it can be a really good tool.
"We use it to invite people to open houses and let them know what we're doing in the community."


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According to a report from SemiAccurate, Intel is looking to sign an outsourcing deal with Samsung, most likely to manufacture chiplets for its future GPUs. Unlike the deal with TSMC which is expected to transfer the production of the Core i series class CPUs to TSMC’s advanced sub-7nm nodes, this particular agreement is over a more mature 10nm/14nm node.
If reports stating that TSMC is going to fabricate Intel’s Xe-HPG or DG2 GPUs are true, then this seems more of a backup plan in case the company is unable to meet the market demand. But that again makes you wonder. If the Xe gaming GPUs will leverage TSMC’s 7nm-class node, then why opt for an older, less efficient node from a different foundry?
Intel plans to order the production of 15K units per month via this outsourcing deal. We’re not sure whether this refers to wafers or chips, but the latter is more likely considering the nature of the silicon. The production is slated to start in the second half of 2021. (texasflange)
As for what will actually be fabbed, it could be the older 14nm Skylake-based CPUs while Intel’s own foundries shift to the newer 10nm and eventually the 7nm node. The other possibility is the production of GPU chiplets for Intel’s upcoming Xe family. Considering that the company has a wide range of products planned across different segments, it’s very possible that one particular family will be fabbed on Samsung’s 10nm/14nm node.
Intel is going to report its Q4 2020 earnings later today. It is during this event that the new CEO of the company will announce plans regarding outsourcing the production of future products to third-party fabs.


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Supermarket customers have been praising Woolworths and Coles staffers on social media, following exceptional customer experiences.
A delighted Woolworths customer took to his public Instagram account to recognise a specific staff member at a Sydney store who went above and beyond.
“Just want to give a big shout out to a young employee Mustafa at Woolworths at Casula,” a delighted Instagram user wrote.
“The last 3 times I have been served by this young gentleman who I’ve just found out today is relatively new in his employment.”
The Instagrammer said that his personal experiences with the team member were not the only thing that prompted him to make the post.
“What amazed me even more about Mustafa is that he went out of his way to see if a staff member could help an elderly lady load groceries into her car,” he said.
“Congratulations to Mustafa and your parents who have obviously brought you up well, and to Woolies for employing someone who really loves their job and people.”
“If this is the new norm in retail, we are in for an incredible ride,” he said.
The post, which was also shared to the poster’s LinkedIn, has attracted comments from other users.
“Good humans are in short supply - we should recognise them when they show themselves,” wrote one LinkedIn user.
“It’s all those 1% that deliver a great experience regardless of if you’re a specialty or large corporation,” the poster replied.
Coles customer tells of ‘friendly and efficient’ experience
A customer from Coles has also spoken out about an above and beyond customer service experience at their local store.
Sharing her experience to Coles’s Facebook page, a Queensland woman wrote about a positive experience she had at the Yarrabilba store.
The woman’s post also featured a photograph of her receipt, showing the date and time of her visit, as well as the name of the team member that served her.
“I'm not sure if the young lady serving me for my large shop at the register was Sarah; she did swap 3/4 of the way through with another young lady,” the customer wrote.
“I just wanted to say I don't usually shop at this store, but I certainly will again as it's been many years since I've had such friendly and efficient service and it was the same from both staff.”
Facebook users took to the comments section to tag a Coles Customer Service Manager in the post, who thanked the woman in a comment.
“Thank you so much for your lovely feedback and comment, as the Customer Service Manager I will make sure this is passed on,” she said.
“We pride ourselves at Yarrabilba for looking after all our customers but it makes it much more worth it when it’s appreciated.”
Random acts of kindness going both ways
The effects of Covid-19 have caused significant stress for retail workers and customers, but it seems that acts of kindness are seemingly on the rise.
Through an initiative by The Kindness Pandemic, members of the public are being encouraged to pay it forward, spread kindness, and brighten someone’s day.
Via one of the Kindness Pandemic’s supermarket campaigns, supermarket customers have been leaving thoughtful notes around stores for team members to find.
Sharing one of these notes to their official Twitter account, Woolworths said: “We’re so proud of our dedicated team and we thank all our customers for your continued support.”
A TikToker also recently gifted the staff at her local Coles store with a large box of chocolates, telling her followers that “during tough times like these you need to do something kind for others.”
Supermarket giants Coles and Woolworths have also been commended by customers on social media after customers have discovered handwritten notes, boxes of chocolates and flowers included in online deliveries.
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Deutsche Bank AG is reviewing further management changes as Germany’s largest bank tries to cut costs and shrink, two people with knowledge of the plan said.
The review of the eight-member management board is driven by supervisory board Chairman Paul Achleitner and a decision may be announced within the next couple of months, said the people, who asked not to be identified as the talks are private.
Co-Chief Executive Officers Anshu Jain and Juergen Fitschen are also studying further changes below management board level, one of the people said. The two will keep their positions as plans currently stand, the people said.
The co-CEOs are under pressure as investors question whether the plan they announced last month to scale back the consumer banking unit will revive earnings. A more radical proposal to exit retail banking and make deeper cuts at the investment bank was watered down by the co-CEOs and Achleitner amid resistance from labor unions, one of the people said.
As part of the overhaul, Rainer Neske, the head of Deutsche Bank’s private and business clients division, is poised to step down, a person with direct knowledge of the matter said on Monday.
Neske, 50, sits on the lender’s management board, where he has overseen the company’s retail operations. He had pushed for the bank to sell all of that business as a stand-alone company.
The bank’s supervisory board meets May 20 and Neske’s successor, most likely to come from within the company, may be named as soon as this week, one of the people said.
Ronald Weichert, a spokesman for the Frankfurt-based lender, declined to comment on the discussions.
Deutsche Bank is now seeking to cut annual costs by an additional 3.5 billion euros ($3.9 billion), sell a majority stake in its Postbank consumer unit and reduce leverage at the investment bank.
With investors questioning the bank’s lower profitability targets and signaling concern Deutsche Bank didn’t give enough detail on how it will achieve the cost cuts it announced last month, the company pledged to provide more information within 90 days.


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Search results for "Oppo Indonesia"
Only New Mobile Phones Will Be Registered With ID Numbers: Government
... all mobile phones sold in Indonesia since the beginning of this ... linked to their legitimate owners. Indonesia has been trying for some ... like Samsung, Apple, Xiaomi and Oppo to fit a certain amount ... are sold every year in Indonesia. By his estimation, if a ...
29 Jul 2019 | 11:54 AM
Aggressive Chinese Vendors Dominate Indonesia's Smartphone Market
... brands are beginning to dominate Indonesia's lucrative smartphone market, according ... associate market analyst at IDC Indonesia, according to a Wednesday (19 ... electronics giant Samsung, Chinese company Oppo Electronics, Taiwanese AsusTek Computer, Indonesian ...
21 Jul 2017 | 01:46 PM
Domestic Smartphone Sales Jump 13% as Chinese Brands Expand Market Share
Jakarta. Smartphone sales in Indonesia jumped 13 percent in ... brands such as Xiaomi and OPPO has jumped to 31 ... best-selling brands were Samsung, OPPO, Asus from Taiwan, local brand ... analyst at IDC Indonesia, the smartphone market in Indonesia has now changed ...
06 Jul 2017 | 02:01 PM
Samsung's Flagship Galaxy S8 and S8+ Help Brand Stay on Top in Indonesia
... Jo Semidang, Samsung Electronics Indonesia marketing director, told reporters. ... competition from Chinese players Oppo, Huawei and Lenovo. ... in 2014. Its competitor, Oppo, has leapfrogged other smartphone ... . "Chinese players like Oppo, Huawei and Lenovo have ...
25 May 2017 | 01:26 PM
iPhone Returns to Indonesia After a Year's Absence
... Selular, or Telkomsel, Indonesia's largest mobile phone operator ... in three cities in Indonesia early this year, paving ... recall — with Chinese manufacturer Oppo coming close behind. They ... 4G manufacturing facilities in Indonesia in 2015. The article ...
18 Mar 2017 | 02:10 PM
BlackBerry Makes Comeback in Indonesia With Aurora
... giants Android and Apple. Indonesia was once the Canadian ... being manufactured entirely in Indonesia and will run Android' ... between Blackberry and Tiphone Mobile Indonesia, has exclusive manufacturing rights ... s Samsung and China's Oppo. BlackBerry, however, is ...
10 Mar 2017 | 02:00 PM
Apple Considering Three Locations in Indonesia for Its R&D Centers
... sell its iPhone 7 in Indonesia this year after the United ... any new smartphone sold in Indonesia this year should have at ... 's largest smartphone market. Samsung Indonesia vice president Lee Khang Hyun ... Data Corporation (IDC). China's OPPO is in second place with ...
20 Jan 2017 | 01:58 PM
Chinese OPPO Expands Local Production in Indonesia to Meet Demand, Export Target
... completed last month, Aryo Meidianto, OPPO Indonesia spokesman, said on Monday (02 ... said. "Despite having fewer models, OPPO Indonesia's sales in 2016 increased ... research firm International Data Corporation, OPPO Indonesia holds the second largest share ...
02 Jan 2017 | 07:53 PM
Samsung Maintains Dominance in Indonesia's Smartphone Market
... impact on brand perception in Indonesia. "Indonesians use smartphones for ... In second place was the OPPO F1s, followed by the ... inch screen. Chinese manufacturer OPPO Electronics is based in ... component manufacturers could move to Indonesia," Reza said. "This ...
16 Dec 2016 | 09:53 PM
Industry Players Must Keep Up With Technological Advancement: Mochtar Riady
... Ideas," at the University of Indonesia in Depok, West Java, ... market with brands such as Oppo and Huawei. "The new ... of Oppo, which currently has around 860 outlets across Indonesia. He ... a business. University of Indonesia literature professor Riris Sarumpaet, ...
14 Dec 2016 | 06:53 PM
Indonesia May Allow Self-Funded Vaccination as Cases Nearing 1 Million
Indonesian Students in Australia Torn Between Staying and Returning Home
Five Men Arrested in Aceh over Alleged Links with IS
Indonesia's Largest Islamic Bank to Be Ready by February
Indonesia Bucks the FDI Trend as Omnibus Law, Vaccination Stoke Investors' Confidence
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Although the dollar has appreciated about 25% against the yen in the past 12 months, the U.S. currency struggles to command the symbolically important rate of 100 yen or more. Sullivan & Cromwell LLP's Keiji Hatano believes the main drivers of outbound Japanese dealmaking remain in place.
"The strong yen was helpful but it wasn't the primary driver of Japanese companies going outbound. There's a more fundamental issue, that Japan is an aging society and if you want growth you have to go elsewhere. That hasn't changed," he said.
The devastating earthquake and tsunami of March 2011 "also highlighted the risk of companies being concentrated on Japan," Hatano added.
He sees the fiscal and monetary stimuli of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as helpful to dealmaking. "Abenomics was designed to change deflation into inflation. With deflation buying tomorrow is cheaper than buying today. With inflation, you'd better act now," he said.
A GlaxoSmithKline spokesman declined to comment on Friday beyond saying it was on track to meet its year-end deadline for completing the Ribena and Lucozade sale. Suntory representatives, who couldn't be reached, had earlier told news outlets that "nothing has been decided."
Ribena and Lucozade had sales last year of about 600 million pounds. GlaxoSmithKline's group revenue was 26.4 billion pounds.
Last year GlaxoSmithKline divested over-the-counter brands with revenue of more than 350 million pounds.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Greenhill & Co. International LLP have been handling the sale of Ribena and Lucozade. PAI Partners SAS as well as Blackstone teamed with Lion Capital had considered bids, as had Bain Capital LLC. Reports suggest the formal auction had not yet begun before Suntory emerged with a pre-emptive offer.
-- Written by Laura Board in London


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Organic farmers say consumers may have trouble purchasing local organic meat after a northern Victorian abattoir’s sudden decision to stop organic service kills.
- Organics for Rural Australia says it has not been given a reason for Hardwicks’ decision
- Other abattoirs licensed to process organic animals are several hours’ drive away
- Transporting animals longer distances risks stressing them
Hardwicks abattoir in Kyneton, north of Melbourne, has told producers it will no longer be processing local organic animals.
In July, the abattoir stopped taking contract goats and there were reports a number of smaller producers had their animals rejected.
Willaura farmer Andrew Liesfield said, unless he could find another market for his lambs, he might have to leave the organic industry.
“It’s pretty devastating news,” he said.
“I think my animals will probably need to go into the conventional market, which will hurt financially. It means our meat won’t be then sold as organic.
“We’ve been told by certifiers that if we run certified organic animals through an unregistered abattoir, that destroys their certification. That also applies with saleyards.”
No alternative processor
Mr Liesfield said the industry was endeavouring to find an alternative processor, but it was proving difficult.
Hardwicks, which was bought by Kilcoy Global Foods in 2021, was one of a small number of abattoirs licensed to process organic animals, with other processors several hours’ drive away.
“There are two others in the state, but there are problems with transport and the ability to transport our product into the Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide market,” Mr Liesfield said.
“Unless we can find somewhere else, [organic sales] will basically stop.”
Local industry struggling
Organics for Rural Australia director Janie McClure helps producers organise and send their animals to Hardwicks.
She said the local industry was struggling.
“Producers are devastated. We get lambs in from as far as New South Wales,” Ms McClure said.
“They used to go direct to the abattoir and it wasn’t too far for the animals.
“But when it becomes long distance, the animals stress, and that’s all part of the certification, that we don’t stress the animals.”
Ms McClure said she was not given a reason as to why the abattoir had stopped service kills, but she hoped to find a resolution soon.
“We’ve been in discussions with Hardwicks,” she said.
“I think growers need someone to support them and I’m going to do that.”
Hardwicks has been contacted for comment.


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September 7, 2017 - To encourage website owners and service providers to move to HTTPS, Google began sending out emails to remind them that their sites will be marked as insecure if they don't comply. This is the latest step in the search giant's long-term effort of creating a safer web experience for every user.
September 1, 2017 - A new phishing campaign that targets businesses goes beyond business email compromise or CEO fraud.
August 14, 2017 - When you buy your child new devices, it's important to lay down some ground rules—especially when it comes to security. That's why we're providing you with a cybersecurity checklist you can use to prepare your children for the coming school year.
July 28, 2017 - It’s the last Friday of July, and today—more than any day—is the perfect day to recognize and express our gratitude to the mighty men and women who make our work life in the office a little more manageable if not totally stress-free, technology- and IT concerns-wise.
July 25, 2017 - The Federal Bureau of Investigation has recently issued a Public Service Announcement (PSA), encouraging consumers to think twice before purchasing internet-connected toys.


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Home> Transport & Mobility
China tests floating maglev cars that travel up to 140 MPH
A total of eight cars were tested, including five new energy vehicles.
Ride-Hailing firm T3 Mobility joins Huawei’s Petal Travel
On September 6, Petal Travel officially started public testing.


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In September 2020, the second phase of China’s National Integrated circuit Fund surfaced. According to related reports, the foundation invested 28.9 billion US dollars in the integrated circuit industry, which is nearly double the amount of the first phase of the fund. We can see from relevant sources that the size of this fund is expected to reach 47 billion US dollars, and the specific areas of focus include etching machines, thin film deposition, testing and wafer cleaning equipment.
According to Strategyanalytics, China’s goal is to achieve self-sufficiency in semiconductor production, starting with the 28 nm CMOS node, the most widely used manufacturing node or feature size for integrated circuits (ICs). China can meet most of its Semiconductor needs by making ICs at this node, and the plan appears to be successful.
Strategyanalytics further pointed out that the reason why China has such an idea is that they want to obtain reliable semiconductor resources to continue producing and exporting Electronic products in mainland China. As recent U.S.-China tensions have made them concerned about their ability to acquire chips now and in the future, China has turned domestically for semiconductor resources in order to survive. Most importantly, the Chinese government sees semiconductor self-reliance as strategically important. Because it protects and sustains job growth in manufacturing.
According to Strategyanalytics, China buys 36 percent of the world’s $400 billion-plus semiconductors annually, and half of those chips are built into electronic products such as PCs, TVs and mobile phones that are exported. Semiconductor producers in mainland China have a global market share of about 5 percent, while U.S. companies have a 47 percent share of the market, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA).
The escalating trade war between the U.S. and China has brought the world into a new reality, the technological cold war. The United States has expanded its “entity list” of blacklisted companies from Chinese military equipment makers to large corporations. Even SMIC has become a target for the United States.
The COVID-19 pandemic has also caused other disruptions to international trade, as it has prompted them to emphasize the importance of companies with multiple sources of supply, including local sources, and we are against technology trade wars, but this has become a reality. important damage caused by this debate. Because the electronics industry’s supply chain is complete, the world has to live with it.
Faced with such a situation, what will China do? To what extent can it be done?
First of all, we must say that before the second phase of the Semiconductor Investment Fund, China announced several plans including the next-generation artificial intelligence development (AIDP). Tensions between the U.S. and China also really escalated in May 2020, as the U.S. imposed tough new sanctions ON Huawei at that time, which boosted the development of the second phase of the Big Fund and allowed China to focus more on achieving Self-reliance for 28nm chip production.
According to the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a trade promotion group, China could spend the next decade investing huge sums in semiconductor self-reliance.
To achieve complete self-sufficiency in semiconductor production, China’s semi-fabs require domestic suppliers of semiconductor equipment, domestic on-site support, and domestic suppliers of repaired parts and raw materials (such as silicon substrates and gases). China has more semiconductor factories than any other country and has about 30 new factories under construction or under construction. According to a SEMI forecast last year, China will spend $14 billion on semiconductor equipment purchases in 2020, making China the largest buyer of such equipment. However, the U.S. has imposed export controls on the sale of U.S.-designed tools and manufacturing equipment to Chinese fabs.
According to Strategyanalytics, among these semiconductor equipment, lithography equipment is the most difficult to produce for China. Because there is no domestic machine in China capable of lithography for 28 nm CMOS. Lithography machines typically cost about $50 million each, and they account for 25 to 30 percent of the cost of fab equipment.
In addition, lithography operations typically account for about 50 percent of semiconductor fabrication time, so such machines are critical in determining the throughput and cost of single-chip and per-chip production in fabs.
Lithography uses challenging and expensive techniques. 28 nm lithography requires machines to generate deep ultraviolet light at 193 nm using a powerful argon fluoride excimer laser, coupled with immersion lithography, which illuminates the wafer while immersed in a transparent liquid to change the index of refraction and create fine lines , these are key issues that need to be addressed.
Chinese fabs have achieved remarkable success in producing LEDs, low-power processors, sensors, discrete semiconductors, and assembly, packaging and test (APT) devices. However, China still lags behind in multiple areas such as multi-core processors, storage devices, semiconductor design tools and equipment, especially in mobile SoCs (systems on a chip) that require smaller process nodes to achieve the highest level of integration. China also lags behind. China is also lacking in handset analog/mixed-signal ICs and RF (radio frequency) front-end components including power amplifiers and RF filters.
Full self-sufficiency in all of these areas will require China to produce more advanced semiconductor equipment than is required for the 28 nm CMOS node. It remains to be seen whether European and Japanese equipment suppliers will follow the U.S. lead, or risk a conflict with the U.S. by continuing to sell semiconductor equipment to China. But it is certain that if equipment suppliers around the world impose sanctions, these companies will lose billions of dollars in sales.
In the face of China’s attack, how should the United States respond?
Strategyanalytics said that China’s independent and controllable pursuit of semiconductors will stir distrust of the United States in China. Politicians, foreign policy and defense analysts see China’s plans for 5G, artificial intelligence, quantum computing and semiconductors as part of their ambitions, posing a threat to the U.S. technology leader. But Strategyanalytics argues that these fears are overblown, a view that persists and has recently intensified.
Over the past few decades, U.S. semiconductor suppliers have outsourced production to avoid the high manufacturing costs associated with building new, state-of-the-art fabs. Today, only a handful of U.S. suppliers still produce their own chips in-house, and most U.S. companies, except for older chip designs, have become fabless.
Therefore, the United States has begun planning, led by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), to promote semiconductor autonomy and revival. Congress also participated in the formulation of the US CHIPS Act. This is a bill totaling more than $17 billion to revive U.S. chip production, while they will fund related research and development and ensure a secure supply chain using investments and generous tax incentives.
In Strategyanalytics’ view, China will achieve its goal of independence on the 28 nm node in about two years, which should secure customers in the Chinese electronics industry. However, it is a bit difficult for China to achieve complete production independence in all aspects.
The main challenge facing the US and China is that the semiconductor industry is indeed global in nature. No single company or country can produce the most efficient product without selling to a global market. Because this requires specialized companies located in various parts of the supply chain in other countries.
So it’s a balancing act. China can still benefit from the outside semiconductor market and foreign sales. Moreover, the United States still needs the strong APT and electronic assembly and production capabilities of the Chinese market. We hope to find a good balance.


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An increasing number of Rotorua people are cashing in on the trend of renting out spare rooms on Airbnb - but the local motel association says there are concerns around the lack of regulation around the increasingly popular website.
More than 260 Rotorua rooms are listed on the website, ranging from $15 a night to more than $1000. The site allows residents to offer their rooms, sleepouts or empty homes to travellers.
But Rotorua Association of Motels chairwoman Fiona Suurenbroek said there was concern websites such as Airbnb had no regulatory requirements.
"As commercial accommodation providers we are subject to many regulatory requirements including, but not limited to, monthly building checks and annual building warrant of fitness, we have a duty of care to ensure that our properties are maintained at a certain standard and we are subject to commercial rates of which these properties are not. It would be great if we were all on a level playing field," she said.
"We have been privy to some horror stories of guests who have ended up in our motels due to their Airbnb experience so our advice is to always do your homework for your holiday and accommodation experience."
Destination Rotorua chief executive Mark Rawson said the growth of sites like Airbnb was a global phenomenon.
"What is clear is that Airbnb has not only challenged how customers purchase accommodation, but also how they choose to experience their stay."
He said it had both upsides and downsides with positives including the additional capacity for Rotorua, especially at peak times of the year, which meant people didn't have to postpone or cancel visits.
"On the downside, this has led to an uneven playing field that exists between the more traditional, commercially regulated supplier (such as a hotel, motel, backpacker) versus a non-commercial, bach, holiday and/or private home owner/host."
He said there were times of the year when the market could and did sustain both.
At other times like the low and shoulder seasons he said the view could "rightfully be taken" that people staying in that sort of accommodation meant fewer people staying in commercially regulated lodging.
Mr Rawson said concerns relating to regulating the sector were not new, with a number of sectors in the commercially regulated supply chain having raised issues at both a local and national level.
Airbnb's New Zealand country manager Sam McDonagh said the company was constantly innovating and investing in new programmes and services that helped make hosts and guests safer. That included a 250-person "trust and safety team" which was available around the world.
He said the average income of an Airbnb host in New Zealand was about $7100.


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Verizon announced it wants to sell 48 data centers it owns. Asking price $2.5 billion.
This is the latest move as Verizon mutilates itself to focus all efforts on wireless.
Look for this deal to shake things up, or perhaps it marks the end of the boom in data center sector.
$40 million Tier III data center just opened on January 15th
website: data center features
The owner is MainOne, the operator of the MainOne submarine cable (capacity of 4.96 Tbps) that stretches from Portugal to Nigeria...


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The April fool’s joke of Volkswagen last week did not go according to plan. According to a report by Automotive News, the marketing agency of the German carmaker would have had the idea of rename Volkswagen of America in Voltswagen as a mere e simple joke of april first. The basic idea was that of encourage people and readers to get to know ID.4, the new electric from Wolfsburg.
Johannes Leonardo, Volkswagen’s main marketing agency, would have the press release was sent under a false name to a number of reporters so from make the joke go viral. According to some sources, Volkswagen would have therefore intentionally deceived their audience also following some clear questions asked by journalists and addressed to the upper floors of the brand. VW spokesman Mark Gillies would even have denied the presence of a joke of April 1st and therefore confirmed the radical change of name. A 360-degree joke, which may have been poorly digested both by the press and by the readers.
In any case, internally, the name Voltswagen already exists and it would already be used for some presentations behind closed doors. For example, in conjunction with the launch of ID.3 in the United Kingdom, where the group would use it to present the very first electric. A winning and captivating strategy that now, however, seems to be branded as a joke; strange, don’t you think?
According to Automotive News, this seemingly innocent little joke would generated strong media attention towards the brand, damaging its credibility. Basically, according to some, Volkswagen would have acted exactly as in the Dieselgate affair shamelessly lying to users even knowing they have something to hide. A kind of déjà-vu that dramatically little appreciated.
Was it a boomerang from the start? Definitely not, it was probably just a poorly coordinated plan which has brought more repercussions than anything else. The impression is that the different departments within VW have not agreed as they should have done, creating only a huge chaos and an almost unwarranted turnaround. If Volkswagen simply had created an ad-hoc press release (as all producers do during April Fool’s Day) there would be no problems.
What do you think of this story? Do you think this is a huge conspiracy or is it taking a game too seriously?