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While residents await massive hikes in electricity bills, competition is helping some small businesses
- Alan Zibel
Bazensky's Dinette & Patio, a family-owned furniture company in Parkville, won't feel the sting of rising electricity bills this summer.
Unlike Baltimore Gas and Electric Co.'s 1.1 million residential customers who face a 72 percent average increase in their electric bills this July, the company has a better deal for its power.
Through a 125-member cooperative formed by the Pikesville Chamber of Commerce, company owner Miriam Bazensky last year signed a three-year contract for electricity that runs until May 2008. The deal, reached before power prices started to soar last fall, locks in electricity prices at about 40 percent less than BGE's new rates for businesses, which will be effective in June.
"In retail business, you always want to use your money wisely," Bazensky said. "When you're throwing it down the tubes for energy, you have nothing to show for that."
Bazensky's daughter Nisa Felps, the company's president, said the business' total gas and electric bills can be as high as $6,000 a month.
The company's experience illustrates one of the harsh realities of Maryland's deregulated electricity market.
Unlike the old regulated system, in which rates were set based on power companies' costs, power is now priced based on ever-fluctuating commodities markets.
Just like the stock market, power markets can vary dramatically based on hurricanes, oil prices or disruptions in the supply of coal. If an electric company such as BGE buys its supply when prices are high -- such as the past six months -- customers can be hit with higher bills.
Supporters of electricity deregulation say this system makes power plants operate more efficiently and introduces competition among owners of plants. But critics say it allows companies such as Baltimore's Constellation Energy Group Inc., parent of BGE, to wring sky-high profits from low-cost generators -- like the Calvert Cliffs nuclear plant in Southern Maryland.
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2008 Beijing Auto Show: The good, the bad, and the ugly from China's booming auto industry
It's the wild, wild east at 2008 Beijing auto show
"Man," said GM design boss Ed Welburn, "this is the most exciting auto show I've been to in a long time. It's the wild, wild east." Welburn was on the Geely stand at the 2008 Beijing Auto Show, checking out the half-dozen or so concepts and all-new models rolled out just for this show by China's second largest domestic automaker. "They don't know what the rules are," he said, referring to some of the weirder designs, "but that's okay. There's a lot of creativity here."
Welburn, whose Buick Invicta concept, jointly designed in GM's Chinese and Detroit studios, is one of the star cars of Beijing, wasn't the only senior designer prowling the eight crowded, chaotic halls of the giant China International Exhibition Center - Ford's Martin Smith, Volvo's Steve Mattin and Audi's Walter de Silva were all spotted checking out the good, the bad, and the ugly from China's booming auto industry.
Booming? You bet. No fewer than 25 international brands are manufactured in China, including Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz, as well as Toyota and Honda, Buick and Cadillac, Hyundai and Peugeot. In addition, there are at least 24 Chinese domestic brands, including Chery, Geely, Brilliance, BYD, Great Wall and FAW. Pure imports include all the top end luxury brands, including Rolls-Royce, Ferrari, Maserati, and Lamborghini. Sales of cars and SUVs in China last year reached 8.1 million vehicles, and will probably top 9.2 million this year, a growth rate of 14 percent. First quarter sales are up 21 percent compared with the same period in 2007.
No wonder automakers regard Beijing (and Shanghai - each is held in alternate years) as a "tier one" auto show, on par with Detroit, Geneva, Paris, Frankfurt, and Tokyo. This year's show featured 890 new cars and SUVs, spread over 180,000 square meters of display area. And it's a show that really does sell cars -- one VIP, a young Chinese entrepreneur, signed a contract to purchase the first Veyron to be sold in the country on the Bugatti stand Sunday morning. All three cars on the Bentley stand - a purple Continental GT Speed, a chestnut brown Continental Flying Spur, and a violet over black Arnage RL -- were sold even before the show opened.
World premieres at Beijing included Audi's Q5 SUV, which is expected to be a strong seller in China alongside the Q7. Nissan revealed a small 1.6-liter crossover, the Livina C-Gear, which is related to the Versa, and the production version of the Teana concept shown at Tokyo last year. The Teana, Nissan's flagship car in China, and shares the same architecture as the new Maxima. The top of the range version gets a 3.5-liter V-6 under the hood and a CVT transmission.
Volkswagen revealed two new Chinese-built sedans, Bora and Lavida, built on the PQ35 architecture (as used for Golf and Jetta). Why two remarkably similar Jetta-sized four doors, both powered by four cylinder engines and available with a six-speed Tiptronic automatic? The answer is the Bora is from the Shanghai Volkswagen joint venture company, while the Lavida is from the FAW Volkswagen joint venture company.
Automaking in China is a complex business -- foreign companies can only manufacture in the country in partnership with a Chinese company, an arrangement designed primarily to ensure China benefits from the transfer of advanced automotive design, engineering and manufacturing skills, rather than to simply provide jobs for Chinese workers. Western automakers know they are being used -- and, as GM found a few years back with Chery's weld-for-weld copy of the Daewoo-designed Matiz, the Chinese are fast learners -- but they take the risk because they want the rewards from being players in the world's fastest growing auto market.
But you don't have to look far at Beijing to see China's automakers already have ambitions beyond meeting demand in their home market. They want to be global players themselves. Half a dozen have changed their logos in the past year in a bid to make them more internationally attractive; the China Daily reported Geely alone is planning to spend about half a million dollars to commission new logos around the globe.
More significantly, Beijing revealed several Chinese automakers are already working on relatively upscale vehicles that support GM boss Rick Wagoner's theory that when the Chinese do come to the U.S. and Europe they won't necessarily follow the Japanese and Korean examples by entering with cheap and cheerful products, and then spending the next 20 years trying to move their image upmarket.
Against this background, perhaps the two most significant cars of the show were the four door coupe and two door coupe-convertible concepts on the Guangzhou Automobile Corporation (GAC) stand. Who? GAC is one of Honda's two Chinese joint venture partners, and manufactures Chinese-market Accords, Fits, Citys and Odysseys (the other, Dongfeng, makes Civics and CR-Vs). Both concepts, which preview models scheduled for production in 2010 that will be sold under an all-new brand name, were Accord-sized vehicles that seemed to use a lot of Accord hardware. And, ironically, each was a way better looking car than the Honda.

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text: Via Businessweek: Count Acer (2353:TT) Chairman J.T. Wang among the many people in the tech world awaiting the debut of Apple's (AAPL) new tablet computer. "I'm eager to see what Apple has done," says Wang, the top executive at Acer, the world's second-largest PC vendor behind Hewlett-Packard (HPQ). Wang and his Acer colleagues have some guesses about what the tablet, which Apple is scheduled to unveil on Jan.27, will be like. "It's going to be a big-screen iPhone," he predicts. "The content can be bigger, more graphic, with more video and text, but they are going to duplicate a successful model." Wang has another reason to focus on what Steve Jobs & Co. are about to launch. If things had worked out differently almost a decade ago, the company leading the tablet wave might have been Acer, not Apple. Long before Apple began its tablet project, the Taiwanese company was a tablet leader, working with Microsoft (MSFT) to produce a first-generation tablet computer in 2002. Other computer companies such as Dell (DELL) and IBM (IBM), skeptical about whether computer users would want a new type of machine, wouldn't commit to making the tablet. Not Acer, which embraced the new gadget. Indeed, even before Microsoft engineers had finished working on the tablet software, Bill Gates would carry an Acer tablet PC everywhere around the office. Being a tablet pioneer, though, didn't work out well for Acer. The product had impressive technology for its time, such as handwriting-recognition software, but consumers didn't much care. Moreover, Wang says, Acer had to cope with internal problems at Microsoft, where outgoing CEO Gates and incoming boss Steve Ballmer disagreed about the project's importance. "At the time, Bill Gates wanted to do that [tablet]," says Wang. "Steve Ballmer didn't care." As a result, "they didn't put in the resources to make it successful." After a year, Wang says, he pulled the plug. "We Don't Have to Be the First" Just in case he needs a reminder of the high hopes Acer had for the tablet, Wang keeps behind his desk at Acer headquarters in suburban Taipei a framed page from a local Chinese-language newspaper. One article is about Wang predicting a revival for Acer's PC business, which had been struggling. The other has the headline "Cooperation with Microsoft: Tablet PC Launch in November." With Apple generating so much buzz, do Acer executives have any regrets about not sticking with a category that now could revolutionize the computer and consumer electronics industries? Wang says no, he and his colleagues "learned a lot" from the episode. Among the most important lessons: Unlike Apple, a company like Acer isn't cut out for taking the lead in establishing a whole new category. When it comes to launching new products, "we don't have to be the first," he says. "We can be No. 2. It's O.K. with us." Acer's culture isn't suited for being out in front, adds Jim Wong, president of Acer's IT products division. "I don't compare Acer with Apple," he says. "Apple is a company that is highly innovative. Acer is more [focused on] leveraging resources from the whole industry. That's Acer's way." For instance, Acer's Taiwanese rival Asustek (2357:TT) was the first to score with netbooks, the small, inexpensive laptops it began selling in 2007. Acer followed, once it could see that consumers liked the new type of computers. Acer now dominates the netbook market. New Tablet in the Works That doesn't mean Acer is going to stay on the sidelines now that Apple is reinvigorating the tablet computer category. Acer last year launched a laptop computer with a touchscreen that Wong says is a first step toward a new, tablet-like device. "Following this concept, you can expect to see more things happen within 2010," he says. Unlike the device that Acer expects Apple to launch, whatever the Taiwanese company introduces this year will maintain some of the basic features of traditional computers. "I don't think we would like to get rid of the keyboard," says Wong. "People still type faster than they write." The goal is to have products with parts that are detachable. "If you need a keyboard, you'll have it," says Wong. "If you don't, you still can have a slate." The new device will be part of a broader push by Acer to diversify beyond its core laptop-PC business. Acer last year passed Dell to become the world's No. 2 computer vendor, thanks largely to the Taiwanese company's strength in netbooks and other laptop PCs. Already, Acer has begun selling smartphones and plans to introduce an electronic book reader this year. The company is also going to launch an online applications store, Wong says.


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Archive by Author
Posted on 12. Oct, 2012 by Andrew Girdwood.
Christmas is months away. My Twitter feed, dominated by digital marketing, communications and technology people has seen plenty of disbelief. Why do shops have Christmas messaging up already? Why? Despite the apparent outrage, I suspect most of the people pointing at the incipient decorations and sale offers know why retailers are already preparing for Christmas. [...]
Posted on 08. Aug, 2012 by Andrew Girdwood.
Has this been the first social media Olympics? The figures look good. Twitter saw more tweets in a single day than the entire 2008 Beijing Games. However, NBC has been using a tape delay in the States, not broadcasting events live, showing coverage later and at strategically calculated times instead. This has led to a [...]
Posted on 01. Jun, 2012 by Andrew Girdwood.
I stole the title of this blog post from Kevin. Kevin works in a department in LBi bigmouthmedia that is entirely dedicated to working with bloggers. Hopefully the concept does not sound strange; outreach experts are increasingly common in adland. Agencies have a number of reasons for getting in touch with bloggers. The outreach might [...]
Posted on 19. Apr, 2012 by Andrew Girdwood.
Yesterday was the first ionSearch conference. Google gifted the conference with big news and there was certainly a buzz. Imagine a conference in which SEOs spent a lot of time discussing how to remove links and whether they should. Just at the end of last month Google successfully cracked down on link networks. These are [...]
Posted on 23. Feb, 2012 by Andrew Girdwood.
It is the last day here at Search Engine Strategies London. It’s been busy. High profile American SEO and blogger Lee Odden compiled a list of 45 SEO and Social Media tools mentioned in just one session. Europen search blog State of Search has put together strong coverage of the ‘Meaningful SEO Metrics’ and Microsoft [...]
Posted on 22. Feb, 2012 by Andrew Girdwood.
Search Engine Strategies is one of the most significant conferences in Search Marketing and perhaps Digital Marketing in the UK. The conference was founded in 1999 by Danny Sullivan and is now hosted by Incisive Media after it was bought from JupiterMedia in 2005 for $43 million. Search Engine Strategies has evolved as Search has [...]
Posted on 10. Feb, 2012 by Andrew Girdwood.
You have until the 22nd of May to build your time machine. If you plan to attend a robust collection of digital marketing events in the UK this year then it’s the 22nd of May you’ll have to survive. Planning on running a digital marketing conference this year? One scheduling tip would be to avoid [...]
Posted on 19. Dec, 2011 by Andrew Girdwood.
Google has just announced a whole bunch of improvements to Google+ including a much better photo experience, new notifications and (finally) multi-admins for Pages for Business. I’m especially happy about all those extra admins. The new feature to adjust the “volume” on your Circles may be the most interesting though. It lets you demote or [...]
Posted on 11. Nov, 2011 by Andrew Girdwood.
I feel like a post like this needs to begin with a disclaimer. I suppose in the ideal world disclaimers should not be necessary but there has been plenty of conversations recently about skill shortages in SEO and the tendency for too many account managers to consider themselves experts just because the keep up to [...]
Posted on 25. Oct, 2011 by Andrew Girdwood.
A week ago Google announced it would make search more secure. It would do this by automatically deploy SSL encryption on searches for logged in users. A logged in user is someone with a cookie from YouTube, Google+, Gmail, etc, that’s still active. Google suggests that that’s less than 10% of current searches. The search [...]


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The Common Council unanimously approved a developer's agreement Tuesday that will allow Walmart to open a neighborhood market in the former Jewel-Osco building at 124th Street and Capitol Drive.
The agreement states that Walmart must keep its grocery offerings within 38,500 square feet of space and is prohibited from expanding its store into the remaining 25,000 square feet, City Attorney Alan Kesner said during an interview. That other square footage will be split into up to three other retail spaces.
The document also lists types of businesses the city will not allow to go into the additional retail spaces - including cigarette shops, coin-op laundries and secondhand stores.
Another clause prohibits RVs and campers from parking overnight there, a practice that is allowed at some Walmart stores around the country, Kesner said.
When the store opens it will be a 24-hour grocery store with a pharmacy inside. It will be significantly smaller in size than the traditional Walmart general merchandise or Super Walmart stores.
The developer has a contract to purchase the 5.5 acres and perform major rehab on the existing building as well as improvements and landscaping to the massive parking lot. Plans have been making their way through the city's Design Review Board.
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Silver service for newly rich
Banks and investment houses are scrambling to sign up 'new affluent' clients who earn at least £50,000 a year and have £100,000 or more to invest.
People are getting richer younger and they want more sophisticated money management services at their beck and call. The likes of Barclays, NatWest and Royal Bank of Scotland are falling over themselves to attract the newly rich with 'all-frills' tailored products and services.
There are several reasons for the emergence of this sector of society. Some inherit young, some are entrepreneurial millionaires, and many have simply reaped the benefits of booming stock markets. About 6.5% of the population have at least £100,000 to invest.
John Church, managing director of Barclays Premier Banking, a one-stop shop for the affluent, says: 'Banks have traditionally focused on the seriously wealthy top end of the market and have applied a retail approach to the bottom end. But there is a younger, more affluent sector in the middle that has different needs.'
Premier customers with between £50,000 and £500,000 to invest are offered a private banking service. They have access to an old-style bank manager, who can advise on all aspects of their finances, including tax planning and investment management.
If a wealthy whizkid decides to blow £6,000 on a case of vintage Krug champagne, no problem. Barclays Premier can arrange loans of up to £25,000 within 24 hours.
Last week, NatWest launched a private banking service for customers with more than £75,000 to invest. The service, which has been set up by its Coutts private banking subsidiary, offers all aspects of financial planning.
Coutts chief executive Andrew Fisher believes the new generation of entrepreneurs and business managers has been dissatisfied with traditional financial services providers. He says: 'These people have not been well looked after. They are financially aware and want sophisticated, personalised advice on a range of issues.'
This year Bank of Scotland also launched its version of private banking for the newly affluent. Called inParallel Solutions, it is aimed at those with £100,000-plus of assets or a salary of more than £75,000. Customers are assigned a 'relationship manager' to look after all their financial planning.
Doug Noble, head of inParallel Solutions, says: 'The number of millionaires in the UK is set to double in two years and treble in five. And this wealthy sector wants a more modern approach to banking.'
Overseas companies are also courting the newly affluent. Swiss group Credit Suisse will launch a pan-European investment service this month for Britons with £60,000 to invest. It will include online share dealing and access to a multi-currency savings account.
Bank of Canada is also about to join the sector with a private banking service for those with £50,000-plus. Vice-president Phil Cutts says: 'There is five times as much wealth in the UK as in Canada.'
Adam Westcott, 26, an analyst for media group Pearson, fits the newly affluent bill perfectly. He owns a house in Brixton, south London, recently spent £30,000 on an E-type Jaguar and is one of Barclay's elite Premier customers. Having a good salary allows him to shop when he wants and fund a luxurious lifestyle that includes skiing at least twice a year.
He is most impressed that as a Premier customer he has instant access to large personal loans and the offer of a buy-to-let mortgage whenever he wants one.
Westcott says: 'I enjoy being able to spend a lot of my salary, but I think a buy-to-let property would be a sensible investment in the future.'
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One theory behind extending daylight saving time year-round is that merchants would rack up more sales because consumers would be out and about later, with all that extra sun at the end of winter days.
But even shopkeepers can’t reach a consensus on this. The Retailers Association of Massachusetts just submitted survey results to a state commission that’s weighing whether to recommend moving to Atlantic Standard Time, aka our daylight saving time, on a year-round basis.
The sample size is relatively small, about 5 percent of RAM’s 4,000 members. But the results are worth noting. Roughly one third — 34 percent — of respondents support extending daylight saving time year round, instead of springing forward and falling back. This group sees an increase in business, energy savings, and an end to the annoying twice-a-year clock switch.
Another 24 percent support a year-round Eastern Standard Time. But the biggest reason seemed to be the disruptive effects from the current March and November time shifts, rather than any great benefit from having the sun rise and set earlier in the summer.
More than 40 percent prefer the status quo, or at least prefer waiting for a national solution. They’re particularly worried about getting out of step with neighboring states.
The potential for interstate confusion in New England is a legitimate concern, one that could outweigh any benefits. The biggest takeaway: If Massachusetts decides to pursue a time-zone shift, we shouldn’t go it alone.Jon Chesto can be reached at email@example.com. Follow him on Twitter @jonchesto.


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Yesterday, we reported that Mattel had signed an extended deal with Warner Bros. Consumer Products to continue producing toys based on DC Superhero properties, including the upcoming Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice and Justice League movies, as well as Arrow and The Flash televisions series.
"In our fifteen years of collaboration with Warner Bros. Consumer Products, Mattel has been honored with bringing the stories and characters of the DC Comics universe to life in toy form," said Doug Wadleigh, Senior Vice President, Global Brands Marketing, Boys and Entertainment for Mattel. "Mattel's robust portfolio has helped extend DC Comics properties to new consumers utilizing the toy brands they know and trust. We are excited to continue our partnership, and look forward to supporting upcoming entertainment launches and franchise development."
"We look forward to continuing our strong relationship with Mattel and the Warner Bros. Consumer Products teams to collaborate on compelling product lines that support the many exciting DC Comics initiatives slated for the coming years including film, TV, games and comics," stated Diane Nelson, President of DC Entertainment.0comments


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Imports of textiles and textile articles too dipped by 23.2 per cent to $1.262 billion, while clothing and accessories imports fell 20.3 per cent to $124.4 million during January-July 2020.
In July 2020, Sri Lanka’s earnings from textiles and garment exports fell by 1.4 per cent to $469.2 million, compared to exports of $475.6 million in the same month of 2019. "With the considerable increase in earnings from personal protective equipment (PPE) such as face masks and protective suits, which are categorised under other made up articles, earnings from textiles and garments declined only marginally by 1.4 per cent in July 2020, led by lower garments exports to the US and the EU," the central bank said in its report ‘External Sector Performance – July 2020’.
Meanwhile, Sri Lanka’s expenditure on textiles and textile articles fell in July 2020 by 20.7 per cent year-on-year to $197.1 million, and clothing and accessories imports were down by 38.7 per cent to $13.4 million. “The reduction in import expenditure of textiles and textile articles was led by lower imports of fabrics and yarn,” the central bank said.
In 2019, Sri Lanka earned $5.596 billion in textiles and apparel exports, registering a growth of 5.2 per cent year-on-year. Of this, clothing exports alone accounted for $5.205 billion. On the other hand, imports increased by 1.8 per cent to $2.909 billion.
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If cars were the stars on the first day of the auto show, Tuesday was all about the tech.
Suppliers got to showcase what they have to offer and one local supplier Denso was looking to cash in on that opportunity with virtual reality simulator.
In this business the trick is to lure in the young talent. One way to do that is with the promise of virtual reality.
Once you have them there, explain there are real life applications to be found even in a virtual world. FOX 2's Dave Spencer put on the goggles for his own VR experience.
"You've seen a car that stopped very quickly at a stop area for an emergency vehicle to go by," said Bill Foy, Denso head of engineering.
This is the work being done at the Southfield-based company Denso. They are a Tuer-1 auto supplier who recently invested $1.2 billion in North America creating 4,500 jobs.
The most exciting of those opportunities may be happening to 12 interns on the campus of the University of Michigan.
"They will work on two specific projects, one is the connectivity," said Doug Patton, Denso executive VP. "And how that relates to autonomous driving."
And that's what an auto show visitor can experience first-hand - figuring out how one driverless car can communicate with the world around it.
"It is either vehicle to vehicle or vehicle to infrastructure," Foy said. "It is a future communications system right now that the government is looking to mandate."
It is technology that this company has been working on for the past 10 years
"You can tell the speed, trajectory and the direction that you're going," Foy said.
Computer program: "When your vehicle is able to see other vehicles that you do. It can help avoid accidents that you don't even see coming."
But they know to continue that work, they need to attract the latest, greatest and youngest talent to take it to the next level.
"We're looking for these types of opportunities for students," Patton said.
Denso is actually hiring at the auto show. They will interview you and hire you on the spot if you meet their qualifications.
The North American International Auto Show opens Jan. 14 to the public.


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Raw Thrills has announced their first arcade-exclusive release, Cruis’n Blast, a reboot of the legendary driver series that debuted in the ’90s with the well-known Cruis’n U.S.A. The company says new Cruis’n Blast takes the series into the new millennium with updated graphics, gameplay and more.
“With the resurging Millennial arcade scene and unprecedented player demand, the time was right for a new Cruis’n game,” said Eugene Jarvis, Raw Thrills president and creator of the series.
The new game will feature an enclosed cockpit cabinet with immersive sound, a 43″ 1080p HD LED monitor, over 1,000 vibrant RGD LED lights, a GTX 750 Ti Nvidia computer for HD graphics and the ability to link up to eight units for massive multiplayer races. Players can choose from a variety of cars, including a Lamborghini Veneno, Nissan GTR and Corvette Z06.
Cruis’n Blast will be shipping in January 2017, and will be available to play at Raw Thrill’s IAAPA booth. For more information, contact your distributor or [email protected].


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The new iPhone will reportedly be unveiled on September 9. Although Apple hasn’t officially revealed the fall event for the phone, sources familiar with the matter told Buzzfeed’s John Paczkowski that the event will take place during the week of September 7 (Paczkowski has been accurate on previous Apple events.)
Wednesday will most likely be the day the event takes place given Apple’s history for holding such occasions.
The event is expected to reveal the features for the new iPhone, including a Force Touch display, a better camera, and a more powerful wireless chip, according to the publication.
But that’s not all. New iPads and a new Apple TV could also be announced as well.


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PUBG: New State pre-registration starts now in India, game to launch soon
- PUBG New State is currently available for pre-registration on the Google Play Store for Android and the Apple App Store for iOS, according to the Krafton studio.
- The new version was first published globally in February of this year, Krafton decided to postpone launch for India users.
- The upcoming version is a battle royale game set in 2051 that features modern weaponry and vehicles, as well as a few gadgets that focus on enhancing gameplay.
PUBG New State is currently available for pre-registration on the Google Play Store for Android and the Apple App Store for iOS, according to the Krafton studio. The newer version was first released globally in February of this year, but Krafton decided to postpone the formal debut in India till later since the company was still working out issues with another version of PUBG, Battlegrounds Mobile India (BGMI).
According to Krafton, PUBG: New State will be released as a free-to-play game on Android and iOS devices later this year. However, there has been no mention of a definite debut date. Pre-registration is available on Google Play for Android devices and the App Store for iOS devices. Over 32 million pre-registrations have been received for PUBG: New State since February, although these figures do not include gamers from India, China, and Vietnam. Pre-registered users are entitled to a free vehicle skin (permanently).
About Game features
PUBG: New State, which was announced in February, is a battle royale game set in 2051 with modern weaponry and vehicles, and also some gadgets that promise to improve gameplay. The trailer, which debuted in February, showcased some of the newer technologies and locations that will set PUBG: New State apart from earlier PUBG games. New rides, flying toys, and customizable guns are among the things that have been teased.
- Troi is the name of the new map in PUBG New State, which has 808 dimensions.
- New Electronic battery-powered car
- Team Up Squad mode
- Drone Store
- Green Flare gun
- Functional Vehicle doors
In September of last year, the game was banned in the country because of its connection to the Chinese business Tencent. PUBG Mobile was rebranded as Battlegrounds Mobile India this year after Krafton obtained the publication and distribution rights to the game. PUBG: New State is being released in India by the same company. Krafton claims to have invested $70 million (approximately INR 511 crores) in India‘s IT sector this year, including in esports firm Nodwin Gaming, game streaming network Loco, and digital novel platform Pratilipi.
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In Ghana, second-hand garments from Europe and North America are known as “obroni wawu” – or “dead white man’s clothes”. Every week, about 15 million of them find their way to Accra, the capital of the West African country. About 40 percent of what arrives is obviously waste, according to local activists, who say the African continent is being left behind to address the devastating effects of Western overconsumption and rapid growth.
Many of these clothes have been “donated” to charity shops or put in “recycling bins” in the West, but – unsaleable there – they are sent to the global south. Local traders buy the bales without knowing what is inside them, hoping that they can make enough money on the salable parts to continue for another day.
The dumping of second-hand clothes has posed a dilemma for Ghana’s growing fashion scene and the young designers working in it.
“I have come to the point because I struggle to be creative. It is difficult for me to combine production “, says Chloe Asaam (29), who graduated in fashion design in 2017.
She is now working with Or Foundation, a charity that raises awareness about the harmful effects of solid fashion in Ghana. Its headquarters are a short walk from Kantamanto Market – one of the largest second-hand clothing markets in the region.
Traditionally, clothes were made to be shared, shared and valued, she says while sitting at the charity office.
Now fast fashion companies are devaluing clothes and westerners treat it especially as disposable products. “How do I combine the product I would create in the same environment? For me, it’s really hard to unite to produce more while trying to fight and advocate better practices in the industry. I still can not unite production because there is too much clothing in the world. ”
Asaam has been working with the Or Foundation since 2020 – the same year was her first seven-part collection, inspired by “the moods and emotions we have had during the pandemic”, presented by Vogue.
In 2019, she was among 50 finalists from 10 countries nominated for a Gucci Design Fellowship, and she traveled to Italy to spend a week with the fashion brand. “When I came back, people kept asking me what was going to happen. The most common question is when the next collection will arrive. If you are a designer, you must produce at least three collections each year in the Ghanaian environment, says Asaam. “People [are] ask me what happens next? What have you designed? Who have you collaborated with? Many times when I tell people that I’m taking a break, it’s almost a bad thing, it’s almost like I’ve failed as a designer. ”
Instead, she urges Western countries – including Ireland – to become more aware of the effects of their purchases. “We try not to point fingers because we all figure it out – we just want them to be aware that they are complicit,” says Asaam. “The problem is [people are] consumes so much. We advocate that people stop for a while to come to terms with their own participation in the crisis … It creates so many waste problems for our societies and it also creates problems for the women we work with.
“I think there is a feeling that Africans should be grateful for what they can sometimes get with clothes,” [that] no one walks around naked, ”adds Asaam.
Inside Or’s office, textile workers and staff are experimenting with throwing materials that they have collected from the market and trying to see what they can create – such as padding for pillows. Asaam says that if she ever returns to design, she will use old materials like this. But for now, she says the only real solution is simply to stop manufacturing. “People believe that recycling is the solution and a complement to consuming so much. They believe that there is a way to put it back in the system but that the technology is not on the scale needed. ”
Next to her sits designer colleague Sammy Oteng (26), who has worked with fashion for almost a decade. He was also a finalist in the Gucci Design Fellowship, but he says his perspective has changed since then.
“Before working at Or Foundation, there were so many questions I asked myself. You should strive to build a brand and work in the industry, but I gained more insight into the problem we had here. I really want to leave school and add the problem? ” he asked.
“We all had a lot of ambitions after school, so for most people [my friends] it was a big shock that I was ready to go full time with this, he says about his work for the foundation.
Traditionally, he says, Ghana’s fashion culture has focused on “simple, sentimental garments”, but now people feel they must “strive for global northern or western standards”, and own more disposable clothing. The exaggeration is “toxic”, he adds, and puts new designers in particular under pressure. “If you do not produce much, if people do not see your clothes everywhere … [there’s an assumption that] you are not talented. “
When it comes to donations to charity shops, he says Western buyers should ask themselves: “” Is [you] be kind or do you just get rid of your problems? This is not a Ghana problem, this is the problem of the world. We are already dealing with so much. “
Fast fashion and the growth of influencers
Fast fashion has adult in addition to the emergence of so-called “influencers” on social media, which promotes a lifestyle where clothes can be bought in bulk and worn only a few times or even once.
According to a McKinsey report, one of three Young women in the UK consider that garments worn once or twice are old, and one in seven consider it a faux pas to be photographed in the same outfit twice.
In Ireland, fast fashion websites offer new clothes at incredibly low prices. A website advertises dresses for as little as € 2. In May, another company offered more than 600 items of clothing for € 5 each with the label “new week, new fit”.
Missguided – a UK-based company that had a 50 percent discount on everything – boasted about adding new styles daily. A documentary about the brand, now available on Netflix, shows one of its Manchester-based buyers bargaining with a supplier for a 10p discount on the production cost of a dress.
Fast fashion companies have been criticized for tearing off styles they see at high-profile designers’ fashion shows, and there have been various scandals related to the exploitation of workers, but this has not stopped their rise.
Chinese fast fashion brand Shein – which was recently valued at $ 100 billion and sells a range of dresses for 3 euros each – has become the second most popular fashion website in the world. According to an analysis made by the technical news media Rest of the World, it adds somewhere between 2,000 and 10,000 individual styles to its app every day,
Fast fashion is too contribute to global warming. In 2019, the World Bank said that the fashion industry is responsible for 10 percent of the annual global carbon dioxide emissions – more than all international flights and shipping combined.
Same year, Oxfam sa that half a ton of clothes were dumped in a landfill every minute in Ireland. Four years earlier, the charity said that an estimated 70 percent of the clothes donated in Europe end up in Africa.
Across Africa, there is a growing movement for used clothing. In Rwanda was its import prohibited 2018 (other East African countries partially backed away from a similar ban because of threats from the United States related to trade laws). In neighboring Uganda, designer Bobby Kolade and filmmaker Nikissi Serumaga recently recorded a podcast series called Vintage or Violence, which explores the damaging effects of fast fashion across the continent. In Kenya, employment has been hit hard, and the number of textile workers has dropped from half a million a few decades ago to tens of thousands.
Many of the clothes that reach Ghana end up in informal dumping sites, sometimes on beaches, in drains, in the sea or by the side of the road.
A dump truck with used clothes, 25 km outside Accra, caught fire last year after it exceeded its capacity. The fire lasted for a week, with thick smoke engulfing nearby roads and forcing people to leave their homes. According to local media, the embers were still smoking seven months later.
There is a special type of suffering for women working at the Kantamanto Market – “kayayei” – who wears bales of used clothing that weigh about 55 kg on their head for a mile or more, and earn less than € 1 per trip. The Or Foundation, which has helped some to get medical evaluations, says that they have seen some 16-year-old girls engaged in such childbirth that has the backbone of 65-year-olds.
“You do not even know what’s in the ball, it’s a surprise. It’s gambling. ‘
In Accra’s Kantamanto market, traders are expressing mixed feelings about the idea of a total ban on the import of second-hand clothes. Some worry about becoming completely out of work if the market closes.
A woman who asks not to be named says she buys bales with 400 white shirts for 1,300 cedis (€ 157) per bale. They usually come from London or South Korea, she says. The shirts are sometimes cotton but mostly polyester – which she thinks is easier to sell because they are cheaper.
“The goods have changed, the quality has changed,” says a man nearby who sells football shirts six days a week. He has worked in the market for 15 years and also asks not to be named.
The cost of a 25 kg ball with football shirts has more than doubled recently, from 1,700 cedis (205 €) to 3,500 cedis, he says. He sells them each for between 10 and 40 cedis (€ 1.21 and € 4.48), depending on the quality.
“You do not even know what is in the ball, it’s a surprise. It’s a game. Sometimes you do not even get one [item] it is good. You can not sell it, you can not carry it. “
#Ghanas #generation #fashion #designers #blowing #fast #fashion


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Colorado residents can now pay state taxes with cryptocurrencies using PayPal, according to the state's payment portal. Payment takes place through PayPal's cryptocurrencies hub for an additional fee.
In February, Gov. Jared Polis outlined plans to accept crypto for tax payments by the end of summer during an appearance on CoinDesk TV.
The option allows residents to use crypto to pay for personal income tax, business income tax, severance tax and withholding tax, according to an Axios report that cites a speech Polis gave in Denver on Monday.
While PayPal lets users deposit, withdraw and hold a variety of cryptocurrencies, the settlement of its crypto checkout service is in U.S. dollars. There's also a service fee of $1 plus 1.83% of the payment amount.
Several other U.S. states, including Florida and Ohio, have tested accepting crypto for tax payments, and in South America, the inflation-hit capital of Argentina, Buenos Aires, said in April it will allow crypto payment for taxes.
The leader in news and information on cryptocurrency, digital assets and the future of money, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups. As part of their compensation, certain CoinDesk employees, including editorial employees, may receive exposure to DCG equity in the form of stock appreciation rights, which vest over a multi-year period. CoinDesk journalists are not allowed to purchase stock outright in DCG.


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The European Commission (Commission) has launched a probe on the impending Apple’s acquisition of Shazam. The regulator is wary that the proposed merger would reduce options for consumers to subscribe to music streaming services in the region. It has set a deadline of 4th September to come up with a conclusion, delaying the approval by four months.
Last December, Apple (AAPL) announced the acquisition of London-based Shazam, which is offering music recognition service to its users. The deal was touted to be worth $400 million and was a strategic fit for Apple’s streaming service Apple Music. Just two months after the deal was announced, few members of the European Union (Austria, France, Iceland, Italy, Norway, Spain, and Sweden) has asked the Commission to look into the deal as they were worried that the deal could give Apple a clear edge at the dismay of its competitors.
The regulator is going to look at two main issues regarding the deal. First point of contention is that post the deal Apple would get access to “commercially sensitive data” from Shazam of its competitors. It also added that this might help the Cupertino-based firm to lure consumers from its competitors (Spotify) to Apple Music, which would make life tougher for streaming providers.
The second issue is relating to the referral system offered by Shazam now. Based on the music clips captured, the app directs users to its partner sites where they can download and listen to them at their comfort. Shazam is currently integrated with Apple Music, Spotify (SPOT), Tidal, Deezer, and Google Play Music.
On a daily basis, the music recognition app used to send 1 million referrals to its partners, which includes Apple Music and Spotify. The watchdog is worried that post the merger, Apple could completely do away with the referral system, which could give Apple Music an unduly advantage compared to others. To put things in perspective, Spotify has 71 million paid users as per its IPO filing and Apple Music, as of April, is touted to be having 40 million paid customers.
Apple is yet to announce its future plans post the merger. As noted by the regulator, it could put an end to the referral system and point users only to Apple Music. There is also another option to pull out Shazam’s Android app. From the regulator’s point of view, post the probe, it could either approve the deal with no strings attached or it could approve it with certain conditions where Apple needs to continue the referral system with other providers or in the worst-case scenario, it might block the deal.
Apple is scheduled to announce its second quarter results on May 1, post the closing bell.
Nvidia Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) Wednesday said its fourth-quarter revenues and profit increased in double-digits amid elevated demand. The results also topped the Street view, driving the stock higher during the
Nutanix (NASDAQ: NTNX) reported second quarter 2021 earnings results today. Total revenue remained flat at $346.4 million compared to the same period a year ago. GAAP net loss was $287.3
Shares of Macy’s Inc. (NYSE: M) were down 2.7% in morning trade on Wednesday. The stock has gained 37% since the beginning of the year. A day ago, the retailer


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Microsoft focuses on stability with looming Windows 10 launch.
UpdatedWindows Insider is your guaranteed ticket to grab a free copy of Windows 10 when it launches.
Windows as a service is upon us, and Microsoft is changing how we purchase, install and update Windows.
Apple's latest OS X Yosemite update brings new Photos app, more emoji and performance improvements to Mac laptops and desktops.
UpdatedMicrosoft announces that Windows 10 will launch this summer in 190 countries and 111 languages.
UpdatedMicrosoft advises that users on Windows 10 Technical Preview may want to pull over to the 'Slow' ring if they want stability.


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Erie County retailers must remove all beauty and body products containing tiny, plastic beads from their shelves starting Sunday, everything from toothpastes to facial scrubs, under a law passed by the County Legislature last summer.
In theory, at least.
The county won’t enforce the ban right away.
And the county’s own lawyer said the ban might not stand up to a court challenge.
But county lawmakers said Thursday that they want to stick with their measure aimed at keeping millions of plastic particles from draining into Lake Erie and other waterways.
“This body took a position on the policy, and I think we should stand by that,” said Legislator Patrick Burke, D-Buffalo, who sponsored the microbead ban.
Erie County passed one of the toughest microbead bans in the country, giving retailers only six months to stop selling body products containing microbeads.
But when President Obama signed the Microbead-Free Waters Act in December, to the delight of environmentalists, Legislature Chairman John Mills said he heard from industry lobbyists who questioned whether the county law still applied. A section of the county microbead ban law states the county law is “null and void” if the state or federal government passes a law with “substantially similar provisions.”
Similar language exists in the federal act. The federal law states that no state or local government can have its own microbead law in place of the federal law unless it’s identical to the federal law. Erie County’s is not.
County Attorney Michael Siragusa sent the Legislature a three-page opinion arguing that the county’s law is not “substantially similar” to the federal law, essentially because the federal law’s timeline is so much longer.
The federal act gives manufacturers until July 1, 2017, to stop making products containing plastic microbeads and gives retailers until July 1, 2018, to stop selling them. The county law forbids local retailers from selling these products starting Sunday.
On Thursday, Siragusa told county legislators at the Government Affairs Committee that they don’t need to give in to the corporate beauty industry.
“They don’t want to go to court and have a PR nightmare on their hands,” he said. “They want us to roll over.”
Anthony Dias, a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer representing the Personal Care Products Council, responded by telling legislators that while he admires their work to end microbead pollution, the law is clear: The federal Microbead-Free Waters Act pre-empts the county’s law immediately.
Dias issued a seven-page response to Siragusa’s opinion, filled with legal citations. He argued Thursday that the federal law not only explicitly forbids local governments from establishing their own microbead ban laws in place of the federal law, its language and intent also implies a pre-emption of local laws.
Siragusa, the county attorney, acknowledged that if the matter were to go to court, the county would face an “uphill battle.”
“You have to have the appetite for litigation,” he said. “I can’t guarantee the outcome.”
Majority Leader Joseph Lorigo, C-West Seneca, said that while he would prefer to ignore the federal law and adhere to the county’s tougher anti-pollution message, fighting a losing legal battle is a waste of county time and resources.
“Taking on an issues we are likely not to prevail in, by the county attorney’s own admission, seems kind of foolish,” he said.


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Do you remember when Bill Gates predicted that the passwords will no longer in use? It was 2004. It’s been more than 10 years now and this prediction seems to come true very soon. Deploying the human body as a recognition tool could be the alternative to your smartphone passwords.
The passwords are easy to break if they are simple & difficult to remember if they are complex. Password security is a big concern for the smartphone industry. Hence, the biometric solutions come to save the day.
According to JWT’s global report on the future of payments, around 471 million global smartphone users will have biometric solutions in their device. That’s a huge potential market.
These are the five alternatives which could make your passwords redundant…
Fingerprint scanner/sensor is the most well-known biometric recognition method in a smartphone these days. Many Fingerprint scanner smartphones (even the budget mobiles) are offering this feature in them. Apple had introduced an embedded fingerprint sensor into its iPhone 5S smartphone. Later, the Apple Pay buzzed this feature with its Touch ID.
There are companies like MasterCard who has collaborated with a biometric company Zwipe for fingerprint authenticated payment cards.
The Iris recognition is a biometric identification which allows the user to use their iris as a recognition method. It flashes a near-infrared (NIR) light and recognize the patterns of iris and unlocks your smartphone.
The Iris scanner in smartphones became popular through Samsung Galaxy Note 7.
Also, the retina recognition tech is about to come in upcoming mobiles. This method involves the recognition of patterns on the blood vessels of the eye.
The heartbeat and ECG signals are very complex and hence difficult to replicate. Apple has already applied for a patent to bring an embedded heart rate monitor on upcoming iPhone phones.
A company named as Nymi has developed a wristband which detects your heartbeat and confirms your identity.
We all are aware of fingerprints recorded on sensitive touchscreen panels. But such touchscreens could also detect the shape of a human ear if right software and hardware are used. Ergo Android App by Descartes Biometric is one of the app developers which is working on smartphone ear print technology.
The app is adjustable and comes with customization options. The app is currently limited to smartphone unlocking feature only; however, it could get used for making online purchases.
The typing pattern, speed, and rhythm of every individual are unique. The keystroke biometric technology records these typing parameters and also determines the hold down time and the time is taken for typing in between different letters.
The facial recognition technology is widely used in Law enforcement and other entities to build databases. The tech for facial recognition requires clear and sharper images for the recognition process. The latest mobiles those are available in the market does show off some jaw-dropping camera specifications. So, the deployment of facial recognition in smartphones could be the next wave in smartphone biometric functions.
The smartphone speech recognition is already there on our smartphones. Moreover, there are functions which could let you use your voice commands to navigate your smartphone. The next thing your voice can do is to unlock your smartphone.
The voice recognition system authenticates the vocal features such as vocal tract geometry, pitch, harmonics, and range of the users. With the use of voice recognition, the users can use their voice as a password.


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Policy makers, European and national and actors of the social economy gathered on the 4th of June at The European Economic and Social Committee for the third edition of the European Day of Social Economy.
The discussion this year was focused on scaling up. Ariane Rodert, member of the EESC opened up the day with Nicolas Schmidt Minister of Labour, Employment and Social and Solidarity Economy of Luxembourg, Christophe Ithier, High Commissioner for Social Solidarity and Social Innovation of France and Ann Branch, acting director of DG Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion. They all highlighted the growing importance of social innovation at a national and European level. Thus, Social Economy represents 2,5 million jobs and 10% of European Union’s GDP. This is the reason why we need to scale up social economy especially in terms of visibility according to High Commissioner Ithier but also by easing finance and help entrepreneurs with training. Ann Branch emphasized on the European agenda concerning social innovation and cohesion policy and mentioned as the key difference between conventional and social enterprises in the field of scaling up: the key objective is not scale up the business for social enterprises but to scale up the impact.
Social entrepreneurs from different State Members spoke about their local activities and how they managed or planned to scale them up, either by expanding or replicating their business model, taking into account cultural differences and local circumstances.
The morning ended with workshops concerning scaling up the impact of social economy, the gender equality in social economy enterprises and the role of clusters and regions in the scaling up. We concluded saying scaling up was not optional for social economy to keep competitiveness and a position in the market. In order to do so, finance should gain more flexibility to support social entrepreneurship and social economy and Victor Meseguer, director of Social Economy Europe highlighted the importance of innovation and investment. Concerning gender equality, alternative ways of management need to be found to allow a better-balanced life for CEO whatever their gender and a greater female recognition. Ulla Engelmann, Head of Unit for Clusters at DG Grow, led the third workshop concluded on the importance of clusters and regions to sustain territorial development and social innovation and the need of regional cooperation.
The last panel concerned institutional response to social innovation in presence of Alain Coheur, President of the permanent study group on Social Economy Enterprises at the EESC, Tadej Splanik, the State Secretary in the office of Prime Minister of Slovenia, Slawomir Tokarski a member of the DG Grow, Marie-Christine Vergiat, a European Parliament Member from the social Economy Intergroup and Juan Antonio Pedreño the President of Social Economy Europe. They called attention on the growing demand of different business models form the public opinion and the importance of social economy in promoting democracy and sustainable values. They also highlighted the social economy resilience against crisis, the main reason why Social Economy and Entrepreneurship should enjoy a greater budget on national and European level. This particular demand is not innocent as the budget post 2020 is being decided right now during the Multiannual Financial Framework for the 2021-2027 period.
This day, organised by the EESC is a great annual opportunity to meet with multiple actors of the social innovation and economy and shape together “socially friendly” economic ecosystems.


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Illovo Sugar (Malawi) plc has relaunched the ‘Everyday Chef online cooking competition’ second series and K8 million will be up for grabs in the 8-week campaign.
The company has announced that the winner of the competition will walk away with K5 million with the second placed pocketing K2 million card and the third placed winner going home K1 million richer.
Illovo Sugar Malawi limited said it is a must for the contestants to use Illovo’s refined and dark demerara sugar as part of their ingredients.
The decision to initiate the second series comes following the success of the inaugural edition launched last year in August 2021.
At the relaunch, Illovo Sugar (Malawi) plc’s Managing Director, Lekani Katandula said the company found it befitting to reintroduce this initiative following its success, saying this year’s competition will also have shopping mall activations.
“The Everyday Chef campaign enabled our consumers to interact with the brand by increasing awareness of refined and dark demerara sugar as they shared their recipes thereby contributing to higher brand engagements.”
“Furthermore, the initial campaign allowed us to grow our Facebook community, which is in line with our strategy of continuing to be more consumer centric. As a business, we understand that ‘amazing things happen when you listen to the consumer’. The promotion has been relaunched in order to excite our consumers and engage them in a fun and creative way while cooking and baking using the different varieties of sugar produced by Illovo,” said Katandula.
The campaign kicked off on 11th August 2022 with a cooking competition in order to select five judges who would then become the judges for the competition. The five judges who were chosen to oversee this year’s campaign are Ipyana Mwagomba, Thobekile Nthinda, Dyson Chikolera, Portia Alimoyo, and Nelson Dhiba.
Just like last year, the promotion will primarily be conducted online and run through Illovo’s Tseketseke brand Facebook page. Each week the company will give consumers a challenge to showcase either their baking or cooking skills which they will then have to share on the Facebook page.
The recipe with the most likes on a weekly basis will automatically be entered into the final ‘Cook-Off’ competition that will be hosted at the end of the 8-week campaign.
To complement the online efforts, shopping mall activations will be running simultaneously during weekends. The shopping mall activations will be hosted by the five chefs who were chosen during the kick off competition of this year’s campaign.
The shopping mall activations will further enlighten consumers on the multiple uses of the white refined and dark demerara sugars produced by Illovo.
During the current promotion Illovo will run in-store sales promotions and shoppers who will buy three or more kilograms of Tseketseke sugar will stand a chance to win assorted instant prizes such as T-shirts, Aprons, cooking utensils and many more.
The winner of last year’s campaign was a Lilongwe-based businesswoman, Manase Munthali who beat seven other cooking and baking contestants in the finale. The runner-up was Chinsinsi Daudi who went away with K2 million while Hajrah Kusweje was third and walked away with K1 million.


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While we’re not clairevoyant, Ubisoft’s CEO Yves Guillemot believes that the next generation of consoles could be the last. Speaking to Variety in an interview, Guillemot was quoted as saying, “I think we will see another generation, but there is a good chance that step-by-step we will see less and less hardware.”
Instead he believes that streaming could be the next big thing. “With time, I think streaming will become more accessible to many players and make it not necessary to have big hardware at home. There will be one more console generation and then after that, we will be streaming, all of us.”
Companies have been testing out game streaming for a while now, such as Capcom who “launched” Resident Evil 7 on the Nintendo Switch via cloud streaming. Plus there are companies such as Valve whose Steam Link app allows full PC games to be played on our phones. Of course only time will tell, but what do you guys think?
Filed in Ubisoft.. Read more about


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KYOCERA Document Solutions America "EMPOWERS" Dealers at FY15 Pan-American Dealer Meeting
Kyocera Executives announce new dealer-centric support initiatives, vertical market opportunities, multifunctional printer products and customizable business applications.
FAIRFIELD, N.J. – April 16, 2014 – KYOCERA Document Solutions America, one of the world's leading document solutions companies, today officially renewed its commitment to its dealers and end-user customers. Addressing more than 1,200 attendees from the United States, Canada, Latin America and Mexico, as well as Europe and Japan, Kyocera executives credited the company’s strong performance in fiscal year 2014 to an unwavering dealer-centric philosophy—and pledged to continue the enhance its dedication to the independent dealer channel throughout fiscal year 2015 and beyond.
“Our dealer-centric philosophy is one reason we believe we’re succeeding in this challenging market,” said KYOCERA Document Solutions America president and CEO, Norihiko Ina. “That’s why we’ve made the cornerstone of our meeting: ‘Empowerment! Commitment to Partnership.’ It defines a two-way relationship between Kyocera and its dealers. We empower our dealers, and they empower us. Our commitment to this channel, across the Americas, is unwavering.”
A Total Document Solutions Focus
Peter Hendrick, vice president of marketing at KYOCERA Document Solutions America, said the company’s ultimate goal is to help dealers resolve their customer’s business challenges. “Our Total Document Solutions approach addresses a user’s business challenges and optimizes their document solutions investment,” he said. “This has been a longstanding commitment at Kyocera—and now we’re rolling out even more initiatives to empower our dealers even further. For example, we’re expanding our Certified Total Document Solutions Partner initiative. This helps dealers analyze and address client needs; it also helps them forge ongoing customer relationships. We’re supporting our dealers, and those dealers are assisting their customers with comprehensive solutions. That is a true commitment to our channel partners.”
New Products and Business Applications for the Coming Year
At the meeting, the company launched the Kyocera ECOSYS M3560idn, M3550idn, M3540idn and M3040idn black-and-white multifunctional printers (MFPs), extending an already impressive multifunctional printer lineup. The new series includes four desktop devices that feature an intuitive touchscreen control panel and speeds of up to 62 pages-per-minute. Like most Kyocera devices, these new MFPs integrate seamlessly with Kyocera-developed business applications and virtually any third-party solution. Kyocera also showcased a variety of new business applications designed to address today’s most critical business areas, such as mobile and cloud computing, cost-control capabilities, and security solutions. These new applications are scheduled for release within the upcoming fiscal year.
Mr. Hendrick also spoke of upcoming marketing campaigns that will address the end-user directly. One such initiative involves Kyocera’s successful “Most Important Document” advertising campaign. “We don’t want to simply entertain customers,” Mr. Hendrick said. “We want to engage them—that is, reach them where and how they want to be reached. And we’re showing our dealers how to bring these techniques to their local markets. As Mr. Ina said, ‘We empower our dealers and they empower us.’”
Nationwide Communications Support
Kyocera is supporting its commitment to total document solutions with a nationwide, multi-million dollar brand advertising campaign that will be rolling out across the Americas. The campaign focuses on a customer’s most important documents, and how Kyocera and its dealers work to manage and protect them. The television campaign, along with national radio spots and online ads, will run throughout the United States; it will also appear on social media websites such as YouTube, Facebook and LinkedIn.
KYOCERA Document Solutions America’s FY15 Pan-American Dealer Meeting is being held at The Venetian Las Vegas April 15-17, 2014. For more information on KYOCERA Document Solutions America, please visit Kyocera’s Web site at: www.kyoceradocumentsolutions.com/us.
ABOUT KYOCERA DOCUMENT SOLUTIONS AMERICA
KYOCERA Document Solutions America, Inc. (www.kyoceradocumentsolutions.com/us), headquartered in Fairfield, N.J., is a leading provider of computer-connectable document imaging and document management systems, including network-ready digital MFPs/printers, laser printers, color MFPs/printers, digital laser facsimiles, and multifunctional and wide format imaging solutions. KYOCERA Document Solutions America is a group company of KYOCERA Document Solutions Inc., a core company of the Kyocera Corporation, the world's leading developer and manufacturer of advanced ceramics and associated products, including telecommunications equipment, semiconductor packages and electronic components. KYOCERA Document Solutions America, the first document solutions company with third-party certified sales data, has earned numerous honors for its products’ high performance, reliability and cost efficiency. Kyocera Corporation's consolidated net revenues exceeded $13.6 billion for the fiscal year ending on March 31, 2013.


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Employees and customers of certain businesses are now required to wear face masks after the Santa Barbara City Council authorized an emergency order Tuesday from City Administrator Paul Casey.
“Our city council and our city administrators received many communications urging us to require face coverings or masks when people are in a congregate setting, so at a grocery store or at any essential business,” said Mayor Cathy Murillo.
According to the order, face masks are now required for workers and customers of certain essential businesses.
The businesses covered in the order include pharmacies, grocery stores, convenience stores, food banks, farmers’ markets, organizations and businesses that provide food to the public, hardware and building supply stores, nurseries, laundromats and dry cleaners, restaurants, taxis, ride sharing services, car rental companies, publicly accessible areas in hotels and motels, stores that sell pet food and medication, and more.
Businesses must now prohibit entry of anyone who is not wearing a face mask.
They must also provide face masks without charge to employees, and may either provide masks without charge or sell them to customers.
Reusable face masks used by employees must be washed and sanitized at least daily.
“The order takes care to say that face masks need not be medical grade or N-95,” said City Attorney Ariel Calonne.
Acceptable masks include cloth masks, scarves, bandanas or other face coverings over the mouth and nose of a person, according to the order.
“This is similar to what a number of cities have adopted trying to address where people are congregating together where social distancing may not be practiced. It’s been advisory, especially in grocery stores and pharmacies. We’ve heard that a lot over the last couple weeks. This essentially would say in the city of Santa Barbara you do need to wear a mask when you approach those,” said Mr. Casey.
The order is a modification to the City Emergency Orders issued March 17 and is modeled after a similar order issued by the city of Los Angeles April 7.
Violations are punishable as a misdemeanor, although Mr. Calonne stressed that that would likely be reserved for large businesses that are openly violating the order and are uncooperative.
“My office, the prosecutors in this office, would use their discretion very carefully before bringing misdemeanor action for a face mask violation. I can guarantee that a casual face mask violation by an individual customer is not going to result in misdemeanor filing,” said Mr. Calonne.
Several city council members expressed concern over the possibility that non-compliance can result in a misdemeanor charge.
The reason for including the misdemeanor penalty is to distinguish the order from a voluntary declaration through some form of enforcement, explained Mr. Calonne.
“Our approach throughout this pandemic is to start heavily with education and information and get compliance,” said Mr. Casey. “We haven’t written any citations for folks in the community. We find that when we talk to them in person we get compliance so that certainly would be our approach here as well.”
To address the council’s concerns, language was added to the order saying a warning would be issued to businesses in violation before any charge was made.
The council also added language ensuring robust bilingual outreach to ensure the public is informed about the order.
The order applies to essential businesses as defined by the County Health Officer, and does not apply to public spaces like parks or beaches.
Additionally, the order suspended the city’s 10 cent charge for business-provided reusable or recyclable paper carryout bags for the duration of the public health emergency.
In other news Tuesday, the council received an update on the Paseo Nuevo development agreement with Paseo Nuevo Owners and the outdoor mall’s current renovation project, which is expected to be completed by June.
The proposed lease would last until 2065, with a one-time option for the owners to extend the lease for 28 years.
The owners would invest $20,000,000 dollars into the renovation project, consistent with plans approved by the city’s Historical Landmark Commission in 2018, and said they would “operate and maintain the mall as a ‘first-class’ retail center consistent with specified retail centers in southern California.”
In addition, the mall would pay Parking and Business Improvement Area assessments up to $300,000 annually, adjusted for the Consumer Price Index, in the fifth assessment year after agreement.
If approved, the agreement would include a one time donation of $200,00 from the owners to the city to assist with homeless solutions. They would also reimburse the city for all third party expenses, including $150,000 for outside legal and consulting services.
City staff and the owners are still finalizing the draft development agreement.
When it is completed, it will be processed by the Community Development Department and sent to the Planning Commission, where it will be presented at a public hearing. The Planning Commission will then recommend that the city council either adopt or disapprove of the agreement in a subsequent public hearing.


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Report: Google to build a fleet of 'robo-taxis'
The Google self-driving car maneuvers through the streets of in Washington DC on May 14, 2012. (©AFP PHOTO/Karen Bleier)
Published Monday, August 26, 2013 6:31PM EDT
Self-driving cabs could be used on demand by consumers while simultaneously showcasing Google's autonomous car technology to a wider audience.
While self-driving and fully autonomous car technology is nothing new, Google's efforts in the field have been capturing headlines and the public imagination in equal measure. So much so that the technology company that started off as nothing more than an internet search engine has managed to get the laws changes in three U.S. states to allow its autonomous cars on the highway.
However, that is just the start. According to tech blogger Jessica Lessin, Google is not only planning to develop software that carmakers can use in their next generation vehicles to aide autonomy, it also plans to take matters into its own hands and build a Google self-driving car, starting with an automated taxi fleet.
According to Lessin's sources, the decision to go it alone is a result of car makers so far being uninterested with Google's technological offerings. Not a single automaker wants to partner with Google.
This is unsurprising. Mercedes, BMW, Volvo, Audi, Ford and VW have all invested millions into developing their own automatic driving aids and can all offer the same levels of self-driving and autonomy on their current production vehicles that Google can, without having to use the search giant's proprietary technology.
This year alone:
- Audi and Volvo have both demonstrated smartphone app controlled self-parking cars and BMW
- Audi and Volvo have showcased self-steering and navigating vehicles that automatically keep a safe distance from the car ahead, that slow down and speed up in conjunction with traffic conditions and that can steer to follow the twists and turns of a major highway route.
- BMW's system is even capable of automatically recognizing entry and exit roads and changing lanes in order to allow new cars to merge onto the carriageway ahead.
Lessin claims that Google's choice of an automated taxi fleet is in part a way to promote its technology to as many potential customers as possible while simultaneously reducing road traffic accidents and, because of their on-demand nature, reduce the need for private car ownership.


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Publishers of all stripes are facing a period of reckoning. Facebook traffic is drying up, ad revenue is getting harder to come by and pivots to subscriptions or commerce won’t be a viable option for many.
Most publishers are putting on a brave face. They talk about how Facebook’s algorithm changes might benefit them long term, forcing them to be more disciplined with their strategies and driving them to forge “more meaningful connections” with their audiences. They argue problems such as ad fraud and brand safety are pulling marketers away from programmatic ads and back into the arms of their “premium” content and experiences.
But behind closed doors, staffers at some publishers paint a very different picture — often one of mounting panic and a perceived lack of direction, as their companies flail around looking for something tangible to pin their hopes on. Their concern is that a lack of strategy and direction is often passed off as an effort at “diversification.” But talking about diversification and figuring out how to do it successfully are two very different things.
Reading about their companies in the media only makes them more nervous when they compare that to the reality they see every day.
“There’s a growing feeling we’re just throwing things out there randomly to see what sticks,” one staffer at a digital publisher told me this week.
Another expressed amusement at what he called “revisionist history” regarding his company’s strategy to rely on Facebook traffic and programmatic ads, which he said he believes has left his company somewhat backed into a corner.
As my colleague Lucia Moses noted in her piece this week about Mic’s post-Facebook struggles, staffers there worry the company waited too long to pivot from Facebook-friendly clickbait and is running out of options (and money).
It’s a similar situation at “legacy” publishers, many of which are building out video studios and commerce arms, instituting paywalls and membership programs, and seemingly anything else they can think of. That’s in addition to various other cost-cutting and “efficiency” exercises such as centralizing editorial resources to work across multiple brands and properties.
Media is hard — that’s news to nobody. But nerves are jangling more vigorously for many in the publishing business as the year continues, with the full force of Facebook’s algorithm fallout still being felt; the continued ad dominance of Facebook, Google and other programmatic platforms; and other looming headaches such as the General Data Protection Regulation.
LittleThings may have been the first notable casualty of 2018, but those across the industry concur it’s unlikely to be the last. The question publishing staffers are now asking over Thursday night beers is: Who’s next?
Inside the NFL’s youth-focused social strategy
As part of the NFL Content Creator Network, which expands the features of youth-focused platforms, the league is engaging with fans in new, innovative ways through games, technologies, or just through creative social media engagement through a variety of creative tools and platforms. Creators are targeted within strategic verticals such as fashion, gaming, wellness, and music, as well as those from TikTok, SnapChat, Twitter, and Instagram focusing on humor, food, art, animals, or football-related content on and off the field
Publishers test personalizing newsletters with varying degrees of success
Publishers are testing personalizing newsletter content based on readers’ interests - but it doesn't always work.
Indie agency Known beats out incumbents to land AMC Networks’ media business
In essence, Known is helping AMC Networks become more of a direct-to-consumer client as the programmer expands into more streaming options on top of its linear foothold.
SponsoredHow marketers are responding to shoppers’ wants this holiday season
Matthew Tilley, executive director, marketing, Vericast With the holidays right around the corner, the economy may force some consumers to adjust their plans and stretch their dollars even further. While some shoppers may rein in their spending, others will still go all out despite a cloudy economic outlook. Given the current economic climate, consumers are […]
How agencies adapt as bots evolve
Social media bots may represent just a sliver of an app's total users, but it turns out they may be generating more content than we were previously aware. The challenge is separating the good ones from the bad.
Publishers feel the crunch of cookieless browsers like Apple’s Safari
Bid enrichment provides publishers the means of sprucing up their cookieless impressions to improve their value in advertisers’ eyes.


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Motorola’s RAZR MAXX HD is a bigger, badder version of the MAXX that hit last year. Still equipped with its Kevlar armor, the device is designed to get folks through the day and then some. And then some more. With its 3300mAh battery, the MAXX HD wants to be old reliable for Web, video, email, photos, all of that — all day. The package is tighter; there’s less bezel, and it feels better in the hand. Sadly, it runs on Android 4.0 for now, but that’s set to change into Jelly Bean before the year is up. Check out Motorola’s impressive battery claims here, and then see how it looks on video in our hands-on.
As technology evolves, Brandon’s love grows deeper, a love that stems from watching the Back to the Future trilogy one-too-many times. When he’s not covering the latest tech news for…
By Brandon Russell |
We’ve spent a lot of time putting the Galaxy S5 and LG G3 through their paces, and each device clearly has its pros and cons. But one main component we keep debating is which of these two offers the superior camera experience. And we don’t just mean sheer image quality, though that’s obviously important. We want to know which has the better camera app, smoother video, which can handle varied lighting conditions better. So we made a video to find out.


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EFF report shows police used Ring cameras to monitor Black Lives Matter protests, tracking the vaccinated by name and race challenges privacy laws, and Amazon’s plan to install surveillance cameras in delivery vans drives lawmaker backlash.
YouTube begins allowing underage users, Kroger and Clubhouse data breaches, and Virginia considers new data privacy legislation.
Minneapolis passes restrictive ban on facial recognition technology, Northwestern University faces lawsuit for improperly capturing student biometrics, and a data breach of multiple major law firms.
US Border Patrol seeks surveillance towers along Canadian border, EU proposes ban on tracking-based targeted advertising, and Amazon’s plan to install AI surveillance cameras on all delivery vans stirs controversy.
Baltimore cancels surveillance plane contract, Amazon installing always-on surveillance cameras in delivery vehicles, and deep dives into ad-tracking.


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LG global account manager for T-Mobile, Jim Michel, has taken on former sales and marketing director John Barton’s role on an interim basis.
Former Motorola general manager Michel has taken on Barton's UK strategic responsibilities after an early departure for the indutry veteran. Michel's title is 'interim sales director', seeing the role drop its marketing remit.
It was previously thought that Barton would leave the Korean Manufacturer in April.
It is not known if Michel will take on the sales director job on a permanent basis, although industry sources said he would be ‘perfect’ for the role.
During a telephone conversation with Mobile, Michel confirmed he had taken on ‘some of’ Barton’s UK duties in addition to his current role, but would not confirm if he will be handed the job.
Michel left Motorola in 2008, amid broader problems for Motorola across all of its territories as it continued rack up losses.


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The talk show celebrity was questioned on Twitter for her Wayfair collection that allegedly included a five-figure pillow but really sells for far less. Social media users questioned the talk show host and if she had any involvement with the alleged child trafficking conspiracy theory.
“@TheEllenShow please explain why you’re selling pillows on Wayfair for over 10k with missing children’s names on them? Are you part of #wayfairtrafficking???” one user asked on social media.
Attached to the tweet was a screenshot of a lumbar pillow with a $10,098 price tag, but a search of the product, which does not have a child's name attached to it, resulted in a page on the Wayfair site for the same pillow with a $99 price tag.
Neither DeGeneres nor Wayfair responded to FOX Business' requests for comment Monday.
The ED Ellen Degeneres collection with Wayfair launched in 2015 as a joint venture between the talk show host and the CEO of Burch Creative Capital, Christopher Burch, according to the Wayfair website. A social media user posted what appears to be a screengrab of the pillow allegedly posted on DeGeneres' Wayfair collection page.
Allegations claiming Wayfair had a role in human trafficking circulated last week when Reddit users in the "r/conspiracy" subreddit flagged screenshot images of furniture items with high price tags, which are not part of Ellen's collection. Cabinets and armoires appeared to be priced between $12,699.99 and $14,499.99 alongside furniture labeled with people's names like Neriah, Yaritza, Samiya and Alyvia. Users on the forum have said that the names could belong to missing children.
On Friday, Wayfair denied claims to FOX Business
“There is, of course, no truth to these claims," Susan Frechette, a Wayfair spokeswoman, told FOX Business in an email Friday. "The products in question are industrial grade cabinets that are accurately priced.”
The company has since removed the product images from its website and said it plans to rename the products.
Wayfair has been in hot water before. The Washington Post revealed last year the online furniture retailer provided beds for ICE detention centers in Texas, which led to a walkout among employees at the company's Boston-based headquarters.
Other high-profile stars that have collections with Wayfair include Martha Stewart, Jessica Simpson and HGTV's Drew and Jonathan Scott of "The Property Brothers."


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Porsche Enters A New Era With The Taycan, The First All-Electric Sports Car
One marks the beginning of a new era, the other the end of a phenomenal one. For Porsche, the arrival of its first fully electric sports car, Taycan, signifies its commitment to propelling the field of electromobility forward. On the other hand, the Star Wars film premiering in cinemas across Asia this month will be the last in the series. In October, the two icons announced that they are joining forces to commemorate these major milestones of innovation together.
"Although one brand is placed in a fantasy universe and one in the real world, it’s interesting that both are defined very much by their iconic design principle,” says Doug Chiang, vice president and executive creative director of Lucasfilm, the production company behind the film franchise, on the tie that binds Porsche and Star Wars.
In late November, the two brands came together for a very special occasion in Singapore—to unveil the Taycan for the first time in Asia-Pacific, ahead of its regional market launch in 2020. The event saw Stormtroopers guarding the car as it was driven onto the stage, while a fleet of drones put on an electrifying show in the night sky to illustrate the features of the brand new Porsche model.
A new order emerges with the Taycan
On where the Taycan stands within the Porsche fleet, Arthur Willmann, managing director of Porsche Asia-Pacific, says, "The Taycan links our heritage to the future. It is a fascinating sports car with exciting driving dynamics, performance and technology—and like every Porsche ever built, it comes with a soul. Something you feel immediately, once you get behind the steering wheel."
Michael Mauer, vice president style at Porsche AG, explains how boundaries have been pushed to create that sensation: "By pursuing the strategy of making it the sportiest in the segment, we have defined a new architecture for purely electric vehicles. Just like what the 911 has achieved, my vision is that the Taycan will become an icon of this new era, a synonym for a purely electric sports car."
And with its design, Mauer says, the Taycan itself won’t look out of place in a Star Wars film. “At the rear of the Taycan, the light bar is more than just a traditional tail lamp. In fact, I think it looks quite like a Lightsaber.”
And just as every Lightsaber has its own unique identity, so does every Porsche car. This is thanks to a two-part strategy that Mauer and his team abides by when they design a car. “We consider two things: brand identity, so you recognise it as a Porsche, and product identity, so you recognise which Porsche it is.”
With the Taycan specifically, he says, “We never questioned about doing everything differently, because we needed design elements that clearly made it a Porsche. But the model also needed its own identity, and because it’s the first time we were working on an electric car, we wanted to go one step further. So now, for example, our headlights are no longer just lamps. They are now a light source and an air intake [to improve aerodynamics]”.
The Taycan on the road
Equipped with two electric motors—one on each axle—and a two-speed transmission, the Taycan gets its power instantaneously. "I couldn’t believe how sporty it was,” says Mauer. “It feels completely different from the usual [combustion engine cars]. It’s like being in a starship from Star Wars—you feel like you’re flying.”
When translated into numbers, the flagship Taycan Turbo S boasts 761hp overboost power with Launch Control and a century sprint timing of 2.8sec, while the Taycan Turbo can generate up to 680hp overboost power with Launch Control and go from zero to 100km/h in 3.2sec. Both variants have a top speed of 260km/h and an impressive range—the Turbo S can travel up to 412km, while the Turbo can do a slightly longer journey of 450km.
Porsche's innovative design for the Taycan has also significantly reduced charging times. While most electric cars feature a system voltage of 400 volts, the Taycan is the first production vehicle with one of 800 volts. This means its battery can be recharged from five to 80 per cent in just 22.5min.
In a galaxy far, far away, a familiar-looking spacecraft appears...
At the unveiling event in November, guests were also able to see sketches of another product born out of the collaboration between Porsche and Star Wars—a fantasy starship that is true to the signature design aesthetics of both brands. This was the first time the drawings were revealed to the world.
“The worldwide appeal of the Star Wars and Porsche brands is shaped decisively by their iconic designs,” says Chiang, who oversees all the designs for the Star Wars franchise. “We are bringing together two worlds with this project: the exotic film design of a galaxy far, far away and the precision work that goes into developing emotive Porsche sports cars. This collaboration promises to produce an innovative design that will blend the best of both brands to create an exciting new starship worthy of Porsche and Star Wars.”
The spacecraft is set to appear in the film franchise’s final instalment, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, which opens in most Asian markets on December 19.


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Adventure 16's top picks at Outdoor Retailer
In this retailer report, a buyer at a California shop dishes on what apparel and footwear excites him most from Outdoor Retailer Winter Market 2018.
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Fifty-six years ago, in a garage in La Mesa, California, a backpacker and a group of adventurous Boy Scouts and their engineer dads decided they wanted to produce 16mm movies of their escapades into the mountains. To raise funds, they built weight-transferring backpacks—innovative at the time. They named their concept Adventure 16, which has become an outdoor industry institution in California, with three brick-and-mortar locations and an online store.
Each store has a woodsy vibe, and the San Diego shop even has its own little cabin inside, full of maps and books where customers can plan their outings. After quitting his job at an environmental nonprofit and thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail, Dan Byrnes came to Adventure 16’s buyer’s office.
“While I was on the trail and surrounded by mountains and trees, I ended up daydreaming a lot about the beach,” Byrnes says. “I decided that when I was finished hiking, I would drive across the country and move to San Diego.” He’s now a year into being the store’s hardgoods buyer.
What new gear are you most excited about so far?
1. Cutter Lyme Disease Test Kit
“I could’ve used it. I got Lyme disease a few years ago when I was backpacking. I also pulled so many ticks off of me while on the AT. To be able to put the tick in a bag, send it in, and know within 48 hours if you could be at risk is really helpful.” (See page 64.)
2. Montem Ultra Light 3K Carbon Fiber Trekking Poles
“I’m really excited to be testing them out when I get back. They’re carbon fiber, which usually runs between $100 and $150, but these retail for less than $100.”
3. DEUR waterproof denim
“Men deserve stretchy jeans too.”
This article was originally published in Day 3 of The Daily (Winter Market 2018).


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A gas station attendant wears a mask as he refuels a car at a Sinopec gas station where customers can purchase supplies as the country is hit by an outbreak of the novel coronavirus, in Beijing, China on 28 February 2020.
Thomas Peter | Reuters
BEIJING – China’s economy recovered from the coronavirus again in the third quarter, according to data released Monday by the National Bureau of Statistics.
The world’s second-largest economy recorded lower-than-expected third-quarter GDP growth, up 4.9% from a year ago. This brings growth for the first three quarters of the year to 0.7% from a year ago.
Chinese economists were forecasting GDP growth of 5.2% in the third quarter, according to an average of estimates compiled by Wind Information, a financial information database.
“Generally speaking, the national economy as a whole has continued its steady recovery and significant results have been achieved in coordinating the prevention and development of the epidemic,” the office said in an English statement. . “However, we must also be aware that the international environment is always complicated and serious, with considerable instabilities and uncertainties, and that we are under great pressure to prevent epidemic transmissions from abroad and its resurgence in the country. The economy is still developing. the recovery and the foundations for a sustainable recovery must be consolidated.
Retail sales rose 3.3% in September, up 0.9% in the third quarter. For the first nine months of the year, retail sales contracted 7.2%.
Investments in fixed assets increased 0.8% in the first three quarters of the year.
The official urban unemployment rate surveyed fell slightly in September to 5.4%.
Industrial production rose 6.9% in September from a year ago, bringing total growth for the first nine months of the year to 1.2%.
Official figures show that China’s gross domestic product contracted 6.8% in the first three months of the year, when more than half of the country temporarily closed in an attempt to limit the spread of the coronavirus .
GDP grew 3.2% in the second quarter.
The International Monetary Fund expects China to be the only major global economy to grow this year, at 1.9%.
This is breaking news. Please come back for updates.