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By Charles Cao, EMEA operations and strategy at Conga
Every year, the PWC Annual CEO survey gathers opinion and economic outlook from thousands of CEOs (1,581 CEOs across 83 countries). In 2018, this PWC Annual CEO survey published record levels of optimism. However, only two years later, it has published record levels of pessimism. In those past two years, the percentage of CEOs who believe global GDP growth will decline has increased tenfold from five per cent to 53 per cent. That report was published prior to the pandemic. This goes to show how unpredictable the business and economic environment is, but looking at macroeconomics forces in play, it’s not that surprising. It is clear that the last few years have been unpredictable to say the least, but these times of uncertainty are a reminder that change is the only constant.
Global changes affecting businesses
A growing challenge for businesses is globalisation. Many organisations have built a global supply chain over the last few years to benefit from tariffs, cheap labour, tax benefits, cheap raw materials and so on. There is a lot of rationale to support this approach in a stable and predictable environment, but the moment the environment changes, points of fragility in those supply chains start becoming more obvious. That is what has been happening to global supply chains and service networks in the light of COVID-19. The once prevalent global-sourcing model in product-driven value chains has steadily declined as new technologies and consumer demand patterns tend to encourage regionalisation of supply chains.
Society itself is also changing in terms of its approach to health, environment and to people, and this is impacting society’s consumption. What can be seen as a result is the fracture of long-held social contracts. The new generation doesn’t think and act in the same way as previous ones, and employees, leaders, consumers, the entire society is evolving dramatically.
Technology is everywhere and it is almost impossible not to rely on it. The pace of technological progress is accelerating with communication, transaction technologies, artificial intelligence and machine learning predicted to play a major role in businesses in the near future.
On top of these major changes, COVID-19 has completely transformed the way we live, the way we interact, the way we consume and, little by little, the way organisations sell.
The impact of global change
Constant change has a deep impact on business environments, whether they are global or regional issues, whether it’s a rise in regulations, trading relationships, upskilling challenges, or even climate change imperatives. But do these changes actually impact the way leaders run their businesses? Yes and no. Many organisations know that change is needed but, in many cases, businesses are too set in their ways and don’t implement the day-to-day operational changes that are required to tackle these macro-economic issues. Some of the largest companies in the world are still running their businesses on Microsoft Excel and Word with antiquated ERP-driven operations. Companies continue to do what they have always done: sell their products or services in the same way as usual, to the same old customers, using the same platforms.
The supply chain is a big legacy around which companies must build to develop strategies – they can’t change everything overnight; having a strategy is vital. And when it comes to strategies, business management books will have a myriad of strategies with fancy names, but ultimately all those strategies will anchor around three main pillars: product, price, market.
We have seen a common trend towards the ‘as a service’ and to ‘on demand’ models, and more and more companies leverage those models to transfer CAPEX to OPEX. Because the demand for flexible consumption models is increasing, more and more companies must learn to sell that way.
Companies’ offerings must change, the way they present them to their customers, their contracts, terms and conditions, and finally the way they execute revenue against those conditions must all change. Unless businesses can execute those changes and bring them to market, they won’t impact their bottom line and capture that evolving demand.
Whether organisations want to change or adapt their offerings, change their price or penetrate new markets, they will always ultimately need that commercial agility. This idea of commercial agility is really the ability to adapt the way businesses generate revenue in a more flexible way: from product, to price, to quote, to contract and to revenue. Without agility, companies are, more than ever before, at a greater risk of eventually failing. And when they fail, people suffer. Agility is no longer a ‘nice to have’, it is a matter of survival.
We have seen many examples of this recently. If you compare the Top 10 Fortune 500 companies between 2010 and 2020, only three companies are still there. Leaders from yesterday have no guarantee to be the leaders of tomorrow: if they don’t challenge the organisation, they’re more likely to fail.
In today’s world, convention has been challenged and, in this environment, it has been striking how fast many companies have adapted, creating radical new levels of agility, productivity, and end-customer connectivity. In the heat of the coronavirus crisis, organisations have been forced to work in new ways and much of this progress comes from shifts in operating models.
The most successful companies in the world demonstrate high levels of creativity and agility
Netflix started by mailing DVDs to customers in 1997. The CEO Reed Hastings had the vision to stream movies over the internet direct to customers’ screens at home. He had a plan and managed to leverage the environment to gradually get customers used to the idea of streaming rather than playing physical DVDs. Now, with over 183 million subscribers worldwide, it’s hard to imagine not watching video on demand.
Amazon started in 1994 as an online bookstore in Jeff Bezos’ garage in Seattle. Today they are one of the largest internet retailers in the world. They are definitively changing the way we consume, offering home services, fresh food online, one-hour delivery and they even produce video content. How could an online bookstore grow into the second largest company in the world with $280bn in revenue and 800,000 employees?
Dyson showed incredible agility during the pandemic. To support the UK National Health Service with medical equipment during the COVID-19 crisis, the company created the Dyson ventilator that addresses the explicit clinical needs for COVID-19 patients. It is bed-mounted, portable, efficient in conserving oxygen and doesn’t need a fixed air supply. The UK government placed an order for 10,000 ventilators from the company.
Were these companies the first to have these ideas? No, but they were able to effectively bring them to market.
To become commercially agile, businesses need HEART: Hunger, Eyesight, Attitude, Rationale and Technology.
As seen throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, when it is a matter of survival, companies unlock those self-inflicted limitations to go beyond what convention defines as possible to achieve the impossible without letting convention get in the way.
In 2019 PWC’s Strategy& conducted a survey of 6,000 executives from companies of various sizes and industries in which only 43 per cent of leaders said their company is “very clear” about how they add value to customers. Successful organisations such as Netflix, Amazon, Dyson have a clear vision. They know what makes them unique and their commercial agility is only a component of their uniqueness.
People need to believe. Still referring to PWC’s Strategy& survey, only 35 per cent of executives think their company’s strategy will lead them to success. It is important to spend time with business leaders, commit to the strategy and get them to buy in.
Organisations need a process: commercial agility requires a large shift in process, technology and people. To make it successful, businesses need alignment, adoption and method. A transformation team or transformation partner is required to change people’s habits, perceptions and, ultimately, to change their results.
In the Fortune 500 CEO report, the percentage of CEOs who believe that technology transformation will be accelerated by current context was 75 per cent. McKinsey Global Institute points out that companies that are digital leaders in their sectors have faster revenue growth and higher productivity than their less-digitised peers do. For many, it is an imperative to reduce IT costs and make them variable. Technologies such as CPQ (Configure Price Quote) or contract management are the cornerstones of commercial transformation and the same applies for managing documents: document transformation can be overlooked as a strategic area of improvement with fast time to value.
Responding to a continuously evolving market
With the continuous obstacles that businesses will face in the years to come, it is the organisations that demonstrate a high level of commercial agility that will be the ones to navigate the demands of an ever-evolving marketplace. For this, they must have the right hunger, vision, attitude and rationale to achieve their business goals and the right technology to help them along the way. By responding well to change and continuing to implement improvements to the day-to-day operations throughout the organisation, businesses will continue to re-invent themselves and evolve with the world around them.


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Binghamton Looks to Sell Water
The City of Binghamton is apparently following up on a plan to utilize the area's water supply for a new economic venture.
According to documents obtained by the Binghamton Press & Sun Bulletin, Onondaga County-based TL Brown Management Group has prepared a report to attract a water-intensive business to the City. That could range from a semi-conductor producer to a water bottling company.
Mayor Richard David earlier this year said the City would be looking into selling its abundance of water to municipalities suffering from drought to to a bottled water company.
Water could also be used to cool systems in semi-conductor production plants.
The paper says the report has found over a dozen companies the City could reach out to.
Project bids are expected to be opened December 20,

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As per the report, the Chinese economy brought about by the epidemic has led to a surge in purchase demand, and notebook products are in short supply. Considering that orders are complete and the quotations of key upstream components continue to increase.
Acer and ASUS will increase the value of notebook computers in the second quarter of this year by about 5% to 10%, marking the first substantial cost increase in ten years. This means that this wave of cost increases in the electronics industry extends from components to end systems and products.
According to industry insiders, in the past, consumer electronic products like laptops, in addition to adjusting their quotations in response to currency fluctuations in some markets “sneered without a price cut”, and now they can increase their prices against the trend, which displays that the market demand is quite hot.
Acer and ASUS continue to be in short supply of laptops at this stage. Chen Junsheng, chairman of Acer, said frankly: ‘Currently, Acer can only deliver one of three orders from customers, and the conversion gap is nearly 70%.’ ASUS currently has a supply gap of 25% To 30%.
Chen Junsheng believes that the PC demand is far greater than the supply, and the PC market will continue to grow this year. “In the foreseeable future, the supply will still be in short supply,” Acer emphasized that the adjustment of the quotation this time is to reflect the cost appropriately on the premise of the price increase of the components.
Regarding the price increase of notebooks, ASUS said that this raise is the first “significant price increase” in history. Other makers are also likely to follow up with Acer and ASUS for price increases on laptops.


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PLEASANTON, Calif., Oct. 23, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Clorox Professional Products Company is pleased to announce Clorox Commercial Solutions® Clorox® Disinfecting Wipes won the 2015 ISSA Innovation Award in the Cleaning Agents category. ISSA, the worldwide cleaning industry association, recently recognized Clorox Professional during the ISSA/INTERCLEAN® North America 2015 trade show in Las Vegas, NV.
The annual ISSA Innovation Award program provides the cleaning industry the opportunity to determine the industry's most innovative products and services. For the past few months, industry professionals have voted online and at the ISSA Conference for the best products in five categories: cleaning agents, dispensers, equipment, services & technology and supplies.
"Clorox® Disinfecting Wipes conveniently tackle a diverse range of commercial cleaning and disinfecting needs to deliver a powerful and cost-efficient solution that allows cleaning professionals to do more in less time," said Jennifer Case, Associate Director of Marketing, Clorox Professional Products Company. "We are honored to once again be recognized by ISSA and the cleaning industry and this latest win further validates our unyielding commitment to developing innovative product solutions to meet our customer's needs."
Clorox® Disinfecting Wipes are Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)-registered to kill 99.9 percent of common illness-causing germs including Methicillin-resistant Staphyloccocus aureus (MRSA) and Bordetella pertussis, the organism that can cause whooping cough. In addition to nine new EPA-registered disinfecting claims, Clorox® Disinfecting Wipes now have 12 allergen-removal claims, and offer 10-second sanitization – the fastest contact time available for bacteria. Clorox® Disinfecting Wipes are compliant with OSHA Bloodborne Pathogens Standards, which applies to occupational exposure to blood or other potentially infectious materials.
Clorox® Disinfecting Wipes are now available in both economical bulk wipe canisters with 700-count refill packs and in 75-count canisters. The bulk canister comes with 40 percent more wipes and costs 20 percent less per wipe than the previous canister.
"Each year, the ISSA Innovation Award Program offers cleaning industry professionals the chance to recognize the products and services they believe demonstrate ingenuity and best meet their needs," said Jonathan Adkins, Director of Digital and Print Media, ISSA. "We congratulate each of this year's winners."
Clorox Professional Products Company has a history of its products winning the ISSA Innovation Award. In 2012 and 2013, respectively, Clorox® Hydrogen Peroxide Disinfecting Cleaners and Clorox® Urine Remover won the ISSA Innovation Award cleaning agent categories.
About Clorox Professional Products Company
Building on a century-long legacy in cleaning and disinfecting, Clorox Professional Products Company offers some of the industry's most recognized brand names for the commercial cleaning industry. Whether it is hospitals, offices, restaurants, schools, hotels or other commercial facilities, Clorox Professional Products Company is committed to meeting the demands of industry professionals. For more information, visit www.CloroxProfessional.com.
 Pet dander, dust mite matter, pollen particles
 Based on EPA master label comparison on 02/09/15
 Duck Hepatitis B virus (HBV), Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1)
CONTACT: Brad Ferris, Clorox Professional Products Company, (410) 617-8483, [email protected]
SOURCE Clorox Professional Products Company


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Cyber threats. Cyber attacks. Malware. Problems we’ve come to accept in our computer-framed world.
“Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said cyber attacks on the financial industry present ‘a real threat to our economic and national security,’ according to a recent article in FCW, a magazine devoted to federal technology.
In a July 16 speech in New York City, Lew called the cyber defense of businesses and government “a central test for all of us going forward,” wrote Sean Lynglass, who added that last year the director of the National Security Agency had warned that a foreign nation could cripple America’s financial system with a cyber attack.
Lew called on Congress to pass a cyber security bill to assist public-private information sharing to counter threats, noted Lynglass.
The latest issue of the National Consumers League newsletter provides another cyber alert, this one that could hit your home computer with malware known as “Cryptolocker.”
“The scam works like this: A consumer receives an email with an attachment or visits a website containing a suspicious link. Tricked into clicking on the link or opening the attachment, the Cryptolocker malware goes to work, encrypting the user’s files, making them unavailable. The consumer then receives a note from the originator of the malware demanding payment for the ‘key’ to unlock the encryption,” according to the league.
“The fraud is especially scary because once the files are encrypted, the user can’t simply remove the malware and restore access,” the Washington, D.C.-based consumer organization warned.
Cryptolocker is one of many types of malware known as “ransomware” that’s proving profitable for malicious programmers. A British study noted that two out of five victims pay the ransom, netting millions for the hackers.
Welcome to the modern world where criminals without guns may be more dangerous than the ones with them.


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Government tourism promotion is not really ‘economic development’
Summer is here and with it comes the usual urge for adventure, which often means travel. It probably doesn’t surprise you that some state and local governments spend millions of taxpayer dollars to try to lure you and your money.
They justify this by calling it “economic development” work, hoping that taxpayers will benefit. That seldom happens, however, even though consultants — who are often paid to help justify government efforts to promote tourism — say otherwise.
The latest issue of Midwest Living, a regional magazine, is full of many taxpayer-subsidized advertisements from various states and localities that want to attract visitors. The magazine has over 100 pages, and more than 23 of them sport at least one advertisement that is partly or completely paid for by taxpayer funds. Then there’s the 12-page insert about Ohio. The ads beckon readers to visit French Lick, Ind., Lansing, Mich., Missouri, Arkansas, Kansas and more.
How long would it take for you to find Hamilton County, Ind., on a map? Its tax-funded tourism agency placed a full-page advertisement in the magazine to lure concert-goers. A second ad from there tells readers to escape to the county for live music and to “savor local flavors in a culinary destination.” So, Hamilton County has live music and food. Well, take that Memphis and Nashville! Even a suburb of Chicago (Oak Park) gets in on the act with its own ad.
None of this would be worth mentioning if the locality or county were better off for having spent the money. A few independent studies suggest this doesn’t happen. One of those, published in the Journal of Travel Research in 2011, concluded that state government spending to promote tourism created some jobs, but it became less effective as spending went up. Moreover, the new jobs were probably low-paying and were, then, unlikely to increase gross state product, which is a measure of a state’s economy.
A 2016 Mackinac Center for Public Policy study examined tourism promotion spending in 48 states over 39 years. When it came to Michigan, we found that for every $1 million in government spending to promote tourism, the Michigan accommodations industry enjoyed another $20,000 in economic activity. In other words, it was a large net negative return. There was no impact on income or GSP for the amusement and recreation sector, and a tiny (and net negative) one for income in the arts and entertainment.
Only five states in the study — Mississippi, Idaho, Washington, Maryland and Nevada — distinguished themselves from the national average. A $1 million increase in tourism promotion spending in these states increased hotel and accommodations activity by as much as $300,000. That’s not $300,000 in tax revenue, but $300,000 in extra business for one sector of the industry, and coming after a $1 million expense.
States that run tourism promotion programs don’t typically tout academic-style studies to prove their success, probably because they seldom find them. Instead, they turn to travel and tourism consultants. These consultants appear to run a cottage industry of telling tourism officials what they want to hear: Your advertisements are bringing in new tax revenue that justifies the cost of your program.
Documents obtained through freedom of information requests indicate state officials in Michigan wanted to pay a consultant to help them justify their spending. The contractor did, but refused our requests to explain precisely how the return-on-investment claims were calculated.
The 2016 “Pure Michigan” advertising campaign claims to have generated $8.33 in new state tax dollars for every $1 spent on advertising. That figure, according to a review by the state’s auditor general, excluded about half the cost of the program, including the expenses involved in creating the advertisements. Perhaps only in government can you ignore the cost of doing business and then declare your business to be a big success.
In his 2006 paper from the Journal of Travel Research, titled “Economic Impact Studies: Instruments for Political Shenanigans?” John Crompton writes, “Most economic impact studies are commissioned to legitimize a political position rather than to search for economic truth. Often the result is mischievous procedures that produce large numbers that study sponsors seek to support a predetermined position.” One of those mischievous procedures is doing what Michigan’s consultants have done: leave some costs out of the equation.
Bottom line: Government tourism promotion efforts are unlikely to be cost-effective when an accurate accounting is made — despite what consultants, slick magazines and other advertisements may suggest.


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Despite popular belief According to a study published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, playing an hour of video games has a positive effect on the brain. The study contained 29 male grad and undergrad students, which were divided into their experience with the popular MOBA, League of Legends. The first
This wouldn’t end the DMCA, only changes it At recent request, the U.S. Copyright Office is considering a rule change to the DMCA. This change would ease up on the current restrictions for emulations and reproduction of abandoned online games. Since it’s introduction in 1996, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act
Complete With a Lovely Dog Are you ready for some hardcore agriculture? We aren’t talking about your Stardrew Valleys and your Harvest Moons. We’re talking about Farming Simulator 19. The weirdly popular produce production game series is returning. Announced alongside a short animated trailer, Farming Simulator 19 plans to take
Developers Rare Announce a Sea of Thieves Scale Test With the Sea of Thieves Closed Beta having recently concluded, the nautical game of pirates and plunder is back to the forefront of everyone’s mind. More than that, the developers have gathered important information as to how they can improve the game.


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Nexus Q, a device intended for streaming of media content, which Google introduced at this year's Google I / O conference, will still not go on sale.
It was excepted the sale to start by mid-July, but people from Google now say that the delivery of this unit will be postponed because they want to improve it.
For those who have already signed up, Google will send a copy of the existing models.
We have an important update about your Nexus Q pre-order.
When we announced Nexus Q at Google I/O, we gave away devices to attendees for an early preview. The industrial design and hardware were met with great enthusiasm. We also heard initial feedback from users that they want Nexus Q to do even more than it does today. In response, we have decided to postpone the consumer launch of Nexus Q while we work on making it even better.
To thank you for your early interest, we'd like to extend the Nexus Q preview to our pre-order customers and send you a free device. If you had other items in your order, your credit card will be charged for those items only.
Your Nexus Q will be on its way soon and you will receive a notification and tracking number from Google Play when it ships.
The Nexus Q Team
And what is all this device can see the promo video.


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In a single month, three reports describe different views of China's economic future
The director known for adding depth to the mundane will make the case that Gap's "Dress Normal" doesn't equal "dress boring"
Three times more money has been spent on the race for the state's school's chief than on the governor's race
An IT expert offers an estimate of what a 50-employee small business might spend to protect against cyberattacks
A slowdown in funding could end the growth of U.S. oil production
Independent developer Lucas Menge took it upon himself to adapt the smartwatch's home screen for the iPhone
Starbucks will start a coffee delivery program in late 2015, giving other companies' employees one fewer excuse to leave the office
New government rules could block 500 colleges from federal aid money and put hundreds more in danger of losing it
Candy sales are increasing, but big drugstores and supermarkets benefit more than local candy shops
Rotkaeppchen, now Germany's best-selling sparkling wine, was first produced in a vineyard south of Leipzig in 1856. The winery was expropriated by the East German regime after World War II and was turned into a collective that produced 15 million bottles per year. For a period after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the brand lost popularity and in 1991 sold only 2.9 million bottles. Today, Rotkaeppchen is thriving, selling about 150 million bottles per year. In 2002 the company bought one of its biggest rivals, the German branch of French Champagne-maker Mumm, and now holds about 40% of the entire German sparkling wine market.


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Posted by News Express | 31 May 2017 | 5,500 times
No fewer than 23 Nigerian banks received inflows amounting to N28.7 billion executed in 460,000 transactions through the Mavrodi Mondial Moneybox (MMM) Ponzi scheme within six months, the 2016 annual report of the Nigeria Electronic Fraud Forum (NeFF) has revealed. The amount was moved between June and December 2016.
The report disclosed that by the time the scheme “crashed” on December 13, 2016, over N11.9 billion had been lost by gullible subscribers.
The NeFF report, which was unveiled in Abuja Tuesday at a stakeholders workshop on cybercrime, organised by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), disclosed that since the MMM scheme had a 30-day cycle before return-on-investment (RoI) was realised, everyone who put money into it after November 12, 2016 did not get their money out.
“No fewer than 23 banks received inflows amounting to N28.7 billion executed in 460,000 transactions through the MMM Ponzi scheme. The amount put into the scheme between November 13th and December 15th, 2016 (through interbank transactions) totals over NGN11.9bn. This amount was largely not recovered.
“To put this amount into perspective, the 2017 budget for Defence Headquarters is N4.7 billion. This implies that the amount transferred by Nigerians under the MMM Ponzi scheme would have funded the Nigerian Defence HQ almost six times over.
“Majority of the transfers made by customers of banks that participated in the MMM Ponzi scheme were made through the account-to-account transfer platform.
“This was followed by the mobile channel, and lastly, through the web channels of other transfer platforms in the industry,” the report said.
It added that 34 financial institutions paid out money for investments into the MMM Nigeria Ponzi scheme, adding that the customers included those of commercial banks, mobile payment operators as well as mortgage banks.
“By the side are the amounts, in terms of volume and value for each financial institution that money was paid out from. Fewer banks received inflows of MMM transactions than the number of banks from which outflows occurred,” the NeFF report stressed.
It also stated that MMM followed the usual pattern of Ponzi schemes, pointing out that “they continue to build momentum and crash when the maximum amounts are already invested in the scheme”.
The NeFF report added that the peak of the MMM investment was in November 2016, when over N13 billion was transferred among the participants, pointing out that the CBN had in the middle of 2016 warned about the dangers of the scheme.
In a related development, the volume of fraud reported in 2016 indicated an 82 per cent increase in reported cases, with an estimated N2.19 billion losses.
The NeFF 2016 annual report titled, “A Changing Payments Ecosystem: The Security,” said the financial industry recorded an 82 per cent rise when compared to 2015 and over 1,200 per cent rise when juxtaposed with the situation in 2014.
According to the report, despite the 82 per cent increase in reported fraud cases, the industry was able to reduce fraud by 2.7 per cent when compared to the 2015 figure.
“Comparing the attempted fraud against the actual losses, the industry was able to salvage 49.7 per cent of the total amount attempted by these fraudsters within the year.
“These figures informed us that there are more attempts on a yearly basis with different innovation tricks or modus operandi to take advantage of the system,” the NeFF report said.
The report also noted that 2016 witnessed a significant transaction increase across all payment channels in both volume and value in spite of the economic recession.
“In contrast with 2015, there was a 71.43 per cent spike in the volume of transactions processed through the NCS (Nigeria Central Switch),” it said.
In his address at the unveiling of the NeFF 2016 annual report, CBN’s Director, Banking and Payments System and NeFF Chairman, Mr. Dipo Fatokun, stated that the Nigeria Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS) report of the Nigeria fraud landscape for 2016 indicated that fraud cases grew by 82 per cent over the 2015 figures, attributing the trend to the increased usage of new payment platforms.
•Adapted from a THISDAY report.
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5Linx names former city chief of staff as CEO
- 5Linx Enterprises announced on Friday that William Faucette Jr. will replace Craig Jerabeck.
The chief of staff for former Rochester Mayor William A. Johnson Jr. has been named as CEO at one of the area's fastest growing companies.
5Linx Enterprises announced on Friday that William Faucette Jr. will replace Craig Jerabeck as CEO of the Henrietta-based direct sales company and 2012 winner of the Rochester Top 100, an annual ranking by the Rochester Business Alliance Inc. and KPMG LLC for fastest growth among local private companies.
The company said Jerabeck resigned his position after 14 years of service. No specific reason was provided by the company.
"This is very good news for our company and the greater Rochester community," said Jeb Tyler, who co-founded 5LINX with Jerabeck and Jason Guck. "It is a brand-new day for our company, and we expect to continue growing, continuing to expand internationally, and continuing to create new jobs in Rochester."
Faucette, 45, rose through the ranks at the city of Rochester over an eight-year period, eventually serving as chief of staff in the Johnson administration for about four years. He was the youngest senior manager to ever serve the city at the time. The Stanford University graduate joined 5Linx as an independent representative shortly after it was founded in 2001.
He became vice president of sales of the company about eight years later, and later added duties in compliance, field operations and product development. He was previously recognized as one of "30 Leaders Under 30" by Ebony Magazine, and was named Citizen of the Year by the Alumni Association of the African American Leadership Development Program.
"This opportunity came up over the last couple of weeks and it’s kind of a natural progression in terms of the roles I played here,” Faucette said. "It is sobering in the sense that you recognize it’s important we get it right for everyone's benefit, and it’s not something I take lightly."
He takes over 5Linx at a time when it looks to regain its form as the area's fastest-growing company, growth that allowed it to build corporate offices in Henrietta about seven years ago, offer BMWs and Bentleys to top performers and penetrate markets in five counties with more than 100 local employees and 90,000 independent representatives.
5Linx was recently named as the 84th largest direct sales company in the world by Direct Selling News. The local company markets products and services in the home, business and wellness categories. Some items include identity theft protection systems and discount travel packages as well as nutrition and weight loss services, Faucette explained.
Jerabeck started his career in telecommunications in Rochester. He founded @Wireless Enterprises in 1997, a franchisor of retail stores, and before that co-founded Cellular Unlimited, which sold cellphones upstate in the late 1990s. In 2001, he started 5Linx with Guck and Tyler. The company employed about 260 people at one time.
5Linx sold off its telecommunication business earlier to Birch Communications, a sale that took about 30 percent of the firm's revenues with it, Faucette said. Still, the company will be profitable this year and plans to be even stronger next year.
"Now we’re focused on growing as we have prior years, so we are very exciting about that," he said. "I take the commitment to the community seriously and am looking forward to not only succeeding professionally relative to the things we do for 5Linx employees and representative across this county and others, but also a good corporate citizens."


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Steve Jobs, Apple's new Chairman of the Board. Apple's new CEO faces a challenge putting his own imprint on the company as long as Steve Jobs sticks around, a management expert said today.
With a new CEO finally at the helm, AMD can begin to move forward in what has become an Intel world.
Newly minted Advanced Micro Devices CEO Rory Read faces a challenge in turning around the company's mobile strategy to wage a competitive battle against rivals Intel and ARM.
After months of hunting, Advanced Micro Devices on Thursday said it hired Lenovo executive Rory Read as its new CEO as the chip maker looks to grow in the mobile and server markets.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ resignation leaves the company's internal operation in the capable hands of his replacement, Tim Cook. But his departure also leaves a cavernous void when it comes to the company’s public persona. And right now, it’s unclear who...
Groupon's problems in China, including a recent round of staff layoffs, have come as no surprise to analysts, who hold that the company rushed its plans in the country and relied too much on foreign expertise.
Steve Jobs stepped down as Apple's CEO on Wednesday and Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook was named as his replacement. Jobs will remain with the company as chairman of the board.
Steve Jobs sent the following letter to Apple employees and board members upon his resignation as CEO Wednesday.
Here is the full text of Steve Jobs' resignation letter:
Apple's iconic CEO, Steve Jobs, is resigning and has asked the company's board of directors to tap COO Tim Cook as his replacement.
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs has stepped down from his position as CEO of the company and Tim Cook, Apple's chief operating officer, has been named to take the helm, Apple announced Wednesday.
Here is the text of a letter sent by Steve Jobs to Apple employees, as he announced his resignation as Apple's CEO on Wednesday.
To those who know their IT outsourcing history, GE and offshoring are practically synonymous.
No one likes to address workplace conflicts -- not the employees who get embroiled in them and especially not the employees' managers, who pretend they don't exist. After all, conflict is messy, often political, and requires confrontation -- an activ...
The head of the organization chartered with managing some of the Internet's complex routing systems is stepping down.
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First impression on unpacking the Q702 test unit was the solid feel and clean, minimalist styling.
For work use, Microsoft Word and Excel programs pre-installed on the device are adequate for preparing short documents.
The Fujitsu LifeBook UH574 allowed for great mobility without being obnoxiously heavy or clunky. Its twelve hours of battery life did not disappoint.
The screen was particularly good. It is bright and visible from most angles, however heat is an issue, particularly around the Windows button on the front, and on the back where the battery housing is located.
My first impression after unboxing the Q702 is that it is a nice looking unit. Styling is somewhat minimalist but very effective. The tablet part, once detached, has a nice weight, and no buttons or switches are located in awkward or intrusive positions.
- FTSocial Media AssistantQLD
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- CCBusiness Analyst (ERP)NSW
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- CCMessaging EngineerNSW
- FTSenior .Net DeveloperSA
- FTProject ManagerVIC
- CCIncident ManagerSA
- FTDesktop EngineerNSW
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- CCContract Analyst Programmer (Java/J2EE/MyEclise) 160721/AP/vmpAsia
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- CCNetwork ArchitectNSW
- FTPortfolio Project Governance AnalystNSW
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(CNN) -- In an effort to curb prescription painkiller abuse, the Food and Drug Administration is banning generic versions of the original OxyContin formula.
"The FDA has determined that the benefits of original OxyContin no longer outweigh its risks," the agency said in a statement.
OxyContin was first approved in 1995. The drug became attractive to abusers who crushed it to snort, or melted and injected it. OxyContin tablets have a time-release formula that delivers the drug over a 12-hour period. But when a pill is crushed, the entire dose is immediately absorbed into the bloodstream.
Purdue Pharma, the producer of OxyContin, stopped selling the original formula to pharmacies in August 2010 after reformulating the pills to make them crush-resistant.
The reformulated pills make the drug more difficult to inject or snort, according to the FDA. The agency has approved new labeling for the drug that makes it clear the pills are more difficult to abuse. Any generic version of OxyContin that is submitted for approval should be based on this formula, the FDA says.
Prescription painkillers have killed more Americans than heroin and cocaine combined, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Approximately 12 million Americans over the age of 12 reported using prescription painkillers recreationally in 2010. According to the CDC, enough were prescribed that year to medicate every American adult around the clock for a month.
Deaths have skyrocketed during the past decade. In 2009, about a half a million people visited emergency rooms as a result of abusing or misusing prescription drugs like Vicodin (hydrocodone), OxyContin (oxycodone), Opana (oxymorphone) and methadone, the CDC found.
In May 2007, Purdue Pharma settled a lawsuit that alleged the company used promotional materials that contained misleading or inaccurate data and downplayed the addiction risks of OxyContin, according to Fortune. The company paid a $600.5 million fine and three of the company's top executives pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of misbranding.
In December, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy sent an alert to law enforcement, particularly along the Canadian border, warning that Canada had approved non-abuse-resistant generic versions of oxycodone, the active ingredient in OxyContin, Percocet and about 40 other painkillers.
"ONDCP expects companies will begin offering these generics without the abuse-resistant features in Canadian pharmacies within the next month," according to the alert.
The letter warned of the potential for these generics to show up in the United States.
Going forward, the FDA will continue "to encourage the development of abuse-deterrent formulations of opioids," the agency said. "(We believe) that such products will help reduce prescription drug abuse. At the same time, the FDA remains committed to ensuring that patients with pain have appropriate access to opioid analgesics."
CNN's Saundra Young contributed to this report.


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PETALING JAYA: Dagang Nexchange Bhd’s (DNeX) subsidiary, Silterra Malaysia Sdn Bhd, has entered into a wafer supply and purchase agreement worth US$400mil (RM1.69bil) with ChipOne Technology (Beijing) Co Ltd.
Under the multi-year agreement, Siltterra will supply wafers, which are used in the production of semiconductor devices to ChipOne, said DNeX in a statement.
ChipOne is a leading driver integrated circuit (IC), touch controller and fingerprint sensor fabless integrated circuit design house in Beijing.
According to the statement, the companies will work closely on product development and mass production based on Silterra’s state-of-the-art bipolar-CMOS-DMOS (BCD) technology.
CMOS and DMOS refer to complementary metal oxide semiconductor and double diffused metal oxide semiconductor.
BCD technology is one of the key building blocks of Silterra’s smart power technology platform developed to deliver optimum energy-efficient products based on proven mature process technology, intellectual property and design kits.
DNeX group managing director and Silterrra executive chairman Tan Sri Syed Zainal Abidin Syed Mohamed Tahir (pic above) said: “We are pleased for Silterra to enter into this agreement with one of the leading semiconductor chip design companies in China. “This also shows the commitment of the new shareholders of Silterra in transforming the company through driving sustainable business.”
Syed Zainal said the agreement would also see Silterra having a guaranteed wafer base load for the next several years and ensure a high factory utilisation rate for the company going forward.
“IC designers are striving to deliver energy- efficient products, and this is aligned to strategies towards energy conservation and sustainability.
“As such, they look to adopt the smart power design techniques as well as advanced power technologies to meet this objective,” he added.
Silterra will be leveraging on its proven process technology, foundry design kits and intellectual property to deliver optimum energy efficient products.
DNeX recently completed the acquisition of a 60% stake in Silterra from Khazanah Nasional Bhd.
DNeX is the majority shareholder of Silterra.
Together with its partner, Beijing Integrated Circuit Advanced Manufacturing and High-End Equipment Equity Investment Fund Center (Ltd Partnership) or CGP Fund, DNeX planned to transform Silterra into a competitive global semiconductor technology player that will be able to capitalise on the strong demand for chips globally.
DNeX is also making its mark as a reputable player in energy, semiconductor as well as subsea telecommunications services.


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Derechos | Equipo Nizkor
Huawei's U.S. Restrictions Expose a High-Tech Achilles' Heel for China
For all of China's efforts to become a global force in high technology rivaling the United States, it has mostly failed to produce top-flight contenders in one crucial area: the industry that gave Silicon Valley its name.
Last year, China imported more than $300 billion worth of computer chips, the backbone of all digital products. That is more than it spent on crude oil from abroad.
Washington has now turned China's reliance on American microchips against Huawei, the Chinese telecommunications giant that the Trump administration has labeled a national security threat. The Commerce Department last week restricted American firms from selling components and technology to the company, essentially cutting Huawei off from Google software, Qualcomm chips and more.
The department said Monday that it would allow Huawei to continue doing business with American suppliers for 90 days to prevent disruption to mobile networks that use the company's equipment. Yet Washington's move still strikes at a national soft spot for China that has weighed on the minds of the country's leaders for decades.
Desperate to reduce the dependence on imports, the authorities in China have pledged tens of billions of dollars to help foster homegrown chip champions. The country's dreams of semiconductor hegemony have added to the trade tensions with the United States, which wants Beijing to scale back what it considers unfair government support for Chinese firms.
Washington has found reason to directly punish one state-backed chip maker, Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit Company. After Micron Technology, an American rival, accused the Chinese company of pilfering chip designs, the Commerce Department blocked it from buying American components.
The fruits of China's chip drive have been mixed at best. Chinese firms' market share remains modest in most areas of semiconductor production. Nearly all of the most complex chips must still be imported. Several Chinese state-backed makers of memory chips, which store data, have announced big production plans. But the global market for such chips is currently saturated, suggesting grim prospects for turning a profit.
On the whole, government support has helped the Chinese industry, said Gu Wenjun, chief analyst at ICwise, a semiconductor market research firm in Shanghai. "But now that the market has become overheated and fickle, the negative effects are increasingly apparent," he said.
Local governments in China "don't understand the industry," Mr. Gu said. They are merely using up resources that private companies know how to spend more effectively, he added.
China's role as the world's leading assembler of electronics, and its vast consumer market for electronics, has convinced some observers that given enough time, the country would inevitably attract or foster the knowledge for producing advanced chips. If China could catch up in making toys and then in producing cellphones, the thinking goes, then why not in semiconductors someday?
For now, surviving without American chips promises to be the ultimate test for Huawei, despite the company's recent strides in developing its own processors.
In an interview with Chinese media on Tuesday, Huawei's founder and chief executive, Ren Zhengfei, said that in "peaceful times," half of Huawei's chips came from American companies, and the other half it developed itself. Huawei has stockpiled chips for emergencies like this, Mr. Ren said.
But the company could never entirely reject American technology, he said. Even members of his own family, he said, are iPhone users.
"We will not recklessly get rid of American chips," Mr. Ren said. "We need to grow together."
Beijing's angst over foreign semiconductors has a long pedigree.
As Japan, South Korea and Taiwan emerged with formidable chip industries in the 1980s and '90s, China experimented with various forms of state planning to develop its own abilities. In 2014, Beijing set a goal of becoming a global leader in all segments of the chip industry by 2030, and national and local government semiconductor investment funds began springing up across the country.
The results of those efforts are hard to spot, however, in the innards of leading Chinese tech companies' products.
To crack open one of Huawei's smartphones or cellular base stations is to see the extent to which advanced technology is a truly globalized endeavor, even as Beijing and Washington have come to distrust each other's tech providers.
In Huawei's new P30 Pro flagship phone, for example, American firms supply a number of key components, including parts that help process the radio signals that carry calls and data through the air, according to an analysis by System Plus Consulting, a research firm in France.
The P30 Pro's memory chips are from Micron and the Japanese company Toshiba. The camera technology is from Sony of Japan. The processor, the brains of the phone, was developed by Huawei itself.
Huawei's semiconductor division, HiSilicon, has surprised industry observers with the progress it has made in developing processors and baseband chips, which connect phones to data networks. Yet even HiSilicon may be affected by the Commerce Department's restriction. Many of the leading providers of chip design software are American.
For other kinds of components, Huawei should not have much trouble finding non-American substitutes if it is fully cut off from American suppliers. In memory chips, for instance, Micron is a leading global supplier, but so are Samsung and SK Hynix of South Korea.
In general, the more advanced the silicon, the more likely it is that Huawei will have to compromise on quality to avoid American providers like Broadcom, which supplies specialized chips for Huawei's data centers, and Nvidia, which makes high-end graphics processors for Huawei's laptops.
The company's options may also be limited when it comes to the critical components that help smartphones process radio signals. American companies, including Skyworks and Qorvo, lead the market for these "radio frequency" parts, which are technologically demanding to produce.
"It's just very difficult unless this is your bread and butter," Liam K. Griffin, Skyworks's president and chief executive, said on a conference call this month with analysts. "We have years and years of experience here working with this."
[Source: By Raymond Zhong, The New York Times, Beijing, 21May19]
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
|This document has been published on 13Jun19 by the Equipo Nizkor and Derechos Human Rights. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.


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Mfg. Co. says its planned expansion at its Spartanburg, SC, assembly plant will add 500 new jobs.
The auto maker today provided a few more details surrounding the previously announced capacity increase that will see $750 million invested at the facility. Once completed,will have poured $4.2 billion into its South Carolina operations.
The investment will add some 1.5 million sq.-ft. (139,000 sq.-m) of floor space and bring annual capacity to 240,000 vehicles by 2012.
The expansion includes 1.2 million sq.-ft. (112,000 sq.-m) for a new final assembly line that will be located north of the existing facility and be used to produce the next-generation X3 cross/utility vehicle.
The remaining 300,000-sq.-ft. (27,000 sq.-m) will be added to the existing paint shop, increasing its size by about 80%. The existing paint shop will be renovated.
Once completed, Spartanburg will produce three models, the X3, X5 and new X6, now in launch. A diesel version of the X5 for the U.S. market will go into production later this year.
“Centralizing our know-how for BMW X models in Spartanburg will enable us to work more efficiently, thus supporting our long-range corporate strategy,” says BMW Board Member Frank-Peter Arndt. “In addition, it was a logical step for the BMW Group as a global player to increase production capacity in its largest market.”
BMW says there currently are 5,600 workers at Spartanburg, including those employed at contractors. The facility operates 20 hours per day.


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January 13th 2021
Nofima is about to start a new project involving research on freezing methods. The purpose is to ensure that the fishing industry gains a regular supply of raw materials thereby forming a better foundation regarding year-round jobs.
January 12th 2021
The Research Council of Norway has appointed Sarfraz as an “outstanding young researcher” (Fremragende ung forsker) and awarded his project NanoFunPack a total of NOK 7.7 million in project support. The funds are awarded to ambitious projects with focused research efforts performing at a high international level. Two sides of the same coin NanoFunPack, or […]
January 8th 2021
Norwegian fisheries provide significant value creation. Analyses indicate that the fishing industry generated a net value creation of NOK 22.7 billion in 2019. Of this, NOK 16.6 billion was created directly from fisheries, while NOK 6.1 billion comes from ripple effects in the supply industry.
January 7th 2021
Would you like lumpfish for dinner? Nofima is trying to reveal how millions of cleaner fish used in the Norwegian salmon farming industry can be used for human consumption.
January 6th 2021
The next time you remove the skin and bones from your fish dinner and throw them in the bin, you might want to keep in mind that you are disposing of something that could be worth NOK 8500 per gram!
January 5th 2021
Animal-based products contain several important nutrients which humans need. Our body needs to be supplied with complex and important vitamins such as B12 every once in a while, and meat is the best source. If you have a vitamin B12 deficiency, you can develop serious health problems. “We don’t need to eat animal products every […]
December 28th 2020
Although many people want to eat more plant-based food, some consumer segments are less keen. How can we convince them as well?
December 22nd 2020
40 percent of all food poisonings occur at home. Nofima researchers are leading the way to find the best solutions for reducing this number.
December 18th 2020
“The assignments prove that our expertise is both in demand and relevant. For Nofima, this year’s allocations prove that industry values our expertise,” says Øyvind Fylling-Jensen, Managing Director of Nofima. The production and processing of food is one of Norway’s largest mainland industries. Research will support jobs, industry and settlement in rural areas. Covid-19 has […]
December 17th 2020
Nofima has developed a new quality test that uses renowned restaurant chefs to assess the quality of raw materials and products.


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Bastille Day Street Fair
Monday, July 05, 2010
The 11th Annual Bastille Day Street Fair in downtown Fairfield is this Sunday featuring traditional French fare prepared by local restaurants including the Blue Lemon of Westport, The Brasserie and Café Lola of Fairfield.
It's not only about the food (though it's Suzy's favorite part), French crafts, books, clothes, bags, jewelry and more will be available for purchase at the booths along the street. Plus, there will be face painting for children, a DJ and a performance by the Fairfield Warde Cheerleaders.
When: Sunday, July 11 from Noon - 6 PM
Where: Sanford Street (near the railroad station)
The Brasserie (formerly St. Tropez) will be open all day and for soccer fans to watch the final World Cup game on their giant screen.
The street fair start at 11:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Free admission.
For more information call 203-254-8094 or visit www.TheBrasserieCT.com


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Yacht Style’s Vietnamese edition promotes boating in fast-emerging market
Luxuo Media Vietnam has launched the first edition of Yacht Style in Vietnamese to promote pleasure boating in Southeast Asian nation.
Luxuo Media Vietnam, owner of www.luxuo.vn, has launched the first issue of Yacht Style Vietnam, a publication dedicated to ‘The Leaders’ of the nascent yachting industry in a nation with a population of 96 million and a coastline of over 2,000 miles.
Local yachting leaders include Doan Viet Dai Tu, founder of Tam Son Yachting. The company is the distributor for Beneteau, Lagoon, Monte Carlo Yachts and Zodiac in Vietnam, and a developer and operator of marinas and yachting services.
Other leaders include Ana Marina creator Dang Bao Hieu and Nguyen Duc Thuan, founder of VietYacht (Jeanneau and Prestige) and LuxYacht (Ferretti Yachts, Pershing and Riva). Nguyen brought 12 yachts to Vietnam in the belief that country will soon start to develop the boating potential along its vast coastline.
BELIEF IN THE FUTURE
Luxuo Media Vietnam is confident of the magazine’s future despite launching the title amid the backdrop of Covid-19.
Hai Yen Ho, Managing Editor of Yacht Style Vietnam, said: “We believe the yachting industry is still growing in Southeast Asia, in particular in Vietnam, where there’s a generation of entrepreneurs emerging in the yacht industry and marina development, and where yacht owners are increasing. We believe we are not alone in our optimism about the future of yachting here.
“The fact that a lot of Vietnamese are confused about the concept of yachting and cruising, and most boat regulations in Vietnam are for fishing boats or cargo ships, mean it’s more essential than ever to launch a publication to clarify the concept of yachting and explore what it offers.”
The magazine includes reviews of the Azimut 78, Lagoon Sixty 7, Sunseeker Predator 60 EVO and Prestige 420. There’s also a comparison of the Merry Fisher 1095 and N33 from Jeanneau, as well as features on catamarans and the Prestige shipyard in France.
“As the public begins to understand what yachts are and how they can contribute to the tourism economy, more and more Vietnamese people will begin to embrace this new culture,” Ho said. “Warm, calm waters, paradise-like bays and passionate industry leaders are already here.”


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TIFTON, Ga. (WALB) - Almost 3 million bottles of Coca-Cola products will circulate every day through the new sales and distributing center in Tifton, according to Tony McBrayer, the chairman for both the Tift County Board of Commissioners and the Development Authority.
“Don’t bottle, they’re just a distribution warehouse and of course you’ll have a management, you’ll have clerical, you’ll have salespersons, you’ll have warehouse workers and CDL drivers just to get the product out to many places like in Georgia, Alabama and Florida,” said McBrayer.
All those positions mean jobs.
The 300,000 square foot facility helped to open up the Tift County job market. McBrayer said this includes the jobs brought over from the smaller facilities in Sylvester and Valdosta.
“We were guaranteed at least 200 jobs. Looks like we’re gonna end up with 225 initially, and then there is room and expected expansion later on,” explained McBrayer.
Officials said one of the crowning features of the new facility is a hard-to-miss 14-foot tall bottle of Coca-Cola.
“In Tifton, we have found great partners in the economic development and community leaders, and we look forward to building a strong presence and deeper relationships here,” said Coca-Cola Bottling Company United in a partial statement released to WALB News 10.
McBrayer said the facility will be fully operational on May 3.
“We’re delighted to have them here,” said McBrayer.
Coca-Cola officials said an official opening is planned for this fall.
If you want to see what opportunities are available, you can click here.


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Australian wagering giant Tabcorp is set to hold a special meeting to allow its shareholders to vote on a scheme of arrangement on the proposed demerger of its lottery business.
Tabcorp told the Australian stock exchange that the scheme meeting was ordered by the Supreme Court of New South Wales.
The company said its directors have unanimously recommended that shareholders vote in favor of the resolutions which will be considered at the scheme meeting and the proceeding general meeting to approve the capital reduction required to effect the demerger.
The company also noted that Grant Samuel, the Independent Expert appointed by Tabcorp to review the proposed Demerger, has concluded that the Demerger is in the best interests of Tabcorp shareholders.
Tabcorp’s decision to pursue a demerger of The Lottery Corporation follows the strategic review it conducted from March 2021 to July 2021.
Through the Tabcorp-Tatts Group merger in 2017 and the subsequent integration, Tabcorp merged six complementary businesses into its current three businesses: Lotteries and Keno, Wagering and Media, and Gaming Services.
The transaction has created synergies and enhanced the diversification of each of the three businesses, with Tabcorp now looking to demerge one of these businesses, the Lotteries, and Keno business.
Tabcorp said the demerged lottery business will be well-positioned to continue to generate attractive returns for shareholders, driven by its strong cash flow generation, demonstrated ability to drive growth through product innovation and active game portfolio management as well as gain future potential upside from further enhancing the customer experience and increasing digital penetration.
On the other hand, the New Tabcorp will also be well-positioned to deliver a compelling customer experience via its omnichannel model, simplify and streamline MAX, as well as future potential upside from any future Industry Change in the Australian wagering and gaming industry, it said.
The company has provided a demerger booklet and briefing presentation to shareholders, which gives an overview of the demerger.


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WASHINGTON — The average price paid for white pan bread decreased in February, while the price for whole wheat bread increased, according to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor.
The national average retail price of white pan bread was 140.7c, down 1.8c per lb from January and down 2.8c from February 2015. On a month-to-month basis, the average price for white pan bread in February decreased in all four regions — down 4.3c in the West, down 1.4c in the Northeast, down 1.3c in the Midwest and down 0.7c in the South.
At 194.7c per lb, the national average price for whole wheat bread was up 0.4c per lb from January but down 7.7c per lb from February 2015.
The national average price of family flour in February was 52.2c per lb, unchanged from January but down 0.3c from February 2015.The national average price for spaghetti and macaroni in February was 130.9c per lb, up 4.4c from January but down 1c from February 2015. Chocolate chip cookies were 328.9c per lb, down 4.4c from January and down 18.8c from February 2015. The national average price of white long-grain rice was 70.7c per lb, down 0.2c from January but up 1.8c from February 2015.


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Venezuelan authorities backed by soldiers temporarily closed dozens of retail outlets for price gouging after a currency devaluation that triggered a frenzy of shopping but met market approval.
President Hugo Chavez announced the devaluation last week, cutting the exchange rate of the bolivar against the dollar by half for oil income and for goods deemed nonessential in a move to bolster state coffers.
The measure strengthens the financial balance sheet in South America's largest oil exporter but risks angering the leftist government's supporters ahead of an election in September if prices rise and inflation speeds up.
Prices for international flights have already doubled, as the airlines charged the new 4.3 rate that applies to non-essential items. Since 2005 the bolivar was fixed at 2.15.
Mr. Chavez is a strong believer in state intervention in the economy and has nationalized many industries in the OPEC nation. He uses currency controls to prevent capital flight.
After inspecting prices, Venezuelan soldiers and authorities closed at least two supermarkets belonging to a Colombian retailer controlled by France's Casino.
National Guard soldiers armed with automatic rifles forced the closure of a hardware store at the start of a day-long revision of retailers in the coastal town of the Guaira.
"We found a list where they were clearly remarking prices by up to 150 per cent," said Jose Useche, and inspector with the government's consumer watchdog.
Venezuelan bonds ticked down slightly on Tuesday but were still at their highest level since September 2008 after a major rally on Monday. JPMorgan raised Venezuelan bonds to overweight from market weight.
"The FX devaluation is unambiguously positive for fiscal accounts and should limit external debt supply," the bank said in a note on Monday, adding higher oil prices also influenced its decision.
The devaluation, which creates two fixed exchange rates on top of a semi-legal black market where the bolivar is freely floated, was less well received on the Venezuelan street and by foreign companies operating in the Caribbean nation.
The new system sets a rate of 2.6 to the dollar for essential items like food and medicine, but gives a much lower rate of 4.3 to the dollar for other goods and oil exports.
On the freely traded black market the bolivar weakened to around 6.5 against the dollar on Friday on low volume and with very few people selling.
Thousands of shoppers have mobbed stores to snap up imported TVs and computers, worried their savings will lose value and prices will rise.
In a bid to calm nerves, Chavez sent troops to monitor prices in shopping districts. A total of 70 retailers have been shuttered and raids continued on Tuesday.
"The situation is terrible," said unemployed Manuel, 48, who was supposed to start work on Tuesday in the hardware store closed by the government. "I am living off the little cash I had saved, but that's now not going to stretch at all."
The government says prices are being manipulated by Chavez critics who want to dent his popularity ahead of parliamentary elections in September.
Mr. Chavez is gambling he can underpin his 50 per cent support with increased spending in the lead up to the election and offset the negative reaction price rises may bring.
U.S. companies operating in Venezuela are bracing for the impact of the devaluation, which will raise the cost of their imports and is likely to reduce the value of bolivar profits.
Oil driller Helmerich & Payne Inc. said Tuesday it expects to take a hit in its second quarter results after the devaluation, with an expected exchange loss of about $20-million (U.S.). Its shares dropped 1.3 per cent.
Shares of Spanish phone company Telefonica, the biggest foreign investor in Latin America, fell nearly 2 per cent on Monday on worries it would see revenue losses for as much as $1-billion in Venezuela due to the devaluation.
Telefonica could take a 5 percent hit to its equity value because of the devaluation, analysts say.


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The need for better communication between small businesses and their energy suppliers has been highlighted in a new report from energy regulator Ofgem.
Of the 95% of small businesses who recalled receiving an energy bill in the last 12 months, 70% did not recall seeing a contract end date or notice period, the annual report, “Micro and Small Business Engagement in Energy Markets,” revealed.
While satisfaction with the renegotiation or extension process is improving, and now stands at 73%, 10% of small business owners still said they were dissatisfied, blaming price increases, poor communication and contract renewal without knowledge.
The report also found “relatively high levels” of distrust in suppliers, while small businesses’ views on energy brokers remained “negative.”
Almost 90%of businesses said they had been approached by a broker in the last 12 months, while 20% reported more than 50 contacts and cold calls.
Meanwhile, just 53% of businesses who were approached by brokers in the past year said they identified themselves clearly and provided accurate information about the services they were offering.
In addition, just 31% of businesses said energy brokers had been upfront about the cost of using their services.
The past year has also seen many small businesses shift away from extending and or rolling-over contracts, towards negotiating new contracts with existing suppliers.
The proportion of all businesses that have switched supplier in the last 12 months has also increased slightly; from 23% in 2014 to 25% in 2015.
While cost savings remain the main factor in decisions to switch, 82% said that knowing that a contract was coming to an end was also a significant trigger, while more than 70% cited receiving a renewal notice from an existing supplier.
Association of Convenience Stores chief executive James Lowman said the report highlighted the need for better communication and support.
“Small businesses should have the same protections as household consumers when dealing with energy suppliers.
“We look forward to the final Competition and Markets Authority remedies in this area, which are due this summer,” he added.


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Key performance indices of PZ Cussons Nigeria Plc turned negative in 2012 as significant increases in top and mid lines costs overwhelmed modest growth in sales. With lowest profit in nearly a decade, both actual and underlying returns halved to their recent lows while average net assets lost a fifth. Audited report and accounts of PZ Cussons Nigeria for the year ended May 31, 2012 showed that substantial increase in costs undermined profitability of the conglomerate. Substantial increase in interest expenses compounded relatively high cost of sales and steady operating expenses. The costs outline was worsened by exceptional item that arose from restructuring of the multinational’s supply chain and factory operations.
The conglomerate meanwhile achieved a largely stronger balance sheet and financing position as significant decline in current liabilities compensated for modest declines in assets. The company became more liquid and stable.
PZ Cussons Nigeria sustained a zero-leveraged balance sheet while equity coverage for total assets improved in 2012. The proportion of total equity funds to total assets improved from 59.8 per cent in 2011 to 66.6 per cent in 2012. Current liabilities amounted to 27 per cent of balance sheet size in 2012 compared with 32 per cent in previous year. The positive financing structure was however, driven mainly by declines in assets and restructuring of its liabilities. Total assets had dropped by 6.6 per cent from N68.93 billion to N64.41 billion.
Total liabilities declined by 16.4 per cent to N21.54 billion as against N25.76 billion, reflecting mainly the 22 per cent drop in current liabilities. With the capitalisation of reserves for bonus issue in previous year, paid up share capital increased by 25 per cent from N1.59 billion to N1.99 billion. Total equity funds flattened from N43.17 billion in 2011 to N 42.87 billion in 2012. Out of this, equity attributable to shareholders stood at N40.93 billion in 2012 as against N41.19 billion in 2011.
PZ Cussons Nigeria showed considerable decline in cost efficiency and productivity. Total cost of business, excluding financing charges, trended upward by five percentage points to 93.3 per cent of total sales in 2012 in contrast with 88.3 per cent in 2011. Average pre-tax profit per employee dwindled from N2.75 million to N1.74 million. Average cost per staff, on the other hand, steadied to N2.55 million in 2012 as against N2.30 million in 2011. The conglomerate’s workforce had reduced from 2,921 persons to 2,723 persons. Total staff cost however, increased from N6.71 billion to N6.95 billion.
Considerable declines in profit margins across business segments, decline in export sales and near stagnation of the group’s electrical appliances business segment altogether brought the group’s profitability to its lowest level in nearly a decade. While the core business segment of branded consumer goods increased sales by about 14 per cent, almost 52 per cent decline in pre-tax profit compounded the near-stagnation in sales and 36 per cent decline in pre-tax profit in the electrical appliances segment.
Also, 10 per cent growth in sales within Nigeria was counterbalanced by 6.2 per cent decline in export sales.
Group turnover stood at N72.16 billion in 2012 as against N65.88 billion in 2011, representing an increase of 9.5 per cent. Segmental top-line analysis showed that the main branded consumer goods business segment increased sales from N44.83 billion to N50.97 billion. However, sales in the durable electrical appliances business line flattened to N21.19 billion in 2012 as against N21.04 billion in 2011. Geographical sales analysis showed increase in Nigeria’s turnover from N64.29 billion to N70.67 billion. Export sales dropped from N1.59 billion to N1.49 billion.
Cost of sales rose by 18 per cent to N55.97 billion compared with N47.43 billion. This moderated gross profit downward to N16.18 billion in 2012 as against N18.45 billion in 2011. Total operating expenses inched up to N11.36 billion as against N10.74 billion.
These consisted of selling and distribution expenses of N8.02 billion in 2012 as against N7.02 billion in 2011 and administrative expenses of N3.34 billion as against N3.72 billion. While non-core business income increased by 33 per cent from N440 million to N585 million, interest expense, which jumped by 433 per cent from N126 million to N670 million, further unsettled the bottom-line.
With these, group pre-tax profit dropped by 41 per cent from N8.03 billion to N4.73 billion. Exceptional costs due to restructuring during the year reduced pre-tax earnings by N427 million to N4.31 billion. Group profit after tax shrank by 54 per cent from N5.22 billion to 2.41 billion. Provisions for taxes dropped by 24 per cent.
Underlying profit analysis showed a generally negative outlook. Gross profit margin slipped from 28 per cent to 22 per cent. Group pre-tax profit margin halved from 12.2 per cent to 6.6 per cent. Average pre-tax profit per unit of sales in the branded consumer goods segment had declined from 11.6 per cent to 4.9 per cent while that of durable electrical appliances segment dwindled from 13.4 per cent to 8.5 per cent.
Further earnings analysis indicated that earnings per share dropped from N1.64 to 61 kobo. Decline in net earnings forced the board of the company to reduce cash payouts from N2.73 billion to N1.71 billion, representing dividend per share of 43 kobo in 2012 as against 86 kobo in 2011. Net assets per share also fell from N12.97 to N10.31.
The downtrend also reflected on underlying returns as return on equity halved from 12.7 per cent to 5.6 per cent. Return on total assets dropped from 11.6 per cent to 7.4 per cent. In spite of significant decline in cash dividend, the sustainable dividend outlook became less favourable with dividend cover at 1.42 times in 2012 as against 1.91 times in 2011.
The liquidity position of the company improved considerably during the period. Current ratio, which indicates the potential ability of the company to meet emerging liabilities, strengthened to 2.32 times in 2012 compared with 1.99 times in 2011. The proportion of working capital to sales remained steady at 32 per cent in 2012 as against 33 per cent in 2011. Debtors/creditors ratio stood at 384.2 per cent as against 371 per cent.
PZ Cussons Nigeria is a subsidiary of PZ Cussons (Holdings) Limited, United Kingdom, which holds 68.75 per cent equity stake in the Nigerian company. However, more than 80,000 Nigerian individual and institutional investors hold equity stakes in the conglomerate. One of the earliest companies in Nigeria, PZ Cussons Nigeria was incorporated as a limited liability company in 1948. It became a public limited liability company in 1972 and was subsequently listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE).
The PZ Cussons Nigeria Group included PZ Cussons Nigeria-the parent company, and four other subsidiaries-HPZ Limited, PZ Power Company Limited, PZ Tower Company Limited and Robert Pharmaceuticals Limited. Besides HPZ Limited where the conglomerate holds 74.99 per cent equity stake, it holds 99.9999 per cent stake each in other subsidiaries. All the subsidiaries are active and trading, except Robert Pharmaceuticals.
The principal activities of the group are the manufacturing and sale of a wide range of fast moving consumer goods including detergent, soap, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, confectionery, cooling systems, food drinks and other electrical appliances.
PZ Cussons Nigeria has maintained stable board and management over the years with requisite corporate governance structures to support its expanding business. There were no major changes in corporate governance structure during the period. Professor Emmanuel Edozien still chairs the board while Mr. Christos Giannopoulos leads the executive management team as managing director. The company broadly complies with the Nigerian code of corporate governance as well as the PZ Cussons international best practices.
The performance of PZ Cussons Nigeria underlined the need for comprehensive review of the business model and strategies of the group. With more small and niche companies upping the competition in the consumer goods market, conglomerate needs not only to substantially drive economy of scale to support its large base, but also engage in the delicate balancing act of providing consumers with relatively better package and pricing options. Less purchasing power often impinges brand loyalty.
Globally, PZ Cussons has recognised the changing time. The multinational conglomerate has embarked on a deft restructuring programme that will concentrate manufacturing operations of the multinational in certain countries including Nigeria.
The global restructuring project was sequel to high costs of operations that have increasingly impacted on the global profitability of the conglomerate. PZ Cussons thus developed the global restructuring programme to ensure that its supply chain cost base remains at a competitive level given sustained rise in raw material costs together with significant wage inflation in emerging markets. Besides concentration of operations, the group will also focus on reducing significantly its overhead at a number of other manufacturing facilities.
Recent investments in upgrade and expansion of production facilities and introduction of new products are expected to form the linchpin for future growth. PZ Tower, which commenced operations in March 2012, is expected to increase the competitiveness of the company in the detergent segment.
Consequently, there is reasonable basis to be optimistic about the prospects of the conglomerate.


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One of the best-selling and best-rated video games of all time just set another record: The most expensive sale of a video game at auction ever.
An unopened, highly graded copy of "Super Mario 64," the 1996 flagship title of the Nintendo 64 console and beloved video game icon Mario's first foray into 3D gaming, sold for $1.56 million at auction on Sunday, according to Heritage Auctions.
Heritage Auctions noted that it's the first time a single video game has sold for more than $1 million. The sale topped a record set two days ago when a copy of "The Legend of Zelda" sold for $870,000 on Friday.
"After the record-breaking sale of the first game in the Zelda series on Friday, the possibility of surpassing $1 million on a single video game seemed like a goal that would need to wait for another auction," Valarie McLeckie, video games specialist for Heritage Auctions, said in a statement.
"We were shocked to see that it turned out to be in the same one!" McLeckie added. "We are proud to have been a part of this historic event."
"Super Mario 64" sold nearly 12 million copies after its release in 1996, making it the best-selling game on the Nintendo 64 console. While a far cry from 1985's "Super Mario Bros.," which sold more than 58 million copies worldwide, "Super Mario 64" is widely considered to be one of the most influential games of all time, setting the precedent for a number of popular 3D platforming games for years to come.
Tim Schafer, the founder of video game developer Double Fine Productions, said when he first played "Super Mario 64," that “it was like an epiphany, that’s what I would say: Mario 64 was an epiphany.”
"Anyone who makes 3-D games who says they’ve not borrowed something from Mario or Zelda is lying," Dan Houser, a video game producer behind the "Grand Theft Auto" series told the New York Times in 2012.
"It defined the 3D platformer as a genre,” Tom Hall, a veteran video game designer best known for his work on "Doom," told VG 24/7. "The industry hadn’t really figured out 3D platforming yet, and here it was, a masterwork that set the standard. And it kinda kicked the butt of everything on the N64 after it.”
The game can still be found high on many lists of "the greatest games of all time" – IGN ranked it No. 10 out of 100, Polygon ranked it No. 16 out of 500, and the game still holds a 94 rating on Metacritic.
For those gamers who want to scratch that nostalgic itch but might not have $1.56 million to spare, Nintendo re-released the game as part of Super Mario 3D All-Stars in 2020, alongside two other fan favorites: "Super Mario Sunshine" (2002) and "Super Mario Galaxy" (2007).


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Police: Skimming device found at ATM in Croton-on-Hudson bank
Police are warning residents that a card-skimming device was found at an ATM in Croton-on-Hudson.
Police say the device was found at the ATM at the Wells Fargo Bank on Maple Street Thursday for the second time in a month. They say they believe it was placed there on Wednesday.
A skimmer device is a card reader attachment designed to look like it's part of the ATM machine. The device collects card numbers and PIN codes, which are then replicated into counterfeit cards.
When you use the ATM, your information is collected by the device and the thieves can sell it or use it themselves at your expense.
To protect yourself, investigators say to check with the bank to make sure there's no suspicious activity with your account. If there is, let the police know.
Another way to stay safe is to always check for any loose parts in the pin pad or card slot, and to look for tape or sticky glue substance.


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With a combined population of about 2.4 billion people across the world, 54 member countries make up the Commonwealth of Nations. 19 of the Commonwealth member states are African countries. Patricia Scotland, Secretary-General of the Commonwealth joined CNBC Africa’s Kenneth Igbomor to explore how the Commonwealth is responding to the impact of the covid-19 pandemic across its member states….
By Kennedy Mubita, Africa Head, SC Ventures. Imagine a bank whose customers can tap on a wearable device to...
By Kariuki Ngari, CEO & Managing Director, Standard Chartered, Kenya & East Africa COVID-19 has upended the social and...
Acknowledged as the world’s largest Africa-focused digital infrastructure and emerging tech event, the Africa Tech Festival has always attracted a stellar line-up of critical thinkers, analysts, futurists, keynote and inspirational speakers. 2020 will more than deliver on that reputation, with a stimulating array of visionary industry presenters, raconteurs and even some sporting greats.
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For decades, the Hong Kong International Lighting Fair has been held in late October, but 2020 is not an ordinary year. With many countries facing travel restrictions, the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) has developed an online sourcing event that will include other categories besides lighting.
A statement from the HKTC reads, “While the COVID-19 outbreak continues to hamper global business activities, online sourcing has become the ultimate solution that makes trade transactions possible. Under the theme of A New Connected World Beyond the New Normal, Autumn Sourcing Week | ONLINE (ASWO) offers a one-stop online sourcing platform for buyers and suppliers to continue explore more business opportunities across various industries including electronics, houseware, lighting, outdoor tech light, eco tech, gifts & premium, toys, baby products, stationery, optical as well as watch & clock.”
Backed by the HKTDC’s global network of 50 offices and a powerful database, ASWO’s exhibition team provides excellent customer service, pre-arranges business matching meetings with on-target partners and unveils the latest industry trends and developments for participants.
ASWO will also continue its “Click2Match,” an AI-enabled business matching platform, to provide buyers and suppliers with online self-service tools such as meeting planner, live chat, video meeting, and e-business card exchange.
To find out more information, visit https://asw.hktdc.com/index_en.html#


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Study finds melatonin supplements vary in actual dosage compared to what's advertised
Some people may be getting more than they bargained for when taking melatonin gummies to help them sleep. A new study found that melatonin gummies may contain up to three times more melatonin than advertised due to little FDA oversight.
Here & Now‘s Scott Tong speaks with STAT reporter Nicholas Florko about why this is concerning.
This article was originally published on WBUR.org.
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.


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Last night the ELLE Style Awards 2013 celebrated talent in Danish fashion.
On Tuesday, May 7 from 4-6pm, London-based designer, Peter Jensen, is the special guest at Danish Fashion I
Copenhagen Fashion Week's online press accreditation for the upcoming fashion week will open on June 3, 201
TONI&GUY Hair Meet Wardrobe, one of the world's biggest hair care brands has joined forces with Copenha
Get the photos from Copenhagen Fashion Week AW13 directly after the fashion shows are finish.
This Saturday our little sister Copenhagen Fashion Festival has joined forces with Hive to throw the closin
Danish fashion institute and the National Association of Eating distorters have in collaboration launched a


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Adi Robertson, The Verge:
Tesla has seen strong sales of its Model S electric car, but Elon Musk is now hoping to bring in more buyers — and to do so, he’s rolling out a new sales plan that promises to give potential owners a Model S for a mere $500 a month.
Five Benjamins a month? Great. What’s the catch?
Either way, though, you’ll be paying $1,199 a month for the $72,400 85-kWh model, or $1,051 a month for the $62,400 60-kWh one. So how does Tesla get that number down to $543, as it prices the 85-kWh plan? It rolls in the savings you’ll get from owning an electric car. […]
By default, for example, it counts $100 in “time savings” from avoiding gas stations — using the somewhat dodgy metric that you’d spend one hour a month refueling and your time is worth $100 an hour. It also assumes buyers will deduct the car’s operating costs as business expenses, removing a corresponding $227 a month.
April Fool’s Day was yesterday, Elon.


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怎么_Powerwell puts business back on track
时间：1个月前 阅读：16 评论：1
,Powerwell employee at work小飞机 怎么 加 群（www.tg888.vip）是一个Telegram群组分享平台，飞机群组内容包括telegram群组索引、Telegram群组导航、新加坡telegram群组、telegram中文群组、telegram群组（其他）、Telegram 美国 群组、telegram群组爬虫、电报群 科学上网、小飞机 怎么 加 群、tg群等内容，为广大电报用户提供各种电报群组/电报频道/电报机器人导航服务。
Powerwell Holdings Bhd’s entry into the stock market happened at an unfortunate time. Barely two months after the electricity distribution product manufacturer was listed on the ACE Market, the whole country went into a shutdown to combat the fast-spreading Covid-19 virus.
Not surprisingly, the company sank into losses soon after its listing in Jan 2020. It was bogged down by impairment losses on receivables, lower revenue and one-off listing expenses.
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“This effort by Samsung shows its commitment to fulfill the global market for EV usage and we are proud that you picked Malaysia to set up this new plant,” he said, adding that the industry played an important role to Malaysia’s overall and comprehensive EV eco-system.太A了！！


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ISKCON has now given a notice to video streaming website Amazon Prime asking it to remove the web series Hostel Daze from its catalogue for portraying its monks in a poor light.
ISKCON’s spokesperson Radharamn Das called the portrayal highly objectionable and promised to take Amazon Prime to court.
Das also shared a video clipping from Season 1 Episode 2 of Hostel Daze where one of the character is being berated for not choosing a good college club with taunts like, “you should have rather grown a ponytail and joined ISKCON instead”.
Das said that ISKCON has thousands of very qualified monks who have degrees from prestigious Universities like IITs who have dedicated their life to serve humanity. He added that legal action will be taken against Amazon.
ISKCON had earlier filed a complaint against Shemaroo for a ‘stand-up comedy’ act by ‘comedian’ Surleen Kaur who said, “Beshak hum sab ISKCON waley hain, par andar sey sun harami porn waley hain…”.
A statement by ISKCON has claimed that it will not be pursuing the case anymore after having received an unconditional apology. This though has been denied by Das who has hinted that the case will continue.
As you are no doubt aware, Swarajya is, all in all, a reader-subscription-backed business model and in order to make sure we build a media platform with only the best interests of India at heart, we need your backing.
And in challenging times like this, we need your support now more than ever—to continue bringing you stories that are often shrugged off.
For us to invest in quality reporting and continue bringing you the right stories, it takes a lot of time and money.
Partner with us, be a patron or a subscriber. We need your support, throughout.


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The Stuttgart manufacturer has given the green light to the development of a new machine built to the new LMDh regulations, which have also lured Volkswagen Group stablemate Audi back to the great race.
The announcement revives a fierce on-track rivalry between the two Volkswagen Group brands, which share by far the most Le Mans wins of any manufacturer. Porsche has 19 and Audi 13, compared with the nine of Ferrari, which last won overall at Le Mans in 1965.
While Toyota and Peugeot are currently developing bespoke cars for the new Le Mans Hypercar category, Porsche will enter using the LMDh regulations, which rely on spec chassis and powertrains. Cars from both categories are eligible to compete in the top class at Le Mans from 2021 onwards, with performance balancing used to even the competition.
Tight controls on both costs and performance in LMDh are key to Porsche’s return, along with the prospect of a single class unifying endurance sports car racing across the US IMSA series and the FIA World Endurance Championship, which includes Le Mans. Porsche has stated its intention to race in both series.
“The new LMDh category allows us to fight for overall victories with a hybrid system at the Le Mans, Daytona and Sebring classics – without breaking the bank,” said Porsche boss Oliver Blume. “The project is extremely attractive for Porsche. Endurance racing is part of our brand’s DNA.
“For the first time in more than 20 years, it will be possible to fight for overall victories with identical vehicles at endurance races around the world. Moreover, the new LMDh category focuses on high cost-efficiency.”
The LMDh rules are based on upgraded chassis from the current second-tier LMP2 class, with a standardised spec for the hybrid system, including control electronics. Four different manufacturers have been approved to produce chassis, with entrants – including manufacturers such as Porsche – able to select one of the chassis and a powertrain system.
Porsche’s choice of chassis partner has yet to be confirmed. The French Oreca constructor has been the dominant force in LMP2, but Porsche also has the option of striking a deal with Multimatic, Ligier or Dallara. Teaser images of an LMDh concept hint at the potential body styling that can at least show some relation to Porsche’s road car range.
The LMDh class also features a standardised 50bhp hybrid system made by Williams Advanced Engineering, control electronics by Bosch and an Xtrac-built gearbox, all of which should help cap annual budgets to around £18 million – a significant saving from Porsche’s previous campaign in the outgoing LMP1 category, in which its sophisticated 919 hybrid scored a hat-trick of Le Mans victories between 2015 and 2017.


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With the recent release of planet-colonization sim Planetbase, combined with four swift patches to it, we've seen another example of the fine line between a bug and a feature. After its release on October 15th, it quickly climbed to become a best seller on Steam with SteamSpy reporting 80,419 owners at the time of writing. Social media, Kickstarter, and the their ilk has made it easier than ever for fans to voice their ire and pleasure directly to publishers. For some games, like Planetbase, patches are rolled out to change how the AI of the game sets up priorities, but other companies have stuck with their original vision, refusing to respond to customer demands.
This reflects one of the ongoing challenges with modern game development – the audience is essentially part of the process now. In an interview with Martiño Figueroa, responsible for the design and programing of the game, from Madruga Works, the team behind Planetbase, said that the Reddit community that grew up around their company was without any particular planning on their part – “It just happened.”


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CMC Magazine September 1, 1995 / Page 3
by John December (email@example.com)
Netscape Communications Corporation announced its stock offering this month.
Buoyed by the success of its Netscape Navigator browser and its Web server software, Netscape Communications Corporations became a public company this month. Netscape's stock (ticker NSCP) issued 5,000,000 Common Shares at $28 each on August 8, 1995 on the NASDAQ National Market.
On its first day of trading, the stock climbed as high as $74 during the day, but the stock closed no higher than $57 during the month of August.
Later in the month, a student in France broke the export version of Netscape's Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) security system. The student, Damien Doligez, made use of 120 networked workstations and about a week of processing time to crack the code using a "brute force" method.
The export version Doligez cracked is a 40-bit version, which is less secure than the 120-bit encryption system used in the United States which is not available for export.
Netscape pointed out that Doligez had to use a lot of processing power to break the system: 64 MIPS-years (equivalent to a processor running one million instructions per second for 64 years). For anyone to break another message using the same technique, he or she would have to use another, equivalent amount of processing power. Netscape pointed out that it would be easier to compromise credit card transactions by rummaging for credit slips in garbage cans. The encryption scheme used in the United States, RC4-128, is 2^88 (2 raised to the 88th power) times harder to break.
Offered with Windows '95 is Microsoft's Internet Explorer, a Web browser with enhanced NCSA Mosaic technology licensed from Spyglass. The browser also has capabilities for RealAudio, a system for distributing sound over the Internet.
In addition to more than 1,000 Internet providers already in the game, AT&T and the former "baby bells" will offer Internet access services to homes and businesses.
The "big" telecommunications companies, still focused on voice-diddling to make money, are entering the Internet service game very late. But AT&T now offers WorldNet. Billed as "Internet for Everyone," the service provides a variety of options for businesses to integrate Internet communication into their business.
|This Issue /||Index /||CMC Studies Center /||Contact Us|


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The Conference Board of Canada unveils a comparison of food performance by province
The Ontario Chamber of Commerce has released a report on on how to grow the competitiveness of Ontario’s agri-food sector
Myth number-1: the fewer regulations the better.
Beef and cattle organizations have launched Canada’s National Beef Strategy, a report highlighting the challenges in the industry today and how to better position Canada in the world market
Gary Fread continues his look at implementing a Canadian food strategy
Gary Fread explains why attitude and leadership can sometimes act as barriers to competitiveness
According to Gary Fread, a transformation of the food industry must occur now
Gary Fread discusses why we need a national food strategy
Gary Fread considers why we need a national food strategy
What will it take to create a globally competitive, financially stable and sustainable Canadian food industry?
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