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Denver, CO. – March 7, 2022 – Omni Interactions (“Omni”), the premier managed services partner providing on-demand contact center solutions, today announced its business results for the full year 2021. Omni ended the year with 203.6% revenue growth year over year as more companies are leveraging their Gig Economy business model to access talent around the country. Omni recorded more revenue in Q4 2021 than its entire year of revenue in 2020. Revenue for the full year was $45.8 million and the company projects it will continue to grow by 40% or more in 2022. Omni supports its growth profitably with positive cash flow creating a strong partner for its clients.
“Even as staffing shortages impact traditional contact centers, workers continue to seek Gig opportunities that enable them to be their own boss by choosing where and when to work” said Christopher M. Carrington, CEO and Managing Partner of Omni Interactions. “This sense of ownership drives greater worker satisfaction and better results for the clients they serve through the Omniverse marketplace.” Omni’s sourcing engine processes many thousands of Gig applicants every week.
“Clients and prospects alike are seeking solutions to address the On-Demand reality of our economy,” said Greg Hopkins Executive Vice President and Managing Partner of Omni Interactions. “While technology provides alternative means to support the customer experience, the average American still appreciates the human connection to finding fast answers to their questions.”
The Outsourced Customer Engagement Market is estimated at $75 billion in 2020 and is expected to grow 5-7% annually between now and 2024, per a Baird research report from August 2021. “Demand for the Omniverse Marketplace continues to grow rapidly as companies are looking for customer experience solutions that offer On-Demand, highly flexible teams on an outsourced basis that can rapidly launch in days, not weeks or months,” said David Parkhurst, Chief Revenue Officer and Managing Partner of Omni Interactions.
About Omni Interactions
Founded in 2016, Omni Interactions (“Omni”) is the fastest-growing managed services provider of outsourced customer experience solutions leveraging the Gig Economy. Omni’s unique business model focuses on working and learning remotely, on-demand scalability and a 100% cloud-based technology platform to revolutionize the handling of omnichannel customer contacts and achieve higher quality outcomes at lower costs.
Omni is reimagining the virtual work from home business model by utilizing the burgeoning Gig Economy and shifting workforce engagement practices. By connecting communities of Gig workers with the nation’s leading brands, Omni delivers consistent, reliable customer experience solutions. Omni reunites the former leadership team of Alpine Access, the leader in cloud-based virtual customer experience solutions. For more information visit OmniInteractions.com.


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Millions of people are spending their lockdowns playing football, racing cars or shooting zombies — but those video games aren't all good, clean fun.
Game consoles are energy hogs and there are concerns about recycling them, but consoles aren't covered by the EU's Ecodesign Directive, which mandates that appliances such as washing machines have to meet specific environmental targets or else face infringement proceedings by national authorities.
Instead, the console giants — Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo — struck an updated voluntary agreement on March 31 on ecodesign requirements, obtained by POLITICO. Such deals are allowed under EU rules if they corral manufacturers with at least 80 percent market share.
Environmental and consumer groups don't think that's a good idea. “We fear that those voluntary agreements are sometimes overused by manufacturers as an excuse not to be regulated,” said Aline Maigret, ecodesign project coordinator for the Bureau of European Consumers (BEUC) and ANEC, the European consumer voice in standardization.
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She argued that mandatory requirements are more effective, saying voluntary deals are "not being taken seriously by manufacturers.”
The industry insists the voluntary deal is fine, and the Commission points out that the big three console-makers have had such an agreement in place since 2015. The EU executive says the deal helped save 41 terawatt hours of electricity over the lifecycle of the last generation of consoles.
The voluntary agreement "is setting rigorous energy efficiency targets for game consoles while committing its signatories to strive constantly for improved energy efficiency," a Microsoft spokesperson said in an emailed statement. "This approach is effective, agile and accountable in a sector with considerable speed of product innovation."
Sony and Nintendo did not respond to a request for comments.
But NGOs argue that the voluntary deal is a bad one, and that it sends a mixed message as it was signed just two weeks after the Commission announced its Circular Economy Action Plan, which includes measures to make electronics easier to repair and recycle.
“The commitments that are set at best reflect the status quo and they do not necessarily do a raise in the level of ambition," said Ernestas Oldyrevas, program manager at the European Environmental Citizens' Organisation for Standardisation (ECOS). He added that this "becomes especially problematic when we are discussing entirely new sets of commitments in relation to the Circular Economy Action Plan.”
Sales of games and consoles surged in Europe last month as strict confinement measures were put in place. Those consoles are getting more powerful and more efficient, but there are also simply more of them around, which means they consume more energy.
A study published last October and commissioned by the EU executive shows that the annual electricity consumption of all the Playstation 4s and Xbox Ones in Europe has gone up by a factor of 10 since 2013. It estimated that both consoles will use 6.65 TWh of electricity in 2020 — emitting as much CO2 as 580,000 cars over a year.
The nonbinding pledge commits the three console-makers to reducing power consumption, to encouraging repairs by making spare parts available to authorized repairers, to improving recycling by marking the composition of plastic parts and to better informing consumers about how to dispose of their consoles.
But for ECOS, the voluntary pledge is not in line with the circular economy plan's objectives. “The adoption of this voluntary initiative is in stark contrast to what has been outlined in the action plan,” Oldyrevas said. “It feels indeed like a major outlier in the overall picture.”
The voluntary agreement caps the power consumption of consoles at 60 watts for high-definition consoles and to 110 watts for ultra high-definition ones, but that's not enough to improve energy efficiency, Oldyrevas said.
"The voluntary agreement is just reinstating what is already the status quo," he said, adding that the commitments in the agreement have already been achieved by all consoles now on the market.
Oldyrevas also said the level of ambition on repairability is “significantly lagging behind” the Commission's promise to create a right to repair for consumers of electronic products. “There is no requirement on how long you will need to keep spare parts after the release of the console, [nor] the possibility of bringing your console to an independent repairer," he said.
According to minutes from a December consultation meeting of stakeholders, EU country representatives and the Commission — seen by POLITICO — Sony argued that "some of the basic spare parts for consoles are indeed available, but other parts like the power supply or the motherboard are proprietary and locked into encryption, and supplying these to third parties would risk piracy."
“We don’t see any commitments toward the replaceability of rechargeable batteries, no commitments on batteries' lifetime," said Maigret. But in the meeting, Sony argued there is "no evidence of battery failing in consoles, and therefore it is not worth the effort of making batteries replaceable."
The NGOs are also upset that the March 31 agreement, which goes into force in January, won't initially cover the newest generations of consoles expected in shops later this year.
The Commission explained at the December meeting that it felt it was "problematic" to set targets for products that are not yet on the market; the signatories replied they "are not in a position to discuss what energy requirements could look like for the next generation of consoles."
The agreement is expected to be revamped next year to take new consoles into account.
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THE fast food chain, McDonald's, was accused yesterday of deliberately hoodwinking customers and competitors by pretending it was first to declare voluntarily the ingredients of its foods.
The truth was very different, Stephen Gardner, former assistant attorney general of Texas, told the High Court.
He was appearing as a witness for Helen Steel, and David Morris, two unemployed environmentalists dubbed the McLibel 2, who are being sued for libel by McDonald's over a crudely printed leaflet they are alleged to have handed out in London called "What's Wrong with McDonald's". Its core allegation was that diets heavy in so -called junk foods like McDonald's had been scientifically linked with breast cancer and bowel and heart disease.
Asked whether McDonald's deserved any praise for being first to put ingredient and nutrition brochures in its shops, Mr Gardner, who was in charge of consumer protection for Texas, said: "McDonald's deserved nothing. Figuratively speaking they had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the fold."
Mr Gardner, now a law professor, told the court that the attorneys general of Texas, California and New York concluded in 1986 that McDonald's was among five big fast food chains which were violating federal law for failing to disclose the ingredients of their foods.
The chains were warned they faced court action, and four - Burger King, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Wendy's and Jack-in-the-Box - agreed to provide the information in brochures available at all branches.
But McDonald's held out until the following month when it issued a press statement launching its brochures, making no mention of legal pressure or industry-wide co-operation, the court heard. "They tried to represent that they were doing it all on their own," said Mr Gardner. "I conclude they intentionally deceived the attorneys general of Texas and California so they could intentionally deceive the people of our states that they voluntarily and unilaterally produced the brochure."
Less than a year later McDonald's was again in trouble for claiming in a US advertising campaign that their foods were "nutritious". The attorneys general demanded it be dropped. They said: "Our mutual conclusion is that this advertising campaign is deceptive. McDonald's food is, as a whole, not nutritious."
The trial continues.


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Tesco says all stores will "remain fully open throughout the weekend despite an ongoing unjustified strike" at 16 stores
Talks between the Mandate trade union and Tesco Ireland have been adjourned this evening 'without reaching a conclusion'.
Discussions between the two sides began before lunchtime at a hotel in Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin.
Strike action is currently underway at 16 Tesco stores around the country, in a row over proposed contract changes for workers who were employed before 1996.
Unions claim the supermarket is trying to force long-serving staff to accept poorer contracts.
Tesco, meanwhile, has argued that the terms of the contracts mean they have too many people working during the earlier, quieter times of the week.
In a statement tonight, Tesco said: "We reiterated today our concerns in relation to how Mandate’s actions are impacting our colleagues and its refusal to accept the Labour Court Recommendation.
"We believe that Mandate should have endorsed the outcome of the State industrial relations processes, which both Tesco and Mandate jointly agreed to utilise to resolve the pre-1996 changes."
Mandate - which represents more than 10,000 Tesco workers in Ireland - said: "Out of respect for the talks process Mandate Trade Union will not be making any further comment on the matter at this moment in time."
Next week, workers in a further 23 Tesco stores will be balloted to join the dispute.
Tesco Ireland says all their stores will remain fully open throughout the weekend.


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RAJSHAHI, May 17, 2018 (BSS) - Some indigenous varieties of mango including tasty Gopalbhog are going to appear in Rajshahi markets Monday on ending ban on harvesting of the seasonal delicious fruit.
Farmers, traders and others concerned are taking preparation to harvest the fruit. The popular summer fruit will be available in the local markets abundantly when all the varieties will appear in the markets.
Mango grower Mubarak Hossain of Charghat upazila told BSS that he expects a huge profit this year from his mango orchard.
A ban has been imposed on mango harvesting and marketing in the district till May 20 to give optimum time for natural ripening of the delicious seasonal fruit.
District administration has taken the decision after a fruitful discussion with farmers, traders and others concerned on May 9 last in order to prevent the artificially ripening of immature mango through mixing harmful chemicals.
Considering the time variation of ripening of different varieties of mango, the ban was imposed on harvesting Gopalbhog before May 20, Himsagar, Khirsapat and Lakhna before June 1, Langra before June 6, Amropaly and Fazli before June 16 and Ashwina before July 1.
Dev Dulal Dhali, Deputy Director of Department of Agriculture Extension, told BSS that most of the mangoes will become matured and ripen within the stipulated time and then those could be harvested normally.
He said the indigenous varieties of mangoes including Gopalbhog have started ripening. But the other delicious and famous varieties- Khirshapat and Langra need some more days to ripen. The mango growers and traders were kept in close observation and monitoring.
"Mangoes mixed with deadly chemicals such as carbide is extremely hazardous for human health. The chemical has a long-term affect on human body," Agriculturist Dhali said.
He said only 100 gram of calcium carbide can ripen nearly 100 kilogram of mangoes while the chemicals could cause deadly diseases like cancer, kidney and liver complications.
Meanwhile, the district administration is ensuring all requisite privileges and security to the farmers and the traders concerned.
Monitoring committee has been formed to oversee enforcement of the decision.
Deputy Commissioner Abdul Kader said formalin-mixed mango is harmful for the public health. So, in addition to the field-level strict surveillance, mango harvesting and marketing has been banned till May 20.
He said drastic action will be taken against those who will be found guilty of violating the ban. The truck-bus owners associations were also asked to refrain from mango loading, unloading and transporting during the restricted period.
Mango is the leading seasonal cash crop of the country's northwest region and dominates the economy in the two districts famous for the delicious fruit.
Kader added there are about 30 lakh mango trees of different ages and varieties on some 32,816 hectares in the region. Number of new mango orchards and mango farming in the homesteads increased in recent years. So, promotion of best practices in the harvesting and marketing is necessary.


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|Emitents||Grindeks, AS (5299006DWR32NKWM1O86)|
|Veids||2.2. Iekšējā informācija|
In the first quarter of 2020 “Grindeks” profit grew by 43.6%
Today, on 30 May, the JSC “Grindeks” submitted the non-audited consolidated financial statements of the first quarter of 2019 to Nasdaq Riga. Non-audited financial results indicate that Group’s turnover of the first quarter of 2020 reached 43.3 million euro, which is by 13.2 million euro or 43.6% more, then in the first quarter of 2019. In the first quarter of 2020, the Group’s profit, attributable to shareholders of the parent company was 0.8 million euro and has decreased by 2.6 million euro or 77% in comparison to the first quarter of 2019.
The decrease in profit in the first quarter of 2020 can be explained by the sharp increase in logistic costs and the depreciation of the Russian ruble. In April 2020, there was a positive trend towards a gradual normalization of the Russian ruble, and the results of the four months of this year show that most of the losses caused by depreciation of the ruble has already been recovered.
In the first quarter of 2020, the Group exported products to 63 countries around the world for a total of 40.3 million euro, which is by 12.4 million euro or 45% more than in the first quarter of 2019.
JSC „Grindeks” Chairman of the Board Ph.D. Juris Hmelnickis: “The first quarter of this year has passed in much more difficult conditions, than usual. The global emergency and measures applied to limit the spread of the Covid-19 virus have contributed to drastic changes in the business environment, including the pharmaceutical sector. There were even days when the situation changed almost every minute and decisions had to be made very quickly. Satisfaction with the work done is great - the “Grindeks” Group was able to operate successfully, respond quickly to the growing demand and significantly increase turnover.”
Sales volume of the final dosage forms in the first quarter of 2020 was 40.1 million euro and has increased by 12.5 million euro or 46%, in comparison to the first quarter of 2019. In the first quarter of 2020 sales in Russia, other CIS countries and Georgia reached 21.6 million euro, which is by 7.1 million euro or 49% more than in the first quarter of 2019. Compared to the first quarter of 2019, sales in Russia and Turkmenistan have doubled. In the first quarter of 2020 the biggest increase in sales volume has been reached in Georgia (64%), Kazakhstan (13%) and Uzbekistan (7%).
Sales volume of the final dosage forms in the EU countries, Great Britain and Norway in the first quarter of 2020 reached 17.7 million euro, which is by 5.7 million euro or 48% more than in the first quarter of 2019. In comparison to the 2019, in the first quarter of 2020 sales volumes also increased in Denmark (8 times), the Czech Republic (5 times), the Netherlands and Finland (2 times), Hungary (83%), Estonia (40%) and the United Kingdom (39%).
In the first quarter of 2020 sales volume of active pharmaceutical ingredients reached 3.0 million euro, which is by 0.4 million euro or 17% more than in the first quarter of 2019. The largest export countries of “Grindeks” active pharmaceutical ingredients during the reporting period were the EU countries, the USA, Australia and Singapore. In the first quarter of 2020 the most demanded active pharmaceutical ingredients of “Grindeks” were pimobendan, oxytocin and atipamezole.
The subsidiary of “Grindeks” JSC “Kalceks”, which specializes in medicines for the hospital segment, achieved a rapid increase in sales in the first quarter of 2020. Sales volumes of JSC “Kalceks” during the first quarter of 2020 reached 8.5 million euro, which is by 6.5 million euro or 4 times more than in the first quarter of 2019. JSC “Kalceks” main sales markets were Belgium, Italy, the Czech Republic, Denmark and Germany.
“Grindeks” is an international pharmaceutical company focused on research, development, manufacturing and sales of original products, generics and active pharmaceutical ingredients. The Group of “Grindeks” has four subsidiary companies in Latvia, Estonia, and Slovakia as well as representative offices in 11 countries.
“Grindeks” specializes in the heart and cardiovascular, CNS, anti-cancer and anti-diabetes medicines. A range of products covers a combination of original products Mildronate® (meldonium*) and Ftorafur®, generics and active pharmaceutical ingredients.
In 2019, products of the company were exported to 84 countries. The most important export markets of "Grindeks" are the EU countries, Russia and other CIS countries, the USA, Canada and Japan.
Head of the Communications Department, JSC “Grindeks”
Phones: (+371) 67083370, (+371) 29256012
Fax: (+371) 67083505


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The deployment is expected to enable China Unicom to offer high-speed mobile data services
Huawei Technologies, a provider of next-generation telecommunication services, has deployed first UMTS commercial network for China Unicom in Zhengzhou, Henan province, China.
According to Huawei, the deployment is expected to enable China Unicom to offer high-speed mobile data services, such as high-speed mobile internet and other advanced multimedia services for its end-users.
In China Unicom’s phase one UMTS tender, Huawei was awarded market share of over 30% based on number of transceiver to be deployed. In February 2009, Huawei connected China Unicom’s first UMTS video call across 20 cites and expects to complete deployment of China Unicom’s entire UMTS network, which includes cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, in April 2009.
Wan Biao, president of wireless product line at Huawei, said: It is a milestone in our cooperation with China Unicom. Based on the rich UMTS network deployment experience, we are confident to help China Unicom quickly deploy high-quality UMTS/HSPA networks across China. Huawei is committed to working closely with operators in the development of mobile broadband solutions and through such collaboration deliver business success for our customers.


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Our industry needs to let our legislatures know how important Right to Repair is for consumers — and us
Editor’s note: Paul E. Grech owned the former San Franciso shop, Allied Engine & Auto Repair, before retiring. In this column series, Grech shares his experiences as a shop owner.
The Automotive Service Association (ASA) is leading an effort to make sure we have access to the information that we need to work on our customers’ vehicles through Right to Repair legislation. We went through this before in 1994 when I was asked to try to get some publicity on this by the director of Automotive Service Councils of California, John Goodman.
I always tell people that I never had to go look for opportunity, opportunity always came knocking on my door. As it happened, the very next day there was a news article on how not to get taken for a ride when getting a appliance repaired. I called the reporter and told him about how car manufacturers wanted to deny us access to repair information. Why did I care, he asked?
It isn’t about David and Goliath.
It’s about the consumer having a place to go for service and repair other than a dealership — which is us, the aftermarket auto repair industry. Well, the news truck was at my shop in a half hour and we got the front page of the San Francisco Chronicle that year in 1994.
Shortly thereafter, the manufacturers decided to let us have the access. I am bringing this up because the fight still remains today.
Here are a few examples of how it hurts the consumer.
• A buddy of mine had a no-start one morning, took it to a dealer and was told it was $7,500 just to diagnose it. Talk about sticker shock. The next day he took to an independent garage and got it fixed for $75. The problem? Clogged fuel injectors.
• In a recent online video, the owner of a very high-end European sports car had noise in the rear brakes and took it to a dealer. The service advisor said he needed new brakes and quoted price for new pads and rotors that was $16,000 (not a typo error). He declined the estimate and decided he was going to do the work himself. He ordered the parts, started to do the job and discovered his brakes were just fine — but the heads of the bolts that held the rotors to the axle flange had broken off, causing the noise.
• In 1982 I bought a 1980 Ford station wagon with an extended, mandated emission warranty. So, I took it to the dealer wearing my overalls and instead got a $1,200 estimate. I left. I had just signed up for a new diagnostic repair service and, for $35 phone call, was told a $10 part and an hour of labor would do the trick.
Those stories are perfect examples of why the consumer needs a place to go to for a second opinion, and the need for the industry to let our legislatures know how important Right to Repair is for us and consumers.
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But all eyes are now on China. Since China was the first to get the epidemic and the first to emerge out of it, conditions there will reflect what will happen to the rest of the world a few months later, so goes the argument. China’s PMI for March, however, shows no V-shaped recovery, but rather a stabilisation around the February levels. We considered the lessons for India from China’s stimulus measures and the impact on supply chains in India now that the Chinese economy is recovering. … [Read more...] about Moneycontrol Pro weekender | Will April be the cruellest month?
Where are rallies planned this weekend
As a result, Naif’s population density is very high and labour managers allegedly cramp too many people into one room. This could have aided the disease spread more rapidly, given it is highly contagious. Scores of people returned from Naif to India early March, before the temporary travel ban was imposed. … [Read more...] about Coronavirus pandemic | 70% of COVID-19 patients in Kerala have Dubai links
"The aim to become a USD 5 trillion economy is not easy, but it is not unachievable. India took 70 years to reach the USD 3 trillion mark but no one asked any questions about it. It is better to set difficult goals and work hard to achieve those than remain directionless," the prime minister said. … [Read more...] about Pay taxes for India’s development; tax harassment will be thing of past: PM Modi
In a way, the phone’s inadequacies during the 1918 pandemic only underscored what a marvel it was. “Less than forty years ago the telephone was an amusing toy, and not for twenty years after that did it cease to be the luxury of the rich,” wrote The New York Times, in an editorial urging readers to make calls only when absolutely necessary. “Now it is become an invaluable implement in daily use, direct or indirect, by all except a small part of our population. Now, nobody can understand how we lived without it, and its value is [certainly] inestimable.” … [Read more...] about How the telephone failed its big test during 1918’s Spanish flu pandemic
The company has been working to open additional data centers in Ireland for its cloud unit Amazon Web Services (AWS). That plan is now at risk, the notes said, and Amazon has floated the idea of offering preventive health measures to those handling construction. … [Read more...] about Coronavirus pandemic | Amazon to delay Prime Day event due to coronavirus, outlines cloud risks


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Worldwide air cargo volumes remained flat in January, reflecting the first month there was no year-on-year drop since the start of the pandemic (and even way before that), according to WorldACD’s latest report.
Worldwide rates per kilogram were 75 percent higher year on year, but dropped 8 percent lower than those recorded in December. Load factors in January slipped 2 percent points from the previous month but up 17 percentage points from January 2020, as capacity dropped 28 26 percentage points, sans integrators. The load factors on wide-body freighters gained 7 percentage points year on year, whilst wide-body passenger aircraft booked an increase of 22 percentage points.
Asia Pacific, the region considered to have recovered quickest from the pandemic, saw the top performers in January, up 12 percent year on year for outgoing volumes and 14 percent for incoming.
Vietnam and Japan each increased their outgoing volumes by more than 30 percent, closely followed by Taiwan, up 25 percent.
Outside Asia, only the United States managed to improve its performance as an air cargo origin (up 3 percent year on year), with the Midwest driving growth (up 13 percent). For the North American market, incoming shipments from Europe showed the highest year-on-year rate increase amongst all major markets at 147 percent.
Express cargo, high tech components and general cargo were the product categories showing year-on-year volume increase, with express shipments up 40 percent. In terms of changes in dollar rates, rates for flower shipments were up 18 percent for flowers, whilst rates for general cargo jumped 83 percent.
Ahead of the Chinese Lunar year, WorldACD noted that the first two weeks of February saw both volumes and capacity decrease, particularly from Asia Pacific, whilst rates continue the uptrend that started in the last part of January.


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The owner of the popular eatery Tian Tian Hainanese Chicken Rice said he would stop serving chicken dishes if it could not get fresh supplies. He vowed to “bring back dishes like fried tofu, fried pork chop and prawn salad, but we will not use frozen chicken”.
The Malaysian prime minister, Ismail Sabri Yaakob, announced last week that the country would block exports of 3.6 million chickens a month from 1 June to stabilise supply at home. The ban is expected to lead to price increases and shortages in Singapore, which relies upon Malaysia for a third of its poultry imports.
On Tuesday, queues formed outside popular food stalls as the public rushed to buy dishes before the ban was imposed, while local media reported that some supermarkets and wet markets had sold out of chicken.
Daniel Tan, the owner of a chain of seven stalls called OK Chicken Rice, told Reuters that Malaysia’s ban would be “catastrophic” for vendors.
“The ban would mean we are no longer able to sell. It’s like McDonald’s with no burgers,” he said.
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A Scottish brewing company said its Christmas beer gets an extra touch of holiday cheer from the tips of spruce trees.
The Williams Brothers Brewing Co. in Alloa said the Nollaig Festive Ale, which includes the tips of needles from spruce trees, is based on a Viking recipe and all 800 bottles made this year have sold out, The Scotsman reported Wednesday.
The company said production of the $20-per-bottle beer will be boosted to 10,000 bottles next year due to the popularity of the beverage.
Brewery Chairman Scott Williams said the ale uses the tips of spruce tree needles picked before the start of brewing in April.
"It's used as a spice," Williams said. "Imagine you're making a stew and the malted barley is the meat and gravy, the spicing usually from the hops. Here it's the hops and the spruce. It goes into the boil and all the resins and flavors are extracted from the tips which are then fermented.
"So you have a malty, sweet characteristic from the barley, while the spruce is perfumey, but also quite resiny, so that adds feel to it, and the hops are bitter. The idea is that you get all three ingredients working in balance."


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Julia Stewart, chair and CEO of Applebee’s and IHOP parent DineEquity Inc., was named Operator of the Year at the 2015 MUFSO conference on Monday.
A 40-year veteran of the restaurant industry, Stewart started out as a server at IHOP when she was 15. She now helms a franchise operation that includes more than 3,600 restaurants globally under the Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill & Bar and IHOP brand banners, representing nearly $8 billion in sales.
The Operator of the Year is voted upon by the readers of Nations Restaurant News. Stewart was among five Golden Chain winners this year, including Peggy Cherng, co-founder and co-CEO of Panda Restaurant Group; John Gainor, president and CEO of International Dairy Queen; John Miller, president and CEO of Denny’s. Corp.; and Charlie Morrison, CEO of Wingstop Restaurants Inc.
This is Stewart’s second year receiving a Golden Chain award. She was also a winner in 2004 as president and CEO of IHOP.
Stewart described leadership as an “honor and a privilege,” crediting the “magic” in her career to “being able to do what I love to do and working with these incredible, incredible people.”
Her love affair with the restaurant industry began when she was working for an IHOP franchisee in San Diego at age 15, though she joked, “I’m supposed to say I was 16 because I think 15 was illegal.”
She continued working for restaurants while in college and found she loved the daily feedback, “the good and the bad, and telling us how we could do a better job and guests talking to us every day about what they loved and didn’t love,” she said. “I fell in love. I’ve never wanted to do anything else but be in the restaurant business.”
Earlier in her career, Stewart held executive positions with Taco Bell, Burger King, Carl’s Jr., Black Angus and Spoons Grill & Bar. In the late 1990s, she served as president of Applebee’s International Inc., growing that brand from 1,000 to nearly 1,400 units, creating the nation’s largest casual-dining chain.
In 2001, she was named president and chief operating officer of IHOP Corp., rising to the role of CEO in 2002.
Five years later, however, she was back at Applebee’s — this time with a $2.1 billion deal to acquire the casual-dining chain. Naming the newly formed company DineEquity Inc., based in Glendale, Calif., Stewart set out to transform Applebee’s into an all-franchised brand with an asset-light model, like IHOP. Applebee’s achieved this goal earlier this year.
Stewart was interviewed by Aylwin Lewis, CEO of Chicago-based Potbelly Corp. and 2014 Golden Chain Award winner.
Both IHOP and Applebee’s are market leaders in their respective segments. According to NRN’s Top 100 census, Applebee’s was the No. 1 casual-dining chain in fiscal 2014 with $4.6 billion in U.S. sales. IHOP topped the family-dining category in 2014 with U.S. sales of $2.9 billion.
Stewart has led an ongoing revitalization of both brands.
IHOP’s domestic systemwide same-store sales increased 3.9 percent in 2014, the strongest annual results in ten years. For its June 30-ended second quarter this year, IHOP’s domestic same-store sales increased 6.2 percent, the strongest quarterly results in a decade.
Applebee’s second-quarter domestic same-store sales climbed a more modest 1 percent, and the company is working to apply some of the same strategies at Applebee’s that helped build momentum at IHOP, including improving the food and menu, honing the guest experience and marketing.
As Operator of the Year, Stewart joins a distinguished hall of fame dating back to 1971 that includes Buffalo Wild Wings Inc. CEO Sally Smith; Firehouse Subs CEO Don Fox and last year’s winner, W. Kent Taylor, CEO and founder of Texas Roadhouse.
The MUFSO Premier sponsor is The Coca Cola Company.
Presenting sponsors are: Dinova, Fishbowl, The Beef Checkoff and The Coca Cola Company
Keynotes/general sessions are presented by: Avocados from Mexico, e*Restaurant from Altametrics and the Texas Restaurant Association.
Pillar sponsors include: Heinz Soups, Sweet Street Desserts and Tyson Foodservice (Culinary); Ventura Foods (Entrepreneur); Smithfield Farmland Foodservice Group (Ideas); and Paytronix (Marketing).
The Monday night awards reception and awards presentation are sponsored by: Avocados from Mexico.
Coca Cola presents the Shake, Sparkle & Stir event, and Texas Pete® are sponsoring the MUFSO Kitchen Hero Cook Off, benefiting Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry Campaign.
Hot Concept/Best Concepts Celebration is sponsored by e*Restaurant from Altametrics.
MUFSO Breakfast sponsors are Community Coffee, Ole Mexican Foods and TABASCO®.
MUFSO Room Key is sponsored by Arby’s; Badge Holder Necklace is sponsored by Service Management Group.
Welcome Package is sponsored by Whirley-DrinkWorks!
Refreshment breaks are sponsored by Emmi Roth USA, Royal Cup Coffee, Saputo Cheese USA and Wrigley Foodservice.


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FOCUS: France Upsets Apple's iPhone Party In Europe
Published on: 7th Nov 2007
Note -- this news article is more than a year old.
PARIS (Dow Jones) As Apple and European mobile operators get ready for the launch of the long awaited iPhone on Friday, in France the party has been pushed back and the sheen taken off Apple's normally slick marketing efforts.
After France Telecom's Orange brand and Apple made a meal out of unveiling Orange as the chosen distributor in France, doubt lingers over just how much exclusivity Orange will have over the sought-after handset, due to French consumer law.
The situation threatens to scupper Apple's fiercely defended business model of distributing the iPhone through one operator exclusively. It could also gnaw at iPhone revenue for France Telecom and Apple while potentially benefitting other operators and phone distributors.
In the UK and Germany, the two other European markets where the iPhone will go on sale this autumn, operators are primed to launch the phone on Friday with all the showbiz panache associated with Apple products. But it won't be officially launched in France until Nov. 29.
Carolina Milanesi, an analyst at Gartner Research believes that the iPhone will be "one of the most wanted consumer electronics products for Christmas."
Some French consumers have avoided the wait, though, after a Web site started selling unlocked iPhones tied to contracts with rival operators Bouygues Telecom, the telecom division of Bouygues, and Virgin Mobile.
Following legal threats from Apple, the website phoneandphone.com, has agreed to hold off selling the phone until "it comes on to the European market."
A spokesman for phoneandphone.com said it planned to continue selling phones tied to contracts with other operators.
The episode suggests Apple, already battling to thwart the spread of unlocked handsets, and Orange will have to fight to keep the iPhone exclusive in France where the law forbids the sale of a product linked exclusively to a particular service with an operator.
The exclusive operator system is something Apple has made a central plank of its business model for the iPhone.
Apple recently tried to stamp out the proliferation of unlocked iPhones by restricting sales in the U.S. to two per person and demanding that customers pay for them by card, not cash. In the U.S., iPhones are sold exclusively locked to AT&T's mobile network, but hackers have consistently found ways through Apple's defenses.
Phoneandphone.com managed to procure unlocked iPhones from "an import network" in France while obtaining Bouygues and Virgin contracts from wholesalers, the Web site's spokesman said.
Once the phones go on sale officially in France on Nov. 29, customers will be able to buy them for EUR399 locked to an Orange contract, or for a higher, yet to be specified, price unlocked and without a contract. France is the only country where unlocked phones will be sold, providing a fresh source for those wishing to sell them on.
Customers who put SIM cards from Orange's rivals into an unlocked iPhone run the risk of not being able to use all of its features, including the iTunes music player.
The phoneandphone.com spokesman said the iPhones the company had been selling were fully functional, but admitted that software upgrades from Apple could turn the phones into bricks. Phoneandphone.com offers to fix customers' immobilized phones, he said.
Apple did not respond to requests for information about the situation, but an Orange spokesman said the company was ready to take any legal action necessary to defend its exclusivity.
Its lawyers may have plenty of work ahead of them. Matthieu Cordelier, a Paris-based lawyer specializing in intellectual property law, said Apple and Orange "cannot legitimately limit the distribution of a product - in this case the iPhone - through a system of linked sale, benefitting a sole national distributor for a defined geographic region."
"Parasitic" sales of the iPhone by smaller distributors like phoneandphone.com should nonetheless initially remain "marginal" compared to those of Orange, said Gontran Filer, a consultant for Idate. A spokesman for phoneandphone.com declined to say how many iPhones the company had sold before withdrawing them from sale.
Elsewhere in Europe, life looks simpler for Apple. In the UK and Germany, where Telefonica's O2 and Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile respectively have the exclusive rights to the iPhone, analysts expect to see much of the fanfare witnessed when the iPhone launched in the United States on June 29.
O2, Apple, and Carphone Warehouse Group, Europe's largest mobile retailer, will open more than 1,300 stores across the U.K. Friday to queues of shoppers for late night trading starting at 6:02pm. Carphone Warehouse, which is selling the phones on behalf of O2, expects to sell around 10,000 phones in its first night of trading.
O2's U.K. Chief Executive Matthew Key forecasts "a couple of hundred thousand" phones will be sold over the Christmas and New Year trading period, making it the biggest seller in its stores during that time.
"The 200,000 number O2 referred to as a target market is quite safe. We think 350,000 iPhones could be sold in the first two months," Gartner's Milanesi said.
Forrester analyst Pete Nuthall agrees that O2's sales figures are achievable, with demand perhaps higher. "It's a hugely powerful device in terms of its user experience compared with other mobile phones," he said.
However, Nuthall adds that O2 will need to avoid a couple of stumbling blocks if it is to achieve the strong sales AT&T witnessed in the U.S.
"The question is whether O2 can control the supply chain to satisfy customer demand. There's been horror stories in the past of operators not being able to get hold of enough of their top selling phones to meet Christmas demand," he said.
O2 say they have ordered hundreds of thousands of phones in line with forecasts and are controlling the distribution channel on behalf of both O2 and Carphone Warehouse.
In Germany, eager customers will be able to get their hands on iPhones at 12:01am Friday when Deutsche Telekom's shop in Cologne opens its doors.
European iPhone operators also face greater competition from rival device makers, says Nuthall. Finnish mobile phone giant Nokia is launching upgraded Nokia N95 and N81 music phones, both with 8 gigabytes of memory, to take on the iPhone. It has also launched Nokia MusicStore to rival Apple's iTunes online music service.
Sony Ericsson has also launched a number of high-quality Walkman music phones, with rival functionality to the iPhone. On Tuesday, it outlined plans for its own Internet music portal and launched three new handsets.
Whereas AT&T had a clear run in the music device segment in the U.S., O2 also potentially faces competition from Apple itself, which now offers overlapping products.
Since the iPhone's release in the U.S., Apple has launched its iPod Touch, which carries all the functionality of the iPhone minus voice and text capabilities. "If you're attracted to the functionality of the iPhone but don't want to pay so much for a phone, you may go for the iTouch," Nuthall said.
In France, Orange's closest rival in the French mobile market SFR, jointly owned by Vivendi and Vodafone Group, Tuesday launched its own riposte to the iPhone, unveiling a new range of tariffs allowing customers unlimited use of the Internet via their mobile phones.
By Jethro Mullen and Daniel Thomas, Dow Jones Newswires; 33 1 4017 1738; firstname.lastname@example.org
(Stefan Mechnig in Dusseldorf contributed to this article)
(END) Dow Jones NewswiresÂ$page_length='long'; ?>


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The question of whether a cocktail would hold up for hours — or even days — is not something that Jared Sadoian ever gave much thought to over his decade of bartending, which includes stints behind some of Boston’s most illustrious bars, including the ones at Eastern Standard and the Hawthorne, where he was general manager. A drink’s appearance, temperature, and flavor at the moment he puts it in front of a guest are of utmost concern. But with the long-awaited passage of House Bill 4856, an amendment that allows bars and restaurants in Massachusetts to sell mixed drinks to-go, considerations have changed. Drastically.
“At the bar, we have total control. We deliver a product to a guest that’s made in the moment. It’s perfect at that moment and we know they’re gonna drink it then. But now we’re at the point where we let the thing go,” said Sadoian, now general manager at Craigie on Main. “People get to choose their own destiny with the cocktail. Will they drink it the way we intend? Put it on ice? Add soda water for some reason? We’re trying to make versatile drinks that stand up on their own, but they can also be messed with and adulterated and still taste good.”
To that end he came up with the Summer Rosa, a simple mix of blanco tequila, hibiscus tea lemonade, and Angostura bitters that delivers flavors that pop no matter how it’s twisted or stretched, be it over ice, diluted with seltzer, or served neat.
The bill was proposed to help the bar and restaurant industry, which has suffered dramatically since Governor Charlie Baker ordered the state shutdown in mid-March. Now, as businesses scramble to stay afloat, selling cocktails from a storefront can provide a revenue trickle that might bolster the bottom line. Sales of beer and wine with takeout and delivery orders have been allowed since April. The effort to legalize to-go cocktails took root around the same time and was largely spearheaded by Jackson Cannon, bar director at Eastern Standard since its opening in 2005 and, later, the Hawthorne. He also consults. He created a #cocktailsforcommonwealth social media campaign. Today bars are using the hashtag to promote their drinks.
The bill faced a number of obstacles in the legislative process, mainly resistance from the Massachusetts Package Store Association, which said bars’ and restaurants’ mixed-drink sales would cut into stores’ revenue. But on July 20, Baker signed the bill into law, and homebound tipplers put down their “quarantinis,” masked up, and stepped out.
Bartenders like Sadoian in and around Boston have been working to engineer cocktails for this unusual scenario. At Trina’s Starlite Lounge in Somerville, Josh Childs, a partner who’s been in the bar business since 1997 when he opened Silvertone across from Boston Common, is selling carbonated cocktails like a raspberry fizz. He seals the six-ounce bottles with caps lined with an oxygen-absorbing material, a technology common to the beer industry. He also cleverly modified the Bee’s Knees, a classic recipe of gin, lemon juice, and honey syrup that calls for shaking with ice, which dilutes the cocktail. But to keep things low-maintenance, Childs adds a small measure of water to simulate the ice-melt, so all you need to do at home is quickly shake the bottle, pour it over ice, and indulge.
Little did Sebastian Canas know months ago when he installed a draft line at the Mariel Underground that he would be positioning his staff to seamlessly pivot to takeout. According to Canas, beverage director at the nightclub/restaurant hybrid, the club could churn out more than 2,000 mojitos in a night, thanks to pre-batching and kegging the drinks, then pouring them from a draft line. A mint simple syrup stands in for fresh mint, and pressurizing the drink with CO2 preserves the perishable lime juice, all of which makes it ideal for takeaway.
But the mechanics of cocktail-making are only part of this pandemic-era experiment. Any bartender worth her weight in brandy-soaked cherries will tell you that what people really want when they hunker down at a bar is the experience, the setting, the banter, and the theater of it.
Some bars have figured out how to provide a flicker of personality, a clever wink to remind you you’re getting a handmade item, not a bottled commodity grabbed off a shelf.
At Trina’s, Childs spends about 45 minutes a day drawing little bumblebees on the cap of each four-ounce bottle of Bee’s Knees. Call it a message on a bottle.
“It’s nice to be able to be doing something creative and let a guest take a piece of what they love about an establishment with them,” says Childs. “It’s grounding. We can show there’s personal contact, even if it’s not live contact at a bar.”
At the tequila-focused Citrus & Salt, managing partner Colleen Hagerty is offering several flavors of the restaurant’s signature frozen margaritas, but with a bit more spectacle. The 16-ounce drinks are served in a kitschy plastic container shaped as a palm tree or bikini-clad glamour gal. But if you lean toward function over form, opt for the cocktails packaged in CapriSun-like pouches.
If there is a silver lining to any of this, it’s increased access. Consider the renowned high-end restaurant Uni. Now you don’t have to wait for a seat at the small, intimate bar to try their imaginative drinks, which bar manager Amanda Saladino creates with ingredients the chef passes along to her.
“By all indications, to-go cocktails seem [to be] popularly received by people,” says Cannon. “It’s great to see extra revenue stream for local establishments, but the most important thing about a bar is that it’s a place to come together. Since that’s something we can’t do right now, it’s a way to support them so they’ll still be there when they can.”
Like late-night television hosts adapting to doing comedy without an audience, bartenders are finding solace knowing that they’re providing a pleasurable diversion, even if they don’t have the instant gratification of a reaction.
“I never thought that putting plastic containers of food in a bag and handing them to people over a table was going to be refreshing or soul-filling. But it is,” said Sadoian. “We went several months without being able to offer hospitality to our friends, family, and strangers. Service and hospitality are paramount, but it’s also important for me to scratch that creative itch. This is a chance to draw that line and start to play. And at the same time see same gratification from guests. They’re taking what we’re giving them and the response is delayed, but still there.”


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September 8, 2003 |
MUMBAI: Dabur has valued its oral care brand Binaca at a floor price of Rs 20 crore. The company, which took a decision to sell the brand early this year, has now appointed PriceWaterhouseCoopers to look for a buyer. It seems a few companies have shown interest in the brand including Anchor Health, makers of Anchor Toothpaste, and talks between the two are at a preliminary stage. Sources said if the deal goes through, Anchor will be able to fill the gap in the premium category.
June 26, 2009 |
NEW DELHI: The Rs 2,800-crore Dabur India is set to turn skin-care brand Fem into its fifth flagship brand. The company already has four flagship brands -- Dabur as the master brand for natural healthcare products, Vatika for premium personal care, Hajmola for digestives and Real for fruit-based beverages. Speaking to ET post the complete acquisition of Fem Care Pharma on Thursday, the company's CEO Sunil Duggal told ET: "With Fem's acquisition, we have become the second biggest skin-care company in the country.
May 11, 2007 |
GURGAON: Dabur India has decided to put its Promise oral care brand on the back burner in the absence of a distinct identity two years after it acquired the brand along with six others from Balsara Home Products for Rs 143 crore. Dabur's original plan to relaunch Promise on a national level has been shelved, even as the other acquired Balsara brands such as Babool, Meswak, Odonil, Odomos, Odopic and Sanifresh have been allocated individual investments for growth. "We have decided to keep Promise in float mode.
March 9, 2005 |
NEW DELHI: Post-acquisition, Dabur is planning to merge the three Balsara companies into one. This unified company will be a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dabur. The acquired brands will be housed in this subsidiary and distributed by Dabur. This is being done to draw a distinction between Dabur's herbal origin and Balsara's chemical products. So, all Balsara brands ? Odonil, Odomos, Odopic, Sanifresh, Promise, Babool and Meswak ? will be manufactured by the subsidiary and marketed by Dabur.
April 26, 2007 |
NEW DELHI: It's a David-versus-Goliath story yet again. Dabur India's big-ticket acquisition of Balsara brands two years ago has begun showing results, with the homegrown FMCG company's oral care basket growing faster than its well-entrenched MNC rivals Colgate and Hindustan Lever Ltd. AC Nielsen data for the April 2006 - March 2007 period indicates that Dabur's kitty of oral care brands (Babool, Meswak and Lal Paste) have beaten market leader Colgate, followed by Hindustan Lever Ltd's (HLL)
February 25, 2006 |
RUDRAPUR: After local muscle, it's global footprint time for home-grown FMCG major Dabur India. The company plans to scale up and consolidate operations in Russia and central Asia and is even exploring the possibility of setting up a manufacturing facility in Russia. The company's Russia operations will initially focus on toothpastes, a segment in which Dabur India consolidated its position significantly after the Balsara acquisition last month. The company now has oral care brands such as Promise, Babool and Meswak in its fold.
February 15, 2013 |
MUMBAI: Consumers have taken a fancy for flavoured toothpastes that promise extra benefits at a premium, helping such value-added products outsell basic white toothpaste in value for the first time last year. Active salt, cooling crystals, lemon, menthol and neem are among tens of specialized flavours and colours that helped the Rs 4,000-crore Indian oral care segment grow 19.6 per cent, its fastest rate in more than a decade, in 2012, industry officials said, quoting Nielsen numbers.
May 19, 2010 |
NEW DELHI: Hindustan Unilever has roped in Shah Rukh Khan to promote its flagship oral care brand Pepsodent that has been losing marketshare to rival Colgate, and even smaller brands like Babool and Anchor. This will be Khan's second association with HUL ? he endorsed Lux soaps ? and the first time that the company had to bring in a celebrity to endorse flagship Pepsodent. The campaign will launch in a few days and, according to HUL, what clinched the deal for Shahrukh is 'his superstar and devoted dad' image.
August 6, 2013 |
MUMBAI/NEW DELHI: Sameer Suneja, former India head of Perfetti Van Melle, is poised to become the global CEO of the 2,245-million Italian sugar confectionery maker, making him perhaps the first non-Italian to head the privately held firm. Suneja, 41, will take over his new role on October 1, becoming the third Indian to head a global consumer company after PepsiCo's Indra Nooyi and Reckitt Benckiser's Rakesh Kapoor. Anna Re, corporate communications official at Perfetti Van Melle SpA (PVM)
May 7, 2003 |
MUMBAI: In a recent move, Hindustan Lever has changed the pricing of its Pepsodent and Close-up brands, which has resulted in prices coming down. Colgate, in turn, has reacted by dropping prices of its Colgate Dental Cream, Colgate Herbal and Gel brands. HLL has discontinued its 200gm Pepsodent pack, priced at Rs 54, and instead launched an 80gm pack at Rs 20 and a 175gm pack at Rs 40. The company has reduced the prices of its 150 gm Close-up pack from Rs 50 to RS 42 and has launched an 80 gm pack at Rs 25 and a 40 gm pack at Rs 12.50.


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Consumers must stop accepting second best
Yesterday was World Consumer Rights Day, a reminder that when it comes to buying goods and services, standards, regulations and disclosure need to improve. But we also need to realise that some of the work to get those better standards needs to be done by consumers themselves.
If Australians are to be savvy and active consumers, they cannot rely on government or responsible businesses to do all the hard work.
I have now lived in Australia for more than a year and am amazed by the possibilities this land has to offer. But on the downside, and most surprising to me as a Briton, are the higher prices, lower quality and a general acceptance by companies and consumers alike that second best is good enough.
Perhaps worse, there is a widely held view, promoted by those companies with most to hide, that second-best is a price we pay for being Australian. Not so.
We need to change the Australian consumer culture. When I started saying this as chief executive of Choice, I worried this might go down badly. But it seems to have tapped into something; those observations have won much support.
The challenge is to turn that support into a movement for change that improves our everyday interactions with companies and government.
Among the responses from consumers came Ray from Perth. Originally from California, he told me how traders and retailers in the United States seemed eager for a sale, but in Western Australia they barely bothered to turn and face their customer. Ray gives constructive and frank feedback wherever he goes. One restaurant has even banned him for his efforts.
Jackie from Melbourne told me she got frustrated when she entered a store and the sales staff only served her when they had completed their conversation about what happened at the pub last night. John from Sydney said he got fed up feeling like a villain when he took back a faulty item. Somehow, through innuendo, he was made to feel like the problem, rather than the product.
We can live with a bit of bad service here and there, but when things go wrong in a hospital, it is life and death. Robert, also from Sydney, told me his father died in hospital, and how he was made to feel like a criminal for seeking answers to wrongdoing that seemed to be brushed under the carpet.
A national consumer culture needs fair play and fair rules. We need to balance the positive Australian outlook with higher consumer expectation. We need to realise the egalitarianism firmly in the Australian DNA is compatible with demanding good service and quality products, and speaking up is not the same as being in-your-face, rude or unreasonably demanding.
By creating a new consumer culture, where people are less complacent, even complicit with poor service and poor quality products, and more willing to take on issues, companies will have to do better.
Treating customers fairly should be a basic principle of good business. Companies should be competing to exceed customer expectations. When things go wrong they should be put right, with heartache and hassle minimised.
I would like to see the introduction of ''super-complaints'' here. In Britain they work by allowing designated bodies to complain on behalf of consumers to the Office of Fair Trading or other regulator. They were used with great effect to expose overpricing in the motor industry.
In Australia they would give grass-roots organisations, which know what it is like for consumers, the power to refer troublesome market sectors to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.
Consumers have the right to know which companies persistently commit offences against consumers. A register should be set up to log such offences and reveal them for all to see.
These ideas and more are being discussed at the National Consumer Congress in Sydney with politicians, policymakers, regulators, consumer advocates and businesses.
The challenge for all of us is to take people power and bring about a transformation in this country where consumers truly are put first.
Nick Stace is chief executive of Choice.


text: South Korean label IISE recently released its 2017 spring/summer collection titled “004” which draws inspiration from traditional Korean architecture. “004” is a continuation of the label’s interpretation of sportswear seen in its “003” collection. This time around, IISE utilizes modern lightweight fabrics to construct its signature traditional Korean Hanbok designs, displaying color blocking and paneling inspired by designs found in Korean Hanok architecture. Additionally, fabrics were bio-washed to create unique streaks and textures that give more character to the synthetic fabrics used. Retailing between $75 USD and $355 USD, ISSE’s 2017 spring/summer “004” collection is available now on the brand’s web store.


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Mann Packing Introduces New Culinary Cuts Promotion and Holiday Packaging
SALINAS, CA - Mann Packing has announced a new promotion for the holiday season, all centered on the company's Culinary Cuts® Sweet Potato Ribbons or Butternut Squash Zig Zags recipes.
Accessible via Mann’s Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram pages using the hash tag #MannsMerryRecipes, the online promotion is running now through December 18. Customers around the country who submit a photo of their favorite Culinary Cuts® recipes will be automatically entered to win a 14-piece Kitchen in a Box cookware set to spice up their holidays. Entries will be featured on Mann’s various social media platforms and will be judged on presentation, creativity, and number of online votes.
“We are changing the way people think about eating healthy around the holidays by offering our customers better products in a way that is affordable and accessible,” said Kim St George, Director of Marketing & Communications at Mann’s. “With Culinary Cuts® and the collection of selected recipes in our Holiday Recipe eBook, we can now better serve our customers and Culinary Cuts® Club members by allowing them to create healthy and delicious meals conveniently and effortlessly during the holiday season.”
Along with Mann’s new holiday recipe promotion, the company is introducing it’s seasonal veggie tray in 18-ounce and 40-ounce versions; shipping now through January to Canadian customers nationwide.
“Our seasonal holiday trays are one of our best sellers with our fun and whimsical snowman graphics,” added Kim. “Not only do retailers benefit from increased vegetable tray sales during the holidays, but consumers are also provided with a unique winter-themed healthy vegetable tray for holiday entertaining.”
With more and more ways to get customers engaged, these new promotions and a third year of offering its Girlfriends Guide for Moms, Mann Packing is ensuring the holiday season will be a breeze. The seasonal ideas and recipes in the Girlfriends Guide for Moms give customers a chance to browse fun and festive recipes to add to traditional family classics. All recipes feature Mann’s pre-packaged, ready-to eat/use premium fresh vegetables.
As always, Culinary Cuts® Club members regularly receive coupons and unique recipes for Culinary Cuts® products. For more information, please visit Mann’s website at www.veggiesmadeeasy.com.


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Facebook has removed the Tasmanian Hemp Association's (THA) ability to promote and advertise its products through the social media platform, citing that the products being sold are 'illegal products or services' and deeming the company's name 'illegal.' Supposedly, the products being sold and the word hemp in the Tasmania Hemp Associations' name does not comply with facebooks advertising policies and has been flagged as 'illegal.'
The Hemp Association in Tasmania is a government-funded group headed by Andi Lucas. This issue was brought to light when the association created an advert to promote their annual Community Education Day and found that they were not allowed to advertise due to Facebook deeming the information 'illegal'.
Clearly causing much upset throughout the hemp community, Ms. Lucas of the THA began researching the advertising ban where they were 'told were effectively selling a drug product, which is completely untrue'.
The Tasmanian Hemp Association focuses on spreading awareness around hemp and its uses and how it differs entirely from the illegal cannabis plant.
Ms. Lucas explained that 'hemp is a plant used by humans to make food, for fibre, its sold in supermarkets, people have it in their smoothies, they build houses out of it, they wear t-shirts out of it', effectively debunking their 'illegality' surrounding the advertising being done by the Tasmanian Hemp Association.
Unfortunately, due to the restriction and ban allowed on advertising, the THA's education day is now seeing ticket sales down around 70% compared to other years, where they could advertise throughout various social media platforms, including Facebook.
Ms. Lucas explained the entire point behind the education day is to 'educate people to the difference between hemp and marijuana, so, ironically, Facebook has made the same mistake'.
ABC requested comment from META surrounding this issue raised by THA, and a spokesperson claimed that the error has now been fixed, and the THA can now post their advertisements. However, Ms. Lucas stated that this is false, and the THA still face issues posting their ADs.
Similarly, here at Margaret River Hemp Co, we are also facing issues surrounding advertising and our online Facebook store;
"The peak of hypocrisy was when they removed our hemp socks from our FB store, let alone be allowed to advertise anything".
Something as simple as hemp fibre socks that substantially benefit customers and the planet being flagged as "illegal products" is outrageous.
One of the most significant issues any hemp company like THA faces is the algorithm on social media and other platforms. Unfortunately, many algorithms flag the word 'hemp' as an illegal good or service. Facebook is particularly sensitive to this, such as in the case of the Tasmanian Hemp Association, but the problem can also be seen on google.
Unfortunately, this can often lead to hemp-based products being flagged as illegal goods, even clothing like hemp t-shirts and hemp socks. This can be seen in cases such as the company Hemp Co which was shadowbanned for advertising hemp socks.
Georgina Wilkinson, founder of Margaret River Hemp co and Co-founder of Hemp Home Australia and Margaret River Hemp Processing.
Margaret River Hemp Co founder Georgina Wilkinson, who is a clear and vocal advocate in the hemp sector, had the following comment to make;
"We are facing ridiculous and outdated issues such as an insurance company refusing to insure us for public liabilities at trade shows around Australia, leaving us to swap to another company, while no reasons are ever given for blocking ethical business".
Many of these algorithms and other issues facing hemp-based companies are outdated beliefs and poor business practices for the companies involved, effectively banning or attempting to stop the sale of hemp-based goods, which are perfectly legal worldwide.
James Vosper, president of the Australian Industrial Hemp Alliance as well as a member of the NSW Industrial Hemp Association, is another big advocate for the positive uses and benefits of hemp products. Outraged with what has been going on, Mr. Vosper explains his frustration;
'If a product is legal, why can't it be advertised? Hemp has a vast amount of benefits, and many of those benefits are being blocked and banned from the public.
The issue of hemp being incorrectly flagged as an illegal good is a reoccurring issue worldwide. As a result, companies selling hemp-based products face being shadow banned, unallowed to advertise, or being banned from selling products on legal platforms.
Bronwyn Blake of Vasse Valley Hemp Farm had this to say “Despite global legalisation of a wide range of cannabis-based products, hemp businesses are still battling the outdated policies of large, international corporations. Vasse valley Hemp farm frequently comes up against large corporations freezing accounts, or rejecting advertisements stating that the company is violating their policies.”
Michelle Crain of Hemp Health and Innovation Expo who runs regular Australian-wide events that focus on spreading market awareness surrounding hemp. Ms. Crain joins in on the topic at hand, sharing some first-hand experience covering the difficulties hemp-based companies and platforms face;
'Marketing is key to an industry's growth. Venues have stipulated that no cannabis wording or logos are to be used, and this is a demand if you wish to hire the event'.
Michelle Crain efficiently gained over 23k followers on social media between 2016 and 2018, raising awareness around hemp. However, she has yet to gain many since due to the shadow banning and advertising restrictions placed on her social media due to the use of hemp.
This issue is not just being faced here in Australia. Platforms and companies worldwide that are selling hemp-based products or attempting to spread awareness and correct information surrounding hemp are facing tremendous issues. How can any company expect to grow and reach its potential when advertising is banned - a pivotal development component?
The incorrect banning and deeming of hemp as 'illegal' is an entirely outdated concept that is damaging to companies worldwide. If you want to hear a little more from Andi Lucas of the THA, you can follow this link to where she spoke to ABC news and gave more insight into THA's difficulties with META - ABC news - Tasmanian Hemp Association's advertising issue with META.


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There is nothing remotely necessary about this sequel, which is itself a fruitless line of judgment to get into when it comes to any movie let alone franchise building blocks. But that also seems to free “Venom 2” to get weirder and more irreverent than the first movie, when it seemed like no one could decide how seriously they were taking themselves. Turns out “not very” was the right answer.
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CHINA CLEARS BOEING 737 MAX TO FLY AGAIN
China’s aviation regulator cleared the Boeing 737 Max on Thursday to return to flying with technical upgrades more than two years after the plane was grounded worldwide following two fatal crashes.
SHOULD YOU BANK WITH YOUR BROKERAGE?
If you’ve invested with a brokerage firm in recent years, you may have noticed that your brokerage offers a product called a cash management account.
SHOPPERS ARE BACK IN STORE, ONLINE, BUT VIRUS IMPACT LINGERS
Americans are spending freely and going back to store shopping, knocking out some of the momentum in online sales from last year when Americans were making many of their purchases exclusively via the internet.
TESLA OFFICIALLY MOVES HEADQUARTERS FROM CALIFORNIA TO TEXAS
Tesla says it has officially moved its corporate headquarters from Silicon Valley to a large factory under construction outside of Austin, Texas.
UK COMPETITION WATCHDOG ORDERS FACEBOOK TO SELL OFF GIPHY
The United Kingdom’s antitrust watchdog has blocked Facebook’s acquisition of Giphy and ordered the social network to sell off the GIF-sharing platform, saying the deal hurts social media users and advertisers by stifling competition for animated images.
SCIENCE REPORT: US SHOULD MAKE LESS PLASTIC TO SAVE OCEANS
America needs to rethink and reduce the way it generates plastics because so much of the material is littering the oceans and other waters, the National Academy of Sciences says in a new report.
MERCEDES, STELLANTIS TO WORK WITH US FIRM ON NEW BATTERIES
Automakers Mercedes-Benz and Stellantis announced agreements with U.S. company Factorial Energy this week to help develop solid-state battery technology that they hope could make electric cars more attractive to a mass market.
FROM SQUARE TO BLOCK: ANOTHER TECH COMPANY CHANGES ITS NAME
There’s a new Silicon Valley corporate name change on the block.
GM CITES IMPROVED CHIP SUPPLY IN RAISING FINANCIAL GUIDANCE
Citing an improved supply of automotive computer chips, General Motors raised its financial guidance on Wednesday and said it expects to return to a normal production rate by the end of next year.
DATA HACKED FOR 400,000 PLANNED PARENTHOOD LA PATIENTS
The Los Angeles branch of Planned Parenthood was hit by a data breach involving about 400,000 patients, but there is no indication that the information was used “for fraudulent purposes,” the group said.
SENDING UP A FLARE
Sedulous tone maverick explains how simply recording big, hairy, gnarly guitar riffs into his iPhone became his “life raft for sanity,” getting him out of his bunker, forging new connections and birthing a creative oasis amid the chaos
ROAD- TESTED Royalty
Christone “Kingfish” Ingram assumes his throne atop the Delta blues tradition
PERFECTLY FRANK PERFECTLY
THE TRUE ORIGINS AND EVOLUTION OF EDDIE VAN HALEN’S LEGENDARY FRANKENSTEIN GUITAR
THE STRIPPED-DOWN appeal of the EVH Striped Series of guitars will most likely never lose its enduring popularity for Van Halen fans and players alike. Even the many iterations of the Wolfgang series adopted by numerous artists continues to grow by leaps and bounds. But if you ask me, I’ve been digging the EVH 5150 Series Standard guitar, which combines the very best attributes of Eddie Van Halen’s famed “5150” guitar along with the refined tones of Eddie’s innovatively designed Wolfgang guitars.
VALERIE SLAPS SLOWHAND CLAPTON!
FEISTY Valerie Bertinelli has defended the honor of late ex-hubby Eddie Van Halen and taken a brutal shot at his nemesis, grumpy guitar god Eric Clapton.
THE FEEL'S THE THING
As a guitarist of many influences, Marcus Machado puts the “extra” into his sensory perception.
BIDEN vs KAMALA: BLOOD FEUD EXPOSED!
Why prez and his 2nd banana secretly hate each other’s guts
WITH HER NEW BAND, FORMER CALPURNIA GUITARIST (AND WEEZER MUSIC VIDEO STAR) AYLA TESLER-MABE HEADS FOR UNDERSTATED, GROOVE-FORWARD WATERS
A sequel squeaks by with just enough gags and a lot of nostalgia.
HOT ON THE HEELS OF HIS AMAZING NEW BOOK, JIMMY PAGE DISCUSSES HIS EVOLUTION AS A GUITARIST, HIS LEGENDARY GEAR, THE CREATIVE PROCESS THAT WENT INTO THE HOLY TRINITY OF LED ZEPPELIN SONGS — “WHOLE LOTTA LOVE,” “KASHMIR” AND “STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN” — AND THE TIME HE PLAYED AT “FULL ACCELERATION” WITH THE ROLLING STONES


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Hardeeville mayor endorses Sunday alcohol sales
As the November election nears, a possible Sunday alcohol sales referendum is on the minds of Jasper County residents and officials.
County Council is considering an ordinance that would allow residents to decide if beer and wine can be sold in county gas stations and grocery stores on Sundays.
Some in Hardeeville say the decision could have a positive impact on the city's economy. Mayor Bronco Bostick fully endorses Sunday sales.
"We need the alcohol sales in the city of Hardeeville," Bostick said. "In 2008, alcohol sales were my campaign platform. I always wanted to go back to Sunday alcohol sales for the region because we are surrounded by areas that sell alcohol on Sunday and we're missing out on that revenue."
One restaurant manager in Hardeeville agreed on the economic benefits of selling alcohol on Sundays. The,
Pancho Garcia, manager of Mi Tierrita, said his restaurant can sell alcohol on Sundays because it is licensed by the state. He said he has seen firsthand the economic benefits of Sunday sales.
"It's a big money maker for us," Garcia said. "Being off Highway 17, people pull over. They're tired and want to have a drink. It would hurt us big time if we weren't able to serve alcohol on Sundays."
"I've run out of alcohol before and tried to buy some from Star Point (a gas station) on Sunday for the store, but forgot that they can't sell alcohol on Sundays," Garcia said.
City Councilman Michael Sweeney said he hadn't given the idea of Sunday sales much thought. Originally from Pennsylvania, the Sun City North resident said alcohol should be sold in restaurants on Sundays but not in gas stations and grocery stores.
"Basically, if you wanted to go to the Okatie Alehouse or a nice restaurant and order a drink and you're also eating, I wouldn't be opposed to the sale of alcohol then," Sweeney said. "But there are other times and other places to buy alcohol from a grocery store or liquor store than on a Sunday. I don't think the city would lose that much revenue because people can always buy alcohol at other times."
Bostick, meanwhile, says sales would bring in a good deal of additional accommodations and hospitality tax revenue.
"In the long run, there will be more money spent here in Jasper County on sales taxes," Bostick said. "If people want to have a party on Sunday afternoon, they currently have to go six miles down the road to purchase a beer and so that's our money not going back into Hardeeville and Jasper County."


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Great news in the security industry is that despite the larger and growing base of installed alarms, dispatch rates have been reduced by as much as 70 percent.That’s important for the systems installers and integrators who want the public to know that alarms are reliable and effective security and life safety devices.
Stan Martin is one of the industry’s great crusaders on the virtues of alarm systems. He has a take-charge attitude and does whatever is necessary to curb false alarms. Martin is the executive director of the Security Industry Alarm Coalition (SIAC), based in Frisco, Texas. (SIAC has one of the coolest web sites out there, with lots of good info. Check it out at www.siacinc.org. )
Martin spoke with me frankly about the subject of false alarms and dispatch rates and relationships with public safety and law enforcement as I put together the story of the same topic which appears in the July issue of Security Dealer & Integrator magazine.
“SIAC studied causes of false alarms, determined solutions and recommended programming changes to the panels and then spent several years trying to get voluntary dealer compliance," Martin explained. "The companies that were paying attention, proactive and professional either were doing the right things or made the recommended changes to improve. However, the vast majority of dealers either didn’t get it or didn’t seem to care.”
And because of this, the industry was forced to do what it had to do to get the job done—have the panels pre-programmed from the factory with certain exit/entry delays and other features to prevent false or inadvertent alarms. Behind it all--the groundbreaking ANSI/SIA-CP-01 Control Panel Standard – Features for False Alarm Reduction, now undergoing its next revision, which will include additional pre-programmed features and functions to thwart false dispatches. The majority of the industry’s control panel and alarm receiver manufacturers participated in the creation of the standard and it made a difference! Read more about it in the July issue of SD&I magazine, page 82. -- Deborah L. O'Mara, editor, SD&I magazine


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The Russia Today TV channel took an interview with the General Director of INCONA Alexey Busev
Last Friday, the Russia Today Arabic TV channel interviewed Alexey Busev, General Director of INCONA.
During the interview, the issues of promoting Russian brands in the UAE and other GCC countries were raised. Alexey Busev noted the general attractiveness and prospects of the region for Russian food producers. He also stressed that at the moment one of the most effective channels of promotion in the UAE is The pavilion of Russian food products, located in Dubai.
The range of services offered by the operator of this Pavilion, INCONA, includes:
- Preparation of an individual plan for the promotion of the exhibitor in the UAE market;
- Conducting informational presentation and tasting events;
- Market analysis for individual types of customer products;
- Provision of logistics and customs clearance services;
- Support of certification and registration of products in the UAE;
- Organization of marketing events in UAE retail chains;
- Legal support for Russian exporters;
- And others.
The issue, filmed in the Pavilion of Russian Food products in Dubai, was published on the official website of Russia Today Arabic.


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HTC announces new limited edition blockchain smartphone in partnership with Binance
Wed, 13 Nov 2019, 06:58 am UTC
Electronic giant HTC is planning to add support for Binance Chain, Binance’s proprietary blockchain platform launched in April, in a new special edition of its blockchain smartphone, EXODUS 1.
In October 2018, HTC opened access to the first phone of the Exodus project, the ‘EXODUS 1.’ Initially the smartphone could be purchased only using cryptocurrencies, but later the company opened up the purchases to fiat currency ($699) as well.
In an online post on Medium, HTC Exodus has now announced its partnership with Binance and unveiled the EXODUS 1 - Binance Edition.
“This new limited edition device is the world’s first blockchain phone to have integrated the Binance Chain blockchain and will offer native support for Binance’s DEX (decentralized exchange) through our Zion Vault solution,” HTC said.
HTC said it partnership with Binance is based on one of its missions, to allow individuals to secure, trade, and verify their decentralized digital assets on the go.
“We are excited to be supporting the Binance Chain and its DEX, which provides our community with the biggest spread and most liquid crypto exchange along with the trust minimized principle of empowering users to own their private keys,” said HTC’s Decentralized Chief Officer, Phil Chen.
As per the details, the special edition smartphone will come preloaded with Binance’s flagship exchange application and the Trust Wallet.
EXODUS 1 - Binance Edition sports a Snapdragon 845 system-on-chip and dual cameras with high-quality zoom. It will be soon available for purchase at www.htcexodus.com for US$599 or SGD$889 – US$100 cheaper than the original EXODUS 1.
Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao believes that smartphones will play a key role in the mass adoption of cryptocurrencies as they give users the ability to become both a “POS terminal and payment device, cutting out most other middlemen.”
“The implications [of this] are profound and far-reaching, and the most innovative smartphone makers are racing to integrate crypto for mass adoption and seamless usability,” he said. “We are excited to collaborate with a manufacturer that is taking the innovative steps forward to truly empower users and further adoption.”
Last month, HTC unveiled a lower-cost version of its blockchain phone, “EXODUS 1s”, which will have the ability to run a full node for the bitcoin network.
In September, Kakao's blockchain platform Klaytn unveiled KlaytnPhone - the blockchain variant of Samsung's flagship smartphone series Galaxy Note10.
<Copyright © TokenPost. All Rights Reserved. >


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Change always remain constant. We all have heard it but Google is the one who implements it. Here are some of the major ones on board again. There are some massive declarations that have been made by Google which are about to change the way how Android app development companies work. The updates announced by the Google are supposed to take effect from 2018 and 2019. All these updates will strengthen the security and enhance the performance of the Google play store.
The preliminary change that the developers have to pay heed to targets the recent Android API for the apps which are to be launched in 2018. The same thing will also be applied to the existing Android apps in the Play Store at the moment. This step is to be taken to ensure that all the app of the play store are on the same page and are built by integrating the latest API. This step is to be taken by the Google to enrich the performance and improve the security of the Android apps. There is no specific in the announcement made by the Google that what will be the minimum level of API that will be allowed to the developers for those who are running the older versions.
Coming to another major update to be rolled out by the Google, Android app developers will need to have minimum 64-bit libraries for the newer apps entering the Google play store along with the updated apps. This change will be applicable from August 2019. This announcement is made in advance to ensure that all apps are made compatible to run with a 64-bit processor and there won’t be an issue when Google stops the support of 32-bit processor. The performance of the Android apps will be better on the 64-bit processor as compared to that with a 32-bit processor. An entire set of new instructions and registers will be out to make the apps compatible with the new alterations. However, this update will be affecting only those apps which are native and rest of the apps will not have any effect on this.
The final update that Google has for the Android apps and for the Android app development company is that it is going to add an extra layer to the app. A layer of security metadata is to be added to the APKs of all the Android apps that are going to be submitted to the Google play store. This will result in a teeny weeny increase in the app size and would acquire more space on the user’s device. However, this won’t increase the work of developers in any way. This layer is a mere indication that the app is downloading from the Google play store. One of the positive effects of this update is that this will entail the developers with an adequate amount of time to roll out the update and make changes as per the feedback.


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H&M To Open Its Doors In Mumbai Later This Year
We know you’re excited. So are we!
Swedish high street giant H&M is all set to open its first store in Mumbai come October. Earlier this week, the brand organised a preview of its fall collection at Ministry of New in Mumbai, and we already know what we’re going to be picking off the racks as soon as the store opens. The fall collection includes Swedish folklore inspired prints, cube bags, velvet dresses, and lots more!
Big Bazaar at Phoenix Mills in Lower Parel will make way for the new H&M store, so clearly the space is going to be grand. What’s more, another store is set to open shortly at Phoenix Market City, Kurla. While no particular date has been specified, we’re sure you’re rearing to go, as soon as the doors to H&M are thrown open.
We can absolutely not wait. Meanwhile, we have for you some exclusive pictures from the preview. Take a look.


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When TechCrunch launched a membership program in February, the value proposition centered on exclusive content and site features, such as a site stripped of banner ads and a summary tool that delivered quick digests of TechCrunch stories.
Those core features are augmented by a growing list of marketing promotions and perks sourced from third-party companies. On Thursday, TechCrunch announced that annual Extra Crunch members, who pay $150 per year, could get two free months of Aircall, a cloud-based phone system that TechCrunch uses for customer service. The Aircall partnership is the fourth member perk TechCrunch has announced in the past three months, joining $1,000 worth of Amazon Web Services credits, 100,000 Brex credit card reward points and six free months of customer support software Zendesk.
According to Travis Bernard, TechCrunch’s senior director of subscriptions and audience growth, the goal is to reach a dozen member benefits. The company has not disclosed how many subscribers Extra Crunch has.
“The reason people subscribe to Extra Crunch, overwhelmingly, is encountering articles in our feeds we want to read,” said Ned Desmond, TechCrunch’s chief operating officer. “The premium offerings are something that helps close the deal.”
TechCrunch’s parent, Verizon Media, opened the year with plans to launch many different subscription products, including a paid version of Yahoo Finance and a stable of Athletic-style membership products aimed at fans of individual Major League Baseball teams. (The subscription sports sites have abandoned those plans this summer; Yahoo Finance Premium launched in June.)
Extra Crunch has proven useful in other ways. This past fall, Bernard said, data about what Extra Crunch members read informed programming at TechCrunch’s flagship event, Disrupt. After an entire track of Extra Crunch programming was “mobbed” with attendees, TechCrunch decided it could create a separate event series affiliated with Extra Crunch called TC Early Stage. Desmond said he expects to sell at least 1,000 tickets, which start at $200, to TC Early Stage events next year; while anybody can buy a ticket, Extra Crunch members get a 20% discount.
To build the list of possible perks, Bernard drew up a list of possible partners and asked for separate recommendations from the site’s editorial team. The site is trying to fulfill current member requests too, such as Crunchbase.
“One of the biggest challenges for startups in their early stages is figuring out what tools they need,” Bernard said. “We’re really well-positioned to understand what the top tools are in this space.”
Though TechCrunch has existing advertising relationships with many of the companies offering these perks to its members, neither TechCrunch nor the companies are paying to secure the offers. Bernard said TechCrunch treats the perks as retention tools, rather than a way to hunt for affiliate bounties or increase the revenue they might earn per member. Marketers participate because the Extra Crunch membership, comprised largely of founders and people working at quickly growing startups, represents an attractive target audience for promotions. “This is a pretty standard marketing approach for Silicon Valley companies,” Desmond said.
While bundling services together with content is somewhat common among B2B publishers, TechCrunch’s moves are part of a broader shift in the way that subscription publishers manage their relationships with advertisers, said Ellen Kan, a senior director at the strategy consultancy Simon-Kucher & Partners.
“I do think it is also part of a push you’re seeing for media companies to find more creative ways for their advertisers to tap into, build a relationship and actually directly monetize their audiences vs just being a conduit,” Kan said in an email.“It’s quite smart of them to insert themselves more directly into the relationship between advertiser and audience to create stickiness.”
“You’re going after the same audience. Why not?” Kan added.
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Capcom has revealed key details surrounding the next-gen only Resident Evil 8, including its resolution target for next-gen.
As the first all-new mainline entry in the iconic survival horror franchise since 2017, the upcoming horror game will be the first game in the series to exclusively target next-gen machines.
Thanks to a new post on the PlayStation Store, we now have new knowledge on what features Capcom is planning for Resident Evil Village on PlayStation 5.
Firstly, the next-gen horror game will be targeting a dynamic 4K resolution on PlayStation 5 with ray-tracing support. With the Resident Evil franchise targeting 60fps on current-gen systems, that framerate target is expected to stay for next-gen.
Capcom has also highlighted extremely fast loading on PS5 as a key feature, explaining that the power of the SSD allows players to jump right into the game with “almost no load times”.
Resident Evil Village also takes advantage of some PlayStation 5 exclusive features like haptic feedback and adaptive triggers on the DualSense controller. These features aim to give players an “even more immersive experience” and the “feeling of firing a real gun with haptic feedback.”
Lastly, the upcoming Resident Evil game supports 3D audio output, allowing players to surround themselves with the “carefully crafted music and sounds of survival horror”. That’s right, it’ll be scarier.
Resident Evil Village launches on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC next year.


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AFRICANGLOBE – President of the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association (JHTA) Evelyn Smith says the island was successfully marketed to the travel trade during this year’s staging of Caribbean Travel Marketplace.
“Jamaica has been presented in a positive light. Feedback from the tour operators I have spoken with is that they have done good business. We now have to see what our members report coming in subsequent months,” Smith told reporters, at the end of the three- day event.
She expressed gratitude to the several participating stakeholders who assisted in the preparation of the event put on by the Caribbean Hotel & Tourism Association (CHTA).
“The staging of Caribbean Marketplace 2014 required significant work. On behalf of the members of the association, the organising committee, as well as the many Jamaican suppliers who participated in the staging, we are very grateful for the support that we received from a number of our partners,” said the JHTA president.
Another positive highlight of the event was that unlike previous years, most of the equipment needed in the preparation of the travel trade show, was sourced locally.
“Almost 100 per cent of what was needed- from the pipe and drape to make the booth, to the decor to get it going, to the equipment to be rented- all of those items were provided by Jamaican suppliers,” Smith explained. “In previous years booth equipment and others had to come into the island. In this case, almost 100 per cent of the equipment came from Jamaican suppliers.”
Hotel mogul Gordon ‘Butch’ Stewart told reporters that this year’s staging of the event was the best he had ever seen.
“I think it is easily the best CHTA Marketplace ever, and people have done business, which it is all about,” he stressed.
“I have been to many, many, over many years and I think everybody is very comfortable with Jamaica, and when we can put on events like this, it says a lot for those involved.”
He added that he strongly believes that the hoteliers from across the Caribbean have all enjoyed the camaraderie and relations forged at the event.
According to Tanesha Clarke, the sales and marketing manager at Sunset Resorts, her company has had very productive meetings during the staging of the event, adding that “we have been able to secure some very good deals for the travel season ahead.”
She added that the display booths of all the Caribbean countries were very impressive.
“When you look around and see what all the Caribbean Islands have brought out, it really looks wonderful, and it’s a wonderful showing for the Caribbean, not only for Jamaica,” said Clarke, adding that Caribbean Marketplace 2014 has turned out to be a very successful event.
Jamaica last hosted the event in 2011.
Caribbean Travel Marketplace 2014, the premier tourism marketing show, is the largest and most important business-to-business marketing event for the region’s hospitality industry.
About 1,200 delegates from more than 26 countries in North America, South America and Europe were in attendance at the event which was staged from Sunday to Tuesday at the Montego Bay Convention Centre in Rose Hall, St James.
The event, was officially declared open by Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller on Sunday night.
By: Horace Hines


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UPDATE July 12 9:00AM: M1 has followed up by offering free local voice calls, SMS/MMS as well as mobile data!
UPDATE2, July 12 12:00 PM: Starhub is offering 1GB free data for the month of August and free previews of their channels from 5 August to 11 August!
It’s free everything this SG51 for Singtel postpaid customers as Singtel has recently announced free mobile data for 24 hours on 9 August (Midnight till 11:59PM) and free viewing on Singtel TV and the Singtel TV GO App from 5 August – 9 August.
Mr Yuen Kuan Moon, Singtel’s CEO Consumer Singapore, said: “As a proud home-grown company, Singtel is delighted to celebrate Singapore’s birthday with everyone. National Day is also a celebration of family and community.”
Sadly, other telco community members M1 and Starhub has yet to announce anything in return. Just last Chinese New Year, Starhub pushed forward free viewing of all their cable TV channels, but M1 remained silent.
We expect that Starhub will be offering their usual fare of free previews, but hope that they will try something else. As far as national day promotions go, last year’s was the most exciting as M1 sought to out-do the other telcos.
Last year, M1 struck first by announcing their national day promotions on 1 June, handing out free calls, data and messaging. Starhub made their announcement on 8 July, announcing an entire month of channel previews. Singtel was last, 15 July, with 2 days of free data, free Singtel TV previews and a mobile payments app welcome bonus.
The Same Old Fare?
Singtel’s announcement should lead the rest of the telcos to default to their usual promotions during national day. I find both sad and funny that there is even a “default” in a sense. Although SG50 was a landmark year, it doesn’t make sense that the telcos see promotions as something they go through the motions with.
Think about other promotions like the Great Singapore Sale. There are always a variety of deals to look out for, and likewise, telco promotions should consistently rise to the occasion instead of having a default one.
I’m looking forward to MyRepublic joining the telco scene and shaking things up. They shook the pricing scene up of the Telcos, so I expect them to have more aggressive and varied promotions to convert customers.
Feature Image Credit: Princess Diana Diaries