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The big jump in income announced Wednesday came despite controversy swirling around Facebook’s role in spreading fake news, and a Texas jury ordering the company to pay $500 million to a software firm that claims its virtual reality technology was stolen.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has described virtual reality as one of the company’s important long-range investments.
In earnings that beat most forecasts, Facebook said it made a net profit of $3.7 billion on revenue of $8.6 billion in the fourth quarter, compared with profit of $1.6 billion on $5.6 billion in revenue in the same period a year earlier.
Meanwhile, the number of people using the Facebook each month increased 17 percent to 1.86 billion.
The ranks of people logging into the world’s leading social network site from mobile devices each month grew to 1.74 billion, a 21 percent increase from the same period a year earlier.
Income from ads on mobile devices accounted for about 84 percent of Facebook’s overall advertising revenue in the final quarter of last year.
Facebook saw strong growth in Asia, with India being a hot market. The social network site still hopes to get into China, where the service is banned.
“Our mission is to connect everyone in the world and it’s hard to do that over the long term if we don’t find a way to serve the more than billion people who live in China,” Zuckerberg said while answering questions from analysts on an earnings call.
Baird research analyst Colin Sebastian said in a note to investors that “few companies share Facebook’s combination of scale, strong technology orientation, and platform breadth/diversity.”
Facebook shares jumped more than two percent in after-market trades, returning to 15 cents above the closing price of $133.23 after chief financial officer David Wehner told analysts that the social network has run out of spare room for ads and plans to invest “aggressively.”
Company priorities include data centers, virtual reality, search and artificial intelligence.
AI has the potential to help find videos or other content people might like on Facebook, and to recognize and remove posts that violate community standards, according to Zuckerberg.
Maryland-based ZeniMax said it was “pleased” with the award, but Oculus said it plans to appeal the verdict.


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You are no doubt reading this article because you stumbled across the Desktop Window Manager process and are wondering just what it is. We’ve got the answer. ..
Alibaba is doubling down on Southeast Asia after it announced a deal to pay close to $1 billion to raise its stake in e-commerce firm Lazada from 51 percent ..
When it comes to the medium of art that artists use to express themselves, the technology at hand is evolving to a point where capturing images now couldn’t ..
A bootable USB drive is the best way to install or try Linux. But most Linux distributions—like Ubuntu—only offer an ISO disc image file for download. ..
Mira, a Los Angeles-based startup, announced Prism, a $99 augmented reality headset that’s powered by an iPhone. The headset will ship to developers ..

domain: news


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Tristan Walker Wants Black Businessmen to Taste Financial Freedom – This is a great interview with Walker and Company Brands’ CEO. His statement about the power of defaults sat me down. In my house right now, there are no other products other than Bevel and Form Beauty, which is also one of our brands. I … Continue reading No. 264 – Building a World with a Broader Set of Defaults
I was so excited to see the announcement last week that 54gene had raised $15M in additional funding for their work sequencing the genome of African folks. That type of work – building technology, research, and infrastructure is what Africa’s going to need as soon as possible. The wave of nationalism that has continued to … Continue reading No. 245 – Africa Can Build Too
Welcome to the Future Whatever Flutterwave and Andela cofounder Iyinoluwa Aboyeji is building, its focus on building a shared vision for the future of Africa is something I can get behind. Excited to see where this goes. Ghanaian startup mPharma is buying Kenya’s second-largest pharmacy chain You don’t see too many deals where a startup … Continue reading No. 184: 2 Thoughts – Future Africa | Acquisitions
Facebook has been on the hot seat as more information comes to light about the role it played in Russia’s meddling in the November 2016 election. The hot seat treatment brought the company’s COO, Sheryl Sandberg, to DC for an exclusive interview with Axios co-founder Mike Allen to discuss the situation and what Facebook was … Continue reading No. 169: Facebook to Get an African-American Board Member…Soon?
Tastemakers Africa CEO Cherae Robinson Gives Us A Sneak Peak On Her 10-Year Plan and I’m Here For It Marketplaces are powerful and have a track record of disrupting industries and building. See eBay and Airbnb. Look out for what Safaricom could build on its Mpesa platform if regulators don’t make the two break up. … Continue reading No. 158: 3AMReads: Tastemakers Africa 10-Year Plan | Safaricom Invests Nearly $2M in R&D Lab | Nigeria’s Petrol Corporation Moves Digital
Microsoft Announces First Public Cloud in Africa Microsoft announced today that it was going to stand up two data centers in South Africa, the first public data centers on the continent. Let that sit with you for a bit. Hopefully, this is the beginning of public clouds proliferating across the continent. The benefits of this … Continue reading No. 156: 3AMReads: Azure in Africa |Facebook Invests in Fiber Optic | Volvo Takes to Kenya
Africa Finance Corporation CEO Makes Case for Infrastructure Investment Andrew Alli is one of my favorite people to follow on Twitter. He is witty and always provides forthright analysis. During the celebration of the Africa Finance Corporation’s 10 years in business, Alli shared some observations on the importance of infrastructure in Africa. His admonishment to … Continue reading No. 155: 3AMReads: AFC Head Makes Case for Infrastructure | GM Sells South Africa Operation
South Africa Central Bank Governor Says Junk Status Can be Addressed Quickly During the World Economic Forum held in Durban this week, South African Central Bank Governor Lesetja Kganyago said that South African can quickly deal with the concerns ratings agencies have raised in cutting the country’s credit rating to junk status or putting its … Continue reading No. 146 – Three AM Reads: South Africa’s Junk Status a Quick Fix? | Another Innovators List | Chevy Volt Designer Goes Home to Nigeria
Africa’s fashion industry has the potential to be massive and you should pay attention to it. When I found out that Akin Adebowale, Kolade Adeyemo, Bobby Pittman, and the rest of the team were building Oxosi, I couldn’t wait to see what they would come up with. Oxosi is an e-commerce platform that brings African high fashion … Continue reading No. 127: Where Can I Buy African High Fashion?
Francophone Africa and Europe can expect access to more African and African-American content through Afrostream. The two-year old startup led by Tonjé Bakang has been on a tear this year, finishing up at Y Combinator and landing funding from Troy Carter’s Cross Culture Ventures (have they finished raising their $50M fund?), Orange Digital Ventures, Ace … Continue reading No. 120: 3 Thursday AM Reads – Netflix for Black Folks Mais En Francais | Atlanta Investors Building Tech Ecosystem | Always Be Closing


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Posted May 29, 2009 A man, who is a shareholder of a company, attends the company’s AGM and asks a question from the floor, about the company’s recent acquisition of another firm – one which organises trade fairs for the arms business. On the way out of the shareholder meeting, […]
Project Concordia, a Kantara Initiative co-founder, recently responded to a need of one of its members and issued a simple survey to learn more about the community’s use of identity federation. 112 respondents viewed the survey (which weeded-out organizations who were not participating in a federation, resulting in 103 survey […]
Kantara Initiative has become a sponsor of this month’s IIW (Internet Identity Workshop) taking place at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View California. We join Information Card Foundation, Google, Microsoft, OASIS ID Trust, OpenID Foundation, OUNO, Plaxo and Yahoo Developer Network in sponsoring the May 18-20 event. IIW […]
We’re officially live and launched, here from the RSA Conference! Brett McDowell, Liberty Alliance, was joined onstage by Eve Maler, Concordia Project; Drummond Reed, Information Card Foundation; Trent Adams, ISOC; and Nat Sakimura, XDI.org, announcing the formation of Kantara Initiative. We’re excited about the road ahead and the opportunity in front of us. Join us in shaping the future of digital identity.


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Kerry designers are taking part in an Irish fashion designers event in New York.
The Ireland Fashion Showcase is hoping to enhance the profile and reputation of emerging designer talents in the Irish Fashion Industry to an international market.
The Showcase being held in the Irish Consulate in New York, is co-ordinated by fashion stylist Marietta Doran and founder of Kerry Fashion Week Orla Diffily.
From Kerry, Milliner Carol Kennelly and Caroline Mathews of House of Delphine are taking part.
New York based fashion designer Don O’Neill originally from Ballyheigue is attending as a special guest.


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Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) is being sued in New York over allegations of overstating the water-resistive capabilities of its smartphones.
What Happened: The lawsuit filed Saturday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York alleges that the Tim Cook-led company’s claims of water resistance are “insufficiently qualified by fine print disclaimers.”
The lawsuit — listed as a class action suit named Antoinette Smith as the plaintiff.
The filed document stated that Apple labeled its iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max devices as IP 68, which promise water resistance to a depth of 4 meters for up to 30 minutes.
Subsequent iPhone 12 models are rated IP68 and promise water resistance to a depth of 6 meters for up to 30 minutes, as per the lawsuit.
Why It Matters: The plaintiff alleged that the IP certification levels are based “on highly controlled laboratory conditions, with static and pure water.”
However, the water devices encounter in daily usage is neither static nor purified, as per the suit.
“This means that consumers who stand at the edge of a pool or ocean and whose devices are splashed or temporarily immersed, will be denied coverage, because the water contained chlorine or salt.”
Further, the suit said that Apple’s disclaimers limit the smartphone’s one-year warrant to exclude damage caused by liquid.
When a user seeks coverage under the warranty the first step is to verify if the liquid contact indicator has turned red, which is a sign that liquid has entered the device.
See Also: Butterflies In Apple’s Stomach? Judge Allows Macbook Owners To File Class Action Lawsuit
Smith, a resident of Bronx County, purchased an iPhone 8, which experienced contact or immersion with water, purportedly consistent with the IP rating of her device.
She was denied warranty coverage by Apple, which forced her to incur financial loss through repair costs among other damages, the lawsuit claimed.
Smith is seeking injunctive relief along with restitution and disgorgement for members of the class along with an award of monetary and statutory damages.
This month the Cupertino, California-based tech giant was hit with a class-action suit that accused the company of running an “unlicensed casino.”
Price Action: Apple shares closed 1.8% higher at $134.32 on Friday.
© 2021 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.


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Beloved Canadian coffee chain Tim Hortons has announced it will be opening 1,500 branches of the shop throughout China over the next 10 years. With locations across Canada and the US, the company also recently opened its first Southeast Asian store in Manila in 2017.
Tim Hortons President Alex Macedo stated on the company website, “We have two main priorities at Tim Hortons: building and strengthening our brand in Canada and expanding our iconic Canadian brand to the rest of the world. China’s population and vibrant economy represent an excellent growth opportunity for Tim Hortons in the coming years. We have already seen Canada’s Chinese community embrace Tim Hortons, and we now have the opportunity to bring the best of our Canadian brand to China with established partners who have expertise in the industry and the country.”
China has earned its place as the fastest-growing coffee market in the world, with Starbucks announcing plans to double the number of shops in China to 5,000 by 2021, opening 500 stores every year.
Along with coffee, Tim Hortons serves doughnuts, pastries, muffins, bagels and sandwiches.
What about Hong Kong?
Candie Clapier, Communications Manager for Restaurant Brands International, the US company that owns Burger King and that bought the Tim Hortons franchise in 2014 , wouldn’t confirm whether Hong Kong would be amongst the first of the China locations to open, saying, “We appreciate your interest in Tim Hortons, but we are not able to share details on restaurant openings at this time. However, we will be sure to connect with you closer to launch.”
We can but hope.
Here’s a pic of those little doughnut holes of goodness – Timbits – to stir up the salivary glands
Who was this Tim Horton guy?
Like all things beloved by Canadians, it involves hockey.
Tim Horton was a hockey player for the Toronto Maple Leafs (who have the most striking hockey jerseys of all hockey teams, just saying). He launched the first Tim Hortons restaurant in 1964 in Hamilton, Ontario, and the coffee there went on to become a national treasure.
When they do arrive in Hong Kong, the Tim Hortons shops will likely bear little resemblance to the original Canadian stores, given that most in the Great White North are located in car parks and oft accessed by drive- through. But if the coffee and Timbits remain consistent with the offerings by the Canuck shops, we’ll be in double-double heaven.
Your guide to Tim Hortons talk
When Timmies arrives in Hong Kong – or even if we have to pop over to China to get a cuppa – you’ll need to know how to converse in Canadian coffee language. There’s a very special lingo here, and it doesn’t involve adding “eh” to everything…
If you like your coffee with one cream and one sugar, that’s a regular. It doesn’t refer to the sizes, which are straightforward: small, medium, large and extra large. For example, you might say, “I’d like a medium regular, please.” And then you’ll receive a medium-sized coffee with one cream and one sugar.
For two creams and two sugars, that’s a double-double (see, it’s easy).
For three creams and three sugars, it’s a triple-triple.
And for four creams and four sugars, that’s a four-by-four. And, yes, this really is a thing.
If you want milk, you always have to state this – otherwise the coffee will be made with cream.
For black coffee, just say black coffee (and your chosen size).
Don’t call it Tim Hortons
In all contexts, when discussing Tim Hortons, say Timmies, never the full name. It’s affectionate (like most Canadians).
What are Timbits?
Timbits are known as doughnut holes everywhere outside Canada. They come in many flavours, and some of them are even patriotic – like the Maple Dip Timbits.
For more hot F&B news like this, like Foodie on Facebook


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The Tesla Semi isn't even in production yet, but it appears at least one early model is getting put to work.
Tesla on Monday tweeted a video of its all-electric Semi hauling a carrier's worth of Tesla vehicles. The tweet's caption makes it sound like the Semi is actively participating in delivering Tesla's production vehicles, and it definitely looks good doing it.
This follows a tweet from CEO Elon Musk over the weekend, which showed a static picture of the Semi fully loaded for vehicle deliveries. In a follow-up tweet, Musk said the company has been "so mired in production [and] logistics for [the] past 18 months," and that he is "[r]eally looking [forward] to getting Semi into production."
Tesla has been placing ever more focus on delivering vehicles in the past several months. In November, Musk tweeted that Model 3 delivery times. In March, a filing from the SEC showed that Tesla in order to acquire trucks and trailers from California-based Central Valley Auto Transport, Inc., further boosting its delivery capabilities.to improve
While the Semi is not yet a production vehicle, according to a text message from a Tesla spokesperson, the Semi has been used "many times" for hauling to and from Gigafactory and elsewhere, so it appears there are no issues surrounding the idea of using a development vehicle for real-deal deliveries. The spokesperson also confirmed that the cars in the video were actual owner vehicles, and that those vehicles were delivered to their owners using the Semi. Nevertheless, it's clear that Tesla is determined to get its own trucks delivering its own vehicles as the automaker expands its offerings and the markets in which they're sold.


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At roughly $82 trillion, the world gross domestic product has more than doubled since 1989. Demand for global products is unprecedented, offering significant export opportunities for U.S. companies of all sizes. Yet many companies in the Richmond region choose not to export, according to data compiled by the Metro Richmond Exports Initiative (MREI).
The MREI, a unique two-year project led by Virginia Commonwealth University’s Center for Urban and Regional Analysis, Virginia’s Gateway Region and the Greater Richmond Partnership (GRP), surveyed hundreds of businesses and local, regional and state officials to benchmark the area’s export climate and develop a specific plan to grow it.
The goal of the MREI is bold: increase exports from small and medium-sized Richmond-area businesses by 40 percent by 2020. The project is being funded by JPMorgan Chase with a matching contribution from the Virginia Economic Development Partnership’s (VEDP) International Trade Division.
Survey results show that 83 percent of businesses in the region are not exporting their products and services. Roughly half said they would consider exporting if they could identify the right markets and obtain financing.
“Metro Richmond has a diverse array of industries, ranging from agriculture, to manufacturing, to engineering and management services,” says John Accordino, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Urban and Regional Analysis and Interim Dean of the L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs at VCU. “Every one of these industries has companies that make products and services that can be exported to a world that is eager to buy ‘Made in America.’ Through the initiative, these companies will find the services and resources that help them realize their export potential, and that will help to grow the region’s economy.”
“We want Henrico businesses to continue to grow and be successful,” says Felicia Ainsa, Existing Business Manager, Henrico County Economic Development Authority (EDA). Ainsa, along with Curtis Cobert, the EDA’s Existing Business Representative, has been tasked with helping existing businesses gain access to the proper resources to ensure growth.Their work is part of Henrico County’s larger effort to support existing companies in Henrico. “When we think about the fact that 96 percent of the world’s population lives outside of the United States, exporting just makes sense,” adds Ainsa. “This is a fantastic way for Henrico companies to enlarge their market share.”
Exporting is good for companies and for the regions in which they’re located. In 2015, exports generated $36 billion in revenue for Virginia, bringing $18.7 billion in income wages back into the state – as well as $2 billion in tax revenue – according to Todd Haymore, Virginia Secretary of Commerce and Trade, in his remarks during the initiative’s unveiling ceremony on September 8.
“Growing our existing companies is a top priority for Henrico. Companies that export hire more people and typically can pay higher wages than companies not engaged in exporting. The MREI will give us another great tool to use in our efforts to offer services and resources our companies will need to continue to grow in Henrico and compete in the global marketplace.”
– Curtis Cobert, Henrico EDA
According to MREI research, 81 percent of global demand for products and services of the sort that American firms produce or could produce will come from other countries – not the United States – between 2015 and 2020.
To swing that stat in favor of Richmond-region businesses, the MREI project team will spearhead the development of a regional export website, which will interface with the VEDP portal, to market the MREI’s assistance and the region’s export services. The team will also oversee numerous new export programs and grants and generate media and marketing materials.
For example, an “Exporting 101” course will also be developed and offered through the Community College Workforce Alliance (CCWA). The purpose of the course is to give business owners an opportunity to learn more about exporting without making a large investment. The class will be a good starting point for local business owners – and appropriate for every level of export experience.
Do you own a business in Henrico County? Now is a great time to explore exporting! Contact the Henrico County Economic Development Authority today and let us put our knowledge and resources to work for you.
The EDA will be hosting a Lunch and Learn about this initiative at our office on Monday, November 28. Please contact us for more information.
This article was originially published on the HenricoNOW website.


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MOUNTAIN VIEW — The rapid growth of electronic data and growing legal demands on businesses to produce documents they have in storage makes clear why Aaref Hilaly made the move to Clearwell Systems Inc.
“No one prints things anymore,” said Hilaly, who became Clearwell’s president and CEO after selling his previous software company, CenterRun Inc., to Sun Microsystems Inc. in 2003. “Everything is stored electronically. The cost of storage has plummeted from $20,000 for 1 gigabyte of information in 1990 to less than 40 cents today.”
At the same time, a series of landmark court decisions has forced businesses to hand over this electronic information.
“There is no more ‘The dog ate my homework’ excuse,” Hilaly said.
Noting the trend, Venkat Rangan, a former lead program manager at Microsoft Corp., founded Clearwell in Mountain View five years ago. Rangan, now the company’s chief technology officer, raised $4 million from Sequoia Capital to establish the new company. Since then, Clearwell has attracted another $29 million in investment from Sequoia and other sources.
Hilaly, a native of London who earned degrees from Oxford University, Harvard University and McGill University in Montreal, cut his corporate teeth at Excite@Home Networks Inc. and The Boston Consulting Group Inc. before founding CenterRun in 2000. He said he realized the explosive growth in e-mail and electronic documents and files made the time ripe for Rangan’s concept, which was to create software to help companies, agencies and institutions manage their own legal, regulatory and investigative matters at less expense than relying on outside service providers.
“Today, companies are spending more than $4 billion on service providers to keep track of this information,” Hilaly said. “You have companies where thousands of employees are creating e-mail communications that need to be managed for risk, human resources and legal reasons.”
He said his company’s search software products, for example, are able to electronically sift through data and focus on only the most relevant material for internal company investigations or for legal cases. Work can be handled in-house instead of by outside organizations.
Rapid revenue growth
As a result, the troubled economy has been a boon for his company, fueling dramatic growth. Clearwell has recorded a 229 percent growth in revenue during the first half of fiscal 2009 compared with the same period a year ago. The company is on track to exceed $30 million in sales for the fiscal year, which ends in December.
“The recession has focused companies on cost control,” Hilaly said. “They have to cut budgets, so they buy our products and reduce the amount spent on outside service providers. Often, the cost-cutting alternative is laying off staff.”
The choice has appealed so far to about 350 companies, Hilaly said, with his client list comprised mostly of midsize companies and big corporations. Customers include Cisco Systems Inc., General Electric Co., and Delta Air Lines Inc.
Brian Babineau, Palo Alto-based analyst for Enterprise Strategy Group Inc., who follows the storage and info management industry, said the poor economy has helped spur Clearwell’s growth but its products are timely regardless of the recession.
“I’ve spent a lot of time in this market, and what Clearwell has done is create a very good opportunity for itself,” Babineau said. “It is saying to companies that before you send off all this data to some off-site company, run this exercise. It’s an appliance that can be installed quickly, and it can bring enormous benefits in a short time — especially in an economy like this one, where there is a lot of litigation occurring.”
Hilaly said his company has even benefitted from the change in administrations in January. He said the more active investigative stance of several federal agencies this year, including the Internal Revenue Service, has made business even more vigilant in record-keeping and data-retrieval practices, contributing to a growth in his product sales.
Kamal Shah, Hilaly’s friend since Harvard Business School, said he joined Clearwell as its vice president of product management and marketing because of the CEO’s talent in managing a business and its people.
“A lot of factors go into making a successful company, and what has always impressed me about Aaref is he is one of the brightest people I know, great at devising a business strategy and its execution,” Shah said. “He’s also a very effective leader, capable of motivating his entire team, from the engineers to the sales staff, support personnel and management. It has been a great ride here.”
Headquarters: Mountain View
CEO: Aaref Hilaly
2009 projected sales: $30 million


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Friday, July 28, 2017
Have you ever wondered whether the massive “new start-ups” in the digital tech field are actually good for the U.S. economy, creating and sustaining good jobs or that they just might somehow create some powerful overall negative consequences? After all, Facebook allows a seller to market to a highly targeted and infinitely available audience. Amazon enables smaller retailers and manufacturers to access a potentially “uuuge” marketplace. And Google opens the door for companies to be “found” in ways that never existed before. All good? Depends on your perspective.
The European Union has come down hard on Google, recently levying a $2.7 billion fine for violating its antitrust laws, while the United States – facing the same kinds of market restraints that angered the EU – has done nothing. The United States, recently pretty lax in addressing antitrust issues at any level, has mostly applied its laws in this space to address market distortions resulting from mergers and acquisition or situations where collusion results in price-fixing. Today mere “bigness” – which is more than enough to ignite EU antitrust violations – doesn’t seem to be much of a consideration to U.S. federal antitrust regulators at either the Federal Trade Commission or the Department of Justice. If companies merge and acquire to get too big: bad. If they just grow to be big: not bad. But it wasn’t always this way. The U.S. has not always allowed organic-growth bigness to pass without serious antitrust consequences.
Back in 1956, the Justice Department began a long and hard look over the monopolistic hold the organically-big Bell System held over virtually all of America’s telephone operations. Bell literally controlled all of what today are known as its fractured descendants, RBOCs (Regional Bell Operating Companies), which have since fractured even further with Internet, wireless, etc. spin-offs and now face competition from cable, Internet and satellite carriers as well. That break-up of the Bell System was hardly voluntary. But the actual break-up (“divestiture”) began in 1974 when the DOJ sued Bell under antitrust laws. In 1982, under a consent decree, that Bell monopoly was broken into little pieces.
But today’s tech biggies are pretty close to the same levels of that monopolistic market domination, and although they are heavily in the acquisition business (mostly smaller tech companies that have technology they want – see below), mostly they got really big simply by growing. Former investment banker and author (Move Fast and Break Things: How Facebook, Google and Amazon Cornered Culture and Undermined Democracy – Little, Brown & Company, April 2017) Jonathan Taplin tells us that these three corporations aren’t too far from the bigness that led to the divestiture of the Bell System.
He reminds us that Google controls 77% of the US ad-search business, and together with Facebook, about 56% of the mobile ad market. Amazon is the eBook giant (70% market share) and accounts for almost a third of all U.S. e-commerce. If you aggregate Facebook and its operating subsidiaries (Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger), they account for about 75% of US social media traffic. That’s big, but what are the impacts on “the rest of us”?
Writing for the July 24th Bloomberg Businessweek, Paula Dwyer explains: “Economists have noticed these monopoly-size numbers and drawn even bigger conclusions: They see market concentration as the culprit behind some of the U.S. economy’s most persistent ailments—the decline of workers’ share of national income, the rise of inequality, the decrease in business startups, the dearth of job creation, and the fall in research and development spending.
“Can Big Tech really be behind all that? Economists are starting to provide the evidence. David Autor, the MIT economics professor who famously showed the pernicious effects of free-trade deals on Midwestern communities, is one. A he co-wrote argues that prestigious technology brands, using the internet’s global reach, are able to push out rivals and become winner-take-all ‘superstar’ companies. They’re highly profitable, and their lucky employees generally earn higher salaries to boot.
“They don’t engage in the predatory behavior of yore, such as selling goods below the cost of production to steal market share and cripple competitors. After all, the services that Facebook and Google offer are free (if you don’t consider giving up your personal data and privacy rights to be a cost). However, academics have documented how these companies employ far fewer people than the largest companies of decades past while taking a disproportionate share of national profits. As they grow and occupy a bigger part of the economy, median wages stagnate and labor’s share of gross domestic product declines. Labor’s shrinking share of output is widely implicated in the broader economic growth slowdown.
“Still others have shown that, as markets become more concentrated and established companies more powerful, the ability of startups to succeed declines. Since half of all new jobs spring from successful startups, this dampens job creation… Peter Orszag [Bloomberg View] He Jason Furman, chairman of President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, point out that higher returns on capital [inherent in some of these behemoths] haven’t resulted in increases in business investment—yet another manifestation of monopoly power.
“Some members of the Chicago School, the wellspring of modern antitrust theory, agree. In the 1970s and ’80s, a group of University of Chicago scholars upended antitrust law by arguing that the benefits of economic efficiency created by mergers outweighed any concerns over company size. The test was one of consumer welfare: Does a merger give the combined company the power to raise consumer prices, and are barriers to entry so high that new players can’t easily jump in? U.S. antitrust enforcers were swayed. From 1970 to 1999, the U.S. brought an average of 15.7 monopoly cases a year. That number has since fallen—to fewer than three a year from 2000 to 2014.” Time to revisit these assumptions? Yup! 0ld theories don’t always hold water in changed times.
“There is little debate that this cramped [Chicago School] view of antitrust law has resulted in an economy where two-thirds of all industries are more concentrated than they were 20 years ago, according to a study by President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, and many are dominated by three or four firms. What’s now at issue is whether the outcome has benefited society.
“Research by John Kwoka of Northeastern University, for example, has found that three-quarters of mergers have resulted in price increases without any offsetting benefits. Kwoka cited industries such as airlines, hotels, car rentals, cable television and eyeglasses.
“And even former antitrust officials acknowledge that their approval of Google’s purchase of YouTube and ITA Software and Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram and WhatsApp look naive in hindsight, eliminating the kinds of companies that might have someday challenged the tech sector’s most dominant firms.” Steven Pearlstein writing for the July 28th Washington Post. But there are so many other ways to look at the world, where current US antitrust statutes simply no longer apply.
The elements that the EU has uses to justify its prosecution of these tech giants often include variables other than direct pricing costs imposed on consumers, issues that have not reached a parallel level of concern here in the United States. “Instead of applying conventional antitrust theory, such as the effect of a merger on consumer prices, enforcers may need to consider alternative tools. One is to equate antitrust with privacy, not a traditional concern of the competition police. Germany’s Federal Cartel Office, for example, is examining charges that Facebook bullies users into agreeing to terms and conditions that allow the company to gather data on their web-surfing activities in ways they might not understand. Users who don’t agree are locked out of Facebook’s 2 billion-strong social media network.
“Another avenue is to examine control over big data. Google collects web-surfing and online-purchasing data from more than a billion people. It uses that to send personalized ads, video recommendations, and search results. The monopoly control of consumer data by Facebook and Google on such a scale has raised antitrust questions in South Korea and Japan.
“[It’s not always a matter of simple dollar-analysis] For example, because what Facebook offers is free, regulators weren’t concerned that its $22 billion acquisition of WhatsApp in 2014 might result in higher consumer prices. In fact, because WhatsApp is in a different industry, it didn’t even increase Facebook’s market share in social media.
“The tech superstars insist they compete fiercely with each other and have lowered prices in many cases. They argue that their dominance is transitory because barriers to entry for would-be rivals are low. Google often says competition is ‘one click away.’ And since consumers prefer their platforms over others’, why punish success? But when a cool innovation pops up, the superstars either acquire it or clone it. According to data compiled by Bloomberg, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft made 436 acquisitions worth $131 billion over the last decade. Antitrust cops made nary a peep.” Dwyer.
And it’s equally clear, these biggies use their power to impair nascent competition. Modern technology – particularly “reverse engineering” (reaching the same technological result with a different patent path) – has empowered the biggest to kill-off threats before they can really be competitive. “Snap Inc.’s experience with Facebook is instructive. Since Snap rebuffed Facebook’s $3 billion offer in 2013, Facebook has knocked off one after another. That includes Snapchat Stories, which lets users upload images and video for viewing by friends for 24 hours before self-destructing. Facebook added the feature—even calling it Stories—to its Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger services, and most recently to the regular Facebook product. Snap’s shares now trade at around $15, below the $17 initial offering price in March. By offering advertisers the same features but with 100 times the audience, ‘Facebook basically killed Snapchat,’ Taplin says.” Dwyer.
Earlier this year, the Yale Law Journal published a 24,000-word ‘note’ by [a 28-year-old law student named Lina Khan] titled ‘Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox.’ The article laid out with remarkable clarity and sophistication why American antitrust law has evolved to the point that it is no longer equipped to deal with tech giants such as Amazon.com, which has made itself as essential to commerce in the 21st century as the railroads, telephone systems and computer hardware makers were in the 20th.” Steven Pearlstein. “Too big to regulate”? We seem to be living in a new evolving “winner-take-all” economy where smaller competitors just do not stand a chance against the biggest baddest boyz in those huge market silos.
While we have used existing required statutes to stop simple “bigness” – as the Bell System divestiture suggests – upgrades (statutory and regulatory) to our antitrust laws are needed to focus beyond simple consumer pricing variables. Think that’s going to happen within the Trump administration or with a Republican Congress? Yeah, right… even if some of the leaders of these companies aren’t exactly the President’s best friends. Weird to think that the American public has to rely on EU antitrust enforcement of big US companies “over there,” which leaks into the United States bit by bit, because its own government has little or no interest in helping the little guy. Maybe that’s why the Dems have just turned to look in this direction. But can they really stand to lose those big contributors? “Jobs, jobs, jobs”? Tired of winning yet?
I’m Peter Dekom, and progress and change requires statutes and regulations to adjust to modern realities… or just wither away into irrelevance like so many other political directives of the past.


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The retailer says general merchandise, which includes clothing and homeware, sales fell 2.2 per cent in the 13 weeks to 30 March. The dip follows a 3.8 per cent fall over Christmas.
A 6.3 per cent increase in food sales offset the poor performance elsewhere, however, boosting total sales by 2.6 per cent in the period.
The retailer set out a long term plan to improve the perception and sharpen the positioning of clothing sub-brands such as Autograph, Per Una and Indigo last year, hiring former Debenhams and Aquascutum boss Belinda Earl in September as style director.
In a statement, M&S chief executive Marc Bolland insists the changes will pay off and that customers have reacted positively to its recent “perfectly” spring/summer fashion campaign. “We are working hard on improving our performance in general merchandise and, despite difficult trading conditions, we made progress in our operational execution,” he adds.
A refusal to slash prices as “promotional activity in the marketplace intensified in March” was cited as a reason for the sales dip in the quarter.
Multi-channel, which under the stewardship of Laura Wade-Gery has become a big focus for M&S, continued to improve, with sales increasing 22.5 per cent in its fourth quarter. Mobile sales, it adds, increased 70 per cent year on year.
John Mercer, senior retail analyst at Mintel says multi-channel is not a “panacea” to improved performance and the retailer needs to redouble efforts on improving the quality of its fashion ranges if clothing sales are to grow again.
“A key plank of Marc Bolland’s revival strategy for M&S is to excel as a multichannel retailer. But multichannel is no panacea – especially if your product isn’t right. We think M&S needs a more wide-ranging overhaul that tackles short-term product issues as well as the weakness of its position as mid-market monolith in an age of more targeted propositions,” he adds.


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Fuzzy’s Taco Shop Primed for Growth under NRD
It happens in every growth business at some point: The realization that what got you here won’t get you to the next phase of the business.
President Mel Knight said Fuzzy's Taco Shop got pretty lucky. The concept was making money, the franchisees were growing and everything was working pretty well.
“We just had years of very fortunate success with our current franchisee base, that we never really marketed franchising and really had a great base of franchisees,” said Knight. “But in a lot of cases, those guys have run out of territory.”
He said to get beyond the 150 locations the concept has, “it was time to get the infrastructure in place to grow.”
Fresh on the heels of an acquisition by NRD Capital in 2016, there was a lot of updating and polishing of the brand and more recently a fresh, development-minded executive.
Michael Mabry, who was most recently COO at Mooyah, joined a few months ago as chief development officer to help get the franchise program to the next phase.
“We’re right at 150 restaurants open right now. We hope to get to 200 in the next 24 months or so,” said Mabry. “We’re not the cute new thing on the block anymore, so you’ve got to have some substance and meat behind you. So just maturing our processes I think is part of the game.”
He said since joining the development process has been formalized with a broker network to speed up the real estate selection, an architect and construction leader to help get builds started faster and an attorney to help with lease negotiations. He said the new group of outside vendors would help expand the pipeline and be more enticing for the next set of franchisees.
“We want to be just a little more strategic in that growth, so really targeting specific areas and specific types of folks to fill out where we already have some penetration,” said Mabry.
He’s also spent a lot of time analyzing who those people might be so his small development team can waste less time on unqualified leads.
“I had a boss who once told me don’t mistake activity for progress,” said Mabry. “I want my team to be busy, but productive. I don’t want to flood my team with 1,000 leads and one is real, I’d rather give them 50 leads and 10 are real, that takes discipline.”
Knight said they had to do a little work on the actual franchise operations to make that possible. One key was the purchasing and distribution and local-store marketing pumped up for the next phase.
“We had a great partner for years, but we were a little it limited so we have just recently partnered with a new distribution company that is going to help with our growth,” said Knight.
Knight said NRD has been instrumental in getting the brand ready to “go big,” which was always in the cards, but not quiet shuffled right.
“That’s always been the plan, I think that we’ve been blessed with this incredible internal growth with our current franchisees, which speaks to a healthy system now that we’ve got a new VP of marketing, a new VP of development new VP of purchasing. A lot of that has come from NRD,” said Knight. “Now we're looking forward to just having all the system in place to do this correct. I think that sometimes people get in a hurry and we’re proud that we have that infrastructure in place.”
Knight and Mabry said they’re on track for 200 by the end of 2020.


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With over 230 million active customer accounts, the online giant, Amazon, is the most popular online store at the time of publication, and even ranks as one of the ten most popular websites on the entire Internet. Even if Amazon's own warehouses don't have what you're looking for, one of its third-party Marketplace sellers might -- though potentially at a high price. Whether you want to shop from Amazon directly or in the Marketplace, head to Amazon's website to start browsing the shelves or use a sky mall that curates different products from Amazon.
On January 22, 2018, Amazon Go, a store that uses cameras and sensors to detect items that a shopper grabs off shelves and automatically charges a shopper's Amazon account, was opened to the general public in Seattle. Customers scan their Amazon Go app as they enter, and are required to have an Amazon Go app installed on their smartphone and a linked Amazon account to be able to enter. The technology is meant to eliminate the need for checkout lines. Amazon Go was initially opened for Amazon employees in December 2016. In August 2018, the second Amazon Go store opened its doors.
Brilliance Audio is an audiobook publisher founded in 1984 by Michael Snodgrass in Grand Haven, Michigan. The company produced its first 8 audio titles in 1985. The company was purchased by Amazon in 2007 for an undisclosed amount. At the time of the acquisition, Brilliance was producing 12–15 new titles a month. It operates as an independent company within Amazon.
In late 2016, the company launched its first experimental Go store, which replaces cashiers with a computer vision system that automatically detects when you take products off the shelf and checks you out as you leave the store. Go now has two locations in Chicago, three in Seattle, and one that just opened in San Francisco today, with more planned in California and New York City over the course of the next year. Bloomberg reported in September that Amazon may open as many as 3,000 Go locations by 2021, with the goal of competing with stores like CVS and 7-Eleven, as well as fast casual and made-to-go meal establishments. The company is also now experimenting with brick-and-mortar stores that sell only four-star rated products from Amazon.com, starting with a location in New York City.
On May 5, 2014, Amazon unveiled a partnership with Twitter. Twitter users can link their accounts to an Amazon account and automatically add items to their shopping carts by responding to any tweet with an Amazon product link bearing the hashtag #AmazonCart. This allows customers to never leave their Twitter feed and the product is waiting for them when they go to the Amazon website.
Amazon’s transformation into the world’s more pervasive retail operation wouldn’t be complete unless the company began a seemingly counterintuitive push from online to offline. Starting with its brick-and-mortar bookstores in 2015 — first in Seattle and now in Chicago and New York City — Amazon established its intent to compete on all fronts with its retail competitors.
We believe that good fashion at affordable prices is a right that every woman should have. With this goal in mind, we strive to bring together everyday closet staples that you can return to time and again and special occasion dresses and professional clothing for women. Browse our collection of trendy women’s clothing to find your perfect piece, no matter the event or occasion.
Aside from creating the logo, A.J Khubani actually played a huge role in the advent of the infomercial as we know it today, which started with his Amber Vision sunglasses in 1987. More recently, his company sold the PedEgg, another As Seen On TV product which has sold 50 million units (in addition to other successful products like the As Seen On TV mop and the As Seen On TV hose). Anyone looking for the same level of success with their own product can pitch their idea to both Telebrands and As Seen On TV, Inc. although they only accept a few submissions each year.


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Ottawa's strategy centred around keeping cellular airwaves specifically earmarked for new players in the sector indefinitely out of the hands of Rogers, BCE and Telus — partly in hopes of ...
Telus Corp. called off its plan to buy small wireless provider Mobilicity on Monday after Ottawa signalled last week that it would not allow the deal
Ottawa's decision to delay the next auction of wireless spectrum until January may have given the industry some needed breathing room to make informed decisions but the pent-up demand for ...
One week after Mobilicity’s backers took comfort in a court ruling approving its plan to sell to Telus Corp., the wireless startup is once again in precarious territory, facing the ...
Ottawa is preparing to take new steps to prop up its vision of a fourth competitor in every market that would promote choice and lower prices in the wireless sector
Five years after Canada’s last auction of wireless airwaves gave priority to new entrants, the government’s efforts to provide alternatives to the Big Three players may come up short
Notwithstanding government efforts to encourage it, competition in Canada’s wireless sector remains a challenge, the country’s industry minister acknowledged Tuesday
“We have to make sure that we can create a good environment to attract investment from the companies,” Christian Paradis said on the sidelines of the North American International Auto ...
The Canadian government has tossed in the towel and will stop fighting international efforts to list asbestos as a hazardous substance, dealing a momentous blow to a once-mighty domestic industry ...
A senior Canadian minister was prepped to discuss foreign investment rules with Research In Motion’s new CEO in a March telephone call →
Canada will exempt certain memory cards from a levy charged to consumers to compensate copyright holders, Industry Minister Christian Paradis said, denying an industry group’s request
What the analysts say about Canada's decision on Wednesday to liberalize the telecommunications market, scrapping foreign investment limits on carriers with less than a 10 percent market share.
Industry Minister Christian Paradis unveiled plans late Wednesday afternoon to lift restrictions on foreign ownership of telecommunications, but only for companies with less than 10% market share
The federal government is said to be preparing to announce Wednesday a long-awaited decision addressing how it will auction off prized radio spectrum considered a cornerstone of the digital economy ... →