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Google "to take on Amazon" with home delivery service
By Stewart Mitchell
Posted on 2 Dec 2011 at 08:37
Google is planning to compete with firms such as Amazon in the retail world, according to reports.
The company is planning a service where visitors shop online, pay a fee to Google and can expect next-day delivery, a scheme similar to Amazon's Prime service.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Google is in talks with major shippers and retailers in the US – there's no word on a UK service yet – as the search and advertising giant looks to boost online retail earnings.
The move might appear bizarre at first glance, but according to online retail experts, Google has motives for confronting Amazon.
“It's important to remember that 40% of Google's revenue is from the 'retail' vertical," said Scot Wingo, chief executive of e-commerce company ChannelAdvisor, in a blog.
“For a long time, Google didn't really seem to do much with e-commerce, it had fits and starts with Google Product Search, Froogle and Google Checkout. Then in June 2011, it hired Stephanie Tilinius from eBay and since then there has been a concerted new refocus on the category.”
More importantly, said Wingo, as Amazon signs up users to Prime it locks them into Amazon, which means a large portion of product searches will no longer be conducted via Google, which would lose revenue.
“Once a consumer joins Amazon Prime, their searches for products at Google have to decrease precipitously,” Wingo said. “In fact, as a Prime user, I only look for products on Google and other channels if I can't find it on Amazon.
“In other words, Amazon has created a lock-in and it has the world's best product search engine. That's 40% of the internet that Google really can't afford to lose serious share on.”
Google declined to comment on the report.
Amazon customer service is why I keep buying from them.
By Lacrobat on 2 Dec 2011
Another Google giggle!
The business case, if you are Google, is unanswerable, the big doubt is that Google can deliver (in any sense of that word).
Without doing a tedious re-analysis of Google's business model let's just take it for granted that 'Customer Service' isn't a keystone. Consequently, or more likely causally Google isn't a big employer. Google's income & good profits derive from being extremely 'lean'.
Users of their more customer-facing Business Applications online have not been impressed by 'customer service' which I'd bet is out-sourced....
On the other hand, Amazon has spent many years building-up a superb customer-facing business, that is pretty fine-tuned to
deliver (in all senses of that word).
For most of its history Amazon has not made much profit from its business, but it has consistently reinvested into it.
A cynic might see Google 'at it' again; doing an 'Android' by copying someone else's successful business without any of the effort required to create one of its own. Looks like that to me too.
As you'll have guessed I'm an Amazon fan, but it was not ever thus. I've BECOME a fan and constant user for a simple reason: Amazon's whole 'product' is easy to use, competitive and works.
By wittgenfrog on 2 Dec 2011
Yes, good luck to Google. Amazon nailed this years ago, can't fault them.
By AlphaGeeK on 2 Dec 2011
One possible in
One possible in for Google would be to find a better carrier for packages.
Amazon themselves have a great reputation but the couriers they use, less so. There are forever comments on various forums about problems with Yodel, etc.
Any company who took a tough line with couriers who fail to do the job (and lie about it) could well make inroads into the market.
By qpw3141 on 4 Dec 2011
Couriers are indeed the issue
I agree with qpw3141. I have just moved into my new studio and I ordered a significant amount of kit from Amazon. As a "Prime" member many items were due for delivery next day. However, DPD, The Home Delivery Network and Royal Mail have screwed up over the past two weeks with items being delivered 3 days late even after paying extra for before 1pm delivery!
Royal Mail even delivered to the wrong address in another village and could not work out to whom the item had been delivered.
I doubt Google could match the superb service Amazon supplies but if they used reliable and trustworthy couriers people might jump ship to avoid the endless follow up of late deliveries.
By Viktor on 5 Dec 2011
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- How Satya Nadella can get some pay-raise karma
- Windows 10: a step back to go forward
- Michael Dell: Cloud infrastructure is the roads, bridges and highways of the 21st century
- How to check your identity hasn’t been sold to the hackers
- Tim Cook: this is how much TV has changed since the 70s
- Westminster wins the .London battle
- 20 years of PC Pro: from deep pan pizza to virtualisation
- Five reasons why the Apple Watch leaves me cold
- How to sell more ebooks on Amazon
- 10 ways to make your business more secure
- Top five VoIP mistakes
- How to add in-app purchasing to an iPhone, Android or Windows app
- Remote-control ransomware: TeamViewer and software hardball
- Why laptops with serial ports matter to the Internet of Things
- Make your mobile battery last longer
- Small steps into handling Big Data
- Nexus 5: does it really run stock Android?
- How to get broadband to a garden office


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Only now, some 7 or 8 years after the global financial crisis are economies of the European Union finally reaching pre-crisis levels. Despite self-congratulatory politicians, growth can be best described as tepid, and certainly well below previous peak levels. New deflationary demons lurk beneath the surface and guards are still up. Putting aside political optimism, economic growth is what Europe desperately needs.
However, in search of growth potential, Europe needn't look far. As the European Commission itself estimates, there are now more than 20 million small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), representing 99 percent of all business across the EU. We continue to believe startups and SME will be potential drivers for economic growth, innovation, employment and social integration in Europe.
While regulation is one vital component enabling sustained growth – a task where both the Commission and the European governments must remain vigilant not to overburden and suffocate business – another component is the SMEs themselves.
Three key elements for growth in Europe are “innovation, innovation and innovation”
This was said by Matti Vanhanen, the former Prime Minister of Finland, in the early 2000s. This, at a time when Finland’s tech industry and economy was booming. Yet without investment, sustained innovation cannot thrive. Now though it seems SMEs are attracting investment, in areas where innovation can be seen to deliver profitable business models - such as in FinTech.
Investment in FinTech
According to an Accenture report, investment in financial-technology (FinTech) companies more than tripled between 2008 and 2013 and grew by more than 200 percent globally in 2014. This compares to a meagre 63 percent growth in overall venture-capital investments. Things are changing, and how the capital is being raised is just as much part of the change. The emergence of crowd investing and online marketplaces is facilitating deal flow and making it easier to spot companies at distinct growth stages.

domain: news


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The locally based 1984 Publishing
has just announced that it plans to release Blood on Black Wax: Horror Soundtracks on Vinyl
, a book about the best horror movie soundtracks. The publisher worked with the Toronto-based horror periodical Rue Morgue
on the tome, and the hardbound, full-color, 240-page book includes images of the intricate (and often rare) artwork on the LP sleeves, as well as album reviews, release details and “wild backstories.”
"I still remember with fondness coming across a copy of John Carpenter's Escape from New York
in San Francisco, and discovering the first Death Waltz reissue Zombi 2
in Las Vegas," says co-author Aaron Lupton, Rue Morgue
’s music editor, in a press release about the book. "With so much excitement out there today over beautiful reissues, colorful variants, and increasingly rare original pressings, I thought it was time to create a book that would bring this obsession to dramatic, vibrant life."
The book includes sections on horror movie soundtracks such as A Nightmare on Elm Street
, Friday the 13th
and The Exorcist
, to name a few of the titles discussed.
Lupton and his co-author Jeff Szpirglas, who's also a Rue Morgue
writer, interviewed composers such as John Carpenter, Fabio Frizzi, Christopher Young and Harry Manfredini. Mick Garris, who directed The Stand
, wrote the foreword, and composer Christopher Young, the man behind Hellraiser
the new Pet Seminary
remake, contributed the afterword.
"I've been rabidly listening to and collecting soundtracks since buying Return of the Jedi
in 1983, but working on Blood on Black Wax
has been the apex of this fan obsession," Szpirglas says. "Over a year was spent sorting through cool covers, and listening to hours of the most insane and freakish soundscapes to curate this book."
Available on April 13, the limited Record Store Day signed edition comes with a 7-inch single featuring rare compositions by Paul Zaza (My Bloody Valentine) and Carl Zittrer (Black Christmas). It features "Prom Night" and "Love Me Till I Die," two previously unreleased disco tunes featured in pivotal scenes of the 1980 cult classic Prom Night
. Pressed on red wax, the release also features exclusive artwork by noted artist Gary Pullin. That release is limited to 1,000 copies in the U.S. and 200 in Canada and will be available only at indie record shops in both countries.
Then, on May 13, an exclusive version of Blood on Black Wax
featuring a limited-edition 12-inch vinyl pressing of the full Prom Night
soundtrack cut at 45rpm will come out.
The special Record Store Day edition of Blood on Black Wax
retails for $39.95, and the base book sells for $34.95. The soundtrack edition (and pricing) will be announced soon at 1984Publishing.com


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INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Chef Oya’s The TRAP is a small local seafood place on the near east side of Indianapolis that’s been getting some buzz around town.
The owner, Chef Oya Woodruff, says the name TRAP stands for Towards Restoring Food Access to the People. However, it’s the sauce on the food that may get even more attention than the food it actually comes served with.
“TRAP Butter is a blend of butter, seasonings and spices that we put together to put, specifically, on our seafood,” Woodruff said. “It was so good (and) people loved it so much we decided to bottle it.”
Because of their small staff, Woodruff decided to shut down their carryout operations at the restaurant, 3355 N Keystone Ave., and focus all of their energy on selling the sauce. She says as a result, their sales went up 40%. “We aren’t open for carryout simply because we’ve been so busy making our bottles and shipping them,” Woodruff said.
The sauce is available in five flavors: OG Garlic Herb, Island Curry, Sweet Thai Chili, Yaad Jerk and Vegan Citrus Chive.
The chef recommends that first-timers try the OG Garlic Herb. “I would have to say try that one because it’s the original and the most popular,” she said.


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Chinese phone maker Meizu has unveiled the world’s first smartphone with no buttons and no ports. The sides of the Meizu Zero are completely smooth, for better or worse.
If you’re wondering how you use the thing, it has touch-sensitive sides that you can use to turn the phone on and off or adjust the volume. It supports 18W wireless fast charging so there’s no need for a USB port. And the phone has eSIM support, so there’s no need to insert a SIM card.
There’s also no audio jack, so I suppose you’re expected to use Bluetooth to connect headphones or speakers… but that’s hardly a unique feature. Over the last few years phone makers have released a lot of models that lack headphone jacks.
Meizu also used an in-display fingerprint sensor to minimize obstructions on the front of the phone. But one trend the Meizu Zero doesn’t adopt? The notch. There are small black bezels above and below the 6 inch AMOLED display, and the 20MP front-facing camera fits snugly into the top border.
On the back of the phone there’s a 12MP + 20MP dual camera system. And under the hood there’s a Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor.
Meizu hasn’t unveiled the price or release date for the phone yet, so while the company is the first to announce a button-free, port-free smartphone, it’s unclear if the Meizu Zero will be the first such device to ship.
Rival Chinese phone maker Vivo is expected to unveil the Vivo Apex 2019 tomorrow, and it’s expected to have a similarly sparse design.


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Cloud-based services now provide a way for companies to plan ahead without relying on cumbersome spreadsheets. But what's a boon for smaller companies is disrupting the market for higher-end solutions.
Tom SimoniteFollow @twitterapi
IT Editor, Software & Hardware
I’m MIT Technology Review’s IT editor for hardware and software and enjoy a diverse diet of algorithms, Internet, and human-computer interaction with chips on the side. Working in our San Francisco office, I cover new ideas about what computers can do for us, whether they spring from tech giants, new startups, or academic labs.
My journey to the West Coast started in a small English town called Wantage and took in the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, and five years writing and editing technology news coverage at New Scientist magazine.
Tom Simonite's Stories
How the inventor of the PalmPilot studied the workings of the human brain to help companies turn a deluge of data into business intelligence.
A Web startup demos a "predictive" search engine.
E-commerce startups are targeting emerging economies where cell phones, not browsers, rule.
Your cell phone could soon tell your friends what you're buying and where.
Twitter's founder talks about his new business, and getting people to share details of their purchases online.
Mobile broadband services are becoming competitive with fixed data links—which means businesses should be able to cut their wired connections.
How venture-backed Brand.net spotted Silicon Valley's blind spot and got brands to buy online advertising up to a year in advance.
HP's printers could soon tidy up Web pages for printing, while also inserting ads.
Music-focused social network is linked to iTunes, and TV shows will rent for 99 cents.


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In his recent Forbes article, Tripp Donnelly, CEO and Founder of REQ, an award-winning digital marketing company specializing in advocacy, reputation and brand marketing for global brands, emphasizes the fact that "we have to learn how to own our reputation in the digital space."
"As we continue to place more trust in search results, the importance of maintaining and managing our online reputation grows. We’ve moved from the age of information to the age of reputation. In fact, according to the Pew Research Center, 91% of people trust what they see and read in search engine results, and the Edelman Trust Barometer reports that 65% of people trust these results more than any other source.
These perceptions will define you. This means that what’s out there matters -- and it will continue to matter. The news cycle may evolve quickly, but your digital footprint never disappears."


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The Bureau of Energy is considering implementing a new “green-power pricing” scheme in July in a bid to support the nation’s renewable energy development, while lessening the government’s financial burden.
According to the bureau, households in the future may be able to opt for a higher electricity rate of NT$3.95 per kilowatt-hour for their energy consumption.
This represents a 37 percent increase from the current rate of NT$2.89 per kilowatt-hour, as the extra NT$1.06 per kilowatt-hour will be paid for renewable energy generated by independent power producers, the bureau said.
The electricity rate for enterprises will be lifted to NT$3.76 per kilowatt-hour, incorporating the original NT$2.7 per kilowatt-hour and the extra NT$1.06 considered as the cost of green-energy consumption, the bureau said.
“We are still collecting public opinions,” Bureau of Energy official Lan Wen-zong (藍文宗) said by telephone, adding that the new pricing mechanism would take effect in July at the earliest if no party raises objections.
Lan said individuals and enterprises can apply to Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) to get proof of their green-power purchases.
Taipower will allow homes and businesses to purchase a total of 310 million kilowatt-hours of renewable energy, mostly solar and wind energy, once the program takes effect.
Based on the bureau’s estimate, enterprises that consume 2,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity a month may see their energy costs increase by NT$2,120 a month.
The new scheme is set to be effective for three years and the bureau welcomes feedback from the public about its proposal until April 30.
NOT ALL GOOD: Analysts warned that other data for last month might be less rosy due to the virus and analysts expect the PMI to contract again next month Chinese factory activity saw surprise growth last month as businesses went back to work following a lengthy shutdown, but analysts said that the economy faces a challenging recovery as external demand has been devastated by the COVID-19 pandemic, while the World Bank said that growth could screech to a halt. China is slowly returning to life after months of tough restrictions aimed at containing the virus, which put millions of people into virtual house arrest and brought economic activity to a near standstill. The strict measures saw a closely watched gauge of manufacturing plunge to its lowest level on record in February,
The output of the global smartphone industry this year is to contract by 7.8 percent on an annual basis as the COVID-19 pandemic ushers in a global recession, Taipei-based market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said in a report on Monday. The global production of smartphones is expected to fall to 1.29 billion units, as the pandemic dampens demand for consumer electronics, leading to a decline in shipments across Europe and North America, TrendForce said. With consumers delaying smartphone purchases and thereby lengthening the device replacement cycle, overall prices would suffer a setback that is expected to negatively affect the profitability of smartphone
ELECTRONICS Lite-On delays sale of unit Lite-On Technology Corp (光寶科技) yesterday said it would postpone the sale of its solid-state drives (SSD) business to Kioxia Holdings Corp, formerly known as Toshiba Memory Holdings Corp, due to disruptions amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Last year, the Taiwan-based electronics components supplier struck the deal with the Japanese firm, agreeing to sell the unit for US$165 million. Citing unfinished integration work due to the pandemic, Lite-On has deferred today’s closing date until further notice, adding that the delay would not have a negative effect on the unit’s operations. AUTO PARTS Hiroca approves dividend Automotive interior parts supplier Hiroca
ALL ABOUT STRATEGY: The company is optimistic, saying that its gross margin should increase year-on-year, but it is scaling back on its plans to expand capacity Quang Viet Enterprise Co (QVE, 廣越), which makes down jackets and garments for sportswear and outdoor brands including Adidas AG, yesterday said that revenue might drop 5 to 10 percent annually this year as some customers trimmed orders in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. That would mark its first revenue decline since 2016. Quang Viet posted record-high revenue of NT$16.26 billion (US$537.45 million) last year, up 22 percent from 2018. Down jackets made up 40 percent of it revenue last year. North Face Inc and Patagonia Inc are this year likely to reduce orders by 20 to 30 percent from a


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ODELL — In the midst of a global pandemic, Duckwall Fruit began processing fruit with the help of some of the newest and most advanced technology in the world. In 2020, they partnered with Unisorting — a brand of the Unitec group — and the fruit packing plant opened their new Optical PreSize Defect sorting machine.
Today, they find themselves as one of the leaders in the fruit processing industry, yet their story began more than a century ago.
For more than 100 years Duckwall Fruit has been a staple in the Hood River Valley and beyond. Their journey began in 1919 when Duckwall brothers, John and William St. Clair, brought apples across the country from Hood River to Indiana. The positive response from buyers and consumers led John to travel overseas and market their fruit internationally and build export networks. In 1958, they moved their operations to Odell. A merger with Pooley Fruit in 1971 expanded the company. In the early 2000s, due to the volume of pears grown in the valley, Duckwall switched from packing apples, cherries and pears to packaging exclusively pears. From packing fruit in a small upper valley orchard to supplying pears internationally, Duckwall has sustained excellence in the fruit packing industry.
Their packing plant in Odell has seen significant changes in recent years. Major modifications include an upgrade to the technology used to process, wash, sort, pack and ship different pear varieties around the world. Unisorting is a brand of the Unitec company, which is based out of eastern Italy. The tech company aims to develop innovative and user-friendly technologies to reduce the costs of packing and processing, while also protecting the fragile nature of the fruit.
During the winter months, Duckwall mainly processes Anjou pears. Quality Control Manager Craig Mallon and Special Projects Manager Nathan Duckwall are thrilled with the new Optical PreSize Defect sorting machine for a number of reasons.
“Labor is a huge problem in our industry. And previously we were doing it all manually or individually by hand. So, it took a lot of people,” said Duckwall.
The new Pear Sorting 3 system completes the work in a fraction of the time it once took 50 people a day to finish. In the Hood River Valley, the agriculture industry supplies many residents with a stable income. Duckwall emphasized that new technology did not displace workers. Instead, they moved those who were sorting to other departments throughout the facility.
When Duckwall placed the initial order in 2019, Unitec began customizing the machinery and computer software to fit their specific needs.
The system was built, tested, and disassembled in Italy, then shipped to North America in 57 containers through the Port of Seattle, then transported to Odell.
Getting the equipment out of Italy was a huge undertaking, said Duckwall Fruit President Ed Weathers. “It was a struggle. That is really when COVID started happening, prior to the machine being delivered. As you can imagine, it was a huge undertaking,” Weathers said. “If you can remember back in time, Italy was a hotspot. A majority of the country was on lockdown. They (Unitec) were on the edge of being shut down.” Import restrictions ordered by then-President Donald Trump targeted foreign manufactured goods, in an effort to curb the spread of COVID-19. But eventually the equipment and technicians arrived in Odell.
Unitec lobbied with the Italian government to let the Unitec employees travel to North America to set up the equipment. Eventually, they agreed to let them travel. And with a letter from Duckwall Fruit stating the technicians from Unitec were essential to their business, the Unitec employees sat in quarantine for two weeks before crossing the border, one step closer to success.
Post-quarantine, Unitec workers arrived in Odell and got started assembling and testing the system one last time before handing control over to Duckwall Fruit.
“It was a pretty crazy time to try to undertake this magnitude of a project,” said Duckwall. Three years later, the system continues to be fully operational.”
The pears begin their journey by being dumped into a pool of water, where pre-sorting happens by hand. Workers manually pick out leftover leaves and deformed pears that they find. The pears are washed and dried before they hit a conveyor belt on their way to the next step in the Optical Presize Defect Sorting machine. Occasionally, the fruit will be covered in wax to lengthen their lifespan in storage.
Once the orchard bins drop the fruit, they are put on their own track, which will lead them through a bin washer — basically a large scale dishwasher. Fruit that passes the computer’s inspection will then be put back in the bins and prepared for packing.
Unitec custom built the presize sorter for Duckwall Fruit and added 12 lanes where the pears pass under an apparatus simply known as “the camera box.” Each individual pear is digitally captured, and the computer software identifies different defects on the fruit, such as misshapen or discoloration around the outside of the fruit.
The fruit is then sorted based on a set of parameters centered around weight, size, color, and grade — overall quality of the pear.
The Unitec Pear Sorting 3 program is the computer software used, and Duckwall Fruit is anticipating the next edition of software — Pear Sorting 4 — to be released soon.
After the fruit is properly sorted, employees package the fruit by hand and the boxes are then loaded on pallets and shipped around the world.
Different sizes of fruits are packed into different boxes. Each fruit is individually cloaked in a wax wrap for protection. When the iconic Duckwall Fruit boxes are full, they are either prepared for export or placed in several different coolers throughout the facilities. There are Common Storage coolers and Controlled Atmosphere coolers. “CS” coolers are for fruit that is ready to be shipped out at a moment’s notice. The Controlled Atmosphere, or “CA” coolers, are specially designed to remove all oxygen from the air, which dramatically prolongs the lifespan of the fruit. A majority of the fruit packed is kept in Common Storage.
Duckwall said that Mexico is their biggest export market, with around 30% of their pears shipped south annually. Duckwall Fruit ships to every corner of the world; South America and the Middle East are other popular destinations.
After the tour, Weathers, Duckwall and Project and Communications Director Sara Duckwall took time to reflect on their family’s legacy in Odell and around the world.
“We equally need our growers, our employees and our customers,” said Weathers. “We feel like we’re a big company that acts like a small one. It’s attention to detail. It’s a family atmosphere. Every customer, every order and everything we do is super important to us.”


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New Pragmatic-Princess Deal Brings Enhanced Digital Bingo to Rapidly Diversifying RomaniaPublished July 31, 2021 by Lee R
The latest deal in Romania will bring stronger verticals to an already popular iGaming site launch.
A landmark deal between Pragmatic and Crowd Entertainment Limited is bringing a groundbreaking digital bingo product to the Romanian market.
The New Deal
The agreement enables Pragmatic Play content provider Pragmatic to build upon a spurt of slot releases to diversify its audience further by introducing a new digital bingo product to the Romanian market via Crowd holding Princess Casino.
New Bingo Offerings
The new content agreement calls for the launch of bingo variants from Gibraltar-based Pragmatic such as the wildly popular mobile-first Bingo Blast game to be made available to players at the princesscasino.ro URL, where Romanian players have already shown an affinity Pragmatic’s slots and casino games offerings.
The casino product consists of what is called “high-velocity” gameplay, a product introduced in 2020 offering action three to four times faster than the average 90-ball bingo variant and optimised across mobile or desktop.
Pragmatic Bingo Background
Pragmatic introduced the easily integrated and fully customisable bingo-on-the-go product at ICE 2019. Headlined by Bingo Blast, the growing popularity of Pragmatic's bingo portfolio has become a key driver of Pragmatic growth.
Crowd Leader Pleased
Crowd Entertainment CRM Marketing Manager Daniela Asaftei, CRM Marketing Manager called bingo is a “strong vertical” which “perfectly blends with the casino background and brings an extra layer of entertainment to our players.”
Asaftei explained her organisation's engagement strategy further in the move:
“After a highly productive collaboration with Pragmatic Play and their slots and live games, we are glad to present another top product to our players.”
Pragmatic Play has called the agreement “another important step” in organisational strategy to ensure that players in increasing regulated markets enjoy “highest quality” games across bingo, live casino, slots, and virtual sports.
Pragmatic VP Speaks
Pragmatic Vice President of Bingo Operations Claire McDaid expressed her company's delight at launching bingo in another territory while “further enhancing our partnership with Crowd Entertainment.”
The VP lauded early results from slot and live casino game offerings with the Princess Casino brand for leaving “no doubt” about make bingo “equally as successful” in the Romania market.
With Pragmatic bingo verticals showing success in other markets already, the Pragmatic-Crowd deal appears a true win-win-win agreement benefiting Romania players the most.


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We’ve seen a 200 percent rise in traffic to our website,” says Emma Jones, CEO of Enterprise Nation. “People are seeking advice on the schemes that can help them and on how to carry on trading during the crisis.”
As Jones explains, Enterprise Nation is a business support company that exists to provide advice and help to small businesses through a network of advisers. In more normal times, Enterprise Nation would be looking forward to hosting around 300 live events across 2020. But these are not normal times. Nevertheless, the company is continuing to provide support through its website while also introducing business owners to expert help.
And over course of the COVID-19 crisis - as it has affected the U.K. - Jones has seen a shift of focus in terms of the advice required by Enterprise Nation’s community of businesses. Initially, the bulk of inquiries were about the various funding options brought on stream by the government, including a package of loan guarantees, grants, payment of 80% of salary to furloughed workers, and cash sums for the self-employed based on their revenues over a period of years.
“At the start, the main concern was money,” says Jones. “By now most people have understood the sources of money that are available.” Attention is now shifting to how to make money (if possible) under the current rules and how to position for the future.
What that actually means depends on the type of business. Many companies - particularly in the retail and hospitality sectors - are completely closed down at the moment in terms of a customer-facing presence. However, online retail sales are rising. Elsewhere, some companies have closed their offices but are employing staff to work from home. A few - if home working isn’t possible - are continuing to operate in the normal way, as long as social distancing can be observed. In other words, the U.K. economy is not completely moribund. Businesses are doing what they can.
But there is a new normal. Jones says small businesses have adapted rapidly - for instance, many of those that weren’t selling online already have begun to embrace e-commerce as a means to serve customers.
Which is not to say everything is fine. There is a huge amount of uncertainty. Consumers may still have money to spend, but as no one can say for sure how long the crisis will last, many are taking a cautious approach to buying goods and services. In the B2B market, customers are probably trying to reduce outgoings while maximizing cash coming in. Consequently, they won't be buying quite so much.
Will The Customers Return?
The government support measures are underpinning businesses that have seen sales fall or their market collapse. The question now is will those customers come back or sales return to normal after lockdown is over?
“So now we’re finding businesses are looking for ways to keep customers engaged. They are also trying to build a community of new customers," says Jones.
Thus Enterprise Nation is seeing rising interest in marketing via email and social media. As Jones acknowledges, this has required a change in psychology. Rather than going in to work expecting to make sales today, much of the work that’s going on is about preparing the ground for generating revenues in the (hopefully) not too distant future. Nevertheless, Jones, businesses they are responding well to the need to engage.
In parallel, businesses that are continuing to trade are doing so at a time when managing cash flow can be a challenge. On the one hand, there may fewer orders coming and when sales are made, cash strapped customers may take longer to pay. If, indeed, the pay at all.
Pranav Sood is VP for Small Business at British fintech, GoCardless - a company that enables businesses to easily set up recurring payment arrangements with their customers. “We’ve been doing a lot of webinars,” he says. “What we’re finding is that small businesses are facing a cash flow crunch," he says.
There is no easy answer to the cash flow problem - particularly when it’s caused by late payments. In the current crisis, businesses want to take orders and maintain their revenues, but those that offer credit or take monthly subscriptions must be aware that payments might come in behind time or not at all. This is always been a problem, but one that has been exacerbated by the current economic slowdown.
For its part, GoCardless has added a new machine learning-driven business intelligence tool to its system. Customer payment patterns are analyzed and when problems - such as a missed monthly payment arise, users are provided with information on the optimal times to seek to retry a payment request. This additional tier of information should make it easier for GoCardless users to follow up on late payments and collect the cash they're owed.
The bigger picture here is businesses who take time to know and engage with their customers may be better equipped to weather the COVID-19 storm than those who don’t. Marketing, communication and business intelligence all play a part. But it could be a long haul.


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The insiders' edge for 40 Act industry executives!
an InvestmentWires' Publication
Tuesday, June 24, 2003|
American Century Still Shrinking
American Century is trimming its sales in front of the summer doldrums. Last week the Kansas City-based fund firm made a buyout offer to workers in its retail shareholder services group. The offer was extended to roughly 600 workers and about 60 to 80 are expected to take the firm up on it, a spokesperson told the MFWire.com.
The buyout offer is part of the fund firm's attempts to align its workforce with the workflow. "We are seeing a little of the typical summer fall-off that has regularly occurred over the past 15 years. Though we think that things will come back in the fall, we foresee that we will still have capacity to accommodate this type of program," explained the spokesperson.
He added that American Century has achieved efficiencies in the group because of technology it has adopted. More customers are initiating contact with the firm over the Internet, for example.
The cutback is also a response to the changing distribution channels by which shareholders find the firm. Nearly half (48 percent) of new fund purchases at American Century now come through an advisor. "We are not only retail anymore, more of our business is coming in through advisors. The way customers interact with us has evolved over the past three to five years," confirmed the spokesperson.
The package includes a payout based on both the salary level and the tenure of the employee. It also includes a prorated bonus for 2003. Those accepting will be paid at least three months' salary and health benefits. Those with more than three years tenure will also get one month's salary and health benefits for each year of service.
The voluntary severance offer was made last week to the employee group that includes workers in Kansas City, Denver and Mountain View, California and is set to for a month through mid-July. The majority of the workers have jobs in which communication with retail shareholders is their primary responsibility. That includes phone workers and those who process transactions as well as staff dedicated to instant messaging.
Printed from: MFWire.com/story.asp?s=5398
Copyright 2003, InvestmentWires, Inc.
All Rights Reserved


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WASHINGTON D.C. – The Food and Drug Administration has declared all U.S. candy corn to be completely free of genetically modified ingredients. Consumers cautious about GMO’s in their diet have been uncertain about the safety of candy corn, and some have been purchasing candy corn only at farmers markets.
The FDA’s statement is meant to reassure consumers, as well as U.S. trading partners. American candy corn producers stand to benefit, as markets that currently ban GMO’s are now open to trade. The European Union is one that will not import genetically modified candy corn, stating that they prefer organic, locally produced candy corn.
Candy corn futures at the Chicago Board Options Exchange are now being traded in positive territory, attracting new investors in the candy corn market.


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Boston 3D printer developer Markforged (NYSE: MKFG) posted strong third-quarter profit and revenue growth for 2021, just four months after going public on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) through a merger deal with a blank-check company. The manufacturer of 3D metal and continuous carbon fiber printers reported revenues of $24 million in the quarter ending September 30, 2021, a 54% jump from the $15.6 million in the same period last year, when 3D printer manufacturers were grappling with the pandemic’s effect on supply chains and businesses in general.
Experiencing growth across all products and services and geographic regions, Markforged reported hardware sales increased 58.4% year-on-year. Moving on to net profits, the company said it grew seven-fold to $23.9 million in its third quarter, which is a massive improvement from the $3.7 million loss it reported for the same period last year.
Following the November 10, 2021, financial announcement, shares rose more than 6% in after-hours trading before dipping 5% when markets opened on the next day. Markforged began trading on July 15, 2021, at $7.76 and has since seen the stock price drop up to 22% in October. However, the release of the latest upbeat earnings announcement could help stabilize the market price between $7 and $8, as the company readies for end-of-year revenues and pipeline milestones in 2022.
Other highlights in the quarter include a workforce expansion to 361 employees and a new VP of engineering and former Amazon executive John Howard. The company also posted gross margins of 57%, a year-over-year decline compared to 59.6% in Q3 of 2020, which is largely attributed to the high costs of materials resulting from global supply chain disruptions.
During an earnings call with investors, Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Mark Schwartz said the company continues to address supply chain challenges in a number of ways, including procuring larger order quantities, adding complementary sources of certain materials, and otherwise mitigating manufacturing constraints to fulfill demand and meet growth objectives. In fact, Markforged has even purchased materials at higher prices to secure sources of supply, something we have heard from other companies as well during these last two years.
Targeting high-value mission-critical manufacturing applications from the most demanding industries, Markforged now supports more than 10,000 customers and has printed over 10 million parts through its connected platform, the Digital Forge. The company believes its AI-based 3D printing software has an opportunity to sustain the highest gross margin in the industry and generate greater demand for new printers and consumables.
Released in late 2020, the Digital Forge serves as a “mini-factory” that can be placed anywhere in the world to help customers overcome challenges–like disrupted global supply chains–and print parts at the point of need. To ensure the creation of parts on-demand instead of shipping them from all over the world, Markforged has gone as far as to test the Digital Forge by 3D printing components on every production line, and in turn, reducing outside dependencies and ensuring business continuity for its customers.
“The supply chain disruptions felt by manufacturers all over the world are amplifying the need for solutions like the Digital Forge, which should translate directly into increasing market adoption and customer penetration and create opportunities for revenue growth. Our customers continue to recognize the value of our end-to-end platform and its ability to address mission-critical problems at the point of need, overcome the global shortage of parts, and ensure their production line resiliency,” said Shai Terem, President and CEO of Markforged.
Other quarterly launches include the introduction of two innovations in software and materials. First, Markforged released its Eiger Fleet software designed to provide access control, management, and visibility and accelerate the adoption of additive manufacturing operations at a global scale. Followed by the launch of aerospace-ready materials Onyx FR-A and Carbon Fiber FR-A, which are currently undergoing qualification through the National Center for Advanced Materials Performance, to increase Markforged’s addressable market by strategically supporting highly regulated industries like aerospace and defense.
During the upcoming Formnext 2021 event in Frankfurt, Germany, Markforged will showcase its newest printer, the FX20. Aimed at solving robust production requirements, particularly in the aerospace, defense, and automotive industries, FX20 is by far the biggest, fastest, hottest, and smartest printer built by the brand.
Discussing the new machine with investors, Terem anticipates it will allow the company to materially increase its addressable market into bigger parts and higher volume production parts, especially for mission-critical applications requiring stronger, lighter, and heat-resistant parts. The CEO said he expects to “ship the FX20 in volume in the second half of 2022,” driving growth and amplifying the normal seasonality generally experienced in the third and fourth quarters of the year.
Now that Markforged has its key products in place, it is ready for future growth and foresees 2021 revenues to be around $90 million, with year-end gross margins of 57%. So far, revenue for the first nine months of the year has generated $64.6 million in revenue, thereby, given the current rate at which sales have been posted, the estimated guidance looks solid. At this rate, revenue is forecast to grow 43.98% per year based on estimates from analysts at Simply Wall Street.
As for 2022, management still considers it early to provide any guidance. However Terem speculated that there is an opportunity for Markforged to continue on its growth path and meet the strong expectations it has set for the company, but he insists it’s “too early to tell and the market is just too volatile.”
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Apple cuts iPhone 5 screen orders due to `weak demand`
Washington: Apple Inc has almost halved its order of LCD panels for the iPhone 5 due to weaker demand for the latest smartphone than the tech giant expected, people close to the matter have revealed.
According to one of the people, the firm has also cut orders for components other than screens.
The people said Apple notified the suppliers of the order cut last month, the Wall Street Journal reports.
According to the Journal, the move indicates that sales of the new iPhone haven`t been as strong as previously anticipated and demand may be waning.
It comes as the company has been facing greater challenges from Korean mobile maker Samsung and other makers of smartphones powered by Google`s Android operating system, the paper added.
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Jimmy Patronis Florida’s Chief Financial Officer, June 7, 2022
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Today, Florida Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Jimmy Patronis applauded Governor Ron DeSantis for signing House Bill 749, Fraud Prevention. The legislation provides various fraud protections for consumers including provisions streamlining the cancelation of subscription services, the implementation of digital insurance cards, cracks down on unwanted telemarketing calls, and provides measures to hold unlicensed insurance adjusters accountable.
CFO Jimmy Patronis said, “As a former small business owner myself, I work every day as your CFO to ensure that the customer comes first and consumers are protected. This legislation empowers Florida policyholders by creating digital insurance cards that will communicate with the digital drivers’ license and mandates that they be operational by 2023 on Florida roadways to create value for Florida drivers and reduce insurance fraud. Included in this bill are also provisions that combat fraudulent and annoying telemarketing calls by requiring licensed warranty agencies and agents to identify their full business name and license number immediately - cracking down on the amount of illegitimate telemarketing calls. I also fought to include increased penalties on unlicensed public adjusters who break the law. In certain instances, following a storm, policyholders may contract with their own adjusters to assess damage. Too often, a bad adjuster that’s unlicensed will take their money and run or lock the policyholder into a bad contract where they sign their rights away – that practice ends now.
“Thank you to Governor DeSantis for signing this legislation which will go a long way in modernizing our DFS statutes and giving the Florida consumer more control and prevent fraud. My thanks to Senator Gruters and Representative Clemons for taking on the challenge of passing these fraud protections and making Florida a safer place to do business.”
Senator Joe Gruters said, “Thank you to Governor DeSantis for signing this good bill into law and to CFO Patronis for his commitment to protecting Floridians. I was pleased to sponsor this piece of legislation that protects consumers from fraudulent activities.”
Representative Chuck Clemons said, “I was pleased to sponsor this legislation in the Florida House and guide it to the Governor’s desk. This bill will hold big businesses accountable and keep fraudsters at bay. Thank you to CFO Patronis for all your support and working to keep the State of Florida fiscally responsible to consumers.”


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Here's another central agency change as SuperYachtsMonaco say they've taken over the central listing for sale of the 42m motor yacht Oxyzen.
A semi-custom yacht from AB Yachts’ 140 series, built in 2007, Oxyzen has futuristic exterior styling that will turn heads in every port and guests will be whisked away at an impressive cruising speed of 35 knots. Her minimalist interior has guest accommodation for 10 in a master suite, two VIP staterooms and two twin cabins. Her top speed is 40 knots, courtesy of triple 2,400hp MTU engines.
On view at the Monaco Yacht Show, Oxyzen is asking €6.9 million. For more information contact:


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- Event Coverage
If you can't do without music, and faithful sound reproduction is all you live for, then this feature is for you. We are currently in Leuven, Belgium, to find out more about Philips' freshly concocted "Obsessed with Sound" campaign and six accompanying audio champions about to grace our shelves real soon.
Lenovo launches a whole bunch of new stuff that promises to be fun, fun, fun! We pop on by to find out.
We got some hands-on time with the recently announced Nokia C3, C6 and E5 at Nokia's office. Also, a quick peek into the Microsoft Communicator Mobile, a collaboration between Nokia and Microsoft to unify communication channels in a corporate environment.
HP held a pretty big enterprise and SMB event in Beijing on the 20th and 21st of April covering new technologies, functions, products and services for their printer division. We bring you the condensed highlights of the event, so step right this way.
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Company‚Äôs turnover jumps 34% to Rs 200 crore in Q4
Online PR News – 28-May-2012 – Ahmedabad – Ahmedabad, May 23, 2012: Agro and food processing major, Anil Limited, reported a 43.64% jump in net profit and a 34% increase in total income for the fourth quarter (Q4) ended March 31, 2012 at its board meeting held on 22 May 2012. The company also declared a dividend of 20% for the year 2011-12.
For the fourth quarter (Q4) the company has reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 14.45 crore which represents a jump of 43.64% over Rs 10.06 crore posted in the Q4 of the previous financial year. Net sales in current Q4 at Rs 199.96 crore were higher by 34.46% compared to Rs 148.71 crore in same quarter of previous fiscal.
For the 12 months ended March 31, 2012 the company‚Äôs consolidated profit after tax was Rs 50.41 crore an increase of 25.62% over Rs 40.13 crore net profit posted in the previous financial year. Total income for FY2012 at Rs 646.55 crore was higher by 27.82% over previous fiscal‚Äôs turnover of Rs 505.84 crore.
Commenting on the financial performance of the company, Mr. Amol S. Sheth, Chairman and Managing Director of Anil Limited said, ‚ÄúDevelopment of new products and focus on speciality products along with a very focussed approach on efficiency improvements and cost management have enabled us to grow both the top line and the bottom line.‚ÄĚ


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Tuesday reported flat third-quarter earnings, despite higher commodity prices, missing analysts' estimates.
The Minneapolis-based food company had net income of $242 million, or 63 cents a share, on revenue of $2.70 billion, vs. $240 million, or 63 cents a share, on sales of $2.64 billion a year ago. The consensus estimate was for 66 cents a share, according to Thomson One Analytics.
The quarterly results include costs related to the company's 2002 acquisition of rival Pillsbury. Without that, the company earned 64 cents a share in its fiscal 2004 third quarter ended Feb. 22, compared to 67 cents a share in the year-ago period.
"Our third-quarter results were disappointing, and reflect the impact of higher supply chain costs and soft unit volumes," the company said in a statement. "We are introducing a number of new products, some of which address consumers' current interest in lower carbohydrate choices. These new product introductions will be supported with increased levels of marketing spending in the fourth quarter."
General Mills offered a revised forecast for full-year 2004 EPS of $2.75, including an estimated 10 cents a share worth of restructuring, merger and other related costs. The consensus forecast for the fiscal year ending in May is for $2.84 a share.
During the third-quarter, sales fell 1% at the company's retail unit and 6% at its bakery and food services group. International sales rose 20%, partly because of the weaker dollar.
Shares fell 35 cents, or 0.8%, to $46.35 in premarket trading.


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2018 will be the year you wear your walletJanuary 9, 2018 | By Ann Cairns
Could this be the year when we say goodbye to the need to dive for your change in pockets or handbags, say so long to the frantic searching for your purse, wallet or card? Thanks to the incredible speed with which new technologies are adopted, physical wallets could soon be a thing of the past as the world wakes up to wearables.
Wearable devices - once restricted to simple tasks such as counting steps or heart rates – are getting a new lease of life by becoming payment enabled, with forecasters predicting 62 percent of wearables will feature payment functionality by 2020. In 2016 the global sales of smart wearable devices stood at a mighty $16.2 billion – with even more growth and payment adoption to come.
One of largest jumps in the European wearable market was seen in the UK with a 45 percent increase in 2016 when a whopping 13 million devices were sold.
It is confidence in contactless technology that is fueling growth in the wearable market. In the second half of 2015, contactless payments grew across Europe by almost 170 percent year-on-year and in 2016 contactless payments tripled.
Mobile payments in the EU-7 ((UK, France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Netherlands and Spain) grew to $52 billion at the end of 2015 and are expected to triple in the next five years.
In the same year, £25 billion was spent using contactless payments in the UK and come 2017, approximately the same amount (£23.23bn to be exact) was spent in just six months. This shows just how fast the growth of wearables and uptake of contactless payment is happening.
Cities in particular are realising the benefit of fast and secure contactless payments for transport. Wearables make this easier than ever. These are growing ever more popular with demand in Europe up 22 percent year-on-year from January to June 2017.
While payment speed is important, just as contactless took a few years to fly, wearables are about to reach a tipping point for mass adoption thanks to better security.
The Mastercard Tokenization system is a big reason why wearable payments are becoming more secure than ever. The system ensures that your 16-digit card number is not used or stored on the wearable device - instead an alternate number, dubbed a ‘token’, is allocated to each new device for transactions. This uses similar protection to physical card chip security and applies it to digital payments.
This secure system is possible thanks to the Mastercard Digital Enablement Service (MDES). This works by the user inputting a credit or debit card number into the phone, once, as a provisioning stage. This is then authenticated with a one-time password from the bank, sent to the phone. The user inputs this code, then Mastercard cross-checks that before making the token available on the device. Since this offers a new token for each newly paired device, any lost payment gadget can easily be cancelled from the phone without other devices being disconnected.
Tokenisation also adds another layer of security due to the real credit card number being kept hidden, even during transactions at the point of sale. Since most people feel more comfortable using a digital wallet offered by their own bank, this authentication process makes it easy for people to pay digitally with confidence.
Payments are made secure thanks to the use of a password, PIN or fingerprint already used on a connected smartphone. Although some, like Apple Watch, use persistent identification, meaning the wearable is unlocked and ready to pay until it is detected as removed from the wearer’s wrist. But security goes beyond the capabilities of any device. As yet another layer of protection, Mastercard’s zero liability provision offers debit or credit cardholders another safeguard for their funds.
A new range of wearables
This security is rapidly unlocking new and innovative wearables from smartwatches with Samsung Pay, Android Pay or Apple Pay to smartwatches with fitness focus like Garmin Pay or Fitbit Pay and even stylish rings. Kerv, a digital ring manufacturer, has created a contactless payment ring for easy payments in a system that is very difficult to lose. This flexibility is making wearables more desirable than the bank card could ever dream of being.
In just two months Fitbit Pay and Garmin Pay have been deployed across a further 10 countries with multiple issuers. This is just the beginning with tokenisation making it potentially possible to turn all sorts of gadgets into secure payment platforms such as cars, TVs and even fridges. Mastercard is working with lots of manufacturers in watch, ring and fitness brands for future wearable payment devices that range from the hundreds of euros to the thousands so there’s something for everybody.
Sophie Charara, features editor at Wareable says: "Owners of smartwatches and fitness trackers are becoming more psychologically attached to their wearables - much less abandoning them in drawers as a few years ago - and contactless payments is one of those everyday features which has really helped to increase this stickiness. Being able to tap your wrist to get on the tube or pay for snacks can be a dealmaker addition to both single purposes devices - like running wearables and smart jewellery - and do-it-all flagship smartwatches.”
End of an era for pockets?
The future will only bring more innovation as different items become payment enabled.
A number of companies are working on the next step with the likes of Levi’s and Jacquard by Google already showing off the Commuter Trucker Jacket that has contactless payment built into the sleeve.
So if your jacket will soon be able to make payments, what are you going to fill your pockets with?


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» Upcoming Haswell Laptops 2014
Upcoming Haswell Laptops 2014
Upcoming Haswell Laptops 2014 on Technology News and Updates AdmaTechnology.com at Saturday, April 19, 2014
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Inspired by the MacBook Air.
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Eidos Montreal announced a new game genre action adventure titled Thief 4, which is scheduled to be released on the PS4 console, PC and next-gen Xbox.
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Star Wars Battlefront has done well on PS4, while Xbox One fans have had more releases to focus on t
It appears that the PS4 is leading the way in terms of online players, with new stats revealing that over a 24hr period, the Sony device hit a peak of 180,000.
The Xbox One hit 104,000, while the PC arrived in third with 48,000, showing the full activity of fans exploring the game over the weekend.
Star Wars Battlefront launched last week, following the prior releases of Fallout 4, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 and Halo 5: Guardians.
Star Wars Battlefront has seen a strong debut
New data from sales monitor Chart-Track appears to show that Battlefront came out on top in during its first week in the UK and had the biggest ever launch of any Star Wars game to date.
It has reportedly sold 117% more units in its launch week than previous best ‘Star Wars: The Force Unleashed’ and is now the fourth biggest launch of any game in 2015.
Battlefront was placed at no.1 in the UK, followed by Black Ops 3, Fallout 4 and Rise of the Tomb Raider.
"As it is more of a reboot than a sequel, it becomes the fastest selling non-sequel PS4 title ever, selling more at launch on Sony’s format than another online-only title, ‘Destiny’," a statement from Chart-track concludes.
Fans, meanwhile, continue spotting new Easter eggs in the game harking back to some of the most notorious moments in the original film series.
The latest to be found includes a scene in which a Stormtropper in the background has a hard time traversing the landscape and can be watched below, (around 13 seconds in).
It pays homage to a classic seen in the movie which somehow made it into the final cut and has to be one of the most cherished bloopers around.
Battlefront looks set to get sequel titles from EA


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A special paperback anniversary limited edition of David Walliams and Tony Ross's Gangsta Granny will be published by HarperCollins Children's Books this autumn, to mark a decade since its first release.
Released on 2nd September, it will be packed with extra features including a foreword from Walliams himself, fun activities, and 10 new extra illustrations from Ross.
There will also be an extensive PR and marketing campaign including a nationwide schools initiative to harness the power of the playground, media outreach, partnerships, and experiential marketing. All activity will be amplified with the World of Walliams licensing partners across retail, arts, and entertainment brands.
Gangsta Granny, first published on 27th October 2011, is Walliams' bestselling work, shifting 1.8 million copies across all editions for £9.4m via Nielsen BookScan's UK TCM. Ever since he has rarely been out of the top of the book charts, and has sold 20.6 million books for £121m altogether. His latest novel Megamonster, published in June, is number one in the bookcharts for the fifth week.
The publisher said: "Gangsta Granny showcased Walliams’ trademark blend of humour and heart, alongside a timely reminder that grandparents have endless exciting stories to tell—and sometimes surprising pasts just waiting to be discovered! This gem of a novel has been enjoyed by old and young for over a decade and has inspired multiple adaptions across film, theatre, licensed products and most recently a theme park ride at Alton Towers resort, which launched in May this year."
Ann-Janine Murtagh, HCCB executive publisher, said, “We are delighted to be celebrating ten years of David Walliams’ Gangsta Granny with a special edition of the book. On publication it marked David’s first ever number one and went on to become one of his most beloved stories with readers across the globe. This beautifully written story celebrates the relationship between a boy and his grandmother, and has been read, loved and shared by young and old. The anniversary celebrations will ensure this much-loved book continues to be enjoyed by readers of all ages for decades more to come.”


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This week on DisrupTV, we caught up with Mei Lin Fung, Co-Founder of the People-Centered Internet. We discussed the upcoming event in San Jose on December 10 about human rights in a digital age & #OurDigitalFuture. Vala and Ray also did a recap of 2018 and hinted at what's in store for 2019.
DisrupTV is a weekly Web series with hosts R “Ray” Wang and Vala Afshar. The show airs live at 11:00 a.m. PT/ 2:00 p.m. ET every Friday. Brought to you by Constellation Executive Network: constellationr.com/CEN.


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Data linked here.
A consortium consisting of HR&A, the Association for a Better New York (ABNY), Citi, Google, and NY Tech Meetup, released a comprehensive study detailing the size and impact of New York City’s “tech ecosystem”– the constellation of workers and firms that are positioning all of New York City industries for future success. The study also offers substantive public policy direction for nurturing the future success of the ecosystem– and by extension New York City itself.
HR&A found that the New York City tech ecosystem has an enormous and growing impact on the City. The tech ecosystem contains 7% of the City’s entire workforce – 291,000 workers who work in tech industries or perform tech functions for non-tech firms. The economic activity engendered by these direct jobs supports 250,000 additional jobs throughout the City’s economy, and generates $125 billion in total spending and over $5.6 billion in annual tax revenues.
Over the past decade, New York City’s tech ecosystem has grown by 18 percent, while total jobs have only grown by 12 percent in the City. The New York City tech ecosystem is also providing critical opportunities for workers with and without college degrees – 44% of all tech ecosystem jobs do not require a Bachelor’s degree; these jobs pay 45% higher hourly wages than other jobs in New York City with the same educational requirement.
The ground-breaking study was conducted over 5 months and involved substantial collaboration with industry thought leaders and labor market experts, an industry survey of over 30 major New York City firms, and significant economic and labor data analysis.


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Detroit To Participate In Japan’s ‘Cash For Clunkers’
As if Japan hadn’t done enough damage during the US Government’s CARS program, the country recently decided to try it’s own, more exclusive version of the incentive. Initially, buyers of imports would not be eligible for the rebates. This would limit sales to Japanese made cars. In an effort to benefit from the stimulus, Detroit has put pressure on Japan to allow American cars to qualify for the program. Their efforts have been fruitful, and Japan agreed on Tuesday to allow Japanese shoppers to buy certain U.S. vehicles and still receive tax break. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s emissions results will be used to determine eligibility of American cars to participate in the Japanese Program.


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Bengaluru-based Instamojo, which was almost written off a couple of years back, has come back from the brink and how!
The eight-year-old start-up made money for the first time in July 2020 and is now aiming to make net profits by the end of the current financial year. In the cash- guzzling start-up ecosystem, Instamojo stands out. What is more important here is that Instamojo is running ahead of its scheduled targets.
How did it get back its mojo? Sampad Swain, chief executive, said that COVID-19 and the lockdowns have been ‘demonetisation 2.0’ for his start-up. What demonetisation has done to digital payments, COVID-19 has done to the digitisation of small businesses, and the Kalaari Capital and Blume Ventures- backed firm has taken full advantage of the scenario.
The company is growing without spending any advertisement dollars and new customer acquisition is happening organically. “In early 2020, one of my co-founders foresaw the potential impact of COVID-19 and we have been on a cash-saving mode since then. What we had not foreseen was this sudden demand for online services from small businesses,” Swain told Moneycontrol.
He took to Twitter to announce cash flow positivity and his growth rates across business verticals and fellow entrepreneurs were quick to laud the achievements.
Words of praise from Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma to Mobikwik co-founder Upasana Taku to even Jupiter founder Jitendra Gupta appeared on Twitter.
With spirited founders determined to get bigger in the hyper competitive start-up world, can Instamojo be the Shopify of India? Perhaps it is still too early, but given the growth projections of the company, pundits might hazard an affirmative response.
Swain believes that the momentum will survive. After all, they are on-boarding close to 1,500 merchants everyday over the last three months, reaching a merchant base of 13 lakh. So, why not gear up for more scale in the future?
“If these businesses are coming online, they will sell something and we are only going to gain from their growth; we have all products needed to support them,” he said.
From starting with a payments link via SMS, Swain and team has today expanded into a full-fledged service platform for micro entrepreneurs. Want to build a website? Accept orders online? Accept payments? Want to ship goods to customers? Need a business loan to expand operations? Instamojo today has all the solutions.
Swain does not intend to stop here. He is also looking to invest in other start-ups in complementary businesses to grow the product catalogue further. The aim is to become a one-stop shop for everything related to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs).
“We used to get 100 percent revenue from payments. Now that has gone down to 70 percent. The rest comes from e-commerce and lending. Our aim is to bring it down to 50 percent,” said Swain. With revenue opportunities in lending and e-commerce bigger, Instamojo has doubled its gross margins to 60 percent from 30 percent during pre-COVID days itself.
Gross margin is the net sales revenue minus the cost of goods expressed in percentage terms.The Indian e-commerce market is worth around $30 billion, as per Swain's estimates. With a run rate of $300 million of gross merchandise value, Instamojo still has 1 percent market share. Swain believes this shows the market opportunity.
Food and retail sectors have grown almost five times, edutech businesses have grown 2.5 times, and financial services and events have doubled. Travel is the only sector which has slumped and is not showing signs of recovery across the world. Similar trends are being reflected on the Instamojo platform as well.
Instamojo has been charting an interesting revival and growth story over the last year or so. The start-up, which was founded in 2012, has till date raised only $11 million, of which $7 million was raised through the Series B round in 2019.
Besides Blume and Kalaari, Instamojo is backed by Japanese investors AnyPay, Gunosy Capital, ex-Googler Rajan Anandan and the top executive of a Singapore-based hedge fund, Rashmi Kwatra, who has invested in her personal capacity.
“We will not need equity capital now. If we raise funds, we will only do that for expanding into newer geographies or for strengthening our ecommerce business,” said Swain.


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India-Nepal Strengthen Financial Cooperation; Inauguration of Digital Payment Soon/ANI
India-Nepal Strengthen Financial Cooperation; Inauguration of Digital Payment Soon
Nepal’s Ambassador to India, Shankar Sharma, expressed gratitude for the recent guidelines issued by the Reserve Bank of India, ushering in a new era of financial collaboration between the two nations. Under the updated regulations, Nepali account holders can seamlessly send up to Rs 2 lakhs per transaction to Nepal, and walk-in customers have the convenience of remitting Rs. 50,000 per transaction, up to 12 times a year.
Revolutionizing Cross-Border Digital Payments: A Timely Collaboration
In a significant development, last December, Indian Ambassador to Nepal, Naveen Srivastava, announced the imminent launch of a digital payment gateway between the two nations. This initiative, expected to kick off in the first phase by the end of February 2024, stems from the collaboration between NPCI International Payments Limited (NIPL) and Nepal Clearing House Limited (NCHL). The integration of India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and Nepal’s National Payments Interface (NPI) aims to streamline cross-border digital payments.
Strategic Partnership for Seamless Transactions: NIPL and NCHL Lead the Way
During the visit of Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal to India, a pivotal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was exchanged between NIPL and NCHL. This MoU signifies the commitment to establishing cross-border connectivity for financial transactions between the two countries, simplifying fund transfers and merchant payments. Initially focusing on inward and outward transfers between banks in India and Nepal, this collaboration will leverage the integration between UPI and NPI, paving the way for extended services, including other merchant payments.
These progressive steps are underpinned by the Nepal Clearing House Limited (NCHL), designated by the Nepal government. With a 10% investment from the Nepal Rastra Bank and 90% from various commercial banks, NCHL stands as a key player in fostering financial connectivity and convenience between India and Nepal.


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Cereplast, Inc. announced this morning that the company has received financing from a European group of investors led by a major bank in Sweden. The company will use the funding to implement its new strategic plan to accelerate growth as well as finance manufacturing supply agreements for the company’s major customers.
“The additional capital allows us to move forward aggressively in a very challenging economic environment,” stated Frederic Scheer, Chairman and CEO of Cereplast. “This investor group clearly understands the rapidly growing market opportunity for bio-plastics and has endorsed our business model that leverages our proprietary product development capabilities and marketing strengths.”
“The new licensing structure has the potential to help Cereplast land contracts with large packaging companies, which require large quantities of resin in a short time,” commented Rene Nicolodi, senior sustainability analyst at Zuercher Kantonalbank (Zurich Cantonal Bank), which began looking at Cereplast two years ago as a potential investment from a sustainability perspective.
“It’s quite important to note that their business plan or model until very recently was to ramp up their own production facilities for a variety of products, and that’s capital intensive, so it’s a challenging thing to achieve,” Nicolodi added. “The change in the business model to license out the production to the clients makes sense from my point of view.”


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Get Back App Ops with Just a Root-Enabled Application
Many things has been said about Google’s recent decision to further hide App Ops. It certainly caused a big disturbance in the force, and some critics have a point in saying that Google tries to play the big brother and decide what we should and should not do with our phones. In the last few days, we’ve presented various ways of getting App Ops back on Android 4.4.2. One of the methods used an Xposed Framework module, while the other was a smali hack, which didn’t break ART compatibility.
There is a third method, and it’s probably the easiest one so far. It was created by XDA Forum Member safet.me. The app adds a sub menu in Settings with many common use cases, rather than one-to-one mapping. For now, it requires root access to work, but we hope that the developer will manage to create an application that can be run on unrooted Android.
This application is a great chance to bring back App Ops without much effort. The newest APK can be found in the application thread, where you can leave your feedback regarding this app.
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One year ago, Google introduced cardboard. Amazingly enough, that was all it took to fire up the Virtual Reality scene on Android, and what began as an open design concept exploded into thousands of apps and dozens of headsets from big and small vendors alike. Now, there are more than 1 million cardboard viewers/handsets - a Google-quoted number that might not even be accurate given the ease with which headsets can be rigged through off-the-shelf equipment. This year, cardboard returned...
Android M preview images are available. That and much more news is covered by Jordan when he reviews all the important stories from this week. Included in this week's news is the announcement of Google's Project Tango going on sale and be sure to check out the article talking about Google's Roboto font going open source. That's not all that's covered in today's video! Jordan talks about the other videos released this week on XDA TV. XDA TV Producer TK...
In the spirit of improving the core Android experience, Google is changing Android M to be smarter about managing power. Their new Doze feature comprises of two primary roles which allow Android to use motion detection in order to predict activity, and go into deep sleep at the right time based on accelerometer readings. In order to extend your screen off battery life, Android M will now monitor your activity levels and if it detects that your device has...


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MrBeast is undoubtedly one of the largest YouTubers out there. He is most famous for the unique videos that he creates on a large scale and like no one else. Starting out as a small Youtuber, he has now expanded his kingdom into restaurant and burger chains, merchandise, charity, and many more ventures.
Like some of the other prominent YouTubers and celebrities, MrBeast is also a regular investor in cryptocurrencies. In one of his recent interviews, the YouTube megastar unveiled his cryptocurrency holdings.
MrBeast’s crypto investments
In one of his recent podcasts on Flagrant, MrBeast recalls a time when he was careless with his private keys. During the conversation, he stated that he could have lost millions of dollars in Bitcoin just because he wrote the private keys next to his laptop. During that time, there was a burglary that happened at his home. Luckily, the thief failed to notice the millions of dollars’ worth of cryptocurrencies and the private key.
Also read: Elon Musk’s Twitter Updates its Logo to Dogecoin, DOGE Price Spikes
In an interview from 2021 on Logan Paul’s “Impaulsive”, MrBeast disclosed his interest in NFTs. He shared that in February 2021, he acquired some CryptoPunks after being introduced to the idea by Gary Vaynerchuk during a group call with 33 other individuals of high net worth.
Logan Paul was also on the call, and they all decided to invest in CryptoPunks after the concept was presented. Initially, Mr. Beast purchased eight Punks, but he later sold them and invested in Gary Vaynerchuk’s VeeFriends.


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The People's Bank of China has approved plans proposed by the Payment and Clearing Association of China for the platform and its management, China Daily said.
The platform is expected to launch next year, with a guarantee fund that can be used to cover losses, the central bank said, according to China Daily
All third-party online payment providers will be under the regulation of the clearing house, including foreign payment providers operating in China.
Zhao Ying, a senior official with the central bank's Chengdu branch, told China Daily that the move will improve information transparency and security.
"A unified platform would do a better job and will verify the identity of clients," she said.
"Establishing a centralised depository system will fundamentally prevent payment institutions from misappropriating the money and using it for loans, investment or wealth management," Zhao told China Daily.


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Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games, Has published several tweets through his official Twitter account clarifying various aspects about the technical demo of Unreal Engine 5 filed a few days ago and alleged secret agreements with Sony about the exclusivity of said demo in PS5. So much so, that Sweeney insists that Unreal Engine 5 will be fully compatible with all platforms and that “there is no secret agreement with Sony” in this regard.
“Unreal Engine 5 will be amazing in both”
And it is that despite the fact that it was announced that the technical demo of Unreal Engine 5 was running in real time on the hardware of PlayStation 5, Epic Games has already clarified that the new version of its popular graphics engine will be compatible with both the new console of Sony as with the next console Microsoft; it was even clarified that Unreal Engine 5 could be exported to other platforms like PS4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch and mobile devices iOS Y Android, as with the current version Unreal Engine 4.
The Unreal Engine 5 demo on PlayStation 5 was the culmination of years of discussions between Sony and Epic on future graphics and storage architectures.
The Nanite and Lumen tech powering it will be fully supported on both PS5 and Xbox Series X and will be awesome on both.
— Tim Sweeney (@TimSweeneyEpic) May 15, 2020
“Both Nanite and Lumen will offer full support on PS5 and Xbox Series X and will look amazing on both,” Sweeney said in his recent social media post, hoping to give folder once and for all to the hints from the community.
To all this, Sweeney himself adds in another publication that there is no agreement with Sony nor “secret deal” between the two companies after showing the technical demo of Unreal Engine 5 through PlayStation 5. “There is no secret agreement. 100% of the things we’ve been working on with Sony in the last few months have already been publicly announced: the demo of UE5 on PS5, Nanite, Lumen and the use of Epic Online Services for cross-play between all platforms ” , concludes the CEO of Epic Games.
Source | VGC


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If the RX-7 left a big rotary shaped hole in your heart, then dab away those tears as Mazda may bring it back in the next couple of years. According to a report by Autoweek, the Japanese carmaker is readying an all-new RX-7 which may be poised as a successor to the popular RX-8.
The model in question could be powered by a 1.2-litre naturally aspirated rotary engine with two or three rotors. With around 250bhp on tap, the little engine should be able to give the car some serious performance on the road.
The report also talks about Mazda’s quest to keep the next-gen RZ-7 as light as possible, so as to keep the enthusiasts happy. Considering the car’s arch rival at the time – the next-gen Toyota GT86, it will be a big task for Mazda to properly blend the relatively low power output with a lightweight chassis.
Expected to go on sale sometime in 2015, the all-new generation RX-7 could make its global debut at the 2015 Chicago Auto Show, where Mazda introduced everyone to the original model back in 1989.


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NEW DELHI: Frito-Lay, the snack food manufacturer owned by PepsiCo, has launched a new co-creation campaign in India, where it is asking consumers to develop an original flavour for its potato chip brand, Lay's.
An increasing number of marketers are utilising co-creation in an attempt to engage with their target audience, with Pepsi already having adopted such a strategy for its eponymous cola in China.
Similarly, Doritos, its tortilla chip range, is currently running a high-profile contest in the US, challenging people to produce an ad to be broadcast during the Super Bowl, having enjoyed considerable success with this scheme last year.
In the UK, Walkers elicited a substantial number of entries following on from the launch of its "Do us a flavour" initiative, which saw the company produce a new variant of its crisps, called "Builders Breakfast", based on the suggestions and votes of its customers.
Lay's is one of the biggest-selling brands in its category in India, and its new communications effort, called "Give us your dillicious flavour", will follow a similar route to that employed by Walkers.
It will be divided into three stages, the first of which will request that consumers send in their suggestions, with the second seeing four flavours go on sale in the Asian nation, and the third allowing shoppers to pick their favourite.
A prize of 50 lakh rupees ($106,481; €71,765; £64,377) will be awarded to the competitor who delivers the winning idea, along with 1% of sales turnover generated by the product after it is launched in May next year.
Deepika Warrier, marketing director of Frito-Lay in India, said "considering the diversity of tastes in our country, the campaign surely will be exciting - engaging millions of Indians to come and express their individuality, tastes and choices."
"Apart from TV, we will also exhibit our presence across outdoor, radio, mobile and the internet to create interactivity."
PepsiCo has previously announced its intention to heighten its investment in several key emerging markets, including India, which has delivered impressive growth levels during 2009 to date.
Data sourced from Indian Television/Campaign India; additional content by Warc staff