text:
Mangolicious June: Bengal Mango Utsav 2022 begins in Kolkata, time to tickle food buds of fruit lovers
Kolkata: Kolkata will be savouring the lip smacking flavours of various kinds of mangoes for the next three days with the Bengal Mango Utsav 2022 beginning in the city from Thursday.
The festival will continue till June 25 at Netaji Indoor Stadium.
Speaking at the festival, West Bengal Minister for Food Processing Industries & Horticulture Subrata Saha said: "The growers of mangoes of the state will benefit with a festival like this."
He said the 'legends' associated with the mangoes grown in the state will also survive by hosting a festival like 'Bengal Mango Utsav'.
"People of Kolkata can also see different varieties of mangoes during this festival," he said.
"We have been able to bring 35-40 varieties of mangoes to the city during this festival," he said.
He said the government hopes to create a mango museum in Murshidabad in future.
"We hope if such a museum can be created then in future also people can see mangoes of the state and the different varieties of it," he said.
Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim said: "The CM has tried to give a positive boost to the rural economy of the state since she came to power."
"We aim to take this festival to an international level as well to make the consumers aware of different exotic table varieties of Bengal mango and avail the opportunity of buying different varieties of good quality mangos at a reasonable price," he said.
The Bengal Mango Utsav 2022, which aims to promote the Bengal mango and Mango products, is being jointly held by the Department of Food Processing Industries and Horticulture, Governmentof West Bengal and the Indian Chamber of Commerce.
Dr. Subrata Gupta, West Bengal Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Food Processing Industries and Horticulture, West Bengal Power Minister Sovandeb Chattopadhyay and Dr. Rajeev Singh, Director General of Indian Chamber of Commerce, were also present at the event.
Mangoes of different varieties, which include 'Amrapally', 'Mallika', 'Himsagar', were sold across various stalls set up in the stadium.
The stalls from different districts of the state, including Malda and Murshidabad, known for cultivating tempting varieties of mango , were seen competing with each other to showcase their supremacy in producing fruit.
However, it was the Nabab Kohitoor variant of mango which stole the show due the price tag attached to it.
A single mango of the variant is priced Rs. 500.
"It is the tremendous effort and tough circumstances under which these mangoes are cultivated which make it so much expensive," said a person who was selling the variant in one of the stalls.
"Preserving this variant is also tough," he said, inviting people to buy it.
(Reporting by Supriyo Hazra, Images by Avishek Mitra/IBNS)


text:
Bloomberg reports that "three Amazon executives were accused by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission of participating in an alleged plan to make it difficult for customers to cancel subscriptions to the company’s Prime membership service.
"Senior Vice Presidents Neil Lindsay and Russell Grandinetti, along with Vice President Jamil Ghani, were added as defendants Wednesday in a lawsuit the FTC filed against Amazon in June. The regulator said they helped orchestrate the plan and ignored pleas by employees to stop using techniques 'to mislead or trick users' into 'signing up for a recurring bill.'
"Lindsay oversaw the membership program, Grandinetti handled the international consumer business, and Ghani was responsible for Prime’s subscription program, according to the filing. The FTC cited internal memos at Amazon going back to 2017 discussing concern that enrollment wasn’t designed to be easy for customers to cancel."
The FTC filed the original lawsuit in June, saying that Amazon with "duped consumers into signing up for Prime and deliberately made it hard to cancel."
Amazon responded to the filing with a prepared statement:
“These leaders have worked tirelessly to make Prime an exceptional program that customers love, and they have our full support … To claim that their efforts were made in anything but the utmost good faith is unfounded and represents a radical departure from the FTC’s own standards for such claims. We’ve always made it clear and simple for customers to sign up for and cancel Prime, and we look forward to demonstrating that the FTC’s claims to the contrary are wrong.”
- KC's View:
As a Prime member almost from the moment it became available, I remain confused why Amazon would want or need to deceive anyone.
But the FTC says it has memos - which, if true, might complicate Amazon's denials, even if the company has made it easier to quit Prime in recent days.
If the FTC's position is proven to be accurate, we can mark it down as an unforced error by Amazon. It would be so much easier just to make Prime better as opposed to making quitting harder.

domain: news


text:
NEW YORK: US Luggage has tapped HWH PR/New Media for its newly launched SOLO, a line of business cases aimed at young mobile consumers.
The SOLO name has replaced the now-defunct US Luggage label on existing product, and a new line including attaches, backpacks, and padfolios will be available shortly. The launch also comes as the company takes strides to go international.
"We need to make sure people understand that although our brand name has changed, the foundation that SOLO stands on is the same as when we were selling under the US Luggage name," wrote Leticia Vargas, Director of marketing at SOLO in an email to PRWeek.
HWH PR/New Media, US Luggage's AOR, will lead the lifestyle PR campaign for SOLO and will continue to work with Briggs & Riley Travelware, US Luggage's other division.
"They really felt that the SOLO brand name - people on the go, you on your own - was more in line with the target audience," said Russell Rowland, EVP at HWH.
That target audience includes not only young executives and business leaders, but students who have become increasingly mobile, relying less on the classroom or library environment to study. Some of the campaign plans being considered by HWH are tie-ins with internet outlets, events with retailers, and an awards program for business leaders. The budget is undisclosed.


text:
15 Nov 2016
Classroom Lessons Put Into Practice AbroadRe: Rita Rebelo de Sousa (AMP 182); Henry McGeeTopics:
HBS students worked on their project with representatives of the bakery chain Benjamin in São Paulo. (photo by Cintia Farago)
In the United States, brand loyalty is often a powerful motivator—consumers will drive miles in search of a Starbucks. But as a team of first-year HBS MBA students discovered while doing fieldwork in São Paulo, Brazil, in some countries, proximity to one’s neighborhood can be a more influential factor when deciding where to shop.
During FIELD 2, part of the Required Curriculum course Field Immersion Experiences for Leadership Development (FIELD), 936 MBA students gained hands-on, global experience in January 2016 by collaborating for eight days on projects with businesses in 15 emerging markets and in Boston. The immersion in São Paulo was organized by HBS’s Global Experience Office and by the Latin America Research Center—São Paulo. Senior Lecturer Henry W. McGee (MBA 1979) supervised the 12 teams deployed in the city, one of which worked with the local 13-store bakery chain, Benjamin.
In the fall, the members of this team—Adam Demuyakor, Adam Gunter, Felix Jiang, Sasha Niemeyer, Sinem Ormeci, and Megan Wu, all Class of 2017—participated in exercises to hone their leadership, teamwork, and design thinking skills to prepare for their Brazil immersion. The process informed the goal: to help their partner company attract more young families to the bakery chain and scale the business.
“In Boston we thought we had the solution: We would go to São Paulo and implement our idea for a kids’ menu,” says Jiang. “But we discovered that the consumer preferences and concepts of a bakery were completely different in Brazil. It challenged us to understand the customers’ mind-sets,” explains Ormeci. Team members conducted extensive interviews with residents of São Paulo neighborhoods and discovered that proximity was the key ingredient for shoppers. “They would go to the bakery that is right next to their apartment because they just wanted convenience,” observes Ormeci.
The students soon realized that food trucks would be the solution to making the bakery accessible to new audiences, adapting company goals to accommodate consumer behavior. They outfitted a test truck and spread the word about its location via social media. The idea was enthusiastically embraced by customers and by Rita de Sousa Coutinho (AMP 182, 2012), an owner of the chain and its CEO. Currently two trucks are in operation.
The students brought their individual strengths to the project as each took turns in leadership roles. The team experience also gave them the opportunity to work on skills they wanted to improve. “When you are in an HBS classroom you learn a great deal, but you are not in pressure-test situations that really challenge you as a person and that put into practice everything you’re reading and discussing,” says Niemeyer. “I think FIELD 2 did that effectively.”


text:
Apple TV Plus is set to release three new documentary series, “Tiny World,” “Becoming You,” and “Earth At Night In Color.” The trio will premiere globally and manifest the living world in-picture.
“Tiny World,” a documentary series narrated by actor Paul Rudd, will debut on October 2 with first six episodes. It will offer a look around the lives of tiniest creature through their eyes, shot by “brand new camera technology,” Apple touts.
The second documentary series, “Becoming You,” exhibits how a child’s first 2,000 days can make impact on rest of their lives. The documentary features over 100 children across the world, from Nepal, Japan, Borneo among others. It explores activities of those children on their way of thinking, speaking, and moving from the first five years on Earth. It will be premiered with first six episodes on November 13.
Titled “Earth at Night in Color,” the third in the list is narrated by Tom Hiddleston. Apple notes that it is shot using “next-generation cameras” to bring color to the lives of animals after the nightfall. It will take viewers across six continents from Artic Circle to African grasslands on screen, revealing new insights and never-before-seen animal behaviors. “Earth at Night in Color” is set to premiere on December 4.
Launched in November 2019, Apple TV Plus has more than 30 shows on shelf with award-winning series, kids’ entertainment, comedies, and new Apple Originals coming up regularly. Apple’s video streaming service costs $4.99 per month, and comes with one year of free subscription if you purchase a new Apple device.


text:
What: Shares of online food order and delivery company GrubHub (NYSE:GRUB) sank more than 20% today after its quarterly results and outlook disappointed Wall Street.
So what: GrubHub shares have slumped sharply in recent months on concerns over increased competition, and today's Q3 miss -- adjusted EPS of $0.13 missed the average analyst estimate by $0.01 -- coupled with downbeat guidance only reinforces those concerns. While revenue for the quarter jumped 38% to $85.7 million, operating expenses soared a whopping 47.2%, suggesting that it's becoming increasingly expensive for GrubHub to maintain its competitive moat against new threats posed from the likes of Amazon.
Now what: Management now sees Q4 revenue of $98 million-$100 million, missing the consensus view of $100.84 million. "While delivery volume remains low relative to overall volume on GrubHub, we've seen tangible improvements in diner frequency, order growth and conversion in some of our secondary markets where restaurants we deliver for generate a significant amount of the overall order volume," said CEO Matt Maloney. "This gives us confidence that our investment in delivery will reap rewards across our entire network over time." When you couple GrubHub's increasingly fierce competitive landscape with its lofty 50-ish P/E, however, I'd hold out for a wider margin of safety before buying into that optimism.


text:
Nicaragua Seeks Investors in Guatemala
Most notable are the opportunities in agriculture "because there is a lot of land" for production in sectors such as cocoa, rubber, oil palm and sugar.
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
A delegation of businessmen and government officials from Nicaragua will meet with Guatemalan entrepreneurs from the agricultural sector in order to persuade them to invest in their country.
Nicaragua already exports products worth $1,300,000 to the Asian country and is keen to promote its agriculture and tourism sectors.
Seven German companies are visiting the country to explore opportunities in sectors related to hydraulic engineering, energy, transportation, agricultural production and health.
ProNicaragua, the state's investment promotion agency and the Millenium Challenge Account are carrying out an Agribusiness forum, with the objective of developing the agricultural industry in Nicaragua's West.
The union of exporters is preparing a meeting for May with Colombian and Guatemalan companies to look at opportunities offered by the FTA signed between the two countries.
- Daily Update
- Government Purchases
- Classified Ads
- Indexes & Statistics
- Press Releases
- Events Calendar


text:
McDonald’s Canada tests renewable gas in its supply chain fleet
Monica FergusonCleantech Canada Operations Automotive Food & Beverage food delivery services FortisBC Energy Martin-Brower of Canada McDonald's Canada renewable gas renewable natural gas supply chain fleet
Martin-Brower of Canada is operating its first tractor for McDonald’s Canada food delivery services on renewable natural gas provided by FortisBC Energy.
The first tractor is in operation, with an additional six scheduled to arrive later this year. The tractors are being tested in British Columbia to assess the feasibility of using them to deliver to McDonald’s Canada restaurants across Canada where possible.
“At McDonald’s Canada, we know making small changes to our supply chain can result in a big impact, which is why we’re working with our long-time distribution partner Martin Brower to help us use our scale for good,” said Rob Dick, supply chain officer, McDonald’s Canada. “Globally, we’ve pledged to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050–a pledge that we are continuing to make progress towards here in Canada by investing in real and tangible changes like testing seven new Kenworth tractors powered by RNG provided by FortisBC.”


text:
Samsung Display announced that it has managed to increase its QD-OLED production yields to 75%. Previously it was estimated that its yields are around 30-50%.
According to the report, SDC's employees are not optimistic regarding its QD-OLED competitiveness with LG's WOLED and RGB OLED structures - and not just because of the low production yields. Initial reviews of the QD-OLED panels say that the contrast is now as high as other OLED displays with ambient lighting, and there are color issues due to the unique pixel arrangement. It is estimated that even with increase production yields, SDC will refrain from further QD-OLED investments until it will see market reaction.
Posted: Apr 16,2022 by Ron Mertens


text:
Beazley and Munich Re, through their Vector partnership, have reported strong demand for “holistic cover” to protect against cyber attacks and resulting business interruption and supply chain risks.
Vector was established in 2015 to offer tailor-made expertise and capacity for the world’s largest and most complex cyber risks, the companies explained.
At that time, most cyber policies only addressed third party liabilities arising from data breaches – coverage that was relevant to firms holding large volumes of personally identifiable customer data such as retailers and financial institutions, Beazley and Munich Re said in a prepared statement.
At the same time, cyber attacks were perceived as less of a threat by many other industries such as large industrial companies and providers of critical infrastructure, they added.
“Since we established Vector, we’ve seen a significant shift in the pattern of demand for cyber cover,” said Paul Bantick, technology, media and business services UK focus group leader at Beazley.
“Every company insured through Vector has sought considerably broader coverage, in particular, for business interruption and contingent business interruption,” he added.
The companies explained that manufacturers seek such contingent business interruption cover to protect their businesses against a cyber attack that brings factories to a standstill.
“While these businesses have traditional property and cyber liability policies in place, they have recognized that they do not have complete protection for cyber-related events and this is clearly an issue that boards want addressed,” Bantick went on to say.
Recent high profile cyber attacks such as WannaCry and NotPetya have highlighted corporate vulnerabilities, the companies said, noting that manufacturers’ greatest fear is a loss of production capability, whether caused by an attack on the company’s own system or on a critical supplier.
“The loss of customers’ personal data is still a concern, and that concern is growing with the coming into force of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation next year,” they explained.
Source: Beazley and Munich Re
Was this article valuable?
Here are more articles you may enjoy.


text:
Investment in the Low Carbon and Renewable Energy Economy (LCREE) sector increased by 48% between 2015 and 2018.
That’s according to a new report published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which outlines a series of estimates relating to the UK’s green economy, covering aspects such as turnover, employment, investment and trade.
It notes total investment reached £8.1 billion in 2018, without taking inflation into account – the ONS suggests this was largely due to a rise in acquisitions by the offshore wind sector, which rose by £3.5 billion between 2015 and 2018.
The statistics estimated turnover in the UK’s LCREE reached £46.7 billion in current prices during 2018, while there were 224,800 full-time equivalent (FTE) workers, up from 200,800 FTE in 2015.
The energy-efficient products sector remained the largest component of the UK LCREE in 2018, accounting for 36% of turnover and 51% of employment.
The largest proportion of the sector’s turnover and employment during the year was from businesses in the manufacturing industry, which account for around a third of both money generated and jobs.
The low emission vehicles sector accounted for 59% of total UK LCREE exports in 2018, making up £3.1 billion out of a total of £5.3 billion in 2018.


text:
Against the backdrop of third-party agencies Accord and Alliance, which have been overseeing factory remediation work in the country for the last 5 years, on their way out, the Government has reportedly decided to take the onus on itself to ensure a safe, secure and compliant apparel manufacturing sector. After the departure of Accord and Alliance, which is likely to happen by December this year, a Remediation Coordination Cell (RCC), overseen by the state, will carry forward the work initiated by the buyers’ bodies.
Following the Rana Plaza building collapse in April 2013 that killed more than 1,100 – mostly garment workers, a total of 3,780 garment factories were reportedly assessed for structural compliance under the three separate initiatives — European retailers’ platform Accord, North American buyers’ platform Alliance, and the Government-led and ILO-supported national initiative.
The efforts put in by the buyers’ bodies towards remediating the apparel sector have been appreciated. There’s no denying that Accord and Alliance did create quite some flutter in the industry amidst allegations that manufacturers were forced to make costly remediation work under pressure, which at times weren’t within the parameters of necessity and rather amounted to un-rational and needless, feel many.
Now that Accord and Alliance are departing, the country with the promise of replicating the Bangladesh model of remediation (which the agencies feel has been very successful) in other manufacturing destinations, Apparel Resources spoke to some industry stakeholders to understand their take on the issue, and the way forward.
“These days, the industry is more than aware of workplace safety, thanks to counselling and strong buyers’ demands. Alliance has no more activity in Bangladesh and Accord will be here for a few more months. If still some work is left, it will be done jointly by the Government and the BGMEA. Besides, independent inspection team will be formed with ILO, Ministry of Labour & Employment, BGMEA, and NGOs. Ministry of Labour & Employment will provide the fund required for the same. Bangladesh has already achieved very good workplace environment through team work, positive attitude, and huge investments. If some factories still lack in achieving those goals, they will also be able to overcome, I am sure,” said a confident Mir Gulzar-A-Alam, CEO of Western Fashion Tex & Sourcing while Brig. Gen. (Retd.) Aftab Uddin Ahmed, CEO of the Centre of Excellence of BGMEA maintained, “I don’t think the exit of the buyers’ bodies would have any business implications as such for the industry. First of all, in the last few years, Bangladesh has achieved the goals towards safer workplace. Besides, the buyers’ bodies would hand over the charge to another entity.”
The manufacturers too shared their views rather forthrightly. “Accord and Alliance have different ways of working and for the same cause, so there is a conflict of interest. The biggest issue that we have been facing is the lack of standardised compliance codes. There are different entities and each has its own standards and specifications, so factories need a standardised policy that would be same for all the platforms. From a personal viewpoint, the changes that have been brought about by Accord and Alliance, especially in the aftermath of Rana Plaza incident, I feel, was very much needed. Now that there are talks of the buyers’ bodies planning to leave the country, I have my doubts if the Government-initiated monitoring system, that would take over from Accord and Alliance, would be able work as efficiently and fluidly as they did,” observed Mainuddin Ahmed, Director-Anowara Group.
“All the buyers have certain standards in terms of safety and security that has to be maintained by the supplier factories. Buyers’ bodies like Accord and Alliance just added to that list of dos and don’ts. The brands/retailers are well aware of what new guidelines have been imposed by these buyers’ platforms and all they need to do to check and confirm if a factory is abiding by the same is do an audit, which again all the buyers carry out before placing any order. Today, all the big buyers have their own audit teams while others do the audits through third party,” says Imranur Rahman, Managing Director-Bando Designs Ltd. Syed Naved Husain, Group Director & CEO-Beximco Limited maintained, “Accord and Alliance ought to have common codes. What I feel is that, the Government needs to have its own set of codes and regulations when it comes to remediation and workplace safety, and to be honest, our Government has done a wonderful job in the direction of making the industry a safer place. At this moment, a lot of investment has gone in towards compliance which is in keeping with the business practices of the current time. From buyers to retailers to end users, all are aware of the compliance requirements and one cannot run a business successfully if one is not compliant. Given the present circumstances, I don’t think one needs to have an Accord or Alliance to impose things on factories, as manufacturers on their own are aware of the need of importance of compliance to make business sustainable.”


text:
CFTC 's DCR and DMO issue guidelines that helps guide the Crypto Industry.
The Seminole County, Florida, tax collector Joel M. Greenberg announced May 14 that the county will begin accepting cryptocurrency for payment for various services this summer in order to eliminate heavy fees and improve payment accuracy…
Two United States House Subcommittees held a hearing today, May 8, on how blockchain tech can be used in supply chain management. The hearing concluded that the technology has a wide variety of applications, despite its current lack of…
Former Federal Reserve Bank (Fed) governor Kevin Warsh thinks that the creation of a ‘FedCoin’ in order to “bring legal activities into a digital coin” deserves serious consideration, The New York Times reported May 4.
The Arizona House of Representatives passed Senate Bill 1091, a tax bill that would allow citizens to pay their taxes using cryptocurrencies, according to public records May 2. Following the recent vote, however, this initiative has been…
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is likely to win its case against three individuals associated with Longfin Corp, a company whose stock skyrocketed after a blockchain pivot, said a federal judge.
According to a media report on 23rd April, Walmart Inc., the US retail corporation and the world’s largest discount retailer, is ready to use Blockchain technology in its live food business.
After about a year of development, JPMorgan and other participants have eventually tested out the Quorum Blockchain Platform, which was intended to make the process of issuing financial instruments more efficient.
The US-based Blockchain project Basis (formerly known as Basecoin), which claims to provide a non-volatile cryptocurrency or stablecoin, has recently raised $133 million in funding from big-name investors, according to an official blog post…
Joel Robideaux, the Mayor-President of Lafayette parish, a Louisiana-based organization proposed the parish government to create its own cryptocurrency and consider launching an Initial Coin Offering (ICO), local news The Acadiana Advocate…


text:
Did you miss GamesBeat Summit 2021? Watch on-demand here!
Carry1st has raised $6 million in funding for its mobile games publishing platform targeted at the untapped potential of the African market.
Africa has around 1.1 billion Millennials and Generation Zs, who are big technology adopters. It’s the fastest-growing region for mobile game downloads, according to mobile insights firm App Annie. And so it’s about time the game venture capital boom came to the continent.
Despite this potential, international and regional studios often find it difficult to profitably serve African consumers due to fragmented and unresolved distribution and digital payments ecosystems. This is a very interesting development to me, as I’ve always wondered how Africa can eventually follow in the footsteps of big countries such as China and India when it comes to the adoption and monetization of mobile games.
Carry1st provides a full publishing solution, handling distribution, localization, user acquisition, marketing, customer experience, and monetization for its partners. Carry1st’s Pay1st
platform is an embedded fintech solution that consolidates popular payment methods in six African countries, allowing customers to pay in their preferred way.
“We essentially just got really inspired by some of the dominant demographic trends on the continent,” said Lucy Hoffman, chief operating officer at Carry1st, in an interview with GamesBeat. “There are over a billion Gen Z and Millennials. Given the influx of cheap smartphones from China, people are coming online for the first time. They’re bypassing laptops, PCs, and consoles and and just going mobile first. And so we thought it was a really interesting opportunity to get involved in the mobile space, as the cost of data is coming down.”
The region’s hot markets include Egypt, Nigeria, Ghana, and Kenya.
“All of that growth is organic because nobody’s marketing in these in these markets,” Hoffman said.
Konvoy Ventures, a video game venture capital firm based in Colorado, led the round, with participation from Riot Games (maker of League of Legends), Raine Ventures, Tokyo-based AET Fund / Akatsuki (creators of Dragon Ball Z), and fintech specialist TTV Capital.
Konvoy Ventures managing partner Jackson Vaughan is joining the company’s board. Carry1st will use the funding to secure new partnerships with global gaming studios, launch and scale its existing portfolio of games, and expand its product, engineering, and growth teams. In an email to GamesBeat, Gordon Rubenstein of Raine Ventures said the investment was appealing because of the team, the potential total available market over next 10 years, the fast-growing emerging market, the opportunity to be the leader, and the potential for partnerships to lift the company’s profile.
Hoffman started the company with cofounders Cordel Robbin-Coker, who is CEO, and Tinotenda Mundangepfupfu, chief technology officer. In a statement, Robbin-Coker said the company was about to sign seven titles during 2020, and it recruited an international team and built its payments and digital commerce platform. Sweden’s Raketspel, which has had more than 120 million downloads across all its games, is among those who signed up. So have New York’s Cosi Games and Ethiopia’s Qene Games.
Since 2018, the company has raised $9.5 million so far.
Carry1st launched a game, Carry1st Trivia, in 2019, and it became the No. 1 Android game Kenya and Nigeria, with more than 1.5 million downloads. But the team found its expertise was more in marketing games by finding alternative ways for gamers to discover games. They studied how influencer marketing worked and learned how critical it was to have local payments solutions. Users don’t have credit cards that are accepted by Google Play and Apple’s App Store.
In early 2020, the company raised a seed round, and now it has built a payments platform that will allow users to pay using local payment methods. That’s similar to the tactics that Krafton and Garena used in Southeast Asia.
“We’re building out a team so going out and recruiting people who come from a free-to-play gaming world and can bring their expertise,” Hoffman said. “No one was doing anything ambitious with content, and so we decided to start with gaming and try to build a really interesting mobile internet company for the region.”
It has 26 employees from 11 countries. Hoffman said about a third of the team is in Capetown, South Africa, and another half dozen are in Nigeria. The rest are spread out throughout the world.
The team includes veterans hailing from Carlyle, King, Jumia, Rovio, Socialpoint, Ubisoft, and Wargaming. In 2020, the company was inducted into the Mastercard Start Path program for the top ten promising fintech businesses globally.
Jackson Vaughan, managing partner at Konvoy Ventures, said in a statement that Carry1st is solving for distribution with its payment infrastructure and it is approaching sub-regions with contextual understanding. Brendan Mulligan, head of corporate development at Riot Games, said in a statement that the number of gamers in Africa is exploding and Carry1st will introduce games to a passionate and important audience.
Monetization is a big challenge in the market, and Hoffman said the company is solving for that with its regional fintech focus. Hoffman said she was excited to have Riot Games on board as an investor. Hoffman said the top six fastest-growing gaming markets in the world in terms of downloads are in Africa, based on App Annie data.
GamesBeat’s creed when covering the game industry is “where passion meets business.” What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you — not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it. How will you do that? Membership includes access to:
- Newsletters, such as DeanBeat
- The wonderful, educational, and fun speakers at our events
- Networking opportunities
- Special members-only interviews, chats, and “open office” events with GamesBeat staff
- Chatting with community members, GamesBeat staff, and other guests in our Discord
- And maybe even a fun prize or two
- Introductions to like-minded parties


text:
Big brands can only encourage innovation by ditching their usual way of doing business and taking risks - including the...
Lego has announced the creation of a new entity, the Lego Brand Group, designed to bolster the potential of a...
Freelance director and creative director Alex Nicholson asks if original work in advertising is being undervalued.
Technology is transforming the retail landscape. Hannah Mirza, global head of partnerships at MediaCom, proposes a route map.
RadiumOne's European MD reveals key trends in advertising that the programmatic specialist is predicting for next year.
Be Heard, the digital marketing group, has acquired content marketing agency Kameleon for £10m.
Samsung has won the backing of the US Supreme Court in a battle with Apple about its patent.
Get top stories and new campaigns emailed to you each day
Stay in touch with our Campaign bulletinsSign up here
Project/Client Manager - Global Brand Strategy Consultancy £30,000 to £35,000 + pension + bens package Ann Sharman Recruitment, London (Central), London (Greater)
CRM Manager £45,000 per annum Ball & Hoolahan, London
Client Service Director £130,000 per annum Elizabeth Norman International, Switzerland
How an excruciating seven-month quest for an idea Steve Jobs didn't hate gave birth to one of the funniest, most effective campaigns in Apple's history, told by the writers, crew and actors who created it 10 years ago.


text:
Ryan O’Hara’s grandmother would surely be tickled to know that her pecan pie continues to be a crowd-pleaser. She died three years ago on Thanksgiving, but her recipe lives on in Georgia Nell’s Pecan Pie ice cream at two Big Spoon Creamery locations in Birmingham.
“This time of year, it’s probably the most popular item on the menu,” says Ryan, the owner, along with his wife, Geri-Martha, of the small-batch artisanal ice cream shop they started in 2014. “It’s fairly simple, but so good.”
When he was growing up, his grandmother’s pecan pie was “sort of a staple of the holiday season in my childhood,” he says. He remembers her making one for every family gathering between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. “There’s no telling how many she made. She would crank them out.”
A year or so after he and Geri-Martha opened Big Spoon Creamery, he decided to try turning her delicious pecan pie into a seasonal flavor. “She loved the idea,” he says. Today, it has become a much-anticipated seasonal favorite. The pie is made in large pans, then chopped into pieces that are folded into vanilla bean ice cream.
Both Ryan and Geri-Martha come from fine-dining backgrounds. They met at Birmingham’s Bottega Restaurant, where they were both working as chefs under the tutelage of Frank Stitt.
“We knew we wanted to do our own thing, and we were passionate about ice cream,” Ryan says.
Three months after they married in 2014, they started Big Spoon Creamery with $500 and an old-fashioned ice cream cart they’d take to various farmers’ markets. By 2016, the couple upgraded to an ice cream truck. And in 2017, they opened their first brick-and-mortar location in Avondale. Two years later, they opened a second location in Homewood.
Having worked for a renowned chef for years, the couple had learned how to build menus based on high-quality ingredients and seasonal, local items. They decided to translate that knowledge to ice cream and create a niche. “There was no one doing artisanal ice cream in this area,” says Ryan. “Birmingham is such a good food city. We knew we could put our fingerprints on it.”
Some of the seasonal flavors available for the holiday season include Christmas Cookie Dough; Peppermint Stracciatella (pure peppermint ice cream with Valrhona 66% dark chocolate flakes); Holiday Eggnog with spiced ice cream, Bulleit bourbon and rum; and Crème Brûlée. “Most of our flavors you won’t get from anyone else,” Ryan says.
The ice cream shop also offers several sammies (ice cream sandwiches) made with homemade cookies and two kinds of homemade waffle cones.
Throughout the year, Big Spoon Creamery offers seasonal special flavors by the scoop or pint. Customers look forward to having their favorites return. “Each fall, people start asking, when’s Georgia Nell’s Pecan Pie coming back?” says Ryan.
It’s back now and will be available through the end of December.


text:
The set-top is increasingly becoming a virtualized app that lives inside tablets, smartphones and other IP-connected devices, but stand-alone set-tops and video clients aren’t expected to disappear completely from view anytime soon. But they are getting smaller.
Taking a cue from retail-focused devices such as the Google Chromecast, Sony Bravia Smart Stick and the Roku Streaming Stick, service provider-supplied video clients are starting to take the form of a set-top “stick” that can be connected via a television’s High Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) port. Alticast, a supplier of set-top software and applications and integration services, will offer an early glimpse here at this week’s International CES gadgetfest in Las Vegas.
And Alticast’s initial entry will have a distinct cable industry angle, as it will demonstrate a set-top stick outfitted with the Reference Design Kit, the pre-integrated software stack for hybrid QAM/IP and IP-only set-tops and gateways being managed by Comcast and Time Warner Cable.
As designed, this HDMI-connected device can receive content over WiFi from an MSO-managed multimedia gateway or receive IP content directly from the cloud. In addition to supporting network-based DVRs, its on-board storage will also pave the way for a personalized device that customers can take with them and plug into other TVs. That portability could also enable operators to extend their user experience when customers are on the go.
Alticast developed the device it’s showing off this week with a yet-unidentified original equipment manufacturer, but the product represents “part of a broader trend of miniaturization and increased mobility,” John Carlucci, Alticast’s chief technology officer and a former Time Warner Cable engineering executive, explained.
Carlucci said Alticast is already working with a service provider in South Korea that plans to introduce this form factor to deliver IP video services later this year. He said Alticast is also seeing interest in the approach among U.S.-based operators.
Carlucci said this approach could also give operators an opportunity to sell the device at retail as MSOs look to deliver their services directly to smart TVs, gaming consoles and other consumer electronics devices with HDMI ports.
The notion of the HDMI set-top stick might also enable the cable industry to broaden its base of suppliers and further reduce product costs. While traditional set-top box silicon providers are weaving their way into this emerging product set, it’s also drawing interest from chip suppliers that specialize in mobile devices, Carlucci said. Alticast has already demonstrated its RDK stack running on chips from three set-top box chip vendors: Broadcom, STMicroelectronics and Entropic Communications.
Please check this week’s issue of Multichannel News for an expanded preview of the 2014 International CES.
The smarter way to stay on top of the multichannel video marketplace. Sign up below.
Thank you for signing up to Multichannel News. You will receive a verification email shortly.
There was a problem. Please refresh the page and try again.


text:
Over half of kids are influenced by Instagram and YouTube stars
- Tuesday, September 17th, 2019
- Share this article:
Influencers are increasingly playing a big role in the minds of the next generation of shoppers, with the potential for this to lead to the internet stars becoming retailers in their own right, according to research from Wunderman Thompson Commerce.
The survey of 4,003 UK and US children aged between six and 16 found that 55 per cent of kids are influenced by their favourite YouTube or Instagram stars using or wearing a product. And a further 14 per cent would like to see influencers operate their own retail outlets in the future.
“The increasing power of influencers is well-recognised and continues to pick up pace,” said Neil Stewart, global CEO at Wunderman Thompson Commerce. “While some brands and retailers are already making the most of the strong connection between influencers and consumers, it will be crucial for businesses to watch the evolution of the influencer trend. If younger consumers wishes are granted and influencers become retailers themselves, this will only mean more competition for existing brands and retailers.”
Influencers still don’t quite have as much pull as friends do when it comes to children wanting to buy something, however. 28 per cent of children still view their friends as having the biggest impact on what they want to buy, compared to 25 per cent for social media influencers. At the same time, 57 per cent of children are influenced by product ads on Instagram.
The type of content children are viewing also has an impact on how influenced they are. Online videos (24 per cent) are the most impactful, followed by social media post and TV ads (both 19 per cent).
Amazon already well-known in Gen Alpha
Interestingly, the research also found that Amazon is already very prominent in the minds of Generation Alpha – being one of their most recognised and well-liked brands. 90 per cent of 13 to 16-year olds, 88 per cent of 10 to 12-year olds, and 74 per cent of six to nine-year olds have heard of the eCommerce giant. Furthermore, 70 per cent of children know what Amazon Prime is, 63 per cent know what it does, and 46 per cent have access to an account.
The awareness of Amazon goes further in that 26 per cent of respondents said they buy most of their products from shopping behemoth – second only to the supermarket. But there is still room for brands and retailers to reverse Amazon’s conditioning, with 66 per cent of kids saying they like to buy from companies that are doing good in the world.
“Todays younger generation wants it all and have been conditioned by Amazon to expect it all, too,” said Stewart. “Retailers and brands need to not just think about the next one or two years, but also the next five to ten. This future will be one where they must work with Amazon to ensure that customers can purchase their goods and services via the Seattle behemoth, whilst also ensuring that their own direct to consumer platforms encourage customers to come directly to them. The only way they can answer that is to look at what services, products and experiences will capture Generation Alphas future spending power.”


text:
Investigation Finds You Can Squeeze Juicero Packs by Hand
Without use of the $400 juicer you're supposed to buy to use them.
Something has always been a bit odd about Juicero—billed by many as a “Keurig for juice.” Similar to how Keurig only works with its own k-cups, Juicero’s cold-press juicing system only works with the brand’s proprietary “produce packs.” But unlike a Keurig which clearly is pumping hot water through coffee grounds, just exactly what a Juicero does is a bit of a mystery. Now, a scathing Bloomberg investigation suggests that the $399 machine, which originally retailed for $699, may do very little at all. In fact, you might be able to achieve similar results simply by squeezing the brand’s “produce packs” with your bare hands.
According to Juicero’s website, the high-tech machine applies “8,000 pounds of pressure … to the fruits and veggies living inside the breathable Pack.” Elsewhere on its site, a blog post credited to founder Doug Evans states, “The Press itself creates three to four tons of pressure—enough to lift two Teslas—and enough to squeeze out every drop of organic fresh kale, spinach, apples, and other fruits and vegetables into your glass.” However, according to Bloomberg, two investors in the product, which has received a massive $120 million in funding, were startled to discover that customers could achieve similar results without using the juicer at all. “There is no doubt the packs can be squeezed without the machine,” Doug Chertok, another Juicero investor, told Bloomberg.
The financial site conducted an on-camera test and came to the same conclusion. “The experiment found that squeezing the bag yields nearly the same amount of juice just as quickly—and in some cases, faster—than using the device,” Bloomberg wrote.
Though Juicero declined to comment on Bloomberg’s article, a “person close to the company” said Juicero knows this is the case but still believes the machine has its benefits: It’s more consistent and less messy than squeezing bags by hand. The same source also pointed out that the machine scans a QR code to check the pack for freshness, though as Bloomberg points out, the pack also has an expiration date printed right on it.
These findings come at a pivotal time for the company. Just yesterday, Juicero announced that it was expanding from three states to seventeen. In that announcement, CEO Jeff Dunn said, “Juicero was created out of a dream to make it easier for people to consume more healthy fresh fruits and vegetables every day.” Turns out maybe it’s even easier than Juicero has been letting on.


text:
Retail fraud tip leads to several arrests, drugs, stolen handguns
Six people were arrested in St. Clair County, Michigan, last week after a retail fraud tip led police to finding $4,500 worth of crystal meth, other drug paraphernalia and a stolen handgun inside of a Port Huron home. The St. Clair County Sheriff’s Office Road Patrol Unit received a tip of a white male in possession of a handgun committing retail fraud at Dick’s Sporting Goods in Fort Gratiot Township in the early afternoon of Nov. 6, officials from the sheriff’s office said. Police stopped the vehicle as it was leaving the parking lot and found the handgun with the serial numbers ground off and stolen merchandise inside. The information was relayed to members of the Drug Task Force, who were able to tie the stolen handgun to a known drug house in the 1000 block of Bancroft in the city of Port Huron.
The DTF obtained a search warrant for the residence and found five adults, the crystal meth, analogue pills, a large amount of U.S. currency, scales, cell phones, needles, packaging material, drug paraphernalia and another stolen handgun that was reported stolen out of St. Clair County inside. Police arrested three males, ages 26, 29 and 29, and two females, ages 24 and 25, all of Port Huron. The 24-year-old female and the 26-year-old male are expected to be charged with frequenting a drug house. The 29-year-old male was a parole absconder originally charged with home invasion. The 25-year-old female is expected to be charged with maintaining a drug house. [Source: The Voice]
Florida man sprays employee with mace
The Indian River County Sheriff’s Office is investigating a case from last week when a man tried to leave the Vero Beach Florida, Best Buy with multiple vacuums, before spraying the loss prevention associate with mace pepper spray. The unidentified white male was seen walking towards the exit with two vacuum robots in his hands. As he approached the exit, the LP associate asked if he had a receipt for both items. The man turned and ran out the door with the merchandise. “I attempted to grab both items from his hands. We struggled over both vacuums; at which point, he pulled out MACE and sprayed me in the eyes. I then went blind and was unable to see him any further,” the loss prevention associate said. Another employee told the deputy that he also saw the suspect walking to the front door with two robot vacuums. He saw the suspect wrestling with the loss prevention associate before spraying mace. The man was last seen running to his car and leaving in a hurry.
The Vero Beach store manager said that the man stole 1 Neato Botvac Connected vacuum valued at $699.99 and 1 Roomba 690 vacuum valued at $328.99. The total value of both items is $1028.98. Coincidentally, one of the retail theft detectives for Indian River County recognized the suspect from another active shoplifting case. Deputies will be presenting a photo lineup to the two Best Buy employees for possible identification of the Vero Beach man. [Source: Sebastian Daily]
New law helps crack down on holiday season shoplifting
“Sometimes we know when it happens, other times we’ll be taking an inventory and we’ll find something missing or we’ll find an empty box,” Hobbytown co-owner Gary Phillips said. Phillips said the items shoplifters steal range from small trinkets to large remote controlled trucks. The new law, written by state Rep. Jason Zachary, R-Knoxville, defines organized retail crime as two or more people working together to shoplift and return items for gift cards. It also stiffens penalties for convictions to include a minimum $300 fine and those convicted five times within a two-year period can be tried as felons.
“For some it will have no effect – a criminal is a criminal,” Zachary said. “But there will be those that it will cause them to pause because they know that if they commit organized retail crime in Tennessee, right here in Turkey Creek, there’s going to be stiff penalties and we have a way to charge them now in a way we didn’t before.” Zachary said the law not only benefits businesses, but keeps the state from losing sales tax revenue from stolen items. Additionally, store savings could be translated to consumers. “You have to allow for it as costs of operation, and that’s generally one or two percent of the item,” Phillips said. “Sometimes we actually have to look at a specific item and add 10 or 15 or 20 cents.” [Source: WBIR10 News]
Only 17 percent of Americans want retailers to open on Thanksgiving
The vast majority of Americans — 84% — are against or indifferent to retailers opening on Thanksgiving, according to a study from holiday deals site BestBlackFriday, which surveyed 523 adults. Nearly 60% don’t agree with stores opening on Thanksgiving, up from 55% last year. Of those opposed to the idea, 37% “strongly disagree,” compared to 21% who just “disagree.” Most consumers are putting their money where their feelings are: 64% say they won’t shop at all on Thanksgiving, up from 60% last year, while 13% will shop online only, 11% will shop in-store only and 11% will shop on both channels, BestBlackFriday found. Not all Americans are against the idea. Some 17% agree with stores opening on Thanksgiving, although that’s down from the 18% who felt that way last year. Of those just 6% “strongly favor” it, compared to 11% who just “favor” it. [Source: RetailDIVE]
Federal jury convicts Alabama man in tax-fraud scheme that sought $22 million
A federal jury in Montgomery, Alabama, has convicted the Phenix City man accused of stealing personal prison inmate information in a scheme to steal $22 million in fraudulent tax returns from the Internal Revenue Service. The jury found William Anthony “Boo Boo” Gosha III guilty of one count of conspiracy, three counts of wire fraud, 22 counts of mail fraud, and 25 counts of aggravated identity theft. Investigators said Gosha ran a “large-scale identity theft ring” with Tracy Mitchell, Keshia Lanier and Tamika Floyd, from November 2010 to December 2013 filing more than 8,800 tax returns seeking more than $22 million in refunds. The IRS paid them around $9 million. Gosha in 2010 stole the identifications of Alabama Department of Corrections inmates and gave the data to Lanier to use for filing fraudulent tax refunds. They agreed to split the loot. When Lanier needed more stolen IDs in 2012, she recruited Floyd, who worked at both the Alabama Department of Public Health and the Department of Human Resources in Opelika.
Floyd’s work gave her access to individuals’ personal identifying information, including teenagers’. Lanier asked Floyd for identities of 16- and 17-year-olds. Floyd agreed, providing thousands of names. Gosha then recruited Mitchell and her family to help file the fraudulent returns. Mitchell worked at Fort Benning, where she had access to the identifying information of soldiers deployed to Afghanistan. She used it to file more fraudulent returns. To file the returns electronically, Gosha, Lanier and their cohorts got Electronic Filing Identification Numbers (EFIN) from the IRS, using the names of fake tax-preparation businesses. The conspirators used the numbers to file fraudulent returns, and to get tax-refund bank products such as blank-check stock. They at first printed out refund checks using the check stock. Gosha also had refunds converted to prepaid debit cards and sent to addresses he controlled. From January 2010 to December 2013, Gosha also sold IDs stolen from the Alabama Department of Corrections to Pamela Smith and to others. They used the IDs to file returns seeking $4.8 million in fraudulent refunds. The IRS paid them $1.85 million. [Source: Ledger-Inquirer]
Connecticut man accused of theft at UPS job gets 4 years in deal
Taylor was also arrested in 2016 in possession of illegal drugs. [Source: The Bulletin225]


text:
While he surfed the world wide web for new startups, Startup Scene's Ahmed Budalama found two e-commerce platforms whose resemblance was uncanny.
In today’s traditional investing philosophy, the most innovative firms that potentially make the most amount of money are those who reign successfully. So, from business books to business schools and corporate boards, everyone is talking about innovation. But, sometimes, copying others is a reality of doing business. In street open markets, fruit vendors will switch from selling bananas to selling yams once they notice that their peers are making more profits from yams.
As a writer and content creator here at Startup Scene, I am constantly exposed to a tremendous number of startups. Learning about a new one each day, I began to realise the common similarities exclusive to the Egyptian business landscape. During my research on what’s new and what’s hot in the entrepreneurial scene, I stumbled upon two uncomfortably similar startups. Confusingly, I reached out on social media to ask some questions. I got in touch with esteemed representatives from two Egyptian e-commerce and software newcomer startups, GetMajar, and AlMatjar, who both worked on their startups in 2019, and officially launched their product just a couple of months ago.
AlMatjar is an e-commerce startup by Ahmed Fawzy, the founder and CEO who came up with a localised, Arabic-language approach that makes clients consider a more familiar approach than global competitors with software that’s built for different geographical landscapes, such as Shopify’s difficulty to penetrate an unfamiliar market. The startup’s corporate strategy includes providing an all-rounded digitisation of online stores, where merchants can create fully customisable Souq-like online marketplaces with prices ranging from $3 (EGP 430) to $122 (EGP 1,970) per month. The startup’s efforts to introduce a disruptive model works well with the targeted Egyptian market’s needs – the startup works hand-in-hand for a personal experience, as they strive to solve real problems faced by customers and provide loyalty as a proof of their work’s favourable quality.
On the other hand, GetMatjar is a startup by Wissam Saleh, who leads a technology software firm that emerged with an idea to make things even simpler, and adding an extra layer of being exclusively a mobile-based platform. With knowledge in the e-commerce landscape, the firm wanted to eliminate the very-specific way Egyptian shoppers utilise Instagram and Facebook’s purchasing features, and allow brands and merchants to set up a mobile-based platform that includes some social features such as chat support, order placement, automated messaging, etc. With a subscription of $15 per month or $150 per year, the startup managed to garner 200 monthly subscriptions within two months of operations.
The line started to blur, once I began to unveil what both startups had to offer, analyse their answers as well as their product. But the various questions that fogged my mind remained. Copying is a primal human skill that we need for survival, at least that’s what American psychologist, Albert Bandura, thought when he coined the ‘social learning theory’, which proposes that new behaviors can be acquired by observing and imitating others. He also claims that people can learn to partake in behaviors that incur a reward and avoid behaviors that incur a punishment just from observing other people receive rewards and punishments for their own behavior.
I asked the founders how they deal with this phenomenon, and if they were aware about each other’s existence, and if they are willing to rebrand or even consider working together:
“For us, it’s not all about branding, it’s about understanding how competitive the market is. It’s about competition intelligence, keeping an eye on competition whilst proving that we can provide value in our service that is uniquely ours," says Ahmed Fawzy CEO and founder of AlMatjar. "Competitor Intelligence is such an important factor that many startups ignore but this should not be the case in today’s competitive market conditions. That’s how brands stay in the market, by providing real value through usability, loyalty and trust with their customers, which makes or breaks a product as unique,” he adds.
Stated in a report by the Harvard Business Review, even developed European and American companies where some can face legal trouble due to copyright infringement, copy — though with enough sophistication to avoid legal problems. Despite all the branding differences, Apple iCloud, Microsoft SkyDrive, Google Cloud Storage, and Dropbox are imitating one another. And who can argue that smartphone manufacturers aren’t copying each other either?
“Sure, rebranding is an option that is in the plans for us soon – to make our business stand out in the face of competition – but it’s not a priority,"says Wissam Saleh, CEO and founder of GetMatjar; adding that their priority is providing excellent service through their product, which aligns with their mission as a startup.
"We’re not just going to fight over a name and force ourselves to pick something or the other," he elaborates. "We’re in our very-own journey, and we’re learning as we go. The way we do it is just to listen to the user, we actually hold focus groups and have potential consumers use our platform so we can build a better experience.”
However, sometimes success comes in employing a new business model to disrupt an industry, and is often done with the use of advanced technology. For example, Uber’s business model disrupted the taxi industry because they introduced a model where they pair up the drivers and passengers in real-time via an app. Because it proved to be successful in disrupting the taxi industry, this model of providing on-demand service cheaply by cutting out the middleman has been replicated in other industries.
“I truly believe that the brand lies in the mind of the consumer, so find your customer’s real needs and keep your eyes on the competition,” says Fawzy.
Entrepreneurs still need to think about whether they need to innovate when there are business models and brands that can be copied lawfully, and whether they should consider more innovative branding options. “No good can come out of going and copying the competitors, the more you observe, the more you become like them. So, there is no point because originality comes from within,” says Saleh.
For an expert, impartial voice, we turned to Egyptian brand strategist and founder of Pew Design Bureaux, AlHassan Elwan for consultation on the matter. "I’ll start off by saying neither of them has any problem. Or at least without understanding their strategy or intent, it’s not possible to know. From the naming, it’s safe to infer that they’re both going for an in-your-face direct/explanatory approach with the naming. They’re basically saying hey we’re an e-store," says Elwan.
The award-winning creative was able to provide a third perspective on the subject, as he claims to have witnessed many similar cases, in fact, too many for him to recall any familiar example. "To survive, they’ll have to build their brand to show difference," he says. "They'll need to find ways to make their audience remember them for something different and not just the name or what they do."
When it comes to rebranding as an alternative solution to this issue, the option lies in what each entity seeks to serve with its product in terms of efficiency as well as the originality of the product. Elwan's advice is in support of rebranding, as it would make each startup stand out as more unique with a memorable identity.
"No, they don’t have to compromise, rather add more to themselves and make sure what they’re adding contributes to giving them difference and uniqueness," says Elwan. "I also would advise to never think about branding as just a mere look or logo, and understand that it’s always about communicating with your consumer while establishing authenticity and building brand belief. You can have the most unoriginal logo or the most visually forgettable logo but maintain a successful brand."
Reaching a consensus on the matter, the brand strategist urges that startups facing this kind of struggle can thrive if they align their strategy correctly along with their objectives.
Sign up for the daily Startup Digest.


text:
You are here
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Leading sales and marketing agency Acosta Sales and Marketing Co. here has signed a definitive agreement for an equity investment by AEA Investors, a New York-based private equity investment firm.
The agreement follows Berkshire Partners' 2003 investment, which produced "solid growth" for privately held Acosta, according to the company.
Acosta's shareholder base of more than 200 active employees will retain a significant equity investment in the latest business. Terms of the transaction weren't disclosed.
"We are very excited to partner with AEA Investors," said Gary Chartrand, Acosta chairman and c.e.o. "This transaction validates Acosta's leadership position in the industry. AEA has an established track record of investing and backing management in respected companies with a history of positive earnings growth and strong growth potential."
Following the transaction, Acosta's leadership will continue to manage the operations of the organization. Gary Chartrand will continue serving as chairman and c.e.o., Jack Laurendeau as president, and Robert Hill as president of operations.
The transaction is expected to close in July 2006.
As well as working with every major food and grocery retailer in North America, Acosta represents almost 25 percent of the inventory in store warehouses, including many product categories' leading brands.


text:
This week, Intel introduced the new Thunderbolt 4 standard, so let’s look at what it means for Thunderbolt 3, USB-C, USB4, USB3, the future of computing, how it will save humanity, etc. Well, maybe not that last one, but you get the idea.
Apple has officially announced that it will be transitioning from the long-toothed Intel silicon to Apple silicon moving forward. What does this mean? How will it affect pros, consumers, and everyone in-between? Keep reading to get answers to all the above.
the beginning of this month, I received a frantic phone call from a long time friend who teaches ninth grade English. She had just been given the news that she would have to start teaching from home. Her school district gave out Zoom accounts and external hard drives to some of the teachers in order to have them transfer their lesson plans from their school computers to the personal devices they have at home, and sent them on their way.


text:
Apple’s stunning new iPhone 4 “catapults the smartphone category forward along every axis of relevance to consumers: OS sophistication, speed, battery life, display resolution, video connectivity, and camera quality,” Oppenheimer analyst Yair Reiner is quoted by Fortune’s Phillip Elmer-Dewitt. Reiner continues, “If products like the HTC Incredible demonstrate that Apple’s competitors have significantly improved their game, the iPhone 4 suggests the stronger competition has sparked an almost fierce level of innovation at Apple. The competition is taking aim, but the target keeps moving faster. Reiterate Outperform and $320 PT.”
Elmer-Dewitt reports, “BMO Capital’s Keith Bachman [wrote in a note to clients], ‘We believe FaceTime (video calling) is a game changer and must-have feature that could provide huge upgrade potential, since FaceTime only works on the new iPhone 4.’ Susquehanna’s Jeffrey Fidacaro:’ Video, video, video — Apple leaps ahead of the competition. In our view, Apple’s strategic focus on improving display, both rendering and resolution, along with video capture has been a key competitive advantage for the iPhone. Now, Apple takes another step ahead of the smartphone competition by also adding native video calling capability.'”
Elmer-Dewitt reports, “Deutsche Bank’s Chris Whitmore: ‘Apple announced iPhone customers on AT&T will be allowed to upgrade 6 months early. We do not view this as benevolence but as a calculated move to lock-in customers with two year contracts prior to losing exclusivity. In addition, we believe AT&T’s entry data plan price cut from $30 (unlimited) to $15 (restricts downloads to 200MB) will drive incremental iPhone demand (lowering the user’s TCO). In aggregate, we believe the combination of the attractive form factor / functionality of the iPhone 4 and early upgrade option will drive robust iPhone 4 unit shipments.'”
Full article, with more analysts’ opinions, here.


text:
Group recommends reforms for scandal-plagued Los Angeles city council
Los Angeles should add more city council members, create two new independent redistricting commissions and better enforce ethics rules, a panel of academics tasked with proposing reforms for the scandal-plagued city government said Thursday.
Weather service: 8 tornadoes hit Alabama, killing at least 5
(AP Photo/Butch Dill)A string of deadly tornadoes roared through Alabama on Thursday, toppling trees, demolishing homes and knocking out power to thousands, part of a broad swath of violent weather sweeping across the Deep South. In the city of Pelham, James Dunaway said he initially ignored the tornado warning when it came over his phone. “Thinking of everyone in Alabama and all of those impacted by the severe weather across the South tonight. Kay Ivey issued an emergency declaration for 46 counties as the severe weather approached, and officials opened shelters in and around Birmingham. Associated Press writer Kim Chandler in Montgomery and photographer Butch Dill in Alabama contributed to this report.
China becoming battleground for plant-based meat makers
American plant-based meat company Impossible Foods Inc. is awaiting regulatory approval to enter the China market, while rivals such as Beyond Meat have pushed forward with plans to set up production in China despite edgy relations between Beijing and Washington. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File)HONG KONG – China has become a battleground for plant-based meat companies looking to tap into the world’s largest market for meat-consumption. American plant-based meat company Impossible Foods Inc. said Thursday it is awaiting regulatory approval to enter the China market, while rivals such as Beyond Meat have pushed forward with plans to set up production in China despite edgy relations between Beijing and Washington. Nestle has said it is expanding a plant-based products factory in the northeastern city of Tianjin. However, since most plant-based meat products often cost more, breaking into the Chinese market could be challenging.


text:
After a few months in testing, Microsoft officially launched “Project xCloud” this week as part of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. The cloud streaming service is live now on most Android devices, but Microsoft has confirmed that Xbox Game Pass won’t arrive on Android TV anytime soon.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Stories September 16
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Stories August 4
Razer launches Xbox edition of Kishi for Android controller, perfect for xCloud
Earlier this year, Razer launched a fantastic new controller for almost all Android phones with the Nintendo Switch-esque Razer Kishi. Now Razer is rereleasing the Kishi with a new design optimized for Xbox Game Pass and Project xCloud.
[U: Sept. 15] Microsoft’s Project xCloud streaming going public in Sept. as part of Xbox Game Pass
The next big step in gaming is game streaming, as evidenced by Google, Microsoft, and Nvidia launching competing services. As Project xCloud readies its launch in September, Microsoft is finally explaining the service’s pricing and its integration with Xbox Game Pass.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Stories July 22
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Stories June 22
Microsoft shutting down Mixer, connecting Xbox’s xCloud to Facebook Gaming
Microsoft is shutting down Mixer, its competitor to Twitch and YouTube Gaming, while moving both their partners and their xCloud game streaming service to Facebook Gaming.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Stories June 18
Like Stadia, Microsoft will upgrade the hardware behind xCloud in 2021 w/ Xbox Series X
Google Stadia is one of the first names people think of when it comes to game streaming, but a close second is Microsoft’s xCloud. Today, it’s been revealed that Microsoft plans to upgrade the backend of xCloud next year with hardware from the Xbox Series X.


text:
Game Changer: Virtual Reality
Virtual reality technology (VR) is making quite a mark on the events industry. We have watched it for a while and have witnessed its evolution from a novelty or futuristic gimmick to a legitimate and important business tool. VR strikes a chord with our visually-obsessed culture and boosts customer engagement, while also improving our services. Walking through floorplans, for example, in advance of an actual event has a positive impact on accuracy and accountability made possible by virtual reality technology.
The events industry is in the business of creating experiences and VR is revolutionizing our industry and our services.
VR is more accessible today than ever before. Many brands are coming out with VR goggle headsets which stores like Wal-Mart are beginning to carry. Facebook, a brand familiar to many, is leading the quest to bring VR to one billion people with the introduction of Oculus Go, the first standalone headset, scheduled to be released this year. The goggles have no connector wires, so the user enjoys more flexibility to use VR in a variety of contexts.


text:
Nazi forums closed as Reddit purges 'violent co...The site shuts several forums but experts say extremists may find ways of dodging the new policy.
Dell web address swiped by third partyA domain name, used by support software on Dell PCs, was taken over unexpectedly in June.
Porn-makers challenge Patreon's crowdfunding banPatreon's rules now forbid its use to fund pornographic movies or private webcam sessions.
Amazon service will let couriers open front doorsUsers of Amazon Key will need a smart lock and Cloud Cam camera to let couriers open their door.
Tesla solar power arrives in Puerto RicoElon Musk's plan to help restore power in hurricane-hit Puerto Rico begins at a children's hospital.
'Bad Rabbit' ransomware strikes Ukraine and RussiaThe new strain of computer-locking malware has hit Russian media websites and an airport in Ukraine.
TV news 'hack' sees bitcoins swipedA pair of hackers managed to reconstruct a code blurred out on TV and claim $1,000 (£760).
How to 'deep clean' your online activityWhat steps can you take to avoid old online posts coming back to haunt you?
Equifax to be investigated by FCA over data breachThe regulator is making enquiries after data belonging to many thousands of UK customers was lost.
Brexit: MPs quiz Facebook over Russian-linked '...Does Facebook have evidence of paid-for activity by Russian-linked accounts at the time of the re...


text:
Narrow your search
Custom-case maker Calibur 11 is offering a Battlefield 3 mod for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles.
A user-generated trend catapulted to industry-embraced phenom, low-budget clips displaying song lyrics are starting to eclipse their big-budget brethren -- and may address a yearning lost in the streaming shift.
CNET sat down with Rolls-Royce CEO Torsten Mueller-Oetvoes to talk about expanding the brand's appeal to younger buyers, new models, and efficient drivetrains.
From the fascinating/gross files, Harvard researchers determine a book in the university's collection is, indeed, bound with real human flesh.
An intrepid reporter with a car full of gadgets arrives in a gale force wind at the Cadillac Ranch in Texas. Nothing says Texas like honking huge cars half-buried in a field.
Although UPS delays left some Amazon customers empty-handed, the company boasts a merry Christmas, both for sales and services like its Amazon Prime.
There's still time to get those last-minute tech gifts delivered to you by Christmas, but the cutoff dates are coming up fast.
Lyft's quirky car ornament had made it the most recognized ride-sharing service in the industry. Lyft's President John Zimmer talks to CNET about the power of the stache.
A nearly life-size AT-ST Walker is up for sale and ready to be the crowning glory for your "Star Wars" collection.
It remains one of the best-looking supercars out there, so we had an in-depth look at the Ferrari 458 Italia to find out what Maranello's finest is all about.


text:
Vermont ANR – Natural Resources Atlas HTML5 Viewer. Richdale Apartment Communities have outstanding spacious plans designed for long-term living.
2020 Lincoln Aviator 9 Things We Like And 4 Things We Don T News From Cars Com In 2020 Lincoln Aviator Car And Motorcycle Design Aviation
We take pride in creating properties that are Built for Life allowing residents to enjoy everyday living in a comfortable setting.
Lincoln utilities. The Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department LLCHD today announced additional COVID-19 vaccination clinics for children ages 5 to 11 following its receipt of more Pfizer vaccine. The extra bookcase added plant shelf deeper cabinet patio storage bonus closet added ceiling height huge master bath pre-wired intrusion alarm USB ports or. Interim Fire Chief Micheal Despain 1801 Q Street Lincoln NE 68508 USA 4024418350.
Lincoln Transportation and Utilities LTU today announced that residents who live within the area bounded by North 27th and North 70th streets and Fletcher Avenue. Northeast Lincoln Water Lines Resume Regular Service Published on November 04 2021. LLCHD is partnering with school districts to host vaccination clinics by appointment only at local high schools and other locations in the city and county.
Top Quality Dc Airport Limo Service Sport Utility Vehicle Lincoln Navigator Luxury Sedan
تجربة سينما السيارات الرائعة أفضل بكثير مع لينكون أفياتور موقع ويلز Lincoln Aviator Best Suv Cars Bmw Suv
Pin On Luxury Suv
2020 Lincoln Navigator Black With Black Alloy Wheels And Chrome Delete Package In 2021 Lincoln Suv Dream Cars Super Luxury Cars
Pin On Fitness
2018 Lincoln Navigator Interior Exterior And Drive Lincoln Navigator 2018 Lincoln Navigator Car
2015 Lincoln Navigator Lincoln Navigator Lincoln Suv New Cars
The Lincoln Motor Company Di Instagram A Confident Stance The All New 2020 Lincolncorsair Marks The Lat Lincoln Motor Company Lincoln Motor Utility Vehicles
Like Any Other Lincoln Range Of Automobiles The 2018 Lincoln Mkc Also Promises To Provide Driving Pleasure And Value Fo Lincoln Mkc Lincoln Mkx Buick Envision
2020 Lincoln Corsair Lincoln Corsair 2020 Lincoln Corsair 2020 Lincoln
Lincoln Mkc Concept Shows Real Promise W Video Lincoln Mkc Concept Cars Detroit Auto Show
2020 Lincoln Navigator Lincon Navegation Lincoln Lincon Navegation Navigator Lincoln Cars Lincoln Navigator Luxury Cars
Drive The Lincoln Navigator In Dubai For Only Aed 1200 Day Rental Cost Includes Comprehensive Insurance An Lincoln Cars Dubai Cars 2020 Ford Explorer
Lincoln Corsair Infiniti Vehicles Lincoln Cars Lovely Car
2020 Lincoln Aviator Review Luxury Done Right Lincoln Aviator Lincoln Roadshow
Pin On Auto
2018 Lincoln Navigator Badwf On Instagram Ultra Luxury Full Sized Suv Lincoln Navigator Lincolnnavig Lincoln Suv Lincoln Navigator 2018 Lincoln Navigator
2021 Lincoln Black Label Navigator Suv In 2021 Lincoln Navigator Black Label Lincoln
Lincoln Navigator Photos And Specs Photo Lincoln Navigator Models And 22 Perfect Photos Of Lincoln Navigator Lincoln Navigator Lincoln Suv Lincoln


text:
CleanTechnica met up with Sunflare Solar’s Chief Marketing Officer Elizabeth Sanderson, and Vice President of Commercial Business Development, Joshua Held at the 2019 Solar Power International in Salt Lake City, Utah to get the update on an exciting new 40 megawatt solar installation the firm has been tapped for.
The new installation at a retired landfill in Israel leverages Sunflare’s thin, lightweight solar panels to transform the otherwise unusable sloped surfaces of the landfill into an important part of a new on-site solar farm. Up at the top of the landfill mound, traditional ballasted fixed-tilt photovoltaic solar panels will complement the 40 MW Sunflare array.
The installation highlights the ability of Sunflare’s lightweight, flexible CIGS solar panels to adapt to new applications, taking solar where it would not otherwise be possible. Critical to delivering on this new project is Sunflare’s ability to directly adhere solar generating modules to the cover that seals the landfill material. This lets the lightweight panels mount directly to the landfill cover without the need for additional hardware or importantly, penetrations.
Because the slope of the landfill surfaces are so severe and because they require so much additional mounting hardware to support their additional weight, traditional solar modules are ill-suited for such applications. For comparison, a traditional 60-cell solar module weighs around 40 pounds. A 60-cell Sunflare solar module like the one on display at 2019 SPI is only 15.5 pounds. That is not only less weight that must be supported by the structure they are installed on, it makes installation a breeze as installers are no longer forced to manhandle 40-pound, 3-foot by 5-foot modules.
The landfill reclamation project is the first of its kind for Sunflare and highlights just a sliver of the potential of Sunflare’s solar modules to enable solar generation where it would otherwise not be possible.
In the last year, the Sunflare team has also been working to optimize its solar roof shingle product for the market. Held told us that the product development was the easier part of the process and the work to make the product easier to install and integrate with existing roofing products was a larger challenge. He specifically noted that the means for electrically connecting the solar tiles together was a challenge. We saw Tesla similarly struggling to optimize its glass solar roof tiles with a slew of patents issued earlier this year with potential solutions.
Sunflare’s solar roof tiles do not use glass and are not rigid, but instead, build on Sunflare’s CIGS cells that print the solar cells directly onto squares of stainless steel. A durable coating is then applied to the surface for a lightweight but durable solar roof tile.
To read the original article from Clean Technica, Click Here.


text:
How Ford Is Catching Toyota in China
Ford's Focus has been one of China's best-sellers since its debut last year. Those sales have helped Ford to big gains in market share, gains that could lead Ford past Toyota by the end of 2013. Photo credit: Ford Motor Co.
Could Ford be on the verge of passing giant Toyota in China?
It's looking more and more likely. That's quite a surprise, given that Ford was far behind just a couple of years ago.
But a massive surge by Ford -- and troubles for Toyota and its Japanese counterparts -- have put the Blue Oval within striking range of a major sales upset.
Huge sales gains continue for Ford in China
While new-vehicle sales in China continue to show steady growth -- sales were up about 13% this year through August -- Ford's sales in the world's largest auto market have simply exploded.
Ford said on Wednesday that its sales in China were up a whopping 61% in September, as the new Mondeo -- China's version of the Ford Fusion -- completed its first full month on the market.
Ford's Fusion just went on sale in China, where it is called the Mondeo. Ford sold nearly 10,000 Mondeos in September, the new sedan's first full month on the market. Photo credit: Ford Motor Co.
For the first nine months of 2013, Ford's sales in China were up 51%, thanks to a slew of new models and continued strong results for the popular Focus.
Those strong growth numbers have put a tantalizing goal in sight: By the end of the year, Ford could overtake rivals Honda and Toyotain China's sales rankings.
A surge that could put Toyota in Ford's rearview mirror
That would be a big deal. Toyota and Honda have had years to build out their networks in China, and both have strong presences in southern China. Ford is a latecomer to the party, but it is spending a fortune to catch up: nearly $5 billion in investments in new factories and infrastructure.
According to a recent Reuters report, Toyota says that it is on track to sell about 900,000 vehicles in China this year, while Honda expects to sell about 750,000. At its current rate of growth, Ford should break 900,000 without too much trouble -- and could hit a million, Ford Asia Pacific chief David Schoch told reporters on Wednesday.
Of the Japanese automakers, only Nissan expects to sell more -- it's aiming for 1.25 million sales in China in 2013.
If Ford does hit that million-sales milestone, its market share in China will have roughly doubled, from about 2.5% at the beginning of 2012 to close to 5% by the end of this year.
It's great progress for an effort announced by Ford a couple of years ago, called "15 by '15". That's shorthand for 15 new or refreshed models for the Chinese market by 2015, which Ford hoped would drive its market share in China to 6%. But Ford's actual gains in China may be outpacing even its own aggressive goals.
The first of those 15 new models was the current Focus, launched last year. It quickly became a best-seller, and has since been followed by the Escape (called the Kuga in China), the refreshed Fiesta, a small SUV called the EcoSport, and now the Mondeo -- as well as the imported-from-America Explorer.
The Ford Kuga, a twin of the U.S.-market Escape SUV, went on sale in China earlier this year. Photo credit: Ford Motor Co.
Many Chinese consumers say they want a vehicle that is comfortable, well-made, and well-equipped with high-tech features, and one that is stylish but not ostentatious. Ford's recent global product formula, which puts high-tech premium features into well-designed mainstream models, is playing very well with those customers.
Not just lots of sales, but lots of profitable ones
What is most impressive about Ford's huge growth is that the company has done it without moving far downmarket.
General Motors makes up about half of its market-leading China sales volumes with inexpensive (and low-profit) commercial vans sold under the Wuling brand name. The Wulings keep GM's overall market share high, but profits are relatively modest.
Meanwhile, Volkswagen has closed the gap with GM thanks to a huge variety of models covering the entire market spectrum, ranging from popular low-price models based on old Volkswagen designs from elsewhere in the world to high-end Audis that out-sell offerings from German archrival BMW .
Ford doesn't go nearly as far downmarket. It does continue to sell its last-generation Focus (called "Classic Focus") alongside the new one, but the Classic Focus is positioned in the middle of the compact-car market, while the New Focus (as it's called) is positioned at the high end.
Ford has avoided reaching for volume at the lower-profit ends of market segments, instead focusing on its own strengths -- well-equipped cars and SUVs offered at the upper end of pricing within mainstream market segments.
Meanwhile, at the higher end of the scale, Ford has said that it will bring its premium Lincoln brand to China late next year. Lincoln is unlikely to directly challenge BMW, which has become an established luxury player in China, but it could steal sales from premium Japanese brands like Nissan's surging Infiniti line.
The upshot: repeating a proven formula for strong sales and fat profits
Ford may see gains in the luxury markets in time, but it's unlikely to be a major point of emphasis for the company. Instead, just as we've seen in the U.S., Ford is placing its biggest bets in China behind its much-improved mainstream offerings.
Here at home, Ford has been able to command premium prices for its latest products by offering attractive high-tech options packages that encourage buyers to spend more. That has helped Ford's North American division to fat profit margins: more than 10% in recent quarters.
Now, that formula is already generating profits for Ford's Asia Pacific division, despite the heavy ongoing investments in building factories. It's a good bet that China will be making a significant contribution to Ford's bottom line within the next couple of years.
A Future Fuel for Transportation You Can't Ignore
One home run investing opportunity has been slipping under Wall Street's radar for months. But it won't stay hidden much longer. Forward-thinking energy players like GE and Ford have already plowed sizable amounts of research capital into this little-known stock... because they know it holds the key to the explosive profit power of the coming "no choice fuel revolution." Luckily, there's still time for you to get on board if you act quickly. All the details are inside an exclusive report from The Motley Fool. Click here for the full story!
The article How Ford Is Catching Toyota in China originally appeared on Fool.com.
Fool contributor John Rosevear owns shares of Ford and General Motors. You can connect with him on Twitter at @jrosevear. The Motley Fool recommends BMW, Ford, and General Motors. The Motley Fool owns shares of Ford. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Copyright © 1995 - 2013 The Motley Fool, LLC. All rights reserved. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.


text:
The Swedish government wants to reduce taxes to encourage repairs of all kinds of products. A measure that clashes with today’s throwaway culture, used to make it easier and in many cases cheaper to buy something new than to fix something damaged that we already have.
The Swedish parliament is currently discussing reducing the VAT for repairs to bicycles, clothing and shoes, from the current 25% to 12%. Regarding the repair of household appliances, the Swedes could claim a reimbursement of 50% of the labor cost of the repair.
Sweden has been a country concerned about its carbon footprint for many years, in fact reducing its CO2 emissions year after year, since 1990 it has already reduced them by 23%. It produces more than half of its electricity from renewable energies. They also take advantage of all their garbage, and that of other countries because with theirs, they do not have enough to produce electricity.
Another outstanding issue will be the fight against large producers and the planned obsolescence of their products. For this, certifications are already being created for companies that manufacture without scheduled obsolescence.


text:
Christina Davis of The LMC Groups recently hosted a webinar that focused on how to get your staff energized and excited to make a difference in your company.
Our upcoming June LCT Magazine is focused on technology, especially how operators are getting very creative in applying technology, mobile aps, and tablets to save money and improve every aspect of operations, communications, and most importantly, better service.
I interviewed Jim Moseley, vice president of development TripTracker, a company that he launched with his father, James Moseley, back in 1985. That’s light years ago in the technology sector. I mean, Ronald Reagan was entering his second term, the first mandatory seat belt law took effect in New York, and Microsoft unveiled its brand-spanking new operating system — Windows 1.0. But even after almost 30 years in business since Jim and his father James developed the first version of TripTracker, Jim is more excited about the future than the past.
Of course he is a major evangelist as to how technology is helping operators run their businesses. But he also tossed out a cautionary note to operators about how they have to change because the new wave of technologies are not just tools, but game changers for operators.
“It’s not so much technology has changed. It’s people that have changed how they are utilizing technology to do business,” said Moseley. “The tidal wave is coming. We’re not in business-to-business anymore. It’s becoming consumer-to-business. People will use devices to decide what kind of transportation they want and what price they want to pay. They’ll want to see reviews and ratings of companies, availability, how much insurance they carry, and how often they perform on time. Consumers won’t be dealing with people or travel desks, they are using a smartphone or tablet to make informed decisions electronically,” he added.
His advice? Moseley says that no matter if you are a large or small company you have to understand what’s coming. “For example, basically Google has made everything an ad, and operators have to understand that and do a better job to market themselves — their brand — or they will be left behind. It’s a consumer revolution, and they want immediate capability to book a ride, immediate response, and feedback when they are done, and they don’t want to call anyone. If you don’t have a brand that draws attention to consumers, you’re going to fizzle.”
Andrea Racanelli presented a session at the 2019 LCT East Show that will help any operator achieve a better understanding of online marketing.
New telematics, battery electric technology, and new generation D-series coaches push the busmaker into a new era.
JAN/FEB LCT Cover Story: The Los Angeles operation creates a bold luxury service model that pursues a progressive edge while promoting a cleaner environment.
Fresh off California’s AB5 passage, the trade group now goes deeper into what the new rules mean for ground transportation operations.
As TNCs continue to prosper, California is fighting back against their dominance.
Not only were the luxury automaker's fourth-quarter sales up by 17.8%, but its entire year sales increased by an impressive 8.4%.
Green Payment Solutions is sponsoring LCT's signature networking event while preparing to help operators save money.
The ride-hailing structure depends on the gig economy, where workers are hired as subcontractors rather than employees with full-time benefits.
CBD and CDLs don't mix. Even labels that state something is THC-free may cause positive drug tests.
JAN/FEB Editor's Edge: The ideas behind these industry suppliers will help define luxury ground transportation in coming years.
eNews Exclusive: Motorcoaches can be lucrative vehicles, but you must first see if you have enough demand to consider owning them.
JAN/FEB LCT: Veteran operator and LCT writer Jim Luff heads up the original and enduring industry magazine and brand.
GGTI’s Adam Parken works at the forefront of a company redefining how business travelers and corporations use networked ground transportation.
Vehicle Pick of the Week: The First Class Customs vehicle is ready to help you meet the needs of all kinds of clients.
The world's No. 1 online marketplace and trader for professional chauffeured and chartered vehicles, including all types of motorcoaches, buses, vans, stretch limousines, sedans, SUVs, exotics, and classics. New and used vehicles are available from sellers across the nation.
The best online networker to find quality affiliates worldwide and market your company.
Click on any state to see the latest industry news and events in that region.


text:
In just a few weeks, Google will finally lift the covers off the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro. Ahead of the launch event, the company has shared quite a bit about its upcoming flagships. We’ve also learned several crucial details, including specifications and camera features, through various leaks. However, the pricing information has remained a secret so far. We expected Google to keep it that way until the day of the big reveal, but a new leak sheds light on what could be the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro’s price in Europe.
The leak in question comes from YouTuber M. Brandon Lee from the This is Tech Today channel. In a recent video, Lee reveals that Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro might be priced at €649 and €899, respectively. The pricing information comes from an unnamed source who works for a major cellular retailer in Europe. While we can’t corroborate these details at the moment, 9to5Google claims to have confirmed these prices with another source in Europe.
Lee’s source has also revealed the…
Written By: Pranob Mehrotra
Original Article: https://www.xda-developers.com/how-much-google-pixel-6-could-cost/


text:
Harley-Davidson Inc. (HOG) shares lost about a quarter of their value in June, victim again of waning consumer confidence. The Milwaukee motorcycle company’s stock has slid 25% to $21.49 over the past month, hurt by poor demand for high-end leisure items and a shaky economic climate, making it one of the worst performers on the Standard & Poor’s 500 index during that period.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may impose huge fines on four of China’s biggest ATV’s makers and withdrew its approval of the import and sale of 200,000 gas-powered off-road motorcycles and all-terrain vehicles. This is the first time EPA has voided certificates of conformity for off-road or all-terrain vehicles. The agency alleges that tailpipe emissions information was either incomplete or falsified entirely. It is just the latest action that casts doubt on the quality or safety of Chinese products or the integrity of the firms that produce them. Back in May, EPA fined Pep Boys $5 million for importing non-compliant motorcycles, recreational vehicles and generators manufactured in China.
The Indianapolis Dealer Expo moves to a Friday-Sunday schedule starting in 2011 (Feb. 18-20). Previously, the show had been held on a Saturday-Monday schedule. For dealers whose stores are traditionally closed on the Monday President’s Day holiday, the new schedule affords them three full days to see product lines and network with manufacturers, distributors and other dealers at the show, plus an extra day to travel home before business opens on Tuesday. Many motorcycle dealers have expressed the desire that the Cincinnati V-Twin Expo change its schedule to a Friday-Sunday schedule. For now, it remains on a Saturday-Monday schedule (Feb. 5 to 7)


text:
Hyundai caught our attention by releasing a pair of dark preview images that give us an early look at its next crossover. The yet-unnamed model will make its official debut during the upcoming 2019 edition of the Los Angeles auto show.
As is often the case, the teaser images ask more questions than they answer. We don’t even know what the model will be called yet, and where it will be positioned in Hyundai’s growing range of models remains up in the air. What’s clear is that the high-riding soft-roader will continue advancing the South Korean firm’s design language. The grille stands out with a light-up logo — a styling cue seemingly worn by every single concept car unveiled in 2019 — and an insert with a three-dimensional look. Closed when the car is stopped, the grille gradually opens up as speed increases.
Viewed from the side, its roof line peaks above the driver and slopes towards the rear end, so the model looks less utilitarian than, say, the Palisade positioned at the top of the Hyundai lineup. It’s difficult to gauge the crossover’s size by simply looking at the teaser images, but Hyundai pointed out it’s a compact model. It was developed with urban driving in mind, still according to the automaker, so it has to fit in tight spaces and dash through traffic.
Hyundai’s powertrain palette includes gasoline-, diesel-, electric-, and hydrogen-powered units, plus standard and plug-in hybrid systems. It chose the latter to power the concept, but it hasn’t released technical specifications yet. The drivetrain should allow the concept to drive on electricity alone for relatively short distances, and rely on its internal combustion engine for longer drives. It might be related to the technology found in the plug-in Ioniq.
The 2019 Los Angeles auto show opens its doors on November 22, so Hyundai will release additional information about its next crossover in the coming weeks. We’ll also hear from over a dozen other automakers planning to unveil a new car, an updated model, a futuristic concept, or all three during the event, which is one of the biggest dates on the auto show circuit.
- When it comes to green cars, Hyundai thinks the more, the merrier
- Volkswagen’s next electric car will have 300 miles of range, launch in 2021
- Ford’s Mustang-inspired EV will be the talk of the table at Thanksgiving
- Next-generation Kia Soul EV’s U.S. launch pushed back until 2021
- Mazda’s MX-30 challenges the commonly accepted definition of an EV
- Lillard and Davis clash in Portland-Los Angeles matchup
- Western Conference leader Los Angeles and Utah meet
- Orlando hosts Los Angeles after Davis’ 50-point game
- Stylish Emma Roberts steps out in animal print leggings and red cashmere cardigan in Los Angeles
- Milla Jovovich dresses baby bump in a red striped maternity dress as she heads out in Los Angeles nine weeks before her due date
- Top Los Angeles homeless official steps down as crisis deepens
- Seattle Seahawks vs. Los Angeles Rams: Where to Watch Sunday Night Football, TV Channel, Live Stream
- Ketamine Healing Clinic of Los Angeles Announces Ketamine Treatment Program for Alcoholism
- Indiana faces Los Angeles, seeks 5th straight home win
- Los Angeles plays Toronto without scoring leader Leonard