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14. Norbrook Holdings
- Chief executive: Liam Nagle
- Pre-tax profit: £45.1m
- Employment: 1,983
- Pay bill: £75.5m
Norbrook is a veterinary pharmaceutical company, which was incorporated in 1969 by the late Lord Ballyedmond.
Headquartered in Newry, Norbrook is rated among the top 15 largest animal health companies worldwide.
To access our guide to Northern Ireland’s most profitable companies, please sign in or register with Belfast Telegraph.
The company is focused on animal health products for livestock (cattle, pigs, sheep), pet and equine across more than 100 countries worldwide. With over 45 years’ experience, Norbrook is a major force in veterinary medicines after developing a broad range of livestock and companion animal products for vets, farmers and pet owners alike.
Norbrook invests a significant proportion of its revenue in the research and development of new products, fuelling the future growth of the company.
In February, the company said it is in the process of stockpiling six months worth of products for its EU customers ahead of what was to have been Brexit day on March 29.
It has also revealed that it has spent £3m transferring more than 2,000 product licenses from a UK holding company to a European firm to ensure it can continue to sell into the EU in the event of a no-deal Brexit.
Tel: 028 3026 4435


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T-Mobile is making it a little bit more affordable to buy an
Certain Apple and Samsung products will drop down to no money down at T-Mobile starting Wednesday, the company said today.
The same offer applies to the iPad Air and
While T-Mobile is easing the upfront payment, customers still end up paying the same amount, as the difference is spread across the monthly device payments over two years. Customers still have to meet certain credit requirements to qualify for these plans.
Apple - USE TAG
reading•Apple and Samsung devices go $0 down at T-Mobile
Dec 12•New Galaxy S10 specs, price, release date rumors: Headset jack stays; S10, Lite, Plus sizes
Dec 12•Intel 3D chip stacking could get you to buy a new PC
Dec 12•How to close apps on iPhone XR, XS, Max
Dec 12•Apple's subscription news service may launch by spring 2019, says report

domain: news


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Microsoft announced its plans for a new standalone media player on Xbox One earlier this week — and it turns out that it will be perfect for watching torrents.
The new player will support playback of both files from USB and local networks via DLNA. But more usefully, it will support a wide array of codecs — including DivX, Xvids, MKVs, and even animated GIFs. Roll all that together and it sounds like the new player will be perfect for anyone who just happens to have a large quantity of MKVs or Xvids sitting on an external hard drive or network-attached storage device. Source unknown, right? [Xbox via Verge]


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Photo by Paz Arando on Unsplash
“Farmers, consumers and food workers are suffering in the face of spiralling food and fuel prices, whereas those sitting in the middle of the food chain – a small number of huge, dominant grain traders – are raking in vast profits”. Will a windfall tax restore balance and help the poorest?
Join the Cool Community
Event report from Perishable Logistics Africa event
New freight tax is ‘unacceptable’ and is hitting perishable shippers hard


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3D Systems says 3D printers available for pre-order 3D Systems announced earlier today that its recently unveiled Cube 3 and CubePro 3D printers will commence commercial shipments in the second half of June 2014 and are now available for pre-order on Cubify.com and through affiliated retailers, resellers and distributors. Cube 3 costs $999, according to the company. In mid-afternoon trading, 3D Systems rose 2% to $50.30.
News For DDD From The Last 14 Days
Check below for free stories on DDD the last two weeks.


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As it stands today, hotels are not particularly concerned with Airbnb, the on-demand accommodation service that lets individuals rent out their empty spaces. Some regulators have taken caution with the new firm, which launched operations in 2008, and the debate continues as to whether Airbnb bookings should face a hotel tax.
While Airbnb has caught the attention of travelers and regulators alike, there is one surprising segment that is not yet too bothered by the service: traditional hotels. According to reports, hotel spending is on target to reach figures higher than last year, and older travelers are largely in the habit of turning to traditional hotels to book their accommodation.
Choice Hotels International chief executive Steve Joyce recently told the Financial Review that he has not seen any impact of Airbnb on the business of the hotels he runs. Similarly, InterContinental Hotels Group Owners Association chairman Kerry Ranson said he does not view Airbnb has a legitimate competitor.
Business travelers, however, could begin to instill fear in the hearts of these traditional hotels.
The use of Airbnb to book business travel accommodation took off last year when the company partnered with travel and expense management service Concur. The collaboration lets Airbnb bookings land directly on business expense reports.
According to some experts, it’s the ease and money-saving attributes of Airbnb that could pull the business into a position that threatens the dominance of traditional hotel chains.
This competition could be good news for business travelers in more ways than one, reports said. Financial Review cited a recent study by Boston University that found the greater supply of open rooms provided by Airbnb has led to declines in hotel costs in some markets.
Authorities’ efforts to regulate Airbnb, reports added, is a direct result in some cases of hotels asking those officials to adopt legislation that makes Airbnb adhere to the same laws as hotels do, including safety regulations.


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Mobile WiMax deployment has hit a snag.
Sprint Nextel and Clearwire called off a plan to join forces to build a nationwide high-speed wireless network using WiMax technology. The companies said they could not come to agreement on terms of the deal, announced in July.
Sprint had positioned WiMax as a way to let customers surf the Web on laptops, cell phones and other portable devices at speeds up to some five times faster than cellular networks now offer. The company had intended to launch mobile broadband services in initial markets by year-end and planned a larger rollout encompassing 100 million customers by the end of 2008.
Sprint says this week it remains committed to developing WiMax and is on track for a soft launch this year in the Chicago and Baltimore/Washington markets, with commercial launch in 2008.
A source told The Washington Post one of the things the companies could not agree on was how many cell towers each company should build to support WiMax and the pace of that deployment.
Now that Sprint is “hobbled” with WiMax, there’s a question as to how fast other companies, such as Intel and Motorola, can roll out the technology, analysts told the Post. One said the Sprint news “was not a death knell” for WiMax, but is certainly a sign that its rollout is further out than previously believed.


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Talk about strange bedfellows. The American Heart Association and Nintendo Co. are teaming up to promote the popular Wii video game console, as the health advocacy group concedes that its campaign for traditional exercise isn't working.
The surprising partnership, announced Monday, comes amid growing concern about obesity among kids who spend much of their time watching television and playing video games.
Nintendo will be able to brand its Wii products with the AHA's iconic heart logo to let consumers know that the organization considers the items a healthy choice. Nintendo will donate $1.5 million to the AHA as part of the partnership.
The upcoming Nintendo console, rumored to be Switch 2, will have power closer to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One than the current-gen consoles.


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A few days back we saw some images of the unannounced Sony Xperia Cosmos and then we got rumors saying it would be launched by the company as Xperia C4. The Sony Xperia C4 is also supposed to be a selfie-centric phone like its predecessor, the Xperia C3 which has a big 5MP front-facing camera with LED flash to take great selfies.
Now a couple of renders of the said Xperia C4 have surfaced online. One of the renders has been received by folks at the Xperia Blog and the other one has been posted by the serial leakster @upleaks on its twitter account.
The Sony Xperia C4 leaked pics show a large camera at the front with the LED flash beside it indicating that this too will be a pro-selfie handset like the Xperia C3 and the LED flash will provide good selfies even in the dark.
Xpera C4 will be available in three colors, White, Black and Turquoise. The pic at the top shows the device in Turquoise color. The photo uploaded by @upleaks is of the white Xperia C4 and can be seen below.
As for the specs, not much information is available about the device but it may have the same 5.5-inch display like the C3. The front cam could be the same 5MP one or could even be upgraded because other smartphones with more powerful front cams have already come in the market, such as the HTC Desire Eye which has a whopping 13MP front-facing camera.
The Xperia C4 is rumored to have a MediaTek processor which is a little surprising as Sony has been using Qualcomm SoCs since long. The handset is also supposed to come with pre-installed Android 5.0 Lollipop.
The Sony Xperia C4 is rumored to launch somewhere in May or June this year. It may be recalled that the Xperia C3 was announced by Sony in July last year.


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17th February 2021
Are Consumers Staying Sustainable in 2021?
The state of the environment is something that is of high concern to consumers across the globe. Indeed, much attention has been given in the media and lobby groups about the damage done to the environment over the last couple of decades. However, there are a variety of factors that link to trend evolution. This is not a new trend; however, consumers are more than ever before recognizing that it is not just the responsibility of big business but must be addressed as a collective responsibility. So what actions are consumers taking in 2021 to address the issue of Sustainability?
FMCG Gurus consumer insights show that there has been a year-on-year increase in consumers who say they are concerned about the state of the environment. In 2019, 62% stated this, however, a 12% increase to 74% in 2020. Not only have consumers become more concerned about the environment but there has also been a 5% increase in consumers who believe the damage done is irreversible. These pessimistic feelings towards the environment will in turn result in consumers taking a more proactive stance on sustainability, looking to make changes to their diets and lifestyles in order to minimize their impact on the environment.
Although consumers understand that it is a collective effort between brands and consumer to be more sustainable, consumers feel that big brands should be doing more to address environmental issues. FMCG Gurus research shows that 64% of global consumers state they believe that brands should be doing more to protect the environment. Not only do consumers want brands to do more but they also need them to be transparent when it comes to addressing environmental claims. Levels of trust towards brands and their ethical and environmental policies is something that is also deteriorating, with there being a noticeable year-on-year increase in the proportion of consumers wo say that they have become less trusting over the last two years. Therefore, it is important that brands are deemed trustworthy and transparent.
Consumers are taking a number of steps in order to lead a more sustainable lifestyle. Some of these steps include making greater efforts to void food waste, making greater attempts to reduce their carbon footprint, and finally made greater attempts to seek out more environmentally friendly food and beverage brands.
Over the last two years, a total of 48% of consumers say that they have made changes to their diets in order to lead a more sustainable lifestyle. This was a noticeable increase compared to when the question was asked a year earlier. Some of the key changes consumers have made to their diets are, turned to more local food and drink (45%), Eaten more fresh food (44%), and reduced their meat intake (39%). The meat industry has been associated with negative environmental impact, which is a key reason to why consumers are looking to reduce meat. This has also led to a number of consumers turning to plant-based foods which are associated with being better for the environment.
When addressing consumers who are looking to lead a more sustainable lifestyle it is important that brands are clear and transparent. Consumer trust has decreased over the past couple of years when it comes to environmental claims as consumers are less likely to believe brands. Therefore, brands must make sure that they are clear and transparent with consumers to help rebuild trust.


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Vacation Travel Booking Starts Early | Local News
Coastal Georgians who are uncertain about plans for the next holiday season could find themselves unlucky if travel is the order of the day.
The desired resort or event out of town can be booked now or nearby.
An AAA travel survey found that 46% of Georgians intended to complete their travel arrangements by the end of October.
Lowering restrictions due to the availability of COVID-19 vaccines and declining cases are fueling greater interest in aviation or highways in 2021.
In 2020, only 30% of respondents indicated travel plans.
Holidaymakers will head for the family, a change of scenery or pure relaxation.
Those with remote destinations will likely depend on air travel. Everyone in this subset should already have a flight and a destination.
âTime is running out for people who are considering taking a flight this holiday season,â said Debbie Haas, vice president of travel for AAA – The Auto Club Group.
âAs we approach the holidays, airfares often increase as availability decreases. “
Haas said the chances of finding the ideal flight at a great price start to decline after Halloween.
We will travel more by car than by plane. According to AAA, 42% of Georgians – or two in five – plan to take a vacation of three or more days during the holiday season.
Those who use the highways might consider carrying extra cash. On Monday, the average price of gasoline in Georgia was $ 3.25 a gallon for regular unleaded, 2 cents more than a week ago, 27 cents more than last month and $ 1.29 more than at the same time last year. And the start of the holiday season is still a few weeks away.
The Centers for Disease Control relies on travelers’ compliance with safety measures. He recommends the COVID-19 vaccine for all eligible people who will be traveling.
âProtect those who are not yet eligible for vaccination, such as young children, by getting the vaccine and other eligible people around them,â the CDC said.
Other frequently cited safety measures should also be part of daily routine, he said, including wearing a mask indoors around other people.
He urges travelers to remember that outdoors are generally safer than indoors and to practice all recommended precautions, including safe distance, in a closed environment when in the company of other people. .
âAvoid overcrowded and poorly ventilated spaces,â the CDC said.
A large percentage of Georgians plan to stay put over Thanksgiving and Christmas. According to the AAA survey, 37% of Georgians plan to celebrate at home due to the pandemic.


text: Device access 20 February 2020 The Establishment Survey considers devices on a household level, so if any member of a household owns a device, then every member of that household is considered to have access. The one exception to this is mobile phones (including smartphones), which are considered to be individual devices, so if a household member owns a mobile phone, other members of the household are not considered to have access. For consistency, these data are for individuals. Continuing the growth seen over time, access to smart (internet) TVs within UK households saw a jump in Q4 2019, increasing by over 2 million individuals to 36.04 million. This is almost a +20% increase versus a year ago. The other measures are stable, with HD TV and games console access both seeing a slight increase in the last quarter, after earlier declines. Note: The number of UK households declined from 28.58 million in Q1 2019 to 28.12 million in Q2 2019. UK household estimates are taken directly from UK Government figures. These were previously reported by the Ministry for Housing, Communities & National Government; from 2019, they have been reported by the Office for National Statistics, which has lower growth in its forecasts. *Any computer includes laptop and desktop PCs and Macs as well as any notebooks or tablets, e.g. iPads, but not mobile phones.


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One the smartest guys I know is Bruce Kasman over at JPMorgan, and he still doesn't think the economy is going to fall into recession, much a less a severe, 1982-style downturn. (Neither, by the way, does the Fed.) Rather, he sees the economy muddling along with 1 percent GDP growth in the second half. Here are his three reasons:
1) Profit margins at nonfinancial companies remain healthy. "This is a testament to the fact that firms have produced strong productivity gains—estimated to have risen at a 2.5% pace in 1H08."
2) Trade remains strong. "This is related to the decline in the dollar and the composition of US exports which is concentrated in agricultural products, industrial supplies, and capital equipment—items that remain in demand by rapidly growing emerging market economies."
3) Businesses will have to rebuild their inventories. "Apparently, retailers and manufacturers are using the lift to demand from rebate spending and strong exports in 2Q08—in which final sales grew at a faster than 3% clip—to clear their shelves. In addition, the agricultural sector is experiencing a forced inventory drawdown due to floods and bad weather conditions. This destocking is holding back our estimate of 2Q08 growth to 2.2%. But it will add significantly to growth in the coming quarters. It should be noted that only twice in the last three decades—at the end of 2001 and 1982—did firms destock at the pace seen in 1H08. In both these previous cases, a stabilization in stockbuilding contributed more than 1.5 percentage points to growth over the following two quarters."


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In 2017, Sonos announced a ground-breaking partnership with Ikea that would integrate full-fledged Sonos speakers into everyday furniture. Today, we found out those speakers will be available starting in August of this year. When they’re […]
Paulo Garcia, Advanced Designer on Mortal Kombat 11, answers questions about the game’s Towers of Time mode, how gear and microtransactions will work, and confirms that the game will include secret characters.
Despite record sales last year, and profitability in recent quarters, Tesla is reducing its full-time employee headcount by 7 percent. CEO Elon Musk made the announcement in an email to Tesla employees on Friday. Tesla’s […]
An update to Google’s Duo app began rolling out earlier today, and unlike many other recent app updates, there’s actually a brand new feature that doesn’t appear to be locked behind a server-side switch. Unfortunately, […]
We’re giving away 100 free PC Steam codes for PlanetSide Arena: Legendary Edition to one hundred (100) lucky fans! (Scroll down to enter below). PlanetSide Arena: Legendary Edition includes: Closed Beta and Full Game Season […]
Likewise, Schaeffler Group of Germany is working with customers on self-driving shuttle concepts, executives said last week during the Detroit auto show. Like Bosch, Continental and ZF, Schaeffler’s first priority is to remain a supplier, […]
Arduino is the open-source electronics platform that opens up a whole new world of creating your own cool tech projects. All you need is an Arduino circuit board, an idea, and some basic programming knowledge […]
Mortal Kombat 11, which is shaping up to be the wackiest, goriest, and most intense game in the series in years, gave hardcore fans a good reason to buy its Kollector’s Edition. NetherRealm Studios fully […]


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May 7, 2018
Lab-grown diamonds are growing in popularity. Image credit: ALTR Created Diamonds
By Danny Parisi
The lab-grown diamond industry is poised to explode in popularity in the near future, thanks to high interest from young consumers and millennials who are willing to spend big on created diamonds.
Share your thoughts. Click here


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The PlayStation Vita is all but dead at this point, but that hasn’t stopped Sony from quietly dropping a firmware update for the handheld.
As noted by Destructoid, system update version 3.73 rolled out to Vita users this week. In terms of what it does, Sony has said nothing besides “this system software update improves system performance.”
Notably, this is exactly what the last few system updates have done. Version 3.72 rolled out in August. Presumably, this update is intended to prevent modded software, although it’s unclear if it may do anything beyond that.
It makes sense that the updates aren’t introducing any new Vita features since Sony has ceased production of the system earlier this year.
Still, this might feel like pouring salt in the wound to the people who still use their Vitas. R.I.P.


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Ex-movie theater projectionist Steve Guttenberg covers high-end audio news and reviews.
CNET editors round up their favorite tablets, including products from Apple, Samsung, and Google.
With a variety of new Dell tablets, laptops, and tablet/laptop hybrids, we've rounded up the most impressive of the bunch.
Hewlett-Packard is offering Black Friday deals on its top-of-the-line ultrabooks.
From less than $200 to more than $1,200; which Chromebook is right for you?
With no new Alienware or Asus high-end gaming laptops on display, it's up to boutique builder Origin to represent PC gaming.
The ultraportable 11-inch PC screen is suddenly hot again, from high-end Sony and Apple laptops to budget tablets and hybrids.
Intel's new CPUs come to a multimedia tower and a budget touchscreen laptop.
Portable PCs with powerful graphics cards are rare these days. Here are some recent favorites.
Up for sale as of Tuesday, the lastest editions to the Alienware lineup offer Intel's Core i7 "Haswell" chip, up to 32GB of memory, and support for 802.11ac Wi-Fi.
PC sales have gone off a cliff as gadget fans turn to tablets instead -- and experts blame Windows 8.
Acer's bold new line of Ethos media laptops features a unique wireless touchpad remote and plenty of upscale specs.


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Posted by: WendyLane in: Food/Beverage -
LANE’s Food & Beverage Beat is back for the ninth consecutive year, and it’s chock-full of information and trends to watch in 2018. Whether you’re looking to simplify your meals or introduce more spice, explore Rhone varietals or discover wild beers, choose foods that pack more nutritional punch or help the environment, we have you covered.
Six experts from across the food and beverage industry have weighed in on the stories and issues that will grab our attention this year. For details, click through to LANE’s 2018 Food & Beverage Beat.


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SINGAPORE (June 18): Singapore’s state-owned port operator, PSA International, has acquired more than 53 million shares in Hutchison Port Holdings Trust from the open market for nearly US$15.9 million ($21.2 million). The purchase was made on June 6, at an average price of 29.7 US cents.
With this purchase, PSA, which has been the second-largest unitholder of HPHT since it went public, increased its stake in the trust to nearly 984 million shares, or 11.29%. Prior to this, PSA, via an entity called Port Capital, owned nearly 930.4 million shares, or 10.68% of the trust.
HPHT’s largest shareholder is still Hutchison Port Group Holdings, part of Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka Shing’s sprawling business empire, which owns just over 2.4 billion shares, or 27.62% of the trust.


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If you’re still wondering when the future will get here, stop looking to the skies for flying cars and look down at your iPhone the next time you walk into an Apple store. The company has just kicked off a new in-store tracking initiative that uses Bluetooth to push offers and notifications to customers as[...]
Microsoft’s takedown of the ZeroAccess botnet wasn’t a complete success. Experts point out that Microsoft targeted only the money-making aspects of the botnet, and that its communication protocol was untouched.
Google revoked digital certificates for some of its domains that had been fraudulently signed by an intermediate certificate authority with links to ANSSI, France’s cyber-defense agency.
As 2013 comes to a close, security experts are looking back at the major stories and developments of the year, including the Edward Snowden NSA leaks and major malware attacks. In this video, Vitaly Kamluk of Kaspersky Lab examines the biggest security news of 2013 and talks about the lasting effects they may have.
Microsoft’s crusade against botnets raged on yesterday as the Redmond, Washington-based computer giant and a coalition of law enforcement agencies and Internet security companies disrupted the notorious ZeroAccess botnet.


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Microsoft's Bing has finally unseated Yahoo from StatCounter's number-two search engine ranking worldwide...with a whopping 4.37 percent.
From explaining Mark Zuckerberg's mysterious trips to China to the sudden death of UberTwitter, the best Quora topics highlight social media insiders spilling the secrets outsiders were never meant to know.
As it turns out, advertisers won't pay much for space next to endless videos of cats. In a new campaign, YouTube is rumored to be seeking out celebrities for a new channel it hopes will pull down some serious ad dollars.
Google asks users to help combat content farms, which are beginning to saturate search results, with a new Chrome extension
Google has done its homework. According to a new study, the search engine is returning half the number of malicious software links that it did six months ago, while its rivals have seen the opposite trend.
Yahoo is looking more and more like a dinosaur stuck in a prehistoric mud pit, and every labored step is digging it deeper. Here’s how to winch out the once-proud Web titan.
Yahoo is launching its own Flipboard-style visual news app on tablets called Livestand. The publication will deliver customized content and social features based on ever-changing user preferences.
Flickr initially said that it had permanently deleted Mirco Wilhelm's five-year old account, but a day later said that it has fully restored the photo collection.
AOL plans to combat falling ad revenue with a comprehensive system for generating thousands of search-engine-optimized articles every week, but some see it as the blueprint for a content farm.
Microsoft and Yahoo have engaged in a blame game over the mysterious data usage affecting some Windows Phone 7 users.
Yahoo Mail has been blamed for hogging about 25 times more data than necessary in certain instances.


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Dieting is like a Chanel suit – it never goes out of style. There are enormous amounts of money spent on diets, on books about diets, on videos and personal trainers that could help you shrink your waistline. If you try to Google “diet” online, there would be thousands of pages filled with tips and tricks to help you lose weight and get back on track with your plans to keep fit. Dieting is a business that is most likely worth billions of dollars.
Thus, it’s no wonder a new study was issued related to dieting. The research is not entirely new, but this time it is based on objective data. It basically shows that people who decide to stick to a shopping list when buying their food supplies weigh less and are more likely to eat healthier. The results were published in the newest edition of the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior.
Basically, in order to conclude the study, the researchers conducted a survey in lower income neighborhoods in Pittsburgh, collecting information from people who made less than $ 20,000. Most of them were African-American and did not have a wide variety of options for eating healthy food. This is why these neighborhoods are often called “food deserts”. More than 1,300 people answered questions about their shopping habits, about their height, weight and the food they ate. One out of three people said that they usually have shopping lists when they go out to buy food.
The people who usually carry a shopping list were at least five pounds lighter than the people who never bothered about planning what to buy. Therefore, a shopping list might be a good solution to cut down on unhealthy, unnecessary food.
However, the researchers pinpoint the fact that the people who were surveyed came from very poor background. Thus, the results might not be the same for people who have higher incomes. Lead author Tamara Dubowitz, who is a senior policy researcher with RAND Corporation, said that there is a good chance the outcome might be similar even in the case of people who can afford to spend more money on food: “It makes sense that if you have a list it is a good tool to counteract some of the other influences that are shouting at us at the store, encouraging us to not necessarily engage with healthy food options,” she added. The fact that the tendency of stores is to advertise unhealthy food rather than healthy food stands as good proof for that.
When people plan what they are going to eat at home, it is easier to steer clear of those temptations that advertisements for products on sale pose. Consumers’ health has ever been on the stores’ lists of priorities. Their main target is to sell. The more you buy, the happier they are. Therefore, we are the only ones in charge of taking care of our health.
The truth is that planning your diet is always the first step to success. You can start from your shopping list. It might prove effective and it can make a huge difference in the long run.
Image Source: be-fit


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As the 2020 Olympics creep closer, Japan is taking strides in adequately preparing the region for the influx of tourists from all over the world. This influx of people will have an effect on several industries; some of which include: retail, transportation, hospitality and healthcare. Localization language services for tourism are most definitely on the rise in Japan, from restaurant menus to public signage will need translation and localization services in many languages. Likewise, the travel and leisure industry will have plenty of guaranteed business in the coming years.
The intensified localization efforts in Japan are setting the country up for the possibility of a much needed economic boost and paving the way for potential growth as businesses look to enter the market. Japan is preparing by investing in a variety of language service options that will help tourists communicate during their stay. Some of these include language service apps, revised signage and marketing collateral for local businesses as well as preparing interpreters to work the ten-day event.
The Internal Affairs ministry announced their desire to provide real-time machine translation services. The Japanese government has invested 1.38 billion yen ($11 million USD) in real-time speech translation. Real-time translation systems include applications that can be installed on smartphones, computers or other gadgets linked to the Internet. One merely selects the targeted language, speaks into the device and waits for it to translate the words in audio or visual form. The words of the speaker are sent by the app to a computer server, which analyzes the voice and selects the closest translation from a vast collection of phrase pairs in its database.
A translation app called VoiceTra4U can instantly translate 27 different languages (30 languages including dialects) in text mode and has 17 languages for speech mode, including English, German, French, Korean and Japanese.
There is also an app Jspeak that translates spoken Japanese into English and vice-versa and can also interpret other languages such as Chinese, French, German and Thai.
While real-time machine translation may not always be grammatically perfect, Japan is sacrificing its known reputation for quality in order to provide attainable support for an enjoyable travel experience.
Other translation and localization efforts in Japan aim to help prepare businesses for foreigners. The Japan Tourism Agency has provided examples of signs for public facilities. Also, retail outlets are making a move to increase the number of tourists they can accommodate. The Japanese government released examples of signs for these businesses to use. The signs cover product information, payment processes, emergency evacuation procedures and other instructions written in English. Other notices such as those banning eating, drinking or speaking inside premises utilize pictograms. The government also plans to equip public buses with multilingual information displays by the end of fiscal 2016 and add English equivalents to all street signs by 2020.
In September 2016, seven universities specializing in foreign languages — including Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Kobe City University of Foreign Studies and Kansai Gaidai University — will jointly hold a four-day intensive seminar in Chiba Prefecture so students can brush up on their translation skills. With their sights set on the Tokyo Olympics, the universities launched the program last year to allow students to deepen their knowledge about the Olympics, foreign culture and hospitality.
According to the Tokyo Olympics organizing committee, some 80,000 volunteers will be needed to run the event smoothly.
Drop us a note in the form and one of our experts will set up a time to discuss the
ways Dynamic Language can help your business go further, faster.


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In 2013, the HDMI Forum released version 2.0 of its audio/video spec. Devices compatible with the standard slowly trickled onto the market, but now they've already fallen behind the curve. The HDMI spec has now been bumped to version 2.0a, which adds support for content with high dynamic range—that is, color formats that allow more leeway between bright and dark hues than usual.
According to the official press release, the HDR update is related to metadata extensions released by the Consumer Electronics Association earlier this year. And, well, that's about it. The new spec doesn't appear to include more bandwidth, additional features, or anything else to set it apart from the 2.0 release. The base spec already offers 18Gbps of bandwidth and support for 4K video at up to 60Hz, so it's hardly in desperate need of an upgrade.
Fortunately, the addition of HDR is probably a bigger deal for televisions than the move to 4K resolutions, because it has the potential to improve image quality in a way folks could appreciate from across the room. Let's hope HDR support spreads to desktop PC displays sooner rather than later.
|Acer's Predator Z35P is on the hunt for a high-end gaming rig||8|
|Fractal Design finds a new Focus on entry-level cases||6|
|Intel plans to integrate Thunderbolt into future CPUs||18|
|Cooler Master polishes the Cosmos II for a 25th Anniversary edition||9|
|Huawei opens up three new Windows 10 notebooks||10|
|Corsair Commander Pro takes charge of case fans and lighting||7|
|National Taffy Day Shortbread||11|
|LG's X Venture has a beefy battery and a heavy-duty build||18|
|Agon AG251FG can do 2560x1440 or 240Hz||22|


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Within the next 30 days, the European Union wants to respond to new US tariffs on steel and aluminum, which were imposed by the Trump administration. After an initial exemption, the president now seems to be more determined to follow through with his attempt to “protect American industries.” With a trade war seemingly about to begin, let’s throw light on who started it in the first place.
The EU’s Retaliation
Through a 25 percent tariff on steel and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum, President Trump intends to shield American producers from foreign competition and keep jobs inside the United States. This is in line with Trump’s general tendency towards economic protectionism, demonstrated by his support for tariffs on the Canadian manufacturer Bombardier’s C-series jets (planes which are partially produced in the UK as well) and for tariffs on imported solar panels and washing machines.
The European Union recently announced its retaliation against those import duties. It has launched legal proceedings against the measure and plans on additional taxes on American imports in Europe, including things like clothing, motor vehicles, orange juice, or cigarettes.
It is certainly strange the European Union doesn’t manage to rise above the mercantilism of Donald Trump. Before his election, and during his first months in office, European politicians made positive signals for free trade. Where Trump wanted less free trade, Europe responded with more economic cooperation. Back in July 2017, we saw headlines like “EU, Japan seal free trade deal in signal to Trump.”
“Although some are saying that the time of isolationism and disintegration is coming again, we are demonstrating that this is not the case,” European Council President Donald Tusk said during a press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
In a follow-up speech, however, EU Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker completely overturned this return to economic principles and to the moral high ground. In a now legendary quote, Juncker said in a speech in Hamburg, Germany:
So now we will also impose import tariffs. This is basically a stupid process, the fact that we have to do this. But we have to do it. We will now impose tariffs on motorcycles, Harley Davidson, on blue jeans, Levis, on Bourbon. We can also do stupid. We also have to be this stupid.
The episode ended with Trump granting an exemption to the European Union. That deadline has now expired, with no deal having been reached. In Brussels, lawmakers are up in arms about the measures, while Washington does not seem to see this as a priority.
Even Donald Trump seems unimpressed by threats coming from the EU. Unlike last time, we weren’t showered in tweets about German cars, but we did get a standard exclamation by the president, which was probably a reaction to the EU’s decision to launch an appeal at the World Trade Organization (WTO):
The EU Started the Trade War
The general media narrative is that the European Union is now forced to “respond” to a trade war initiated by the United States. But is Donald Trump right about the fact that American products get treated unfairly in Europe? The answer is: yes, absolutely.
Here are the tariff rates imposed on Europe by the United States on a number of goods (numbers taken from the United States International Trade Commission):
- New Diesel car: 2.5 percent
- T-shirt: 16.5 percent
- Umbrella: Tariff-free
- Olive oil: 5 cents/kilogram ($5/100 kg)
- Biscuits: Tariff-free
- Regular cigarettes: $1.05/kg + 2.3 percent
- Orange juice: 7.85 cents/liter
- Sugarcane: $1.24/ton
Here are the tariff rates imposed by the European Union on a number of goods (numbers taken from the European Commission):
- New Diesel car: 16 percent
- T-shirt: 8 percent
- Umbrella: 4.7 percent
- Olive oil: €134/100 kg ($156/100 kg)
- Biscuits: 9 percent EA (additional “agricultural component” duty), 24.2 percent ADSZ (additional duty on sugar contents)
- Regular cigarettes: 57.6 percent
Orange juice: 12.2 percent
- Sugarcane: €4.6/100 kg ($5.37/100 kg, $53.7/ton)
Just on a random selection, it turns out that the European Union is already heavily taxing imports from the United States. In fact, while the EU is threatening to introduce duties on products it hasn’t been taxing yet (such as bourbon), it also wants to increase taxes on things like orange juice, which are already heavily taxed. On top of that, you also need to add two components of non-tariff barriers: food quality and other product safety standards, as well as agricultural subsidies.
In practice, this means that in order to export to the European Union or any of its associated members, an American orange juice producer needs to abide by the European Union Council Directive 2001/112/EC on fruit juices (this one was amended in both 2009 and 2012 to tighten requirements on labelling and content of the juices): Health control (food law, hygiene, microbiological criteria, contaminants, pesticides), Plant health control (harmful organisms), Marketing standards. This makes him obligated to know everything about Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 on the hygiene of foodstuffs as well as Commission Regulation (EC) No 2073/2005 on microbiological criteria for foodstuffs, and Commission Regulation (EC) No 466/2001 of 8 March 2001 setting maximum levels for certain contaminants in foodstuffs. Since the regular producer is unable to figure all of these regulations out by himself, he’ll have to pay compliance costs for firms to figure them out for him, because if he doesn’t, retailers will quickly drop his products because according to EU law the importer is responsible for the import.
On top of that, he will have to pay a 12.2 percent import duty.
After complying with all of these rules, he will then compete on a European market in which Spanish orange juice producers receive agricultural subsidies (which make up 40 percent of the EU’s annual budget), and can, therefore, sell for much cheaper.
Non-tariff barriers matter just as much as tariff barriers, even though they more difficult to measure. How exactly the European Union, given all of these restrictions, pretends to claim to hold free trade as a value is questionable.
What about a Race to the Bottom?
President Trump is clearly hyperbolic in his claim that there is such a thing as a 100 percent customs duty, but he isn’t wrong in bemoaning the EU’s trade policy. While the European Union might practice free trade within its own borders, it is a protectionist bloc for anyone who wishes to trade with it.
This is particularly frustrating given the important of Euro-American trade relations. Europe is the United State’s largest trading partner. US goods and services trade with the EU totaled nearly $1.1 trillion in 2016. Exports totaled $501 billion; imports totaled $592 billion.
The ones suffering from all of it are the consumers. It’s the consumers who pick up the tab when customs duties have to be paid, and when local producers can increase prices when they’re shielded from international competition. As low-income producers spend most of their income on consumption goods, they are suffering from it the most.
Of course, pointing fingers at “who started it” doesn’t resolve the fundamental problem. Neither Brussels nor Trump have an understanding of how trade relations work. If the European Union wants to appropriately respond to new tariffs on steel and aluminum, it should actually reduce tariffs on US imports. This would send a clear sign that the belief in free trade in Europe is consistent, no matter how much Trump uses mercantilism for political point-scoring with his base.
If there is to be a trade war, it should be a trade war to see who can slash tariff barriers the most.


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Tour Edge, the pound for pound industry leader in performance and innovation, today announced the all-new Exotics 721 Series irons: the C721 iron and the E721 iron.
These ultra-premium irons provide all new design concepts and ground-breaking technology from Tour Edge that takes the Exotics 721 Series to an entirely new level of performance.
This is being led by innovation breakthroughs by Tour Edge, most notably the new Diamond Face 2.0™ and VIBRCOR™ technology that provide the ultimate in power and feel.
The performance and design goals of the Exotics 721 Irons are to provide every level of golfer two extreme distance irons that feature full-face forgiveness and ball speed with a perfected sound and feel.
“This is next-level Exotics,” said Tour Edge founder and President David Glod. “It’s a brand-new direction for Exotics, not only with ground-breaking new tech, but with virtually every aspect of the design.”
The new direction of the Exotics 721 Series was born out of a desire to raise the bar in every metric of Exotics performance, including a major emphasis on power creation and sound and feel.
“VIBRCOR is a new technology that enhances speed and feel in a major way,” said Glod. “With the dual placement of VIBRCOR inside of the hollow-body pocket of the C721 and the undercut pocket of the E721, we’re able to provide the best of both worlds; perimeter weighted forgiveness and distance with the feel of a forged muscle-back.”
These two designs utilize the same basic design concept, with one designed as a player’s distance iron and the other as an extreme game improvement iron.
“We’ve also brought Diamond Face technology to irons for the first time ever with this release,” added Glod. “We were able to cover the entire iron face with up to 100 diamond shapes behind the face in our thinnest iron face ever produced.”
The new ultra-premium, high-performance Exotics 721 irons will be available for purchase worldwide on March 10, 2021.
“These are our most powerful, most forgiving and best feeling irons we’ve produced to date thanks to all this new innovation we have packed into them,” said Glod.
The Exotics C721 Iron (Player’s Distance) will retail for $142.99 per iron in graphite and $129.99 in steel, while the Exotics E721 Iron (Extreme Game Improvement) will retail at $114.99 per iron in graphite and $99.99 in steel.


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Today, StackAdapt, a Toronto-based ad tech company specializing in powering brand and agency trading desks with programmatic native advertising capabilities for content distribution, rolls out a platform update to support basic users.
Toronto, Canada, March 24, 2015 (Newswire.com) - Content marketing trend is booming; in fact 90% of B2C companies are now leveraging content to educate consumers about their brand (Forbes); and according to eMarketer 67% of media buyers looking to increase their native advertising efforts to distribute this content. As a result, in the US alone, native advertising is expecting to pull $4.3B in 2015 and grow at a 25% rate for the next three years (eMarketer).
“Previously we thought of content marketing as something reserved to large brands. But once we realized the extent to which smaller companies and startups wanted to share their story or vision through content, we knew we had to provide tools to help them reach their target audience”, says Vitaly Pecherskiy, co-founder of StackAdapt.
Starting today, StackAdapt supports both smaller clients that look for basic tools for content amplification, and sophisticated enterprise-level trading desks that have resources internally to manage a full-blown demand-side native advertising platform.


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Mobile backend-as-a-service platform AnyPresence has generated $6 million in a series B round of funding, which includes a strategic investment from software multinational Citrix.
The funding announcement is just the latest in a slew of activity around MBaaS platforms. We’ve recently seen Kinvey raise $10.8 million in a funding round, while FeedHenry got snapped-up by Red Hat for around $82 million last week. Then we’ve had a number of new MBaaS product launches specifically around enterprise, with built.io releasing their enterprise on-premise service, just after Kinvey rolled-out a similar product.
In another sign that the middleware market is converging, AnyPresence says the raised funds will be used to expand into areas such as API management and user interface development. AnyPresence will also use the money to grow its engineering team and expand its sales and marketing departments.
“We are excited to have new investors to help accelerate our growth and leadership in the mobile app development platform market. This funding round will also be used to expand our capabilities based on requirements from customers and partners, such as API management and support for emerging devices driven by the Internet of Things movement.”
Commenting on the company’s investment, Citrix mobile GM Brian Dye added:
“Reducing the friction of building and integrating apps is key to unlocking mobile innovation. We believe AnyPresence has delivered a leading MBaaS platform that helps companies channel this innovation to rapidly mobilize their business, and are investing to support their continued growth.”
Other investors who took part in the funding round include CNF Investments, Kinentic Ventures and Grotech Ventures. For more information take a look at the AnyPresence website.


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Plans for an Apple TV set (or a more advanced set-top
) may still be some time in coming, suggests Pacific Crest's Andy Hargreaves. On Wednesday the analyst met with Apple's CFO, Peter Oppenheimer, and its senior VP for Internet software and services, Eddy Cue. Hargreaves pressed the idea of a "more significant move into TV distribution," according to a new memo. In response, Cue repeated a frequent company position that Apple will only enter markets where it thinks it can create good customer experiences and solve major obstacles.
"The key problems in the television market are the poor quality of the user interface and the forced bundling of pay TV content, in our view," Hargreaves writes
. "While Apple could almost certainly create a better user interface, Mr. Cue's commentary suggested that this would be an incomplete solution from Apple's perspective unless it could deliver content in a way that is different from the current multichannel pay TV model.
"Unfortunately for Apple and for consumers, acquiring rights for traditional broadcast and cable network content outside of the current bundled model is virtually impossible because the content is owned by a relatively small group of companies that have little interest in alternative models for their most valuable content. The differences in regional broadcast content and the lack of scale internationally also create significant hurdles that do not seem possible to cross at this point."
Apple has been rumored as working on a TV set for some time, and earlier this year the rumors accelerated, even hinting that a product could be announced as soon as late 2012. Talk suddenly quieted down however, which could mean that Apple is running into hurdles and/or postponing efforts in favor of other projects. Many reports have, on the other hand, said that a TV wouldn't arrive until at least 2013.


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No Man’s Sky’s latest gameplay video at Sony’s E3 conference shows massive procedural generated worlds in vibrant color palettes.
The demo show on stage featured exploration and destructibility. The game looks really ambitious for an Indie title, hopefully its as fun as it looks. While short, the demo showed off just how vast the game is.
Check out the No Man’s Sky E3 gameplay demo below.
[youtube width=”602″ height=”350″ video_id=”vwAvammpTsQ”]
No Man’s Sky is coming for PS4 and Windows this year although they still haven’t set a fixed date. Developers Hello Game are said to put up the finishing touches and tell fans to expect the game “soon.”.


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Bangalore-based Theramyt Novobiologics Pvt Ltd, which recently raised its first round of funding from various investors including Aarin Capital and Accel Partners, is on its way to develop a platform ...
- Valuation and Fundraising for Tech Startups, Taj Yeshwantpur, Bengaluru, 2020-02-26
- VCCircle India Limited Partners Summit 2020, Trident, Nariman Point, 2020-02-27
- Business Transformation Summit 2020, ITC Kohenur, Hyderabad, 2020-03-14
- VCCircle Consumer Investment Summit 2020, Four Seasons Hotel, Mumbai, 2020-03-20


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DAVAO CITY — Autostrada Motore, Inc., the official dealer of Ferrari cars in the Philippines, is looking for a local partner for its planned Davao distribution that is targeted by next year.
Ginia R. Domingo, managing director of Autostrada, said they want a partner that not only has financial capacity but a commitment to the brand.
“For a partner, you have to have a showroom and a facility for after-sales and warehouse for your cars. This is very common, but it needs a bigger investment because we have more expensive cars… If it’s a very high cost item it requires heavy capitalization… and I think more than the monetary investment is really the commitment to the brand,” Ms. Domingo said in an interview.
Last week, Autostrada brought and showcased four cars — one Ferrari Portofino and three Maserati — in Davao City, with the participants of the Davao Investment Conference 2019 among those invited to the event.
“We have a very warm welcome from the local community in Davao… We are so happy with the response… especially that it is our first time in Davao,” Ms. Domingo said.
Apart from Davao, she said they see a big potential for the automotive industry in the Mindanao market.
“The local business here has been doing pretty well,” she said.
In terms of sales, Ms. Domingo said one car per month is considered “good.”
“That is how specialized the market is. So one a month is 12 cars in a year, so when we get to 24, it’s really good. So far we are on track.”
Autostrada’s marketing campaign in Davao will be focusing more on the Maserati.
“The Maserati is a little easier to acquire because that, we have an inventory. The inventory is like a normal car sale. If we don’t have the preferred color then you wait for awhile, but otherwise it’s readily more available compared to a Ferrari,” Ms. Domingo said. — Maya M. Padillo


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Selfies on Steroids
At last weekend’s Writer’s Digest Annual Conference in New York, two 40-something authors were overheard between sessions talking about Toronto-based Wattpad. They’d just attended a session in which the service was discussed.
“I just found out Wattpad has a lot of millennial readers,” one said.
“Yeah,” said the other writer, “and it’s all about serials,” said the other. “Did you know that?”
Such is the peculiar, almost cult-like progress of the world’s largest reading and writing platform. Wattpad’s massive reach has grown even larger in its deals with major traditional publishers such as Hachette in France.
Today, the Canadian company’s most active market, the US, gets access to Raccoon, a new video app for storytelling. Raccoon? Think raconteur, we were told when Publishing Perspectives asked. “And it’s also a nod to Wattpad’s homebase in Toronto,” a spokesperson told us, “which is known for its raccoons.”
Wattpad co-founder (with Allen Lau) Ivan Yuen tells us, “Raccoon’s focus is to deliver real stories from real people, and it’s a critical step forward in realizing Wattpad’s vision to connect and entertain the world through stories.
“As we look to the future of storytelling,” he says, “it’s clear that video will play an important role—digital video audiences are predicted [by eMarketer digital research] to reach 2.15 billion this year alone.”
Raccoon, for iOS and Android, is the most serious leap yet for the operation into visual storytelling. While writing and words have been at the heart of the Wattpad universe to date, Raccoon lets users create and share videos to tell their own stories. These are vertical selfie videos with which users express what Wattpad calls “their genuine selves, allowing them to make authentic connections with others.”
Raccoon is expected to be adding themes and prompts that users can deploy to enhance and embellish the stories they create in and about their own lives and worlds.
Wattpad tell Publishing Perspectives that in an early rollout in Canada, the service picked up fast traction in storytelling focused around four areas:
- Childhood stories (“millennial memoir,” you read it here first)
- Personal challenges
In that last category, personal challenges, we see another interesting potential convergence in the offing. Many Wattpad fans are also major consumers of YouTube, and the typical YouTube star is a popular performer of what amounts to selfie videos—exactly the medium that Wattpad is asking its users to incorporate into their own storytelling with Raccoon. Expect the Wattpad-YouTube axis to heat up quickly.
In their contacts this week with journalists about Raccoon, Wattpad’s spokespeople refer to the new app as “a major foray into nonfiction storytelling.”
“By providing a platform where people can experiment with new forms of short-form video storytelling,” says Yuen, “Raccoon creates authentic connections between storytellers and their audiences, and cultivates a safe space for people to tell stories around shared experiences.”
Storytelling as Story-Showing
“It’s clear that video will play an important role—digital video audiences are predicted to reach 2.15 billion this year alone.”Ivan Yuen
Unlike our wide-eyed authors at the conference, Publishing Perspectives readers know a great deal about Wattpad.
And its numbers tell an impressive story about Wattpad’s global success. UPDATE: A few hours after this story was published Wattpad sent us new numbers. These are freshly updated on August 25 at midday Eastern time:
- More than 60 million active users monthly
- More than 15.5 billion minutes spent monthly on the platform
- More than 400 million uploads shared on the platform
- More than 50 languages supported in stories and continual chatter between readers and the authors
At the moment, Wattpad spokespeople say they have no plan to attach a paid subscription to Raccoon, which is a departure from the model for their next-to-newest feature, Tap.
Tapping Deeper Into Mobile
Today’s US rollout of Raccoon follows the late-July activation of Wattpad’s Tap Originals, the enhanced chat-fiction functionality that lets users incorporate audio, photos, video, voice notes, and alternative ending options into their stories.
The initial Tap app from Wattpad was released in February, and it vies in the App Store with such services as Hooked and Yarn. Tap Originals are available in 10 or more languages. And Tap has an optional subscription model attached to it, the latest move in Wattpad’s gradual build up of revenue streams. A spokesperson for the company gives us a quick explanation of out the Tap subscription options work.
Each user has a certain amount of taps loaded onto their account. You tap to get a new installment of a texted story. Once your account’s taps are used up, you need to reload them. Taps are reloaded after a certain period of time passes, or if the user purchases a subscription to Tap Premium. So Tap Premium is the way to get your story’s next increments without waiting. By subscribing to Tap Premium, users receive unlimited taps to power through their stories without interruption.
There are three Tap Premium subscription packages, and each package offers unlimited taps:
- US$2.99 per week
- US$7.99 per month
- US$39.99 per year
If you find it tricky to keep up with the accelerating arrival of new wrinkles in Wattpad’s offering, keep in mind that the core concept has to do with closing the gap between creator and observer–between writer and reader.
What these new apps–Tap and Raccoon–are doing is capitalizing on what Wattpad’s creators at WP Technology Inc. in Toronto have learned over the years: access is the key. Readers of all ages, not just millennials, are using various social media to communicate with authors, entertainers, composers, choreographers, sculptors, designers, you name it, in ways they could never do in the past. What the platform’s first decade confirmed was that letting readers interact with their favorite writers meant that a lucrative bond could be nurtured between maker and consumer.
And now that Wattpadders can get their paws on Raccoon, those phones have just become an even smarter way for publishers to think about reaching readers.
Wattpad’s Ashleigh Gardner and Hachette Romans’ Cécile Terouanne will be in conversation with Publishing Perspectives at Frankfurt Book Fair’s Business Club on how publishers can work with the platform. The session is at 2 p.m. on Thursday, October 12.


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At this year’s Global Liner Shipping & Shipping2030 Asia, we gathered some of the most prominent thought leaders, and asked them to share their views on the hottest topics in shipping and maritime.
In this interview, Kate Adamson, CEO & Founder of the Futurenautics, tells us about the global trends that will shape shipping’s journey in the upcoming years.
Watch the video or read the transcript below.
Lili Nguyen: What are the next technological innovations that the industry should look out for?
Kate Adamson: I actually think that the technological innovations are secondary to the new kind of world order because shipping has, for centuries, served the engine of global trade. We are seeing significant changes in demographics, and that’s going to lead to significant changes in global trade patterns. That’s where the technologies start coming in, because technologies are partly responsible for some of these changes. Technologies which are disrupting the shipping industry are also the technologies that hold potential for them.
In terms of digitisation, obviously the most important one is connectivity, particularly from a vessel perspective. One of the things that held shipping back in comparison to other industries has been the expense and complexity of deep-sea connectivity, satellite technologies being literally rocket science. Now, with the advent of new satellite networks, the cost of communication is coming down, and it has opened the gate to new technologies and new opportunities to bring activities on the vessel closer to the organisation. And of course, it also gives the opportunity not just to transfer data to and from end points of a vessel, but now actually access all sorts of other functions as well on vessels.
LN: What economic and social trends do you see emerging that will impact shipping?
KA: We are entering a really interesting period in history. We’ve got these global megatrends such as the shifting influence of the G7 resource scarcity, rapid urbanisation, climate change, then you have all the technologies that are driving mindset changes. These mindsets now prefer collaboration, transparency, and access. So, these three things are coming together to profoundly change the world that we live in. What’s even more complicating is that thanks to the exponential growth of these technologies, change is happening much faster than it has ever done in the past.
So shipping is not alone in trying to cope with this massive change, but it may have started at a bit of a disadvantage because it hasn’t had access to the kind of bandwidth that has allowed shore based companies to roll out all sorts of new technologies over the last 15-20 years.
So how will this socio-economic stuff impact shipping? Well, shipping exists to serve global trade. And anything that impacts global trade is, by extension, going to impact shipping.
LN: How close is shipping to industry 4.0? Where are the gaps?
KA: Industry 4.0 is really about creating a global interoperable value chain that is shared by different companies and different countries. But the key thing about industry 4.0 is merging the physical and digital, the cyber physical, systems.
Over the last 3-5 years, shipping and other industries have been rigidly focused on getting data. Everybody wants data, and as much of it as possible, and rightly so! But what we’re moving into now is another phase, and now we are going to be able to start materialising rather than just digitalising. That means bringing together all this data from real-world objects and allowing us to truly innovate in the physical space.
A lot of ship operators and managers have said to me over the last few years ‘we can’t be a digital platform; we’ve got big assets and need space; we have big pieces of steel’. But now, after all this effort going into digitalisation and bringing in data and understanding our meat space in a digital form, the opportunity is clear. Where we go next is to use that data to start innovating cyber physical systems.
So how close are we to industry 4.0? We are absolutely not there yet, but equally, industry 4.0 is about all industries working together. We’re not all there yet. We are moving in different stages, but shipping is undoubtedly part of the journey. And I think that once people begin to understand that the next stage are these hybrid ecosystems that bring digital and physical together, it would possibly give a lot of comfort to ship operators who have struggled with the idea that everything in the future is going to be digital. These big chunks of steel floating on the ocean – what do we do with those? This is now a part of the sea where the two come together.


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A little over a month ago, President Joe Biden announced that his administration negotiated an agreement for the Port of Los Angeles to move to a 24/7 operation in order to help alleviate bottlenecks at the largest port in North America.
The traffic jam of container ships is being partially blamed for tying up the supply chain and driving up consumer prices. The backlog has led to dozens of ships being stuck at the port, unable to offload goods for days and weeks at a time, leaving retailers to warn of some shortages ahead of the holiday season.
But officials cited “great progress” on Tuesday: Since Oct. 24, the number of import containers at the Port of L.A. dropped 25%, and cargo sitting for nine days or more fell by 29%.
“After three weeks while working a record number of ships by our great [International Longshore and Warehouse Union] men and women, we've reduced that 29% on the aging cargo side, and all imports are down about 25%,” Gene Seroka, executive director of the Port of Los Angeles, said Tuesday.
Seroka acknowledged there is much more work still to be done, but was proud of the progress they’ve made.
“There’s much more work to be done on this front but great progress by our dock workers, shipping lines, truckers, marine terminal operators and railroad partners,” he said.
As of Tuesday, there were 84 container ships waiting offshore to get into the Port of Los Angeles or its neighboring sister port in Long Beach, an improvement from some recent days when the number topped 100. In normal busy times, only a handful of ships have to wait to dock.
The two California ports account for 40% of all imports to the United States.
Seroka said that a shortage of truck drivers and nighttime warehouse workers pose problems in establishing a 24/7 schedule, along with getting importers to embrace expanded hours: “It’s an effort to try to get this entire orchestra of supply chain players to get on the same calendar.”
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg agreed with that assessment, saying that moving to a 24/7 schedule is not as easy as “flipping the switch,” adding: “There are so many players, even just on the grounds of port.”
“As so many of us know, decades of under-investment in our supply chain infrastructure, combined with unprecedented consumer demand,” as well as a global pandemic, are “all combining to put our supply chains to the test,” Buttigieg said.
“The warehousing complex traditionally work during the day and they found it difficult to bring in workers during this time,” Seroka noted. “On the trucking side, as we've explained before, drivers have a limit, federally-mandated, of 11 hours behind the wheel every day, and if they work consecutively, they must take a rest. We need to add more drivers.”
Officials touted the recently-signed $1 trillion infrastructure bill — which will provide $17 billion to improve port infrastructure, as well as nearly $45 billion heading directly to the state of California, the largest sum of any state — saying that the funding will help alleviate the backlog at the ports.
The Biden administration also announced a number of other actions to address supply chain issues and fund ports recently, as part of its efforts to help alleviate strain on the supply chain.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.


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In a blow for Android, not to mention the free market, innovation and common sense, the United States International Trade commission has ruled in Apple’s favor in its case against HTC’s Android devices. Certain devices, not currently articulated, will be illegal to import into the United States as of April 19, 2012. The two companies may reach a patent settlement, or President Obama may veto the order.
Apple brought forth its case based on several patents, but the one that it won the patent case one is a system level patent, according to The Verge. The injunction will go to the desk of President Obama, who will have sixty days to veto the motion or sign it. (He’s a Blackberry guy, so we’ll call him neutral in this case.) Vetos against an ITC decision are rare, but something tells me that this case will receive particular attention.
What happens now? Normally when two large companies come to blows over patents, a licensing deal is hammered out before it actually stops sales or imports. And that may indeed happen – but if anyone is poised to buck the trend in patent litigation, it’s Apple. The company refused to settle with Samsung in their Australian patent case, forcing a long and drawn out system of appeals.
It was revealed in the recent autobiography of late apple co-founder Steve Jobs that he was furious over perceived theft of intellectual property in Android, and declared that he would “spend my last dying breath if I need to…I’m going to destroy Android because it’s a stolen product.” Apple’s non-cooperative and litigious actions in Australia and Germany seem to be in line with that imperative. Apple eventually lost the Australian case on appeal, and Samsung’s tablets are once again on sale down under.
Apple also tried to ban Samsung from selling phones and tablets in the US based on design patents, and the injunction was denied earlier this month. Apple’s efforts to harass, stymie and generally beat Android manufacturers into economic death using the patent system have so far met with mixed results. What happens now depends upon how willing Apple is to negotiate (a factor that may have changed after Jobs’ death) and whether or not President Obama agrees with the ITC ruling.
this is crazy….i can’t believe there is actually a judge that can justify taking that position while keeping a straight face. I’m guessing the new condo that he just “bought” and the boat will look nice with his new apple I-Phone he got as a parting gift!
Truly a sad day for everything fair and open in the history of mankind. I think now is the time for every company in OHA (Open Handset Alliance) to go on complete offensive against Apple and just shut it down. Can’t anybody see that Apple is really bringing a complete Nazi era in the corporate world!
This is not a surprise because I knew Apple (Jobs) is willing to spend a lot of money to do anything they can to stop the advance of Android. Dirty tricks like this by Apple just insures that I will NEVER buy any of their products again.
Y’know, after using my new ASUS Transformer tablet (with keyboard) for a couple weeks I’ve noticed a little something: These things make a beautiful little laptop that is a real pleasure to use. All that is missing today is a good word processor, but they are coming soon.
So what’s that say for Apple and Microsoft? A tablet/laptop will be rather inexpensive and quality software will be anywhere from free to just a few bucks. Those companies selling expensive hardware and software are going to feel that pinch within the next couple years.
Jobs saw that coming and that is why Apple turned a room full of lawyers loose to harass any company selling Android as much as possible. Microsoft got into that act, too.
Maybe Apple will be the only product available in the USA and those of us elsewhere will benefit from a wider range of cheaper devices that are “dumped” on us!
I’m all for protection of Intellectual Property if the ideas are truly novel but more often than not it just seems that patents are granted for something that is an electronic implementation of a previously existing mechanical device or action of a similar nature.
Is an Icon that changes when you touch it really that different from an illuminated doorbell from the the 1940’s? How can “turning a page” or “locking” something be granted a patent?
The patent system is being abused and in danger of becoming a laughing stock around the world.
I guess this will be a never-ending clash of the big smartphone distributors… it’s all about staying on the top and beating the competition… 🙁
Oh come on Apple!


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In an increasingly more virtual international, generation will advertise historical social inequalities except the machine is challenged and adjusted, warns a brand new e-newsletter from Professor Yasmin Ibrahim from Queen Mary’s Faculty of Trade and Control.
Prof Ibrahim’s newest e book attracts on analysis from pc science to sociology and demanding race research, in a ground-breaking demonstration of ways virtual platforms and algorithms can form social attitudes and behaviour.
“Virtual Racial: Algorithmic Violence and Virtual Platforms” explores how algorithms can goal and profile other folks in line with race, in addition to how virtual applied sciences allow on-line hate speech and bigotry. The e book additionally main points how algorithms are now not solely used for virtual platforms, reminiscent of social media and on-line buying groceries; they play a hidden however rising function in necessary public services and products like well being and social care, welfare, schooling and banking.
There are numerous examples of the risks that virtual applied sciences can pose—from notorious scandals like Cambridge Analytica knowledge misuse and racial bias within the U.S. courts’ possibility overview set of rules, to rising problems like self-driving vehicles being much more likely to hit darker skinned pedestrians and digital assistants now not figuring out various accents.
Prof Ibrahim highlights real-world examples of ways virtual platforms can expose and make stronger deep-seated inequalities—reminiscent of Fb’s set of rules contributing to the Rohingya genocide, during which an estimated 25,000 other folks had been killed and 700,000 extra displaced. Amnesty Global discovered that “Fb’s algorithmic techniques have been supercharging the unfold of destructive anti-Rohingya content material,” and the platform failed to take away unhealthy posts as it was once benefiting from the higher engagement.
Extra just lately and nearer to house, “The A—Degree Fiasco and U-turn through the United Kingdom Govt” (2020) noticed an set of rules created through examination regulator Ofqual downgrade scholars at state faculties and improve the ones at privately funded unbiased faculties, disadvantaging younger other folks from decrease socio-economic backgrounds.
In a similar way, Dutch High Minister Mark Rutte and his complete cupboard resigned in 2021, when investigations published that 26,000 blameless households have been wrongly accused of social advantages fraud in part because of a discriminatory set of rules. This ended in tens of 1000’s of fogeys and caregivers being falsely accused of childcare get advantages fraud through the Dutch tax government—incessantly the ones with decrease earning or belonging to ethnic minorities.
Bearing on her fresh paintings in “Applied sciences of Trauma,” Prof Ibrahim’s new e book raises the problem of ways easiest to average virtual platforms. Since algorithms lack the humanity wanted to pass judgement on what is also destructive to other folks, this process incessantly falls to low-paid employees on volatile contracts, pressured to take a look at huge quantities of disturbing content material. Prof Ibrahim argues that content material moderation must be handled as a hazardous industry, with law for employers and strengthen for workers.
Commenting at the e-newsletter of “Virtual Racial,” Prof Ibrahim mentioned, “Virtual applied sciences have the prospective to result in certain social alternate, however additionally they elevate with them the chance of spreading and intensifying current inequalities. I am extremely joyful to in the end be capable of proportion this e book with the sector, which I’m hoping will get started a vital dialog concerning the function of virtual platforms and the results it may have on equality.
“With the upward push of generation and its expanding function in our lives, it is extra vital than ever to be sure that virtual areas don’t seem to be replicating racial inequalities in our society. We will have to problem algorithmic inequality to stem discrimination, hate, and violence and push for extra inclusion and illustration in our virtual platforms.”
The darkish facet of AI: Guide warns that algorithms is also producing hate and discrimination (2023, February 15)
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The tech giant has already opened 11 locations, and appears to be planning to expand rapidly.
Eleven Amazon Fresh grocery stores have opened in the past eight months, and Amazon plans to open at least 28 more stores, according to a report in Bloomberg. This represents an aggressive expansion in the massive grocery industry in the United States, and could indicate Amazon's ambitions for offline retail in the future.
The first Amazon Fresh location opened to the public in September of 2020, in Woodland Hills, California. That location was quickly followed by more in the Los Angeles and Chicago areas. According to the report, new locations will span from Philadelphia to Sacramento, California.
Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
See also: Amazon's online grocery order options compared: Prime vs. Fresh vs. Whole Foods


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There is a revolution slowly occurring in the trucking industry. With 22% of US freight consisting of agricultural products and 76% of domestic agricultural products transported by truck, this stands to have a big effect on the food and agriculture industry.
Currently, the US trucking industry is an intensely complicated, decentralized network of drivers, brokers and commercial fleets without standardized pricing or aggregation.
This means there are multiple layers of middlemen, offering next to no transparency or visibility on how goods are moved. The fragmentation of the trucking industry also means that everyone is working with multiple carriers, as the top 20 asset carriers only own about 12% of the physical trucks. The average fleet size in America is five trucks.
For a fruit growing operation, like Borton Fruit in Yakima, Washington, that means that when it is time to hire a truck to deliver its crop to customers, Borton makes phone calls, sends emails, and even faxes to brokers and owner/operators to try and book appropriate drivers. The assigned driver shows up and hauls the load and the shipper has no way of tracking it until it gets to its destination.
For a crop with a short season and short shelf-life, this is a high-stakes process.
“During cherry season, one day can be the difference between good cherries in the store and defects starting to show in the store,” said Sky Johnson of Borton Fruit, a grower of apples, pears, and cherries.
Johnson says that the apple season getting started now is predicted to compete with Washington state’s best ever – the estimates are around 130 million bushels. With such an intensive harvest period — roughly twelve weeks — the opacity of the trucking availability means dollars and cents.
“The apple shippers out here find gaps in trucking availability frequently. Especially during the Christmas tree season when refrigerated trucks hauling trees absorb any surplus of trucks and erode the availability of apple truckloads getting out,” said Johnson. “As we look to the next five years of apple and cherry production in Washington, the gross production will continue to grow, creating more pressure on the supply chain.”
Growers can not only lose out on premium margins with old-school trucking, but farms will have to hire someone to wait with the crop until a truck arrives, which can take hours.
Convoy is one of the largest of a relatively new wave of startups that are trying to disrupt the status quo in trucking with software programs and apps that aim to imitate the Ubers and Lyfts of the taxi world.
And it has attracted some impressive investors recently, including Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, billionaire Barry Diller, LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, and Bill Gates when it raised $62 million in a Series B round in June led by accelerator Y Combinator.
Convoy considers itself an “automated freight brokerage” today after moving away from the “uber for trucking” descriptor that lost its appeal in the wake of Uber’s many controversies, said Convoy CEO Dan Lewis to The Verge.
Convoy is an app and a service, much like Uber, but with more specificity and higher stakes. The app uses an algorithm to match a load, the size, distance, destination, and items being hauled with drivers who are looking for these parameters. The app learns about drivers and over time offers them loads that are supposedly more and more ideal.
By making GPS tracking available to shippers, presenting all pricing and fees up front, using algorithms to match drivers to the kinds of loads they like to haul, and shippers to the kinds of trucks they need, Convoy is attempting to take the anxiety out of trucking for both sides of the equation.
In terms of attracting carriers, Janelle Stewart, Convoy’s business development director says that the company’s algorithm learns what loads and trips they like and offers them more and more relevant haul over time.
“We give them loads that match what they want to do, where do they like to run, and where can we give them round trips. Machines can optimize better than humans can,” she said.
Johnson is excited about the increased flexibility and transparency Convoy can provide. “The biggest foreseeable benefit of what Convoy is working to achieve is bringing the visibility of those “extra” trucks that will be needed to keep the domestic and export distribution of apples, pears, and cherries flowing,” he told AgFunderNews.
Johnson is particularly excited for Convoy’s potential solution for less-than-load (LTL) situations, where a truck is not full or is returning to its origin completely empty.
“LTL loads are nearly impossible to arrange for produce out of Washington today,” he said.
According to Stewart, 40% of the trucks on the road are empty. “If we can make even 1% of difference in that optimization, we could have a significant impact on the economy in general.”
Trucking Tech Picking Up
Despite its young age, Convoy is well-funded and has raised $80.5 million in three rounds since its founding in 2015.
And it looks like investment for trucking startups will grow as CB Insights predicts that this will be the first $1 billion year for this essential sector.
In the world of freight-hauling, Convoy is seeing competition from Uber Freight, which just launched in May (and declined to comment for this story). The service has expanded from its initial market Texas to now cover major metro areas in California, Arizona, Chicago, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina in August.
Major internal infrastructure for Uber Freight was attained through an acquisition of Chicago-based trucking brokerage 4Front Logistics. The company also purchased autonomous truck startup Otto for $680 million, but progress there has apparently stalled after Google accused Otto’s CEO (and former googler) of stealing the basis for Otto’s truck from Google. The trial begins next month.
Progress on Uber’s autonomous truck has been reportedly been floundering since, but executives other than the recently departed CEO Travis Kalinak, claim that Uber Freight is full steam ahead. In fact, newly appointed Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi is an investor in Convoy and may have to divest due to the conflict of interest presented by his new position.
Spanish OnTruck, a similar on-demand trucking app covering the European market, has a former Delivery Hero VP as chief technology officer. OnTruck raised a $10 million Series A Round in May, led by British tech VC Atomico and French private equity firm Idinvest Partners.
Other US startups in a similar vein are Transfix, which is moving away from a “matching” model to a marketplace model for connecting carriers and shippers. Transfix raised a $42 million Series C round lead by Bowery Capital.
Stewart also mentioned that Convoy is contending with “drop-shipping” schemes as well, where a company drops off and then picks up a container to truck to its destination. TruckerPath is also working in this space along with creating other tools for truckers. The Mountain View, CA-based startup raised a $30 million debt facility in June bring its total funding to $51.5 million
Winners and losers will likely be determined by which startups are able to deliver on their promise of truly making hiring freight easier and more dependable. As with ride-hailing, it will most likely come down to the experiences of individual customers in choosing which app they use most frequently; geographically will also be a major restriction.
Brian Rogers accelerator lead at the Fedex-sponsored Epicenter Logistics Accelerator in Memphis told AgFunderNews, “I think we are closer to the beginning than the middle of the trajectory of new technology penetration into these markets,” said Rogers of both Uber Freight and Convoy.
Rogers said that the fact that trucking is decentralized and largely not digitized may slow down the adoption or penetration of these new technologies, but the talent and the innovation is there. “The indications and innovation pipelines we see first-hand are strong on future opportunities in both industries, independently and in crossover areas,” said Rogers.
There are a lot of transitions happening in trucking right now that could make the customer experience better for those hiring freight. But a more efficient trucking system may be able to allow food companies and growers to hold onto more margin. Said Johnson, “Convoy and the digital-logistics movement will bring orders of magnitude of improvements to an industry that has not evolved since the inception of fax & email.”


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Nothing here yet, how about adding some downloads?
A First Class stamp accutane results youtube for mild acne side Gen. Joseph Dunford, the head of the International Security Assistance Force and U.S. forces in Afghanistan, told Fox News through a spokesman that he believes Hafez should receive a visa "as soon as possible." how much does flonase generic cost It's obvious to just about everyone that Amazon is run by incredibly smart people that are willing to take a lot of chances. How else could a corporation grow from an online department store to also serve as the leading force in cloud computing? I can't think of another company with a more diverse portfolio. buy imigran online uk I understand this struggle. I have two very active kids who didn't like to sit still when they were younger. They considered reading to be a full-contact sport on some days. Sometimes kids just aren't in the mood for a book - so what's a parent to do? turmeric curcumin complex "On Android phones, we're able to recover pictures," Hickman told ABC News. "On iOS devices, we can recover videos." In addition to the photos and videos themselves, Hickman can also find out when the photo was sent and occasionally the username that sent it. nexium discount card philippines He also believes the emergence of young pitchers such as Matt Harvey, who still is facing a decision on Tommy John surgery, Zack Wheeler and others on the way will make Flushing an attractive landing spot for potential free agents.


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Snapchat parent company Snap Inc. on Wednesday sold its first shares of stock to the public at $17 a share, or a market value of $24 billion, including outstanding equity. The stock opened at $24 and closed the day at $24.48, a 44 percent premium to the people who bought it yesterday. The stock sale set Snap up as the most valuable American company in the technology circle to go public since Facebook nearly five years ago. It’s also one of the most awaited IPOs since Twitter and Uber.
In terms of payouts, it’s too early to say if Snap, Inc. is able to deliver what the Wall Street wants: impressive profit margins. Twitter too had a gung-ho debut, but its stock soon fell below the $26 IPO price. Facebook, on the other hand, was a mess on day one but is now one of the most valuable companies on the planet. Then again, it’s too soon to tell if Snapchat IPO buyers will be handsomely rewarded. There is a possibility that Snap shares could fall flat on their face within the first week after trading.
Snapchat Largest Tech IPO on Record, Valued at $24 Billion
Snapchat’s business is largely based on intangible assets. While it’s growing strongly (158 daily active users as of February 2017), it isn’t expected to make profits in the near future. Although, it looks like it’s beginning a bigger trend: investors valuing companies that haven’t reached profitability yet.
The popular mobile app’s business is based on long-term user relationships. Normally, such businesses require substantial upfront investment in growing their user base. This audience is monetized over time, turning highly profitable once break-even is reached.
With such businesses, trade pundits are quick to point out that the company is losing money. For shareholders, engagement is only valuable if it can be monetized. While Snapchat monetizes on ads, most of the ads appear in between “Stories”, series of photos and videos. In addition, the company has been largely successful in launching new features. To monetize the camera interface, it has launched branded geofilters business which gives individual and businesses the opportunity to purchase filters inside Snapchat’s popular stickers section. For example, Budweiser launched a Snapchat advertising campaign for the 24 hours leading up to the Super Bowl. The campaign reportedly let you play a mini-football game within the app. If you won, you unlocked an exclusive filter to use.
Snapchat IPO Prospects
Snapchat’s quarterly average revenue per ad of $1.05 per user lags behind Facebook, which is at $3.9 per user. While its ad revenue lags behind Facebook, Snapchat’s advertising business has grown. In fact, it is on track to make $377 million in advertising sales this year. Just forty months ago, Facebook was desperate to buy Snapchat for $3 billion. Between 2013 and 2015, Facebook tried to take on Snapchat more than ten times: two acquisition attempts, two ephemeral messaging implementations, four standalone apps, and a dozen or so clone attempts. By the end of December 2016, the flagship social network has copied 15 Snapchat features, including photo filters and stickers.
According to eMarketer, Snapchat is expected to rake $935.5 million, a 151% year-over-year increase by the end of next year. Some of Snapchat’s ad partners includes 4C, Adaptly, Amobee VaynerMedia, Brand Networks, SocialCode, TubeMogul and Unified.
- Roster includes Burberry, Calvin Klein, Cosmopolitan, CNN, Domino’s Gucci, NFL, General Electric, Starbucks, Taco Bell, Starbucks, Victor’s Secret, and People.
- Added more 25-to-34-year olds, an increase of 103 percent, and users over the age of 35 (an 84 percent increase) than 18-to-24-year olds in last twelve months.
- 158 million daily active users, creating 2.5 billion snaps per day.
- Projected ad revenue is $935.46 million.
Snapchat’s debut also draws similarities to Twitter’s, which went public in 2013. The micro-blogging site went public with an offering price of $26, and the stock climbed $70 at the end of 2013, and then dove as low as $15 in the Spring of 2014. Today, the company is in serious trouble justifying its lofty valuation as it struggles to sustain growth and effectively monetize its platform. To say that Snapchat wants to avoid Twitter’s fate would be an understatement.
Founder Evan Spiegel is determined to make the technology work, rather than change behaviors like the ephemeral nature of communications. Snapchat told its investors it expects 2017 revenues to increase to between $500 million and $1 billion, an impressive figure for a seven-year-old company. As for comparison, it took Facebook six years to peak $1 billion in sales, and Twitter, eight years.
But, the question remains:
What metrics can we refer to in order to determine Snapchat’s future performance?
How do we determine the sustainability of Snapchat’s post-IPO performance?
A lot happens after the first day of trading. Post Snapchat IPO, Spiegel is going to have to prove to its investors that it’s worth the hefty valuation. Let’s not forget that Snapchat started out as a selfie app, which then turned into a new way of communication. If Snapchat stays true to its long-term focus of reinventing the camera, it could become a champion for investors who like to play in the risky space.


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Monday, November 15, 2021
This evening will see Xbox hosting a celebratory 20th anniversary live stream, primarily looking back at where it all began, with the original Xbox in 2001. The event is also likely to include its fair share of announcements, too, although we're unlikely to get anything new.
What we could get is news of the backwards compatibility program firing into action once more, or the possible return of online quiz show 1 vs 100. Confirmation that Halo Infinite's free-to-play multiplayer may be going live early, ahead of its planned 8th December launch, could also be in the offing, alongside a bunch of other stuff.
In other Halo news, actor Pablo Schreiber also reckons that “something very exciting” is also happening today, which could be a reference to the Halo TV series in which he plays Master Chief. 343 Industries Studio Head Kiki Wolfkill responded to Schreiber's tweet, dubbing it “crazy talk”, which only makes us thing that this is definitely going to be a thing. News on the Halo TV show? Go on then.
The Xbox Anniversary Celebration live stream is due to start at 10am PT/1pm ET/6pm GMT/7 pm CEST, and you can watch it right here.
Crazy talk.— Kiki Wolfkill 🍜 (@k_wolfkill) November 14, 2021
Monday, November 15, 2021 @ 10:47 AM
Monday, November 15, 2021 @ 11:28 AM


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another hot july
Generally speaking, real estate reports are generated by statistics and data. But in a development that’s just so typically Houston, data showing a home sales downturn actually belies yet another surge in our local sales frenzy.
According to the Houston Association of Realtors (HAR), single-family homes sales were down 6.1 percent compared to last July. Specifically, the HAR report finds 10,159 units sold in July 2021 versus the historic 10,822 that sold a year earlier.
Yet, the Houston housing market is up 13.9 percent when compared to July 2019, which was considered an average month of home sales with volume totaling 8,921, HAR notes.
On a year-to-date basis, local home sales currently exceed 2020’s record pace by some 19.1 percent.
Why the disparity? While the numbers suggested that Houston-area home sales were down this July, a slew of COVID-related home closing delays during Q2 2020 finally pushed through as most of the pandemic lockdowns were lifted. The resulting surge of pent-up sales made July 2020 a record-setting month.
Meanwhile, the upper-echelon market continues to dominate in Houston real estate. Homes priced from $750,000 and above led the way in sales volume with a 36.7 percent year-over-year increase, HAR notes. Sales for houses priced $500,000 to $750,000 rose 18.9 percent.
Home prices also climbed: The single-family home average price increased 15.3 percent to $389,197, while the median price climbed 13.9 percent to $309,910. HAR notes that this increase marks the second highest pricing of all time behind last month’s record-setting figures.
Total dollar volume for the month rose 11.4 percent to $4.5 billion, per the HAR report. Sales of all property types fell 3.7 percent year-over-year, totaling 12,383. But, that’s still the third greatest volume of all time behind June 2021 (13,115) and July 2020 (12,865).
“We know anecdotally that the Houston real estate market is still red-hot, but the statistics make it appear to be slower than a year ago because of the surge in home closings that took place last July when the market began to normalize with the lifting of pandemic-related restrictions,” said HAR chairman Richard Miranda with Keller Williams Platinum, in a statement.