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Samsung’s recall of Galaxy Note7 smartphones because of exploding batteries remains a challenging task, and some users, for example, in Canada, are still not exchanging their devices for a refund or a different phone.
The South Korean company has decided to cut these phones from the network, adopting similar measures to those taken last month in New Zealand and earlier this month in Australia.
The company said Wednesday that starting Dec. 12, functional limitations on Note7 phones, including curbs on the battery charge, and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth disablement will be introduced in Canada.
From Dec. 15, customers still using the Note7 will no longer be able to connect to any Canadian mobile network service to make calls, use data or send text messages. Samsung said it had been able to secure nearly 90 percent of the Note7 devices that were brought into the Canadian market.
When Samsung announced in September a recall of the Note7 in tandem with Health Canada, a Canadian federal government department, it was said that about 22,000 of the recalled smartphones were sold in the country.
Samsung announced a global recall of the Note7 in early September after it found a “battery cell issue.” The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission on Sept. 15 announced a recall in the U.S. of about 1 million Note7 phones as it found that the lithium-ion batteries in the devices could overheat and catch fire. By Oct. 13, the CPSC expanded the recall to include replacement Note7 phones that Samsung had supplied to customers under the first recall as they too were found to have the battery problem.
The company also stopped production of the phones. It has yet to explain in detail what caused the batteries to explode. A recent report suggested that the phone design could compress the battery even during normal operation.
Samsung said on Dec. 1 that it was working with local carriers to disconnect from Dec. 15 Note7 phones that were still being used by customers in Australia. Note7 owners in the country responded well to the recall, but a small number of affected devices are still with them, the company said. Customers in New Zealand were to be disconnected from Nov. 18.
The Note7 recall has been both a public relations and financial debacle for Samsung. The company has reported that the third quarter revenue of its IT and Mobile Communications division was down 15 percent from the same period last year to 22.5 trillion Korean won (US$19.8 billion) while operating profit fell 95 percent to 100 billion won, as a result of the discontinuation of the Galaxy Note7.
The Berlin-based company is backed by Li Ka-shing, one of Asia’s richest men and Peter Thiel, a co-founder of PayPal and an early investor in Facebook, along with other investors including Berlin’s Earlybird Ventures and Zurich-based Red Alpine.
The company, which received its own banking license from German financial regulator Bafin this year, offers online accounts for cash withdrawals, savings and insurance services that users manage on their mobile phones.
Without the expense of branches or legacy computer infrastructure and by relying on selective outsourcing, mobile-first banks can challenge established banks by promising lower lending rates and higher rates on savings.
Established banks have responded by plowing more money into upgrading their own computer systems, rolling out mobile apps of their own, closing retail bank branches and investing in fintech startups.
N26, which first launched in 2015 in Germany and Austria, then moved into Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Ireland and Slovakia, is now adding the Benelux countries, the Baltics, Finland, Portugal and Slovenia.
“We have built Europe’s most modern mobile bank,” Number26 Chief Executive and co-founder Valentin Stalf said in a presentation at the TechCrunch Disrupt London conference.
“We are getting closer to building a truly European bank.”
While greater bandwidth in the 300GHz and above band has been known for a while it is pointless because the range makes it a chocolate teapot.
Some researchers have managed to hit 100 Gbps but when it only works for a few centimetres it is not commercially viable.
Now boffins at the Tokyo Institute of Technology have got the technology to provide a great 34 Gbps speed with a decent range.
Naoto Oshimo, one of the scientists behind this latest test, said that “device performance is almost sufficient for short-distance wireless communication such as KIOSK downloads, which might be its first application”. By that they mean that they have managed 10 metres, almost OK for home use.
Oshimo believes that this technology will scale hugely in terms of the speed as well, and we could eventually be looking at topping the 1Tbps mark.
While PC shipments are set to decline in 2016, beancounters at IDC think that the drop will be better than expected and there will be an improvement in 2017.
IDC expects PC vendors to ship a total of 258.2 million units this year, a figure which would be 6.4 percent lower than last year. It had been expected that there would be a 7.2 percent fall. Now IDC is saying that growth will still be negative in 2017, but shipments are expected to decrease by just 2.6 percent compared to this year.
Commercial shipments of notebooks will grow this year, while desktops should stay flat in terms of growth. The pressure from mobile devices is said to decrease as the markets mature. The tablet market in particular is not as big of a concern or threat to PCs as it is declining too.
IDC Worldwide Tracker Forecasting and PC research vice president Loren Loverde said that the PC market continues to perform close to expectations.
“Some volatility in emerging regions is being offset by incremental gains in larger mature markets while the interaction with tablets and phones is stabilizing. We continue to see steady progression toward smaller desktops and notebooks as replacement buying helps stabilize overall shipments in the coming years”.
Looking towards 2020, IDC claims that the market will still face a decline in terms of unit shipments, but only a small one at 0.8 percent. In 2020, PC vendors are expected to move 250 million units.
IDC Devices and Displays senior research analyst Neha Mahajan said:
“Despite continued weakness in the consumer segment, the US PC market is showing some signs of stability in the near future with some sources of optimism for the long haul. Backed by early Windows 10 transitions that are expected to boost commercial PC shipments in the next couple of years, and steady growth of PCaaS (PC as a Service) which should help shorten refresh cycles of commercial systems in the long-term, the overall US PC market sentiment certainly seems to be improving”.
DirecTV Now is a flexible pay-as-you-go streaming service that starts at US$35 per month. DirectTV’s conventional satellite service is the foundation, but the content will be streamed over the internet.
Traditionally, users needed a two-year commitment and credit check to get DirecTV, but those requirements are not needed for the new service. The streaming service will work on the Roku, Apple TV, Chromecast, and Amazon Fire TV streaming devices, as well as mobile devices with Android and iOS and PCs.
There are four pricing bundles, AT&T said at a press event in New York City. Users will be able to get more than 60 channels for $35, more than 80 for $50, more than 100 for $60, and more than 120 for $70. As an introductory promotion, AT&T will offer 100 channels for $35.
The programming lineup includes Disney channels, ESPN, AMC, Turner Broadcasting, NBC Universal, Fox, and many more channels. HBO and Cinemax can be added for $5 each. A deal to add CBS and Showtime is being negotiated.
NFL Sunday Ticket won’t be available with the service, but AT&T is also negotiating to add the service. NFL content will still be available on the games broadcast on NBC, Fox, and ESPN. When CBS is added, its NFL games will be available, too.
AT&T also plans to add a cloud DVR service in the coming years. Subscribers will be able to watch two streams simultaneously on separate devices.
The interface is key to the success of a streaming TV service. DirecTV Now will be able to track the programs users are watching and provide recommendations based on categories. The content is categorized as TV shows, movies, and networks. The interface will list shows people are watching, and users will be able to search content.
DirecTV Now is the third major streaming TV option after Sony’s PlayStation Vue and Dish’s Sling TV. It’s competitive on price with PlayStation Vue, which starts at $40, but not as cheap as Sling, which has fewer channels for $20.
For AT&T, DirecTV Now is a big deal and a new way to deliver programming. It’s also a way to say goodbye to the ubiquitous DirecTV satellite receivers.
“This is the foundation for how we’ll do things in the future,” said John Stankey, CEO of AT&T Entertainment Group.
Qualcomm has already revealed that Snapdragon 835 is officially the world’s first 10nm SoC, and Fudzilla exclusively posted this in April 2016. At that time, Qualcomm didn’t want to officially talk about the insides of the Snapdragon 835, but a leaked roadmap claims that the new SoC has 4+4 cores based on updated Kryo 200 architecture.
The same leak doesn’t talk about any clock speeds, but one can assume that there are four faster and more powerful and four slower cores, something that you saw with the Snapdragon 810 and the Snapdragon 600 series. A Chinese source includes the fact that this is a 10nm FinFET processor and has a Snapdragon X16 Gigabit class modem. These two things have been officially confirmed by Qualcomm.
The roadmap details Adreno 540, obviously, with faster GPU support for 4x LPDDR 4x @ 1866 MHz memory. The new Snapdragon 835 (also called MSM 8998 internally) supports UFS 2.1 storage and it is supposed to arrive in Q1 2017. The source is quite confident that you can expect to see this SoC inside some versions of Samsung Galaxy S8 phones.
Snapdragon 660 is clearly a successor to the recently launched Snapdragon 653. The Snapdragon 653 comes with four Cortex A72 with speeds up to 1.95GHz and four Cortex A53 for power saving. The new Snapdragon 653 supports a few important features that will drive phone sales in the mainstream part of the market in 2017. The Snapdragon 653 has a Snapdragon X9 Cat 7 modem with 300 Mbps downlink speeds and 150 Mbps uplink speeds, dual cameras, and supports 8GB of RAM.
This is what you will see in mainstream phones in early 2017. Let’s not forget the Qualcomm upload plus. It comes with 2x20MHz carrier aggregation and 64-QAM modulation on both upload and download side. We think 8GB will be very big for mainstream and performance phones, but of course is pure marketing and very little to do with need or necessity.
According to the leaked roadmap, the information about the chip potentially called Snapdragon 660 are all over the place. First they called it the MSM 8976 Plus and Qualcomm shared on its website that the Snapdragon 653 also shares a 8976 Pro internal branding. The Snapdragon 660 and 8976 Plus might be two different chips. In any case they would come to replace the Snapdragon 653 / 652 SoCs.
The roadmap also claims that the MSM 8976 Plus chip comes with Kryo 4×4 configuration while the Snapdragon 660 comes with Cortex A73 quad core with four Cortex A53s. It would make a lot of sense to see the 14nm Cortex A73 quad core with four Cortex A53 cores. The GPU is updated to Adreno 512, while the Snapdragon 653 comes with Adreno 510. The 14nm makes sense as it will offer a lot of power savings compared to the Snapdragon 652 and 653, both based on a 28nm manufacturing process.
We would not expect to see Snapdragon 660 and mysterious MSM 8976 Plus before the middle of next year at the earliest, but the roadmap also claims that the new chip comes with Snapdragon X10 300/ 150 Mbit capable LTE Category 13 (uplink) LTE Category 7 (downlink) modem.
Last and not least, the new MSM 8976 Plus might support UFS 2.1 storage and 2x LPDDR4 4X at 1866 MHz.
Troubled maker of smartphones HTC has denied rumours that it could be about to flog off its smartphone business.
The rumours had been picked up largely because HTC has not been doing very well, the company was not Apple and the Tame Apple Press does love to pretend that only Jobs’ Mob makes money from smartphones.
Now according to the Taiwanese media HTC has denied those rumors and is refusing to ever speak of it again. So to make up for this lack of a quote the Tame Apple Press has continued to rubbish HTC and implied that it really is going to flog off its smartphonebusiness but “the official stance” is that isn’t.” Apparently, HTC’s alternative is to go into VR – yeah that will sort it out.
We feel sorry for HTC because it generally makes good gear, has Google’s Pixel as a contract, but does not seem to get a lucky break.
There’s something quite noble about Phil Larsen, Luke Muscat and Hugh Walters, and their reasons for turning their collective backs on Halfbrick.
The trio had been partly responsible for some of the biggest games in the smartphone space, including Fruit Ninja and Jetpack Joyride, but they felt they had nothing left to learn working at the developer, so took the gamble to go it alone.
“There weren’t too many more challenges, and the challenge of starting something new and being small and agile seemed like a smart idea,” says Phil Larsen, who is the MD at the studio. “And we are all basically in our early 30s, and we thought that maybe we wouldn’t get another chance. So we decided to go for it.”
The team left Halfbrick at the start of 2015 and attended GDC with “no money, no game, no nothing”. Although Larsen felt the newly formed team, named Prettygreat, had the capacity to pull in some big investors, they instead decided to aim a little lower, and accept funding from the founders of Crossy Road makers Hipster Whale.
“Matt [Hall] and Andy [Sum], being so successful with Crossy Road at the time, wanted to put some investment into other studios, and they were the perfect fit for us,” Larsen explains. “They were other developers who understand what we do, they trust in us as a team because we’ve done it all before, and it just helped us get everything off the ground. It has basically been the best possible decision we could have made.”
Prettygreat has only been going for 18 months, but it’s already created two games, with a third deep in development. The firm initially made the modestly popular smartphone title Landsliders, a casual collect ’em up project that it managed to pull together in just four months.
“Although we’d worked together before, working on our first game is always going to be tricky, you’ll be understanding each other and finding a new approach,” Larsen explains. “The way we did that was to try and create something a little bit unique, a bit weird, with some control innovation… as a game, it was profitable, which is good. It wasn’t the mega hit of the year or anything like that, it wouldn’t have reached any Top Ten charts in terms of downloads, but we made that game in four months, and we supported it for six months after launch, which we wouldn’t have done if there wasn’t profit to be made. The game has about 5m downloads so far, which is not bad. We’ve come from a place where 200m or 300m downloads were the norm, so we’re scaling back, which is fine. But Landsliders is a first game that says: ‘hey, this is what we can do. Make a game fast and make it successful’.”
It may seem like a rapid turnaround, but Prettygreat managed to outpace that with its second game, Slide the Shakes, which was designed and released in just six weeks.
“Basically, we had about three weeks left at the end of last year, because we’d done everything for Land Sliders. So we just decided to make a game. It also made a profit and had 3 or 4m downloads already. That was also a game where we understood its scope and potential, so we invested the appropriate amount of time – which was six weeks, but I think our quality level for that was quite high.
“We are game strategy agnostic, for want of a better way of expressing that. We are not sitting here saying we’re going to make triple-A games on mobile, or make six months projects every time. We are going to pick projects that we like and we are going to develop it to the level that we think it will be successful – and if that means it is six weeks, fine, if it is six months, which is our current project, then we will do that. We just want to make all sorts of crazy ideas. We don’t have any specific business model or genre.”
The Prettygreat team seem to know a thing or two about building sustainable smartphone games, which is difficult in a market where discoverability is difficult and the competition is plentiful. Even some of the world’s biggest mobile developers struggle to enjoy repeat success in this space. It’s a fact that’s not lost on Larsen, but he says if developers are smart, plan carefully and make sure the projects are in tune with the team’s talents, then success is not necessarily that hard to come by.
“A lot of people talk about how competitive it is, which is true. And they talk about how hard it is to make a whole bunch of money, which is true. But a misconception that a lot of people have is that you have to be making Clash Royale money, or you need to be spending loads of money, or you need to take years making the games,” Larsen begins.
“There is a lot of competing factors as to what makes a business successful. For a while it was Angry Birds, and building a brand, and merchandise. Then it was all about free-to-play. We have been through all of that at Halfbrick. Our perspective is, it is competitive but you need to pick the right business model for your team, and you need to pick the right approach for you. With three dudes at the start of a company, we weren’t saying: ‘Let’s do a Candy Crush and make $1m a day.’ No. We will pick something that we know we can get out there in a short amount of time, know generally what monetisation trends that are happening, and what is the easiest way of getting some revenue going for our games.
“Yes it is hard, but it is not impossible. A lot of people say it’s impossible, but no, you just need to be smart about how you approach it for your team specifically. If we had taken AUS$2m in funding when we started, or attacked it in a bigger way, then people would be expecting us to make a Candy Crush. But we didn’t want to do that.
“Our biggest strength as a company is scoping products right, and making them for the right people at the right time. It is very easy for an indie team to say mobile is hard, but that’s possibly because they’ve spent 18 months making the game – that might be hard to recoup as an investment. We would sooner spend four months on a game.
“Having a team that works together really well, and approaching it with a clear focus, then you can make money. We haven’t made millions of dollars yet, but that’s ok, you don’t need millions to pay three people.”
Prettygreat’s next product is currently not announced, although Larsen says it is an online multiplayer project that will be unveiled soon. This title has a much bigger scope and has already been in the works longer than its previous projects. However, Larsen is reluctant to suggest the team will continue to make bigger, more ambitious projects. He tells us that the following game could take six weeks again, or four months.
Yet don’t take this to mean there is a lack of ambition on the part of the former Fruit Ninja makers.
Larsen concludes: “I don’t want to be perceived as just three guys making stuff for the hell of it, and it’s all crazy and whatever happens, happens. That’s true to an extent, and day-to-day things are very fun and casual. But we are very serious about success financially, and our reputation is very high and we want to keep that going. The path we take is sometimes a bit unconventional, and it doesn’t necessarily have a simple six month or 12 month goal, which is what the bigger investors want to see. But we still have our eyes on the prize. We are probably not going to become a 100-person studio anytime soon, but the idea that we can create some of the biggest games in mobile and strategically scale to support them, then that’s fine. If that happens, then we will make that happen.
“We have come from a place where we were working on Fruit Ninja and Jetpack Joyride, which were some of the biggest mobile games ever for a few years. We are not strangers to that environment. We haven’t started a studio to figure out how to do mobile, we absolutely already know how to do that. We’ve been through the highs and lows of some of the biggest things out there. We know what to expect and we are definitely aiming for it, but we are not going to compromise quality or our studio culture to get there.”
Hopes that Apple might sex up its iPhone 8 with OLED technology could be dashed by the fact that its suppliers can’t make enough of the technology.
After producing an iPhone 7 which was more or less the same as the last one, Apple had been expected to do something special with the iPhone 8. OLED screens were being touted as a way that the tax-dodging cargo cult might pull that off.
However according to the IB Times suppliers may not be able to meet the demand.
This could force Apple to release limited next-gen iPhone units in 2017 with the rest using the older LCD technology. In other words it will be regurgitating the same technology it has used for years meaning that the iPhone 8 will look and feel like the iPhone 7, which looked suspiciously like the iPhone 6, which was not much of an advance from the iPhone 5.
Samsung Display, LG Display, Sharp and Japan Display cannot mass produce enough units as demanded by the smartphone industry. OLED screens are difficult and time-consuming to produce and it is likely that this constraint will spill over to 2018.
Samsung is reported to be the chief supplier for iPhone’s OLED panels in 2017 but it is facing low yield rates along with its high demand. Apple ordered an initial round of 100 million units for 2017 but Samsung is likely to produce only a portion of that.
KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that Apple may resort to releasing a fair amount of units featuring screens that use older LCD technology.
The issue, described in August as “touch disease” by repair guide website iFixit, is characterized by a gray, flickering bar at the top of the display and an unresponsive touchscreen. The issue affects both the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus, according to iFixit.
Apple appears to consider it a problem with the way users handled the phone rather than a defect. It said Thursday that the company has determined that the smartphones may exhibit display flickering or Multi-Touch issues “after being dropped multiple times on a hard surface and then incurring further stress on the device.”
The company is offering to repair the problem for a service price of $149 if the phone is in working order, and the screen is not cracked or broken.
A proposed class-action lawsuit on behalf of iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus users was filed in August, alleging a design defect in the iPhone 6 series phones.
Apple has offered to reimburse the cost difference to those iPhone 6 customers who have already repaired the phone earlier for the same issue either through Apple or through an authorized service provider. Those who have paid for a repair believed to be related to the issue but have not been contacted yet by Apple, are asked to get in touch with the company.
Recently, iPhone customers in the country have complained about the problem to the China Consumers Association, the group said in a statement on Tuesday. The shutdowns occur when the phone’s battery charge drops to between 60 and 50 percent.
The problem will persist despite upgrading to the latest version of iOS. It will also occur in both cold environments and at room temperature. After the automatic shutdown, the phones will also fail to turn on without connecting to a power supply.
A “considerable number” of consumers have contacted the China Consumers Association, and many have the same problem, the group said. It made the statement as the local press in the country have written stories about the shutdowns.
Apple hasn’t publicly commented on the matter.
Prior to Tuesday’s statement from the consumer association, affected iPhone users in the country also took to local social media services to express their complaints.
“When the battery is at 60 percent it shuts down,” wrote one user on Sina Weibo. “On restart, the phone will display no battery. Then when I turn it on again, it will be normal, only to automatically shut down again.”
Local Chinese media have posted the letter the China Consumers Association sent to Apple. It asks that the company reply within 10 days.
The association is asking Apple what the problem is, whether the phone’s battery is responsible, and what steps the company will take to address the issue.
ARM has announced that it will introduce tiny processors which have Trustzone baked in to run the next generation of IoT devices.
The ARM TechCon in Silicon Valley was told that the new designs will stop devices from being hacked and recruited into huge botnet swarms.
TrustZone has been around for a decade for Windows, Mac OS and Android products but never for chips this small or low-powered.
ARM’s new Cortex-M33 chip design is just one-tenth of a square millimeter, and the Cortex-M23 is 75 percent smaller than that. They are based on the new ARMv8-M architecture and are designed to work with ARM’s mbed OS. Already Chip vendors including Analog Devices, NXP and STMicroelectronics have already licensed the design.
ARM expects chips based on them to be used in products like bandages that collect and send medical data, tracking tags for packages in transit, and portable blood-monitoring devices.
These things won’t be plugged in to an outlet and may not even have batteries: A pocket-sized blood-testing device for diabetics could harvest enough energy to do its job just from the motion of the user removing the cap, ARM says.
ARM also introduced a cloud-based platform for managing and updating IoT processors for as long as they’re deployed. The mbed Cloud software-as-a-service platform is designed to solve the problem of how to manage millions of chips in devices that may be deployed all over a city or a global enterprise.
When a device boots up, mbed Cloud can provide a security key for the communications channel and specify who can get access to the data from the device, based on enterprise policies.
The service can also help to prevent IoT-based denial-of-service attacks by monitoring what’s going on in the network. If there are abnormally chatty devices, it can isolate them or shut them down.
The service can be run on multiple public clouds.
A task force of more than 30 major technology and telecommunications companies are reporting progress but have not found a definitive solution to eliminate “robocalls” or automated, prerecorded phone calls, but a top U.S. regulator urged faster action.
“We are not yet where we want to be,” Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler said Wednesday at a meeting of industry executives who have been working on the issue since August. “We’ve not reached the goal. We need solutions now.”
The strike force said it would report back by early 2017 on strategies for blocking unwanted automated calls. But Wheeler wants “commitments and timelines” to move up action.
AT&T Chief Executive Officer Randall Stephenson, who is chairing the strike force, said the blue-ribbon group has “come a long way in 60 days and we’ve got a long way to go – I fully recognize that Mr. Chairman, he said. “There’s no one part of this ecosystem that’s going to fix this. So it’s going to take everybody’s cumulative efforts.”
Wheeler wrote major companies in July urging them to take new action to block robocalls, saying it was the top source of consumer complaints at the FCC. Scam artists often times based abroad try to appear to call from a bank or a government phone to trick consumers into disclosing confidential financial or account information.
Wheeler said he and Stephenson will bring the strike force back together in six months to check in on the group’s progress.
Google parent Alphabet Inc, Apple Inc, Verizon Communications Inc and Comcast Corp are among members of the “Robocall Strike Force” that joined the task force that has met more than 100 times since August.
FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel said more action is needed. “There are no prizes for participation,” she said.
The strike force hopes to implement Caller ID verification standards to help block calls from spoofed phone numbers and eventually create a “Do Not Originate” list that would block spoofers from impersonating legitimate phone numbers from governments, banks or others. It is also working on authentication standards in a bid to try to ensure a phone call is from the number that appears.
The task force ran a “Do Not Originate” with Internal Revenue Service phone numbers that were often spoofed that reduced robocall complaints by 90 percent.
The IRS phone numbers on the list had to be “receive only” and had to be entered into a database, said Joan Marsh AT&T’s vice president for federal regulatory affairs. “There is no easy way for any of this,” this I adds a multiple pronged effort.”
There are other technical issues about how to create and manage the database of phone numbers and how carriers get access to the database.
Carriers cannot block all mass automated calls or texts made because of legitimate communications from schools, weather alerts, utilities, political calls and others. Marsh said it is tough to “get the bad ones” but not block calls people want.
AT&T announced the deal late on Saturday, stoking urgency in the telecoms and media sectors, where carriers facing a saturated wireless market are looking for content to attract mobile users and producers of shows and movies are seeking digital distribution.
T-Mobile took most of the wireless industry’s subscriber and revenue growth in the third quarter. Its strong balance sheet and fast-growing wireless business makes it an attractive target for a pay-TV or media company, analysts said.
T-Mobile shares jumped 9.5 percent on Monday after it announced third-quarter financial results. At least nine analysts raised their target price on the No. 3 wireless company, which said it added 851,000 postpaid subscribers in the quarter.
T-Mobile has taken market share from bigger rivals Verizon and AT&T, and that momentum is expected to continue, analysts said.
“The takeout target over the next twelve months has got to be T-Mobile,” New Street Research analyst Spencer Kurn said. Potential buyers include Comcast Corp, satellite-TV provider Dish Network Corp, and Mexican telecom company America Movil, analysts said.
Comcast and Dish declined to comment. America Movil could not be immediately reached for comment.
“Content of all kind is rapidly landing on the internet and the internet itself is rapidly transforming toward mobile,” T-mobile Chief Operating Officer Mike Sievert told Reuters.
T-Mobile is “very interested” in exploring strategic opportunities, he said.
Sprint Corp, which is aggressively working towards reviving its wireless business, is another takeout candidate, analysts said.
Sprint received more calls than usual from bankers over the weekend after the AT&T-Time Warner deal was announced, Chief Executive Marcelo Claure said on an earnings call on Tuesday.
“Our strategic value to many has significantly grown,” he added.
Tesla Motors Inc has plans to introduce a ride share services program and will announce details next year, the luxury electric vehicle maker said on its website, a service first outlined by Chief Executive Elon Musk in his master plan in July.
News of the Tesla Network was in a disclaimer about the self-driving functionality on new Model S vehicles. Musk said last week Tesla is building new vehicles with the necessary hardware to eventually enable full autonomy, although the software is not yet ready.
“Please note that using a self-driving Tesla for car sharing and ride hailing for friends and family is fine, but doing so for revenue purposes will only be permissible on the Tesla Network, details of which will be released next year,” read the disclaimer.
Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for more detail.
Car makers have rushed to invest in so-called mobility services, hoping to capture the potential trillions of dollars in revenue from selling both vehicles and such on-demand services, while carving out a stake in the industry dominated by Uber.
Barclays analyst Brian Johnson wrote in a note to investors on Thursday that although a Tesla Network could “excite the market” over its potential earnings stream, it was a costly proposition.
“While we think ride-sharing/hailing is the future of mass-market mobility, we have some financial concerns with the idea of an OEM-owned fleet,” Johnson wrote.
Venture capitalists and corporate investors had poured nearly $28 billion into the ride services sector in the past decade as of June, according to a Reuters analysis.
General Motors has made the biggest bet, investing $500 million in Lyft in January. GM’s upcoming electric Chevrolet Bolt was designed expressly with car sharing in mind, executives have told Reuters.
Money-losing Tesla lacks the deep pockets of GM, and ride services companies like Uber and Lyft burn billions of dollars in price wars to secure regional dominance, as occurred with Uber in China before it ceded to local rival Didi Chuxing.
In his “Master Plan, Part Deux” in July, Musk outlined a system in which a Tesla owner could add a car to a shared Tesla fleet using a phone app, allowing it to “generate income for you” and lower the cost of ownership.
Musk said that in cities where car ownership is lower, Tesla would operate its own fleet.


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Wal-Mart Stores Inc's Canadian unit will remodel or open 73 stores this year in its most ambitious expansion plan ever, aiming to stay ahead in a retail market that will grow more competitive with Target Corp's 2013 debut.
The world's largest retailer said on Tuesday it would invest more than $750 million in the program. The money will go in part toward the coversion of most of the 39 former Zellers locations that Wal-Mart picked up from Target.
Wal-Mart's rival - the No. 2 U.S. discounter - had purchased dozens of Zellers leases from Hudson's Bay Co in preparation for its Canadian entry, now set for early 2013. Target then sold off some leases for stores in unwanted locations.
Minneapolis-based Target plans to open up to 135 stores in Canada, starting in March or April 2013.
By the end of January 2013, Wal-Mart expects to have more than 375 outlets in Canada, up from 333 at the end of January 2012, and 325 a year earlier.
Wal-Mart is earmarking much of the spending on its Canadian supercenters, which represent more than half of the 73 projects. Supercenters, which feature a wider array of grocery items than standard Walmart stores, have already put pressure on profit margins at Canadian grocers.
Walmart and Target are not alone in looking for growth north of the border, as and more and more U.S. retailers, such as Nordstrom Inc and Kohl's Corp, contemplate a move into Canada.
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During his 2011 State of the Union address, President invoked the history of Apollo moon missions in setting a goal to get 1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2015.
Now, just two years later, with sales of electric cars limp the Obama administration is backing off that goal:
Under a new strategy announced today, the Department of Energy promised to support research into new battery technologies and manufacturing methods that would lower the cost of lightweight materials and improve vehicles’ fuel-efficiency, Reuters reports.
But the DOE backpedales furiously from a goal set out in a 2011 State of the Union speech, where President Barack Obama announced what he called “Apollo projects of our times.” One of them was the goal for the United States to be “the first country to have a million electric vehicles on the road by 2015.”
“Whether we meet that goal in 2015 or 2016, that’s less important than that we’re on the right path to get many millions of these vehicles on the road,” an unnamed Energy Department official told Reuters.
Reuters reports that “demand for hybrids and electric vehicles has been weaker than expected.” Maybe that’s because they’re expensive and impractical, and the only reason they exist in the marketplace is because of government incentives.
The economic interventionists, the people who always think they know what’s best for the economy and are willing to use the law to force their vision, overestimate the ability of the government to manipulate commerce. Markets are dynamic, and laws are static.
If people wanted electric cars, they’d need no subsidies. And that goes for pretty much everything else the government subsidizes too. If something works, and people want it, and it can be provided at prices people can afford then there’s no need for the government to get involved at all.


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Image Gallery: 2019 Harley-Davidson Street Glide Special
Harley-Davidson launched the 2019 Street Glide Special in India at Rs 30.53 lakh. The Harley-Davidson Street Glide Special is a part of the manufacturer's plan to launch 100 motorcycles by 2024.
2019 Harley-Davidson Street Glide Special is a touring motorcycle and is powered by the Milwaukee-Eight 144 engine. The engine displaces 1868cc that produces 165Nm of torque.
The touring motorcycle comes equipped with a 6.5-inch, touch screen operated multi-media system that allows you to shuffle between information about the weather and music.
The 2019 Harley-Davidson Street Glide rivals motorcycles like the Indian Chieftain, Moto Guzzi MGX-21, BMW K1600 GTL and Honda Gold Wing.
Starts Rs 30,53,000
Starts Rs 21,29,500
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SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- Yahoo said Monday it's buying Overture Services for $1.63 billion in stock and cash, combining one of the top online media companies and the leading paid-listings firm.
The deal comes as competition in the search industry heats up and the paid-listings business continues to power growth in the online advertising sector.
As part of the deal, Yahoo YHOO will pay $4.75 in cash for each Overture share. Overture shareholders will also receive just over six-tenths of a share -- 0.6108 -- of Yahoo for each Overture share they've held.
That means Overture shareholders would receive $19.66 in Yahoo stock plus $4.75 in cash for a total of $24.40 per Overture share. That's a 13 percent premium to Overture's close Friday.
Overture shares jumped 12 percent to $24.05 in response to the premium valuation that Yahoo is paying. But Yahoo shares fell 2 percent to $32.20 on concerns the deal would dilute earnings in the short term, though Yahoo said the deal would be neutral to earnings in 2004.
"We think this marketplace is very early on," said Yahoo's chief operating officer, Daniel Rosensweig, in an interview with CBS MarketWatch. "We can't sit back and wait."
By combining the leader in both traditional advertising and paid listings, Yahoo would "accelerate this position in this marketplace," Rosensweig said.
Yahoo said the deal is expected close in the December quarter. Yahoo isn't planning layoffs beyond redundancies in administrative positions, said Joanna Stevens, Yahoo spokeswoman. Overture has 1,300 employees and Yahoo has 3,837 employees. "The value of this transaction is not in cost reductions but in the significant synergies between the two businesses," said Stevens.
"Long term, we believe that this deal makes strategic sense for Yahoo," wrote Youssef Squali, an analyst at First Albany. He estimates that Overture accounts for roughly half of Yahoo's cash flow and a significant portion of Yahoo's online advertising revenue.
To this end, by acquiring Overture, Yahoo secures much of the sales and cash flow, Squali wrote.
Indeed, Microsoft and Yahoo accounted for 65 percent of Overture's sales in the first quarter. Squali estimates that Microsoft contributed more than Yahoo, accounting for roughly 35 percent to Overture's revenue.
If Microsoft were to own Overture, Yahoo would risk losing the healthy cash flow and revenue it receives from Overture.
Since a combination had been speculated upon in recent months, and discussed among observers in Silicon Valley as much as six months ago, it comes as a surprise to some that Yahoo would pay at relatively higher prices. Overture shares have recaptured the $20-mark, a level not seen since February.
Since February, however, the stock languished, giving Yahoo the opportunity to make its move.
Yahoo's deal-making at Overture's more recent highs prompted some analysts to wonder whether the move was meant as pre-emptive.
In fact, based on the action in the stock market, investors are expecting Microsoft to make its own move and buy up LookSmart
Beyond just the competitive landscape, the timing of the deal does raise questions about Yahoo's outlook for traditional advertising versus paid-search advertising.
Just last week, Yahoo announced earnings that just met expectations. See Yahoo Q2 earnings story.
At the time, Yahoo Chief Financial Officer Susan Decker said Yahoo expected traditional advertising to grow between 8 and 12 percent. By comparison, the paid-listings business, which Overture dominates, has been forecast to grow as much as 35 or 40 percent a year. Clearly, the paid-search business remains the fast-growing portion of Yahoo's marketing services business.
Yahoo search vs. Microsoft, Google
Some analysts expect the deal to be dilutive for Yahoo shareholders, since Overture will likely lose its distribution deal with Microsoft
Yahoo's Rosensweig wouldn't comment on the Microsoft relationship, though he said Yahoo would like to maintain the Microsoft MSN distribution partnership that Overture now enjoys.
He cited a relationship Microsoft maintains with Inktomi as an example of Yahoo and Microsoft working together.
Yahoo purchased search technology company Inktomi in December, a move that signaled it was seriously considering owning and integrating search throughout all of its services. Microsoft uses Inktomi's search listings.
Yahoo recently centralized its search business under one unit and under one executive, Jeff Weiner. In April, it launched a revamped search service along with a splashy marketing and advertising campaign. See Net Stocks: Yahoo returns to search roots.
Rosensweig said Yahoo wasn't responding to Google's expanding lead with these latest moves. "We made this decision because it was the right decision for Yahoo. We had been the leader in Internet advertising and search... we want to extend that leadership."
At least one analyst, Scott Kessler of Standard & Poor's, was willing to say on the record that Google was a significant motivating factor. Kessler suggested that if Google were to have purchased Overture, that combination would have been a larger threat to Yahoo. Google has already been gaining market share in the search industry against Yahoo. See related story: What will Google do with cash?
Third-party sources do support this trend.
According to ComScore, of the 7.7 billion searches conducted in May, Yahoo accounted for 23 percent, while Google accounted for more than 43 percent. Microsoft's MSN and AOL Time Warner's
But back in April, Yahoo accounted for 25.5 percent of searches, while Google accounted for 40 percent, according to ComScore, which measures Internet audience and ratings.


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Homegrown automaker, Tata Motors has announced to enter in the personal electric vehicle segment in Q4, 2019-20. The Nexon EV will be powered by the recently introduced Ziptron technology. Tata Motors has also signed-up Milind Soman and Ankita Konwar to promote the new Nexon EV. The power couple will experience the all-new Ziptron Technology as they drive around different terrains of India and share their experience with near-production ready, Nexon EV.
The Tata Nexon EV will offer around 300km of range in a single charge. It will be powered by the state-of-the-art Ziptron technology. The Tata Nexon Electric Vehicle will sport an efficient high voltage system, fast charging capability, battery and motor with warranty of 8 years, and adherence to IP67 (dust and water proof) standard. The Tata Nexon electric is expected to be priced between Rs 15 to 17 lakhs. Also See – Tata Motors to open 300 fast charging stations for electric vehicles
Tata Motors’s new electric engine comes with smart regenerative braking system. The Ziptron battery will be offered with warranty of 8 years. The Tata Ziptron engine has high voltage system featuring a permanent magnet AC motor, which offers superior performance on demand.
Tata Motors has also released a new campaign titled #TheUltimateElectricDrive, featuring Milin Soman and Ankita Konwar, where they will be driving from Manali to Leh, in a Nexon EV. The company claims that the Nexon electric vehicle smoothly tackled the toughest terrains in India, covering the high altitude Himalayan passes, with limited charging infrastructure and under extreme weather conditions. Tata believes that the Nexon EV will break existing barriers like range anxiety, lack of charging infrastructure and performance capabilities.


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EICMA 2018: Kawasaki reveals new 400 streetfighter
Further diversifying their street motorcycle portfolio, Kawasaki has debuted the Z400 in Milan. Of course, it's styled with a heavy dose of the Sugomi design language, as seen on the Z900, though it doesn't look as aggressive. The streetfighter is the naked version of the Ninja 400 - everything from the trellis frame, to the sub frame, cycle parts and 399cc twin cylinder motor is shared between the two motorcycles. As for specs, the naked Z400 is claimed to make 45PS and 38Nm torque, compared to the 49PS of the Ninja 400. It has standard ABS, a six-speed gearbox and an added slipper clutch. Losing the fairing has resulted in the Z400 weighing 167kg wet, compared to the India-spec Ninja 400 at 173kg wet.
The new Z400 is the perfect candidate for an Indian launch in the coming months, though it will have to be competitively priced, if it is to have a fighting chance. For reference, the faired Ninja 300 recently saw a price adjustment to Rs 2.98 lakh, ex-showroom, while the larger Ninja 400 still retails for 4.69 lakh, ex-showroom. The smaller-engined naked, the Z250, is priced at Rs 3.08 lakh, ex-showroom, with the middleweight Z650 carrying a tag of Rs 5.29 lakh, ex-showroom.
The Z400 gets new digi-analogue instrumentation and raised handlebars
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- Do you save or lose money on owning an EV in India?


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There will be a new face managing all of Nissan India’s money from now, as the car maker has today announced the appointment of Sandip Neogi as their Chief Financial Officer. Reporting to Guillaume Sicard, President Nissan India Operations, Mr Neogi will be based in the city of Chennai.
With more than two decades of experience working in financial governance for Indian and global companies in the steel, IT, pharmaceutical and medical devices sectors, Mr Neogi graduated from the University of Calcutta and will be responsible for the financial performance and governance of all Nissan companies in India. He will lend a major hand in Nissan’s ambition to become a major player in the domestic car market. With this welcome change, Nissan also witnessed a growth of 24.2% in sales in the fiscal year 2014 amid one of the most ambitious dealership network expansions undertaken by a newcomer to the Indian auto industry.


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Unemployment is still currently high, but consumers seem to be managing their income bills. Consumer default reports states that rates dropped in March. “The first quarter of 2013 shows healthy consumer credit quality,” says economist David Blitzer, managing director and chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices.
The consumer credit report situation in comparison to the 2005 is as good or better than it was back in 2005. Quarterly earnings from Bank of America indicate that low interest rate spreads are making it harder for banks to make money.
Gold is down to $1,380 an ounce. The price of oil has fallen slightly on futures markets to below $89 for West Texas crude.
Picture by debtcovered


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Woodhead has ceased buying and selling and made the vast majority of its workers redundant.
The corporate cited market circumstances and the impression of speedy worth will increase all through the provision chain, coupled with mounted worth contracts as being the basis explanation for its demise.
“Having labored tirelessly to mitigate these points over current months, in the end the enterprise confronted a variety of money stream challenges in current weeks that proved insurmountable and concluded that the corporate couldn’t proceed buying and selling.”
RSM will shortly be writing to all collectors to elucidate the formalities round inserting the corporate into voluntary liquidation.
Within the meantime suppliers trying to make a declare ought to e mail firstname.lastname@example.org.


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Date Published: 04/29/10
Tourism Breaking News
SOUTH AFRICAN TOURISM
20 April, 2010
‘Nigeria market important for South Africa’
As Nigeria/SA trade partners work on increase arrivals in SA
Nigeria has been described as an important market for South Africa as tourist arrivals from Nigeria to South Africa is quite impressive with 4.3% increase in 2009 compared to previous year figures.
The Regional Director, Africa and Domestic markets, South Africa Tourism (SAT), Phumi Dhlomo, disclosed in Lagos, at a media roundtable during a one-day trade workshop to update SAT trade partners, tour operators and travel agents on the available business and leisure products in SA, that tourism is very important to South Africa because it contributes about 8% to the GDP of SA with a desire to grow to about 15% in the nearest future.
According to Dhlomo, “Nigeria is an important market for our country and these arrivals are encouraging and show a sound return on investment in marketing activities that South African Tourism implements in Nigeria.”
Globally, SA recorded 9.9 million arrivals in 2009 with 7.7 million from Africa, a result which necessitated SAT to grow the African market according to Dhlomo since it has the lion share.
He said the tourist arrivals success recorded in SA in 2009 was not occasioned by sheer luck, but rather it is a result of SAT many investment in African countries like Nigeria and Kenya coupled with global marketing campaigns, top events like the FIFA Confederations Cup and the good trade relations between South Africa and other countries of the world.
The SAT regional director noted that although, large percentage of the arrivals in SA is on business purposes, one of the objectives of the trade workshop is for Nigeria and SA trade partners to work out measures of increasing arrivals in SA as well as make the rainbow nation a leisure hub.
Dhlomo allayed fears that after the FIFA World Cup, SAT might fall short of marketing SA to the world by explaining that the country will properly harness the opportunity of hosting the World Cup and continue in the right direction of using already created and tested platforms in further promoting SA beyond the World Cup period.
Speaking also during the media roundtable, South African High Commissioner in Nigeria, Mr. Kingsley Mamabolo announced the issuance of free event visa for the FIFA 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
The unique event visa specifically meant for the World Cup is to be issued free to travelers who wish to be part of the biggest football fiesta in South Africa come June, 2010.
According to the head of the South African envoy in Nigeria, the South African Department of Home Affairs has introduced FIFA event visa specifically for travelers with proof of purchase of FIFA match ticket.
A valid travel document, proof of valid return air ticket, match ticket booking voucher and two Identity photographs in colour are the necessary requirement for the event visa, Mamabolo stated.
He said this visa can only be used for the purpose of the FIFA World Cup™ event and will not be used for work or other purposes other than that for which it has been designed.
The validity period of the visa is a maximum of 90 days and it must not expire after the expiry date of the traveler passport / travel document.
Travelers are advised to start applying for the special Event Visa during the period leading towards the FIFA World Cup™ event. They need to allow adequate time for visa application processing which takes 5 days, the South African Home Affairs Department stated.
Tahndi Mgxwati, Head of South Africa Lagos mission, also speaking at the media roundtable affirmed that the event visa will be issued free to all who meet the stated requirements for its issuance, adding that people carrying the event visa has the advantage of prompt attention from the port of entry into South Africa.
Meanwhile, the consumer activation which was held at the Silverbird galleria, Lagos, was a spectacle to behold as shoppers flooded the arena to witness a Nigerian dance ensemble, “Dance Na De Main Thing” performed the scintillating Diski Dance to create a carnival-like atmosphere at the venue.
With various souvenirs on the tourism sites of South Africa shared freely to the teeming spectators including the very popular Vuvuzela as some Nigerian youth dancers thrilled the crowd with the special 2010 FIFA World Cup official dance- diski dance.
According to Dhlomo, “the consumer activation is to create more excitement about 2010 and teach people the Diski dance.”
Trust Nigerians, a Nigerian version of the diski dance in consonance with the original sound track was showcased to the enjoyment of the crowd.
The trade workshop and the consumer activation are expected to increase Nigerian arrivals in South Africa before, during and beyond the 2010 FIFA World Cup for both business and leisure.
Issued by TOPCOMM Integrated Marketing Communications in Nigeria on behalf of South African Tourism.
For further information contact:
Tope Ogbeni Awe Abdullahi Mohammed Moshood
Tel: 234- 803 963 0155 Tel: 234- 803 284 6056
E: tope.ogbeni-awe@topcommng. com E:mohammed.abdullahi@ topcommng.com
South African Tourism is the national tourism agency responsible for the marketing of South Africa as a preferred tourist destination. It is headed up by Chief Executive Officer, Ms Thandiwe Sylvia January-Mclean and Chief Operating Officer, Ms Didi Moyle.


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Behind the Scenes at the Wine World's Big Networking Event Sommeliers with an entrepreneurial spirit volunteer once a year to take great wine and meet their peers.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Great entrepreneurs are well aware they don't know everything and, as a result, they surround themselves with smarter people.
Well, if you are an entrepreneurial sommelier, volunteering to work the annual Wine Spectator Wine Experience at the Marriott Marquis in New York City will allow you to do exactly that.
Sommeliers from all over the country volunteer their time for the opportunity to not only taste some of the world's greatest wines, but to network with the elite in their field.
Now, granted, you can't just show up. You have to apply to Wine Spectator and be selected by the woman in charge, Andréa Fulton-Higgins, who currently is the sommelier at the Joel Palmer House in Dayton, Oregon.
She selects around 25 of the best sommeliers to work the four-day event each year.
And she is able to create a list of the greats, like
- Master Sommelier Larry Stone, Dean of Wine Studies at International Culinary Center, from Oregon
- Paul Grieco, recently named the second most influential person in wine in New York City, according to a recent survey of industry pros
- Gillian Balance, Master Sommelier and Education Manager, Treasury Wine Estates, in San Fransicso
- Virginia Phillip, Master Sommelier and Wine Director at The Breakers, in Palm Beach, Florida
"They have been coming for years now on their own dime because it's an honor to be around these wines and these people," says Fulton-Higgins, who has been running the event as Wine Service Director since 2005.
"I love the camaraderie," says David Gordon, long-time wine director at Tribeca Grill in Manhattan, who has been working the event since 1991.
The sommeliers who are selected spend most of the weekend in a back room and are rarely seen throughout the event. "We all have to get there at 7am on Thursday and we're tasting wines by 7:15am. It's just fun," he says.
It's the wine world's ultimate bonding experience. And was a dream come true for Shawn Dore, owner of Sommelier Services, when she first worked the event back in 2000.
But it's work. The sommeliers, a.k.a, somms, have to taste each wine to make sure its not "corked," which is an industry term meaning the natural fungi from the cork came in contact with the wine and then it tastes bad.
"They also have to taste for bottle consistency because the goal is to try to give everyone the same experience," says Fulton-Higgins, who started working at the event in 1987.
Each wine producer is asked to send six cases of each wine being served at the seminars given throughout the weekend, and it's amazing that the same wine from the same vintage in the same case could actually taste differently.
"The wine develops in the bottle and some just show better than others," says Dore, who not only found a job, but met her fiancé working the event over the last 16 years.
Related: Popping the Cork on Champagne
But to go through this exercise is a rare occurrence for sommeliers. "Its an invaluable learning experience to taste 72 bottles of same wine," says Fulton-Higgins.
And from a business angle, there is nothing like it, says Gordon, because the producers of all the wines come to the event. "You don't have [Baron] Eric Rothschild [of Chateau Lafite Rothschild] coming into your restaurant showing his wines," Gordon says. "Here you get to meet these people."
Then it's much easier to talk to the producers about getting older vintages or special bottles for his wine list. So it's not just good for Gordon, it's good for business.
While the somms show up Thursday morning, Fulton-Higgins flies in on Monday. She's responsible for the delivery of more than 3,500 bottles of wine and must know where they are at all times. Some wines might need to be decanted for sediment or air, as well. Then she assigns them to the somms to taste. She also manages an additional 30-40 Marriott employees, who help pour the wines.
Fulton-Higgins' grandmother bought her a ticket to her first Wine Spectator Wine Experience back in 1983, where she attended as a guest. She never could have imagined that she would one day be running it. She says she's "so proud and grateful for the opportunity to do it each year and am indebted to Marvin Shanken," the publisher of Wine Spectator, who started the event 35 years ago.
"The event has been instrumental in my development as a somm. That's why I will keep doing it," says Dore.
And that makes great entrepreneurial sense.


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The Best Cities for Christmas in 2020, According To Science
This year, the definition of “the best Christmas city” is somewhat different than usual. It’s not the city with the best window displays or holiday parties. In a season of social distancing, Christmas is all about safety, sticking to admiring your own Christmas tree, and of course, drinking. WalletHub just released its report of 2020’s Best Places for Christmas Celebrations, and the cities on the list reflect the unique Christmas season in which we find ourselves.


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As the Maharashtra Shops and Establishments (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 2017 came into force, it was found that establishments and shops with less than ten workers were evading the rules. Such complaints were received by the government and there was a demand to take action against them. To alleviate this issue, the Cabinet decided to amend the Act.
Meanwhile, Shiv Sena’s old ally BJP alleged that the move was being taken keeping in mind the upcoming Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) elections. The party said that Sena is looking to consolidate its Marathi Manoos pitch by taking this decision.
Shiv Sena-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government approved a proposal wherein shops prominently display a signboard in Marathi. The state cabinet passed the proposal that will be binding on all shops and establishments across the state. In 2017, the Maharashtra government had made a rule that all shops in the state should have a signboard written in Marathi. However, its implementation did not go as planned. In many places, small nameplates were put on shops in Marathi and in many places, shopkeepers circumvent this rule.
In many places, the name used to be mentioned in capital letters in English. In Marathi, however, names used to be in lower case. With today’s decision, the name in Marathi will have to be in capital letters like any other language. An amendment was approved that letters in the Marathi-Devanagari script could not be kept shorter than letters in other (English or other) scripts. As a result of this decision, shopkeepers across the state will now have to display their shop signs in Marathi.
State industries minister Subhash Desai said, “The Maharashtra government has taken a decision that all shops should have name boards in Marathi. This should be in a font that is prominently visible. The decision to have Marathi name boards on shops was taken in 2017. But its implementation was not happening on the ground. Hence, the Cabinet today took the decision to implement it effectively.” “Earlier, this rule was applied to shops having more than 10 Maharashtrian employees. That rule has been amended and now all shops will have a bird in Marathi,” he added.
AIMIM Maharashtra unit president and MP Imtiaz Jaleel slammed the state government’s decision to make it mandatory for shops with fewer than 10 employees to use Marathi signboards and wondered if the move will create more jobs for Marathi youths.
Jaleel stated, “When elections come closer than you remember Marathi boards, a border dispute with Karnataka, Marathi pride. People are not fools and they understand this gimmick. Will Marathi boards give jobs to Marathi youth, is a million-dollar question? The decision to make it mandatory for shops with fewer than 10 employees to use Marathi signboards was taken by the state cabinet at its meeting in Mumbai.”


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PARIS — The chicest celebrities in the business rocked the final day of Paris Fashion Week on Wednesday as powerhouse Louis Vuitton and Miuccia Prada’s VIP-magnet Miu Miu presented their spring-summer 2016 collections.
But among fashion insiders it was the unexpected decision by Balenciaga to name its new artistic director that drew the most attention.
tap here to see other videos from our team.
Here are Wednesday’s fashion highlights:
BALENCIAGA’S NEW DEISGNER
Outgoing Alexander Wang had only just said his final catwalk goodbyes in an emotional and intimate show in Paris last week.
Now Kering, the luxury group that owns Balenciaga, made a shock announcement Wednesday that 34-year-old Georgian designer Demna Gvasalia would be replacing him.
It’s the third Balenciaga designer in four years for the Parisian house.
The appointment of Gvasalia, head designer of street wear brand Vetements, has raised some eyebrows among fashion insiders as his casual esthetic appears to be at odds with the established Balenciaga, which was founded in 1919.


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Driving Digital Transformation Urgency in Manufacturing
Early adopters of Industry 4.0 technologies, once considered visionary, are now poised to drive quick and measurable operational improvements in today’s new world. How has COVID-19 forced the urgency of innovation and transformation in business and operational models, and how can companies get up to speed swiftly?
In a recent discussion with manufacturing and production industry experts, it’s evident that COVID-19 is a catalyst for rapid digital transformation. How have priorities changed because of the pandemic? Has there been a shift in digital efforts due to COVID-19? And, what lessons can be learned?
Over the last couple of months, we’ve witnessed an emerging focus of companies moving from adjusting to the early days of COVID-19, to stabilizing operations. By now, we’re all well aware of frontline workers and personal protective equipment (PPE).
The pandemic has changed companies’ priorities around digital transformation. Regardless of what industry you’re in, whether it’s oil and gas or CPG, the one overarching priority that COVID-19 has drastically impacted across all industries is safety. Everyone in the industrial world has a heightened sense of safety on their mind. Operating a business during a crisis, when you may have intermittent challenges around employee safety, is an additional concern to think about. Whether you’re a worker on the factory floor or an employee working from home, ensuring your teammates’ safety is absolutely critical.
In addition, many companies are embracing agile methodologies because of COVID-19.
An agile business system can help companies create the innovation needed to survive these uncertain times, and beyond. If you don’t adjust to change, your operations will be challenged, yet again in the next looming crisis.
What we’ve observed is a tremendous amount of innovation and new ways of working, as manufacturers adapt to the “new normal.”
Lessons From the World Economic Forum (WEF)
Parsable has been working to create the New Generation Manufacturing Leaders community in partnership with the WEF. Our CEO, Lawrence Whittle, shared some thoughts on how member organizations are addressing these issues in the short and long term:
- Collaboration across the value chain and driving transparency between suppliers and customers – Pre-COVID-19, companies would spend a significant amount of time adopting and deploying technology across their organizations. In recent discussions with WEF members, as a result of COVID-19, companies have started to move fast and prioritize collaboration among teams.
One of the learnings that has come out of the WEF is the need for transparency between suppliers and customers – across the value chain. On top of that, remote collaboration across teams has become the new norm. You don’t need to send people to the factory floor to conduct an audit; it can now be carried out remotely with modern digital tools, as not all team members are physically present on the factory floor.
- Starting with a few use cases and drive them globally – Companies in the manufacturing space want to propagate new ideas, quickly. Change management in the industrial environment has typically always been a challenging and slow process for many companies. Because these organizations are quite large and have a global presence, even with digital technology and the willingness to collaborate, it can be difficult to drive change across an organization.
Manufacturers want technology they can rapidly test, deploy and learn from. A key component is to find a use case, whether it’s safety, quality or efficiency, and then drive it across sites, globally.
Shift in Digital and Technology Efforts Due to COVID-19
According to many, overall investments are down and CAPEX is at its lowest since 2009. However, this does not apply in many cases to digital transformation. And because the economy is struggling and resources are constrained, there’s a pressing need for manufacturers to be strategic in their approach. Many companies are maintaining and even accelerating their spend on digital technology. This is due to the fact that there are fundamental needs, that only digital tools can address. To quote Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, “We’ve seen two years’ worth of digital transformation in two months.” Companies need to focus on ROI and the types of digital innovation that will drive inherent value.
Though change management can be an arduous undertaking for many organizations, COVID-19 has created a catalyst for change. Technology solutions are making it possible for manufacturers to not only continue operations given the disrupted work environment, but drive compliance.
For example, instead of conducting monthly forecasting, teams have switched to daily digital sales and operations planning (S&OP) meetings. In addition, non-essential workers are not able to go on site and working remotely is the new norm. Companies have shifted their operations to accommodate for a new way of doing work. Frontline managers and support maintenance personnel are now tasked with monitoring processes and assets remotely, which has only been possible because of modern digital technology. Providing frontline workers digital instructions at their fingertips, to accurately and safely carry out jobs, has never been more important.
Safety is a priority, but due diligence is also a concern. For example, as government agencies mandate social distancing protocols on the factory floor, it’s more difficult – yet more important than ever – to prove safety compliance. That’s where technology plays an integral role in enforcing and driving compliance, ensuring frontline workers are maintaining social distancing. We’ve seen some amazing things with our customers that have been using connected worker technology to enforce social distancing within their work environments.
Concerns and Priorities That Have Emerged Because of COVID-19?
There are a number of challenges teams across the manufacturing and production space face in pushing projects through.
- Don’t waste a good crisis – As early as a couple years ago, discussions of AI, machine learning and automation were nebulous ideas and manufacturers lacked a clear understanding of the role technology plays in manufacturing. The pandemic has amassed a significant amount of focus and attention on digital transformation and technology’s role in it. It wasn’t necessarily a critical priority beforehand, but it’s now transformed into an urgency that is manifesting itself in various change management projects.
Now the focus has shifted towards connecting humans to technology, collaboration and business results. The new normal is about how you react and whether or not you are driving sustainable impact. Another crisis will happen; how will you prepare for it?
- Take advantage of moving fast and seizing the opportunity – As mentioned previously, for large established companies, change management can typically take years with a lot of back and forth among key decision-makers. COVID-19 is forcing manufacturers to be agile, and make decisions even faster than they used to – as they try to maximize on the urgency. Set expectations that you are moving fast, but remember you are learning, and there will be hiccups.
- Use of devices on the shop floor – Another topic that often comes up is the use of devices on the shop floor. We’ve seen a proliferation through this period of the need to enable people to execute work on mobile devices, whereas pre-COVID-19, it was still a debate for some companies. We need to change our attitude toward devices on the shop floor, we have seen this shift, particularly when it comes to the topic of safety.
For example, one of our customers has a massive deployment around behavior observation safety analysis, where 44,000 employees worldwide execute behavioral observations every week. It’s not efficient to have people lining up at one device at the factory. Mobile devices are secure enough and it reduces the bottleneck of having to queue up behind one device to complete a single job or even worse – paper, manual processes. The value of data is not just for the workforce, but for driving safety, quality and productivity.
COVID-19 has created a sense of urgency of innovation and transformation across all manufacturing and production companies. The importance of being agile and operating with a sense of urgency, while understanding that importance of the role of humans. Connected worker technology is no longer a nice to have, it’s a must have, empowering your teams to be successful in these changing world environments.


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The price of mung beans fell by as much as Ks 60,000 per tonne since the end of January, although there have been no changes in the Indian pea and bean market.
“Today, one tonne of mung beans costs about Ks 800,000 in the local market. I think this is because the harvesting period for both Myanmar and India is approaching. Merchants are still watching the market instead of buying and selling. March and April are the main times for harvesting. So it is still early to analyse the market. Mung beans harvested in 2014 seem to have sold out. Indian buyers are watching the market for the 2015 crops. I think the price could drop for some time, but it will be up again when the right time comes,” said merchant Min Ko Oo.
The price of mung beans, also known as green gram, was Ks 925,000 per tonne for special quality (SQ) and Ks 856,000 per tonne for fair average quality (FAQ) as of January 30. By February 6, the price had fallen to Ks 875,000 per tonne for SQ and about Ks 800,000 per tonne for FAQ, according to Bayintnaung Wholesale Centre.
Thein Naing, a farmer, said he is worried about decline bean prices, and he believes they will go up again in May.


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The Ford Bronco may not be headed to Europe, as we reported way back in 2019, even though Ford is admittedly open to producing a right-hand-drive version of its rugged SUV. However, the 2021 Ford Bronco is headed to other parts of the world besides the U.S., including India (possibly) and the Middle East (definitely).
Today, Ford confirmed that the Bronco will launch in the Middle East this summer, which just so happens to be the same time frame it will launch in the U.S. It’ll be interesting to see just how many Broncos are earmarked for the region, as Ford will only be able to fill around one-third of its reservations in the U.S.
Ford did not specify which trim levels of the new Bronco would be available in the Middle East, but did mention both the Badlands and Wildtrak in its release. It also notes that the Sasquatch Package will be available as standard equipment on those two trims and that both two- and four-door configurations will be available.
Buyers can choose from both Ford’s 2.3L EcoBoost I-4 and 2.7L EcoBoost V6. However, it appears that the seven-speed manual will not be available in the region, as Ford noted that both engines “come fitted with Ford’s incredible 10-speed automatic transmission.”
Additionally, Ford will have over 100 accessories available for the Bronco when it launches this summer, which is quite a bit fewer than what it has promised for the U.S. Regardless, we doubt that Bronco fans in the Middle East will care, as they’ll just be happy that they have the chance to buy a new Bronco, which is a privilege few parts of the world will get to enjoy.


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LONDON: White sugar futures on ICE hit their highest in 5-1/2 years, with dealers worried Indian exports might not reach the 10 million tonne cap for this season, while raw sugar prices also rose.
August white sugar rose 2.9% to $595 a tonne at 1233 GMT, having hit its highest since October 2016 at $597.20.
“First indications are that the new (Indian) system for acquiring ‘permission to export’ (sugar) is slow and onerous. As a consequence, we think exports may not reach the full 10 million tonnes allowed,” said broker Marex Spectron.
It also noted the premium for white sugar versus raws is shooting ever higher, indicating that some refineries are working at less than full capacity, or that the market has under-estimated consumption.
July raw sugar rose 2% to 19.68 cents per lb.
Dealers said top producer Brazil looks likely to continue favouring ethanol production over sugar near term, with energy prices remaining lofty, tempting cane mills in Brazil to produce more of the cane-based biofuel and less sugar.
July arabica coffee rose 1.6% to $2.3615 per lb, after hitting the highest since February at $2.4200 on Thursday.
Dealers said the market remains well supported by tight supplies, with ICE stocks continuing to fall towards the 1 million bag mark.
July robusta coffee was flat at $2,136 a tonne.
July New York cocoa rose 1.1% to $2,496 a tonne.
ICE cocoa inventories rose to an 8-month high of 5.42 mln bags at last count.
September London cocoa fell 0.8% to 1,779 pounds per tonne.


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A two-man entrepreneurial team who attended an elite college together where they founded a startup they sold to Google for a reported $81 million have just sold a second company they founded together for nearly $2 billion.
Google's firing of an engineer over his controversial memo criticizing its diversity policies and "politically correct monoculture" didn't violate U.S. labor law, a federal agency lawyer concluded.
Google has begun a new effort to block annoying ads on its Chrome browser, as part of an initiative aimed at improving the online advertising ecosystem that provides the bulk of its revenues.
On Thursday, Google will begin using its Chrome browser to reshape the web by eradicating ads it deems annoying or otherwise detrimental to users. It just so happens that many of Google's own most lucrative ads will pretty ...
Google launched its own "stories" format Tuesday to compete with Snapchat and Instagram with image-driven news articles aimed at mobile phone and tablet users.
Google has been fined more than $21 million in India for "search bias" and abuse of its dominant position, competition regulators said Thursday.
Former Uber chief executive Travis Kalanick on Wednesday denied conspiring to steal autonomous driving technology in a tense courtroom appearance that could be key to a blockbuster trial over allegedly ill-gotten trade secrets.
Google is taking back Nest, the smart home unit of parent firm Alphabet, as part of an effort by the tech giant to battle rivals like Amazon and its Alexa digital assistant.
A slew of reviews for Apple's new smart speaker HomePod dropped recently, and they all come to the same conclusion: It's good—if you can afford it and only use Apple products such as the iPhone and services such as Apple ...
Former Uber chief executive Travis Kalanick appeared tense and tentative as he took the witness stand Tuesday seeking to counter allegations that his company stole autonomous driving secrets from former Google car unit Waymo.


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U.S. Bancorp executives view the issuer's portion of the proposed $7.25 billion swipe-fee settlement, which some merchants are fighting, as an expense already incurred.
The settlement "that seemingly nobody likes" is acceptable, Richard Davis, the bank's chairman, president and CEO, told analysts during a July 17 conference call to discuss second-quarter earnings. The bigger question is what merchants might do with the temporary, eight-month cut in interchange rates and their new ability to add a surcharge, he said.
U.S. Bank, which is not a direct party in the case, set aside $65 million during the second quarter to cover the temporary reduction in interchange, Andy Cecere, vice chairman and chief financial officer, told analysts on the call. The litigation began in 2005.
Whether merchants pass along their reduced costs to customers could prove interesting, Davis said.
The bigger issue, though, is the permission the settlement gives to retailers to surcharge Visa and MasterCard transactions, but not ones initiated with American Express cards, Davis said.
"I do think it is very interesting and provocative to see what kind of actions the retailers will take because typically surcharging is a negative feeling," he said. "I would suspect that most of them probably won't jump on it."
Davis also acknowledged that the settlement isn't final and that merchants still may opt out.
"It may, in part, be just a starting point to the continuing saga that is now 7 years old," he said. "I think we have a lot to watch. … This was a retailer-versus-card business, and I think it has got probably halfway through the game. We will see how it goes in the next couple months."
Asked for his outlook on the issuer's credit card program, Bill Parker, executive vice president and chief credit officer, cited the "very favorable" conditions for cards in current market. "It's a competitive market, but the credit outlook is very strong," he said.
U.S. Bank has focused on improving card-account originations in its retail branches, Parker noted. "That gets a very high-quality customer, one that we can provide other products and services to," he said. "So that is one change that we have really focused on especially this year."
But the focus will not be on subprime or near-prime consumers, Davis added.
"We will continue to extract more opportunity from the customers we have," he said. "But I am not going to go into an underwriting game here to try to improve the volume."
A higher provision for credit losses, partially offset by an increase in total net revenue, helped to drive down profit for the Payment Services business at U.S. Bancorp, the issuer reported July 18.
The unit, which includes consumer and business credit cards, stored-value cards, debit cards, corporate and purchasing card services, consumer lines of credit and merchant processing, generated a $316 million net profit for the quarter ended June 30, down 12.9% from $363 million during the same period last year. Total net revenue increased 2.6%, to $1.19 billion from $1.16 billion.
Credit and debit card revenue decreased 17.8%, to $235 million from $286 million, because of lower debit card interchange fees resulting from new Federal Reserve rates that went into effect Oct. 1 under the Durbin amendment to Dodd-Frank and the impact of now classifying credit card balance-transfer fees as interest income.
"However, these negative variances were partially offset by higher transaction volumes and an $18 million credit related to the final expiration of debit card customer rewards," U.S. Bank said in its earnings release. "Partially offsetting this decrease, corporate-payment products revenue and merchant processing services revenue increased due to higher transaction volumes, and other revenue increased due to a merchant processing-related gain."
Corporate payment products revenue increased 2.7%, to $190 million from $185 million in last year’s second quarter. Merchant processing services revenue totaled $359 million, up 6.2% from $338 million. ATM-processing services revenue was down 21.9%, to $89 million from $114 million, because of a change earlier this year to classify surcharge revenue passed through to others as a reduction of revenue instead of as an occupancy expense.
Average credit card loans during the quarter were $16.7 billion, up 5.2% from $15.88 billion. Net card charge-offs were $170 million, down 21.3% from $216 million. The net charge-off rate was 4.1%, down 135 basis points from 5.45%.
Credit card charge volume totaled $26.62 billion, up 7.7% from $24.71 billion. Broken out, retail payment charge volume was $14.08 billion, up 12.7% from $12.49 billion. Corporate payment services charge volume was $12.54 billion, up 2.6% from $12.22 billion.
On the acquiring side, merchant volume totaled $80.5 billion, up 10.7% from $72.7 billion. Transaction volume during the quarter totaled 921 million, up 14.6% from 803.5 million. Debit card transaction volume grew 6%, to 12.4 million from 11.7 million.


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New Delhi | Jagran Technology Desk: In the biggest outage ever faced by Mark Zukerberg-owned social media platforms, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp on Monday suffered almost 6 hours of disruption in their services globally. The three social media platforms lit up again early on Tuesday (IST) after the six-hour outage that prevented the company's 3.5 billion users from accessing its social media and messaging services.
Apologising for the disruption in the services of Facebook, Whatsapp and Instagram, tech giant's CEO Mark Zuckerberg has stated that services are returning online today.
"Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger are coming back online now. Sorry for the disruption today -- I know how much you rely on our services to stay connected with the people you care about," Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post.
Users started reporting that Instagram, WhatsApp and other services under the Facebook corporate umbrella are now accessible as normal for the first time since about 9 pm IST Monday when reports of the outage and disrupted services began pouring in.
Earlier, a site that monitors reports of outages across the internet, Downdetector, said the Facebook service outage is the largest it has ever seen. The company said in a post on Monday, "The largest outage we've ever seen on Downdetector with over 10.6 million problem reports from all over the globe."
The outage was the second blow to the social media giant in as many days after a whistleblower on Sunday accused the company of repeatedly prioritizing profit over clamping down on hate speech and misinformation.
As the world flocked to competing apps such as Twitter and TikTok, shares of Facebook fell 4.9%, their biggest daily drop since last November, amid a broader selloff in technology stocks on Monday. Shares rose about half a per cent in after-hours trade following the resumption of service.
Facebook, which is the world's largest seller of online ads after Google, was losing about $545,000 in U.S. ad revenue per hour during the outage, according to estimates from ad measurement firm Standard Media Index.
Soon after the outage started, Facebook acknowledged users were having trouble accessing its apps but did not provide any specifics about the nature of the problem or say how many users were affected.
(With Agencies Inputs)
Posted By: Talibuddin Khan


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In the first month of adult-use cannabis sales in Illinois, the state made nearly $40 million in sales according to figures from the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation.
Officially, the department said through a Feb. 3 news release, statewide sales totalled $39,247,840.83. Over $30 million in sales were made to Illinois residents in the first 31 days, while over $8.5 million sales went to out-of-state residents, adding up to the sale of 972,045 items.
Sales to those out-of-state buyers proved Gov. JB Pritzker’s theory to be true, and even gave him some material for his State of the State address, saying that adult-use cannabis “gives us a chance to collect tax revenue from the residents of Wisconsin, Missouri, Iowa and Indiana.”
Toi Hutchinson, Senior Advisor for Cannabis Control to Gov. Pritzker, said in the release that the first month was positive.
“The successful launch of the Illinois’ legal cannabis industry represents new opportunities for entrepreneurs and the very communities that have historically been harmed by the failed war on drugs,” he said. “The administration is dedicated to providing multiple points of entry into this new industry, from dispensary owners to transporters, to ensure legalization is equitable and accessible for all Illinoisans.”


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Season’s Greetings from All of Us at Compunetix!
Compunetix, acknowledges and supports Chairman Ajit Pai and the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) and its Keep America Connected Pledge. Compunetix has committed to take the steps necessary to provide vital communications equipment across the globe […]
Compunetix along with Sonexis (a brand of Compunetix) will be attending and sponsoring the ConvergeOne National Sales Conference in Denver, CO. This event, which will showcase our video collaboration solutions and enterprise audio systems, begins […]
Compunetix is proud to announce that President and CEO Dr. Giorgio Coraluppi and a select team of company executives will be in attendance at this year’s EY Strategic Growth Forum in Palm Springs, CA on […]


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Who has the highest inflation in Europe?
As of July 2022, the inflation rate in the European Union was 9.8 percent, with prices rising fastest in Estonia, which had an inflation rate of 23.2 percent. By contrast, the inflation rate in Malta and France was 6.8 percent, the lowest in the EU during this month.
What age group is most affected by inflation?
Taking an average of all categories, as the inflation index does, shows that inflation is currently highest for younger households. It is about 2 percentage points higher for households headed by 21-year-olds as it is for octogenarians who live at home. That has not been true for most of the last 40 years.
What are the benefits of inflation?
Benefits of Inflation More demand, in turn, triggers more production to meet that demand. Inflation also makes it easier on debtors, who repay their loans with money that is less valuable than the money they borrowed. This encourages borrowing and lending, which again increases spending on all levels.
How much should I ask for a raise based on inflation?
To ensure that your raise results in real wage growth, you might consider asking for a bump in pay that outpaces inflation. Mustain recommends asking for a minimum of 10% for standard work performances. Normally, asking for that high a raise is risky.
Why is inflation so high now?
The current high inflation rate can be attributed to many different factors, many of which are a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. Gapen pins rising prices on three general causes — increases in household demand and supply-chain shortages due to the pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the presence of a strong labor market.
Who are the winners during high inflation?
Inflation Can Help Borrowers If wages increase with inflation, and if the borrower already owed money before the inflation occurred, the inflation benefits the borrower. This is because the borrower still owes the same amount of money, but now they have more money in their paycheck to pay off the debt.
Why is inflation so high?What is causing inflation right now?
“To boil it down, inflation is currently being driven by energy, labor and housing, and while we are seeing some easing on the energy front as evidenced by lower gas prices in July, we can expect these levels to remain elevated, particularly on the housing front as driven by rent,” Dominick said.
What is the current inflation rate in Japan?
What is France’s inflation rate?
Current France inflation rate The Consumer Price Index for France is 112.87 for the month of July 2022. The inflation rate year over year is 6.08% (compared to 5.84% for the previous month). Inflation from June 2022 to July 2022 was 0.28%.
How high is inflation really?
According to the latest report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the annual inflation rate in May was 8.6%, its highest level since 1981, as measured by the consumer price index. Other inflation metrics also have shown significant increases over the past year or so, though not quite to the same extent as the CPI.
Why is inflation so high?How much is my money worth with inflation?
To see how inflation affects the value of $1, first divide the inflation rate by 100. Then, multiply that number by $1 (or any starting dollar amount you wish). Then add that number to your dollar amount.


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With more robust regulation hitting market players in China and the United States, Marius Galdikas, CEO at ConnectPay, shares an insider’s view as to whether similar regulatory tightening could soon fall upon European fintechs. The pandemic set a strong precedent for faster roll
China Mobile has officially opened its first data centre in the UK, forming a key part of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road initiative to connect Asia and Europe. The data centre will directly connect to China Mobile’s existing data centres
The Green Computing Consortium, a group which is dedicated to promoting green computing in cloud data centres in China, is welcoming a new member – Marvell, the global semiconductor manufacturer based in California.
Thanks to China’s strict censorship, will the internet really split in two – Chinese vs Western? Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt predicts the change is already well under way and will have happened by 2028.


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Burberry today said digital commerce outperformed in the third quarter of its financial year, helping to lift sales by 9%.
The upmarket fashion retailer said in a trading update and interim management statement that its total revenue climbed to £613m in the three months to December, up by an underlying 9% compared to the same time last year.
The retail part of its business, which includes online trading, saw sales hit £464m, up by 13%. “Record social media engagement,” said the statement, was generated by its Spring 2013 advertising campaign while digital commerce outperformed. Like-for-like store sales rose by 6%. Half of the growth came from sales of coats and other outerwear.
“Burberry delivered 13% underlying retail growth in the third quarter,” said chief executive Angela Ahrendts, “benefitting from a particularly strong week in the run up to Christmas. In an otherwise difficult quarter, core outerwear, mens and digital all outperformed.”
Wholesale income fell by 5% to £120m, a trend expected to continue for the rest of the year, while revenue from licensing was up by 4% at £29m.
Looking ahead, Ahrendts said: “We expect the external global environment to remain challenging, but see continued opportunities to drive productivity in our existing business, while investing for growth in under-penetrated regions, product categories, channels and mediums.”


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The Western Producer recently published comments from an international grain broker that led the paper to ask the question, “is Canadian wheat in decline?”
We are pleased to answer that question with an unequivocal “no.” In fact, it is quite the reverse.
The wide-ranging comments brought up questions on logistics, grain grading and return to Canadian farmers. We would like to deal with those issues in turn.
There is no question that the transportation and logistics failures in 2013-14 hurt Canada’s reputation as a reliable supplier of consistent high quality wheat.
Customers and governments have been reassured by the actions taken to clear the backlog and fill contracts, but it is clear that we cannot afford to see another year like 2013-14. On this front we would agree with the buyer.
The grain broker also expressed concern regarding changes made to the Canadian Grain Commission’s vessel certification process.
Before last year, the commission required every 2,000 tonnes of grain going into a vessel to meet precise specifications. This is commonly referred to as “incremental certification.” If one 2,000 tonne interval is out of specification, the grain must either be removed or certified to a lower grade.
This approach to certification does ensure uniform loading of the entire vessel, but it is also time consuming and expensive.
Starting last year, the grain commission offered the Canadian industry and customers a more efficient and less costly option: composite certification. Under this option, individual increments can deviate slightly from specifications as long as the composite sample for the whole vessel meets the requirements.
There is an absolutely critical word in the above paragraph: option. Incremental certification is still available if customers wish to continue using it.
This is one of the key information pieces that the new Team Canada delivered when visiting 20 countries as part of the new crop missions this past fall.
Team Canada is a collaboration between Cereals Canada, the Canadian International Grains Institute, the grain commission, provincial crop commissions, Canadian exporters and farmers.
It provides customers around the world with a comprehensive value-chain overview of how Canadian wheat will perform and the changes to the Canadian system that will ensure that customers in every region of the world get exactly what they want when they want it.
However, delivering what the customer orders does not mean selling our premium quality wheat at a discount.
The broker interviewed by the Western Producer stated that in the past he would consistently get better than what he ordered. He would pay for a No. 2 and receive No. 1. It is not a bad thing if this is not happening anymore.
It is not in Canadian farmers’ interest for us to be the discount outlet for premium wheat. As an industry, we must strive to gain the maximum value for everything that Canadian farmers grow. Gaining maximum value means delivering the quality that customers demand and pay for.
The Canadian grain industry has rapidly evolved over the past years. We believe that these changes benefit all parts of the value chain and are helping us meet the needs of tomorrow’s customers rather than the markets of the past.
The comments reported by The Western Producer do demonstrate the need to have open lines of communications with customers in all parts of the world.
This is why the Team Canada approach was launched.
We will continue to reach out to develop new markets and support existing markets when they choose to buy Canadian quality. The Maple Leaf will continue to be the symbol for premium quality in every region of the world.
JoAnn Buth is chief executive officer of the Canadian International Grains Institute, Cam Dahl is president of Cereals Canada, Gary Stanford is president of Grain Growers of Canada and Wade Sobkowich is executive director of the Western Grain Elevator Association.


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For the fourth quarter, sales increased 14.8 percent to $1.8 billion. Loss from continuing operations was $159 million, compared to a loss from continuing operations of $192 million for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2010.
"We reported our seventh consecutive quarter of year-over-year sales growth and the largest percentage sales increase since 2006 for both the quarter and full year,” CEO Joe DeAngelo said. "In addition, we reported our highest gross profit rate since 2005 and our best operating profit since 2007."