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Gold Coast residents will wake up to a splash of colour and comfort today, following a Burleigh Heads’ business, Theory Agency’s activation to bring optimism to the city, through artwork.
The pro-bono project was the brainchild of creative branding agency, Theory who has partnered with Australia’s leading digital outdoor advertising company, QMS Media to bring it to life.
Theory Agency’s artwork will be displayed on outdoor advertising sites throughout the Gold Coast over the coming weeks.
The artwork boasts messages like, “We’ll get through this together” along with the hashtag, #TogetherGC – encouraging residents to spread positivity among the Coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis.
Since launching in 2019, Theory Agency, co-founded by Adam Mesaric and John Argyle has designed and produced several large-scale community artworks.
This new project, however, is specifically for the cause of helping Gold Coasters get through COVID-19.
“Among the current climate of fear and anxiety, communities are pulling together to ensure that we emerge from this crisis intact,” Mesaric said.
“We’ve launched the #TogetherGC billboards and posters across the Gold Coast to inject some much needed optimism. Little sparks of optimism can have an immeasurable impact on our city and the need for a positive voice has never been greater.”
“Although effectively in ‘lockdown’, we know that people are still venturing out into the world – be it for exercise, for work, to check on loved ones or for essential shopping trips. So if we can make their short journey that little bit brighter, then we’ve done our job,” Mr Argyle said.
QMS Chief Marketing Officer, Sara Lappage said that Theory Agency’s design led campaign was exactly what local communities need at this time.
“The team at Theory have created a visually engaging yet simple campaign that will help unite and inspire community spirit aross the Gold Coast reminding us all that while we need to implement social distancing, we can still remain close together by providing ongoing support and care for each other during these unprecedented times”
Lappage added; “We are proud to work with Theory Agency to bring this campaign to life and create something truly memorable for the Gold Coast community.”
Theory Agency has invited cafes and other local businesses to get in touch to be sent posters to display, with the mantra that “design has the power to be a positive influence”.
Early bird ticket prices for Cannes in Cairns 2024 are ending soon, so you’ll need to move quickly to save money on the hottest ticket in town (or anywhere!). You have until 31 March to secure your ticket at the discounted price of $1,979.99 inclusive of GST. What’s more, you can get even tastier discounts […]
Marking a historic moment, THE LUME Melbourne will welcome original pages from Leonardo da Vinci’s Codex Atlanticus to Australian shores for the first time, as they touch down on March 9, before going on display to the public from March 16, when Leonardo da Vinci – 500 Years of Genius presented by Webuild opens to […]
Eyeota, a Dun & Bradstreet company and a global source of data for digital marketing, have selected Proximic by Comscore, a leading provider of audience and content targeting solutions for programmatic activation, as its preferred partner for making its full taxonomy of audience segments available for contextual cookieless targeting.
To promote the launch of its latest campaign, ‘Finding Brisbane’s Best Cafe’, The Coffee Commune (TCC) harnessed the power of radio, digital and programmatic OOH. The seven-week campaign also served to increase The Coffee Commune’s membership, and via TFM Digital, it saw a record 39,633 entries garnered (28,774 unique), with 880+ cafes nominated. Teaming up […]


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Facebook employees can sell their stock this week with a ban lifted on insider sales. Up to 234 million shares and stock options could be sold.
It appears some employees may be eager to sell shares this week. On Wednesday, Facebook shares dropped more than any other time in five weeks, news reports said.
Company shares dropped 3.8 percent to $21.11 at the close of trading on Wednesday.
Image via Shutterstock
In August, a ban covering 271 million shares expired on sales by early investors and some directors. Some of these shares were held by Accel Partners, Goldman Sachs and Peter Thiel, a PayPal co-founder, according to The New York Times.
The AP estimated that as many as 1.5 billion shares could be sold.
The sales come after Facebook’s problem-plagued initial public offering in May. The stock has been a disappointment to some investors.
There are more key dates this year when bans will be lifted from selling Facebook shares, The AP said. On Nov. 14, 777 million shares and stock options could be sold. On Dec. 14, 156 million shares held by early investors and some others could be sold. Then on May 18, 2013 some 47 million shares held by Mail.ru Group and DST Global, who were early investors, could be sold.
The more recent sales ban was scheduled to be lifted on Monday, but did not take effect until Wednesday because the stock market was closed with the impact of Hurricane Sandy.
In August, TechZone360 reported that some of the causes of the falling stock price were an earnings report (which showed costs increasing more than projected) and lingering questions about future company growth. A few key executives (Katie Mitic and Ethan Beard) left the company. Also, Facebook reported more than 83 million Facebook accounts were duplicates or fakes.
Meanwhile, the company is trying to come up with a way to take advantage of mobile devices.
At the end of the week the free upgrade window for Windows 10 closes. This has been an interesting experience because Windows 10 for the most part ste…
The move from hardware- to software-based networking solutions, along with the fact that our still recovering economy has kept many businesses cautiou…
Recently, the police's ability to access someone's phone has been a hot topic in American news. I'm sure we all remember the ordeal involving Apple an…
The sale of Yahoo's core assets to Verizon for a reported $4.83 billion, leaving Yahoo shareholders with roughly a $41 billion investment in Chinese I…
It's no secret that development and programming are very highly sought-after skills these days. Various tech jobs are consistently among the highest p…

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Ford Motor Company announced the appointment of PK Umashankar as Ford Philippines’ new managing director. Umashankar “Uma” will replace Bertrand Lessard effective on July 1, 2019, and will continue to report directly to Ford ASEAN president Yukontorn ‘Vickie’ Wisadkosin.
Umashankar is currently serving as the director of Ford ASEAN’s Customer Service Division, based in Bangkok, Thailand. His new role is to keep Ford Philippines’ momentum in the Philippine market, as well as sustain the success of the blue oval brand’s refreshed lineup. He will be responsible for keeping the pace of the American brand’s expansion of dealership network, enhancing the aftersales performance that will eventually improve Ford vehicle’s cost of ownership.
Umashankar has accomplished a couple of achievements in his current position. The Indian executive aims to implement a number of initiatives to improve overall Ford’s customer experience. Among his deeds include leading efforts to streamline parts sourcing and delivery across the Ford network, as well as launching the Ford Authorized Parts Distributor Network and Ford-owned Quick Lane brand in Thailand.
Apart from being the Ford ASEAN’s director of Customer Service Division, Umashankar also served as the brand manager of Ford Asia Pacific from 2015 to 2017 and was based in Shanghai. He was the one who oversaw the region-wide launch of the all-new EcoSport, as well as an international market model called the Figo in India, Middle East, and Africa.
However, before all his regional postings, he served nearly 19 years under Ford India, where he took on roles of increasing responsibility, including leadership positions across Customer Service, Marketing, and Operations. These include being the vice president of Customer Service Operations for almost four years, where he was able to lead the set up a new modification center connected to Ford’s Chennai manufacturing facility.
There are other efforts by Umashankar, including his contribution to 40% of Ford India’s sales in his 2002-2005 position as divisional operations manager, North and East. Prior to everything else, he received a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Madras, as well as an MBA in Finance from the Loyola Institute of Business Administration (LIBA). Umashankar’s rich experience in parts distribution may mean that Ford Philippines may improve further on this area.


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Earlier today, Capcom revealed via its Unity Blog that Dark Void will be landing on the DSi next month, with a 2D retro-styled action-platformer called Dark Void Zero.
What's glass-covered and architectonically gothic and smooth as black ice? Bonus points for guessing the Vatican inside a snow globe, but if you said Apple's iPhone/iPod Touch 3GS running Epic's Unreal Engine 3, you're either psychic or pretty amazin...
Microsoft recently filed a patent for a dynamic game avatar system that limits avatar or even gameplay options based on a user's physiological data.
Howard Schmidt was named as the White House's cybersecurity coordinator on Tuesday, a job that was reportedly difficult to fill as the U.S. strengthens its computer security defense.
British Telecom (BT) has revealed its super-fast fibre broadband network will be completed by 2012.
A former Massachusetts prison inmate has been given an 18-month prison sentence for hacking prison computers while he was incarcerated.
2009 will see a total of 1.2 billion mobile devices shipped, including all categories of wireless devices such as mobile phones, MIDs (Mobile Internet Devices), netbooks, mobile consumer electronics products, and cellular modems.Shipments of these de...
BT has revealed its super-fast fibre broadband network will be completed by 2012.
Over half of Brits (59 percent) look for 'green credentials' when choosing online retailers, says 1%1 Internet.
Mobile application downloads will reach five billion by 2014, say analysts at ABI Research. This is an increase from an estimated 2.3 billion applications downloaded in 2009.
Apple is looking to add monthly subscriptions to the TV content available in its online iTunes store, and Disney and CBS are interested in signing on, according to a news report.
China Telecom plans to offer service for the popular BlackBerry handset from Research In Motion (RIM), the company said Tuesday, making it the second Chinese carrier to do so.
Close to 12.5 percent of the productivity of employees in India is lost daily as most of them while away their time on social networks, according to a survey by a large industry association in the country.
U.S. authorities are investigating the theft of an estimated tens of millions of dollars from Citibank by hackers partly using Russian software tailored for the attack, according to a news report.
You obviously don't need to be told that texting and driving are two complex tasks that don’t mix well. But a new study by University of Utah researchers sheds light on why and finds that this activity is even more dangerous than talking on a cell ph...
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Save. Share. Connect.
Tuesday, May 22, 2018
VOLUME -25 NUMBER 12
Publication Date: 12/1/2010
Front Page News
People in the News
Electronic Mfg. Services
Electronic Mfg. Products
Special Features: Test and Measure
Product Preview: electronica
December 2010 Issue
Add Message Board
electronica 2010 Confirms Upward Trend
Munich, Germany — The 2010 electronica drew over 70,000 trade visitors to see presentations by 2,595 international exhibitors from 45 countries who presented their products, solutions and services at the trade fair from November 9-12, 2010.
Both exhibitors and visitors were extremely satisfied with the outcome of the event. 59 percent of exhibitors and 47 percent of visitors came from other countries to see the exhibits in Munich, once again demonstrating the international character of the trade fair.
The conference program started one day earlier on November 8 with the electronica automotive conference. The event was given very high grades by the participants.
The mood at the trade fair was very upbeat, spurred by the enormous upturn in the industry during the last few months. Exhibitors agreed that companies can expect stable growth in the foreseeable future and expect to see many new, innovative technologies.
Mobile electronics Star
The electronica automotive conference also turned out to be a total success this year. 32 delegates from 23 countries attended this conference on November 8 and 9, while a total of 1,281 exhibitors presented their products and services in the automotive segment — 559 of them with products and services relating to mobile electronics. The program was also supplemented by the automotive forum.
One exhibition segment was characterized by a large number of components and systems for electric vehicles — from components for power electronics and charging stations through to electric scooters and electric cars. Also of note were energy-saving components and systems for vehicle lighting and control.
A total of 518 exhibitors presented electronic products for managing and monitoring photovoltaic systems. Renewable energy was a major player, with exhibitors showing storage technologies for wind and solar power plants, components for power electronics, inverters and energy harvesting solutions for building services and industrial applications. Numerous talks during the electronica Forum complemented the exhibition segment during the trade fair and provided information about the latest trends and developments in international markets.
Energy efficiency also became part of the trade fair itself; entire exhibit areas were fitted with LEDs for the first time. The advantages made evident were greatly reduced heat generation is and that energy consumption was also substantially lower.
Electronic applications in medical technology were very well-represented with 1,156 exhibitors who displayed many innovations. They presented, for example, electronic components for the latest generation of intelligent prostheses, portable medical devices such as blood sugar testers and pulse meters, implantable blood pressure sensors and remote monitoring and control systems for pacemakers.
CEO Round Table
One of the highlights was the traditional CEO Round Table, this year featuring the CEOs of Infineon Technologies, Freescale Semiconductor, STMicroelectronics and NXP Semiconductors. They discussed the economic crisis of 2008 and 2009, its background and the impacts on the semiconductor industry, keeping to the theme: "What lessons have we learned from the crisis?" The participants agreed that, of particular note was that companies in the semiconductor industry had invested in R&D during the crisis to assure that they would emerge from the crisis in an improved condition. However, the participants also conceded that there were still delivery bottlenecks at times due to the enormous upturn in the last two months.
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China reports a record trade deficit
China reports in February a new record trade deficit of USD 31.5 billion reflecting weak global demand and thus another reason why the Chinese government is accelerating domestic consumption in order to make up for the losses at the export front
Chinese exports were still growing at 6.8 % in the first two months of the ongoing year but exports to Europe were 1.1 % less due to the debt crisis. According to the bank HSBC growth of processing imports decreased to 2.4 % as to compare to 2011 and down from 8.6 % in the fourth quarter. Those imports are significant to China’s exports and reflecting that Chinese factories expect a more lean business in the months ahead and they keep inventory as low as possible. This is another reason why the Chinese currency is on a very slow course to further increase its outside value.


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Carriers have earned nearly $42bn in Q22022: Sea-Intelligence
"This is not only higher than combined Q2 EBIT of past 11 years but is also right at the top with Q421 & Q122 EBIT."
Major shipping lines recorded a combined earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) of $41.6 billion for Q22022, and this is discounting CMA CGM that only issued a press release so far, which does not list EBIT, according to the latest update from Sea-Intelligence.
"This is not only higher than the combined Q2 EBIT of the past 11 years but is also right at the top with Q42021 and Q12022 EBIT. Once CMA CGM's EBIT is included in the list, Q22022 would likely become the most profitable quarter in the last decade.
"We should stress that we do not mean this as a value judgement on whether shipping lines making money is a good or a bad thing, and we note it has generally been an unprofitable business for the past decade or so. We are merely pointing out the unprecedented nature of the current market dynamics."
Figure 1 shows the EBIT/TEU for the carriers that publish both their EBIT and their global volumes. The Q22022 EBIT/TEU figure of each of these shipping lines, excluding CMA CGM, dwarfs each of the previous years "with the latter hardly relevant in context of the outsized EBIT/TEU numbers that we are seeing right now. These figures are backed by a Y/Y increase in freight rates in Q22022."
This level of profitability, however, might not continue into Q3 due to the fast-falling freight rates, and the slowdown in global demand, the update added.


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The world’s banking payment system is going to be tokenized on a blockchain, according to the head of Goldman Sachs. In a discussion of Facebook’s new Libra cryptocurrency with the French news site Les Echo on June 28, Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon said he finds the “principle interesting” and the fifth-largest American bank, does “extensive research on the concept of tokenization.”
“This is the direction where the system of payments is headed,” he added, noting that his company believes in the potential of a “stable digital currency based on a basket of real currencies that can move money across borders and without friction.”
Solomon added that one should “[a]ssume that all major financial institutions around the world are looking at the potential of ‘tokenization,’ ‘stable coins,’ and frictionless payments.”
Solomon would not comment on whether Goldman Sachs has even talked to Facebook about Libra, to say nothing of whether the bank would join the project.
“Whether it’s this platform or one of the other fifty that people are watching that will make the most progress, I can’t tell you,” said Solomon, noting that Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg made clear that the social media giant’s Libra project is still very far from a launch. “[I]t’s too early to say which platform will win out.”
Addressing the concern that giant technology firms like Facebook, Google, and Apple have the size, financial strength, and technical know-how to steal banks customers with burgeoning payment systems such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, Solomon said he wasn’t too worried.
“I don’t think banks will disappear because of that,” he said. “Admittedly, they’ll have to evolve because trades linked to payment flows will become less profitable.”
While these tech companies “have a lot of customers and will certainly try to monetize them,” Solomon said he believed they have a long way to go before they can dislodge banks.
To do that, said Solomon, tech giants “will have to gain the trust of customers on big fundamental questions in terms of risk management, of financing capacity.”
Trust is the key word there, as the Facebook Libra project’s biggest problem is skepticism of its motives and good faith by regulators and elected officials. The company is involved in a variety of scandals in the U.S. and Europe over misuse of customers’ private data.
Beyond that, tech companies have a long history of hostility to regulation that won’t fly in banking. “Do you think that tech giants, who have other things to worry about at the moment, want to submit to the same regulatory constraints as JP Morgan or Goldman Sachs? But it seems to me they will try to seal partnerships with banks rather than become banks themselves.”
Solomon pointed to his bank’s March partnership with Apple on its new credit card as a more likely example of what is to come.


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Acura’s NSX is coming.
Roll with the wrong rubber this winter and you won't be going far. Those low-profile summer tires may look cool, but they slip and slide when snow falls. That's when you'll need winter tires to keep your trip to Grandma's from becoming a skid into a ditch.
Driving the Kia K900 full-size sedan around town for a week was like being in an ad campaign. "This is a Kia?" everyone said.
Q: I have owned Mercedes diesels for more than 25 years now, always priding myself on purchasing a vehicle of unsurpassed comfort, longevity, efficiency and yes, practicality. The problem is that diesel has now actually risen in price as gas has fallen, topping more than a dollar a gallon...
Proving that German automakers can’t resist playing in each other’s sandboxes, Mercedes-Benz is jumping into the oddball "SUV coupe" segment with its new GLE Coupe.
Ford Motor Co hopes to get a fresh start and erase bad memories for some owners when it launches the new version of its in-car, interactive touch-screen system next fall.
Mad Max: Fury Road. After a 30-year hiatus, the fourth installment of the car-crashing desert dystopia from Down Under tears up the big screen in 2015.
Air bags have been in the spotlight lately due to the sweeping recalls and investigation of air bag manufacturer, Takata, which supplies air bags to ten automakers globally. Over time, the defective air bag inflator can explode, especially in areas with high humidity, and shoot metal shrapnel...
I must confess: I own a Smart.
Downsizing the engine of the 2015 Lincoln Navigator full-size SUV is a good move, regardless of gas prices. In addition to replacing the V-8 with a V-6, Lincoln gives its full-size luxury SUV a cosmetic freshening plus an upgrade in creature comforts and technology. It still comes in full...
Volkswagen will present a sport-utility concept vehicle in the United States next month, intended to increase its range in the lucrative crossover segment and boost sales in the world's second-biggest car market, company sources said.
Nissan Motor Co said on Tuesday it is recalling about 470,000 sport utility vehicles and cars globally for possible fuel leaks.
Mazda Motor Corp said on Friday it would recall 52,000 cars in Japan to investigate potential defects in Takata Corp air bags.
Honda Motor Co was so concerned by mounting recalls for Takata air bags, and frustrated by its supplier's failure to explain why some have exploded, killing five people with shrapnel, that it bought used and scrapped cars in Japan to conduct its own tests.
As Toyota sees it, the future isn't some fuzzy, far-off point in the distance. It's here in the form of a midsize sedan I was able to drive this week, when the Japanese automaker made its bold bet on hydrogen.
Q: I'm a 77-year-old woman who reads your column every Sunday even though I don't understand it most of the time. I have a 2006 Cadillac DTS. For about the first half-mile after starting the car, it sounds like someone knocking from the trunk. I told my grandson there was a ghost in the...
Forget martinis and femme fatales; the constant running through 50 years of James Bond movies has been Martin, Aston Martin.


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Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, on directions from the Ministry of Interior, has asked mobile phone companies to block voice and data, or just the data in some cases, across select locations in major cities of the country.
We have confirmed reports that thousands of cell sites are currently offline owing to orders from the government.
Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Peshawar, and many other cities include the list where services have been shut down.
We can’t share the list of locations where services are down, due to security reasons, but we can confirm that thousands of cell sites, for all operators, are currently not operating.
It is to be noted that the government ordered telcos to keep services suspended in areas till further notice, meaning that the closure of services is for a longer period of time.


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Apple is really starting to clamp down on iPhone repairs not carried out by an authorized technician. Back in August, unofficial batteries were flagged as requiring a service, now unofficial iPhone displays are being targeted.
As Engadget reports, a new Apple support page has appeared entitled "About genuine iPhone displays." It explains how important using a genuine Apple display is on your iPhone and that any repairs should be carried out by a certified technician. Apparently not doing so can lead to a series of problems including multi-touch not working properly, touches registering unexpectedly, the display not turning off during calls, unintentional battery drain, brightness problems, and the list goes on.
Apple clearly doesn't want you opting for an unofficial repair and has gone so far as to display a message on all iPhone 11 models running iOS 13.1 if an unofficial display is detected. If you navigate to Settings > General > About on an iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, or iPhone 11 Pro Max with an unofficial display fitted, the message "Important Display Message - Unable to verify this iPhone has a genuine Apple display" will be visible.
It's also made clear on the support page that the message doesn't "affect your ability to use your iPhone or your display." However, the message will be displayed for the first four days on your lock screen and then in the Settings app for 15 days after which point it will only appear on the About page.
Apple is not doing anything wrong here, but clearly it's hoping users who have an unofficial display fitted will see the message and pay (again) to have a genuine display instead. I doubt that's going to happen very often.
The repair options have opened up recently for Apple devices, but they are still tightly controlled by Apple. 1,000 Best Buy stores now offer official repairs and Apple is allowing independent iPhone repairs, but there are a few caveats.
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Consumer Influences on Retail
Retail is a key channel through which consumers see, hear and learn about food. The way food products are presented and marketed to consumers in a retail setting also heavily influences their perceptions and knowledge about food. Here’s what we can expect to see on the retail market with food this year.
- Health Foods
The health and fitness craze isn’t set to slow down any time soon, and neither will its related food products. As Australians grow busier and busier, they demand healthier, more nutritious food that is convenient to obtain and consume. Expect to see increasing health food brands that offer ready-to-go nutrition.
- Open Plan Outlets
The whole idea of aisle shopping will soon be a thing of the past, with an increasing number of supermarkets and retail stores opting for open plan approaches. These may incorporate the likes of sushi and seafood bars, bakeries and roast carveries to keep consumers in store for longer. Rather than being a place where you go to shop, food retail will be a place where you can hang out.
- Grocery Delivery
Just like the explosion of online shopping over the past few years, food delivery is also set to pick up speed. Food delivery services (not limited to groceries) will continue to expand, growing more prominent in terms of offering same-day delivery, subscription boxes and the like. In the US, retail giants such as Walmart are already experimenting with taking on food deliveries, so it’s only a matter of time before it hits our shores.
Finding it hard to keep up to the latest trends? Visit Fine Food Australia in Sydney this September to access the latest industry trends and products to help maximise your business. Register now for free entry.


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Archive for the ‘cyber security’ Category
If you are responsible for the cybersecurity of a medium-sized company, you may assume your organization is too small to be targeted. Well, think again.
While the major headlines tend to focus on large enterprises getting breached – such as Sony, Equifax, or Target the actual reality is that small and mid-sized companies are experiencing similar threats.
According to Verizon’s 2018 Data
Posted in Cyber Attack, cyber security, cyber security videos, cyber security webinar, cybersecurity, Enterprise Security, hacking news, webinar | Comments (0)
A zero-day vulnerability has been discovered and reported in the Microsoft's Windows operating system that, under a certain scenario, could allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on Windows machine.
Discovered by security researcher John Page (@hyp3rlinx), the vulnerability was reported to the Microsoft security team through Trend Micro's Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) Program over 6
Posted in cyber security, hacking news, vCard exploit, Vulnerability, windows hacking, windows security, windows Vulnerability, Zero-Day Vulnerability | Comments (0)
Can feds force you to unlock your iPhone or Android phone?
A Northern California judge has ruled that federal authorities can't force you to unlock your smartphone using your fingerprints or other biometric features such as facial recognition—even with a warrant.
The ruling came in the case of two unspecified suspects allegedly using Facebook Messenger to threaten a man with the
Posted in android lock, cyber security, fingerprint scanner, iPhone Face ID, iPhone hacking, iphone lockscreen, law enforcement, smartphone security, touchid, unlock iphone passcode | Comments (0)
Cybersecurity researcher has discovered online a massive database containing records of more than 202 million Chinese citizens that remained accessible to anyone on the Internet without authentication until last week.
The unprotected 854.8 gigabytes of the database was stored in an instance of MongoDB, a NoSQL high performance and cross-platform document-oriented database, hosted by an
Posted in Chinese, cyber security, database leaked, Database Security, database server, Hosting provider, MongoDB database, secure mongodb, server security | Comments (0)
Almost every activity on the Internet starts with a DNS query, a key function of the Internet that works as an Internet's directory where your device looks up for the server IP addresses after you enter a human-readable web address (e.g., thehackernews.com).
Since DNS queries are sent in clear text over UDP or TCP without encryption, the information can reveal not only what websites an
Posted in CloudFlare, cyber security, dns security, DNS server, dns-over-https, DNS-over-TLS, fast dns service, Google DNS, internet security, network security, privacy tools, Secure dns | Comments (0)
Remember "The Shadow Brokers" and the arrest of a former NSA contractor accused of stealing 50 Terabytes of top secret documents from the intelligence agency?
It turns out that, Kaspersky Lab, which has been banned in US government computers over spying fears, was the one who tipped off the U.S. government and helped the FBI catch NSA contractor Harold T. Martin III, unnamed sources familiar
Posted in cyber security, data theft, Harold Thomas Martin, insider threat, Kaspersky, Kaspersky Antivirus, NSA contractor, nsa hackers, nsa hacking tools, The Shadow Brokers | Comments (0)
German police are seeking your help in gathering information related to a MAC address that could lead to the cell phone device used by a DHL blackmailer who last year parceled out bombs at different addresses in Brandenburg and Berlin.
Between November 2017 and April 2018, someone used German parcel delivery service DHL to sent out several so-called improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in
Posted in cyber security, DHL blackmailer, German government, German Police, hack wifi password, MAC address, open wi-fi network, Parcel Bomb | Comments (0)
It should come as no surprise that cybersecurity is one of the most important and lucrative fields in the world right now, and it’s becoming more important every day—thanks to a growing number of cyber attacks that are targeting everything from individuals and startups to Fortune 500 companies and entire government agencies.
So it should also come as no surprise that demand for talented and
Posted in cyber security, cyber security books, cyber security training, deals of the day, ethical hacking books, hacking news, learn ethical hacking, learn hacking, thn deal | Comments (0)


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Coventry's Oktoberfest is fast approaching, with the new venture taking shape in Broadgate as plenty of beer lovers get ready to descend upon the city centre this week.
For five days, Broadgate will be transformed into a celebration of all things Bavarian as a huge tent is erected in the city centre.
1,750 Coventry residents will be able to take shelter in the tent, with Oktoberfest taking place from August 26 until August 30.
Open from 4pm until 11pm on Wednesday to Friday this week, the festival will also let you indulge a little over the Bank Holiday weekend as the gates swing open at noon on Saturday, before it culminates on Sunday at 9pm.
Hops will be on-sale throughout the five day event, with so much beer that it'll be "just like Munich", according to event organisers.
Waitresses and waiters will be dressed in traditional lederhosen and dirndl, bringing with them a touch of authenticity to a beer festival which has long-standing tradition in Germany, having been conceived over 200 years ago.
The tent will be filled to the brim with long tables, with Bavaria beer served over the sound of a Bavarian band, who will be on hand to add to the atmosphere with their live music.
The event is set to be free, except on Saturday, when you will be charged £5 for entering.
Food and beer packages, which range from £34 to £39 per person, are available to book now from here.
To find out everything you need to know about the event, from prices to what you can expect, have a look at our ultimate guide to the five-day extravaganza right here.


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The national average retail diesel price climbed for the ninth consecutive week, climbing 3.8 cents to $4.127 a gallon during the week ended Monday, Sept. 4, according to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration. EIA’s weekly survey of U.S. diesel prices was delayed one day because of the Labor Day holiday.
During 12 straight weekly declines from April 16 through July 2, the price of diesel had dropped 49.9 cents a gallon; since that time, the price has climbed 47.9 cents. Two weeks ago, the price surpassed the $4 mark for the first time since May 14. This week’s price is 25.9 cents above the same week last year.
Average retail prices rose in all regions, led by an 8.4-cent increase to $4.493 a gallon in California, the nation’s most expensive diesel by region. The least expensive diesel on average was $4.026 a gallon on the Gulf Coast, where prices climbed 4.5 cents.
Complete diesel price information is available on EIA’s Website.


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Saudi Arabia Interested in Indonesian Wood Craft
Chairman of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) Rosan P. Roeslani said Saudi Arabian businessmen are interested in Indonesian-made woodcraft craft which is considered potential to increase trade trends between the two countries.
“They are interested in handicraft products, especially wood,” said Rosan in Jakarta, Friday, March 3, 2017. They conveyed their wishes (crafts) related to wood or trees.
He explained that trade trends between Indonesia and Saudi Arabia seen decreased about 5 billion US dollars in 2016 compared to 2015 which reached 8 billion US dollars.
Therefore, Kadin is looking for a breakthrough to increase cooperation so that the trade sector of the two countries is not only based on oil.
Kadin also used state visit of Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud by holding a business forum titled “Indonesia-Saudi Arabia Business Forum” which brought together Indonesian and Saudi businessmen.
According to Rosan, there is no denying that so far, Saudi Arabia’s investment in Southeast Asia has been mostly done in Malaysia. However, given Indonesia has the fourth largest population of the world, investors are now starting to pay attention.
In addition, King Salman’s arrival is also a factor for Saudi entrepreneurs interested in investing.
“One of them is the arrival of King Salman, they (entrepreneurs) have more attention to Indonesia and are more open, it is quite different, investments made by the kingdom with a different business community, each invest,” said Rosan.
He added that other sectors that Arab businessmen ogled are tourism, start-up companies, health, and infrastructure development.
Another good source : Home and Garden Articles
Yanis Gallery – Indonesian Crafts Exporter


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UK: Asda launches first ESG report
Asda has published its first Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) report which sets out its commitments to a sustainable business strategy and outlines how the supermarket will make it easier and affordable for customers to shop sustainably. In launching its first report, Asda is recognising the growing importance of ESG issues to customers, investors, suppliers and the communities Asda serves. It brings together existing and new commitments and builds on Asda’s current Create Change for Better programme.
UK: Co-op Group unveils ten-point plan to hit zero-carbon by 2040
The Co-op Group has announced a 10-point action plan to drive its goal of net-zero emissions by 2040. The announcement – which comes as the retailer announces a decade of carbon-neutrality at its Funeral care business – includes pledges to remove carbon from its products, for low-carbon pension fund investments, and to step up its campaigning on the issue. It also aims to be the first supermarket in the world to sell fully carbon neutral own brand food and drink by 2025.
Holland: DekaMarkt parent company announces management changes
Detailresult Groep (DRG), the parent company of supermarket chains DekaMarkt and Dirk, has announced that the operational and commercial management of the 2 banners will no longer take place centrally. The decision is aimed at strengthening both retail formats and position them for future growth.
France’s E. Leclerc gains 1.9m more households, takes market share to 22.1%: Kantar
E. Leclerc has consolidated its position as France’s biggest grocer, gaining an additional 1.9mln households and increasing its market share by 1.4 percentage points to 22.1%, new data from Kantar has shown. According to Kantar data for the period March 22 to April 18 (otherwise known as P4), Lidl was another retailer to make significant gains, growing its market share by 0.9 percentage points to 6.5%.
SPAR Hungary expands e-grocery catchment area
To meet the rapidly rising demand for e-grocery options, SPAR Hungary has expanded the catchment area of its popular home delivery and click-and-collect service. After adding more areas, the e-grocery service is now available to almost 2.3mln customers in the country. SPAR Hungary in March also relaunched its popular taxi delivery service for online orders.
UK: Co-op tackles plant-based price gap with industry-first commitment
Co-op will save families choosing vegan alternatives over a hundred pounds a year after slashing prices in an industry-first move to match its plant-based GRO range to meat-based equivalents. The UK’s leading convenience retailer will invest over £1.7mln to reduce the price of 29 fresh, chilled and ambient vegan products, from 5 May 2021, to help the increasing numbers of shoppers adopting a “flexitarian” diet.
Holland: Ahold Delhaize teaches cooking and job hunting through a new platform
In the Netherlands, Ahold Delhaize is launching the educational app On Track, a digital platform with short videos, together with a whole range of partners – from Just Eat Takeaway to Unilever. The “mini-master classes”, as Wouter Kolk, CEO of Ahold Delhaize Europe, calls them, are taught by professionals in their field – including Dutch celebrities from the world of art, film and music.
US: David McInerney steps down as FreshDirect CEO
David McInerney, the onetime chef who co-founded the iconic New York e-grocery retailer FreshDirect 20 years ago, is departing as its CEO. McInerney is to be succeeded on an interim basis by Farhan Siddiqi, chief digital officer of Ahold Delhaize, the Dutch retailer that acquired the company earlier this year.
US: Autonomous shopping coming to San Diego high-rise community
Amazon Go has competition in the autonomous shopping arena. Checkout-free retail solutions provider Accel Robotics is launching its automated Valet Market store with Last Step Delivery within Brookfield’s luxury high-rise community, Vantage Pointe, in San Diego’s East Village.
US: Lucky rebrands, readies to open flagship store
Lucky California, part of The Save Mart Cos., is slated to open its newly remodeled flagship store on May 12 in Pleasanton, California. In addition to an extensive remodel, the store has been rebranded from Lucky to Lucky California. The flagship location will also serve as the company’s innovation lab, offering a variety of dynamic food and beverage experiences, celebrating local Tri-Valley purveyors and producers, and featuring produce from the heart of the agriculture-rich Central Valley.
US: Saladworks sees path to ‘hundreds’ more locations inside grocery stores
Fast-casual chain Saladworks aims to open “hundreds” of locations inside grocery stores over the next few years, said Kelly Roddy, CEO of parent company WOWorks, in an interview. He said Saladworks plans to open between 25 and 30 full-service salad shops inside stores this year, and upwards of 100 next year. It’s also ramping up its ghost kitchen locations, with 90 locations secured inside Walmart stores and a goal of getting to 400 across WOWorks’ portfolio of restaurant brands. Saladworks, which has locations inside Kroger, Giant and ShopRite stores, is cashing in on the recent struggles of self-service salad bars and the demand for fresh, healthy fare.
Canada: Loblaw beats estimates for quarterly revenue
Canadian retailer Loblaw Cos Ltd beat market estimates for quarterly revenue, as homebound consumers shopped more for groceries and other essentials online during the COVID-19 pandemic. Revenue rose to C$11.87bln ($9.67bln) in the first quarter from C$11.80bln a year earlier, surpassing analysts’ estimates of C$11.72bln, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
US: UNFI adopts emerging transportation technology to reduce emissions
United Natural Foods, Inc. announced it is adding 53 all-electric transport refrigerated trailer units (TRUs) to its fleet located at the company’s Riverside, California distribution center. This effort is in keeping with UNFI’s Better for All 2030 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) agenda, and the company’s bold commitments to take innovative action on global social and environmental issues that help transform the future of food. The company is one of the first wholesalers to utilize the innovative technology and comes as the California Air Resources Board (CARB) announced plans in January to impose zero-emission requirements on TRUs sold or operated in California by December 31, 2029.
US: No pandemic slowdown at Ingles Markets
Southeastern grocery chain Ingles Markets continued to leverage pandemic-driven sales into increased revenue and profit during the second quarter. The company reported that net sales totaled $1.18bln for the second quarter ended March 27, an increase of 3.4% compared with $1.14bln for the quarter ended March 28, 2020. Gross profit for the second quarter of fiscal 2021 was $310.5mln, or 26.2% of sales. Net income was $52.2mln, compared with $40.3mln for the 3-month period ended March 28, 2020. Basic and diluted earnings per share for Class A Common Stock were $2.65 and $2.58, respectively, for the quarter.


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Trojans and other threats continue to be a serious concern when it comes to money matters over cell phones.
Kaspersky Lab, the online and mobile security company, has now released its most recent quarterly report on its analysis of the evolution of threats that consumers were facing during the third quarter of 2015.
The analysis involved the detection of more than 300,000 new mobile malware programs.
That considerable figure represented an increase of 10.8 percent over the number of threatening mobile security programs that were detected in the second quarter. The primary technique that was used in order to profit from the mobile threats was the display of intrusive ads to consumers on their smartphones and tablets. Adware has seen a growing trend over the mobile channel and in this most recent report, it represented over half of all threats that were detected for these devices during the third quarter.
The report also described the different types of mobile security attack methods most commonly used.
For instance, some types of mobile cyber attack involve the use of super-user privileges (that is, root access) in order to hide the fact that they are present within the systems folder. This makes them much tougher to spot and overcome. At the same time, the report noted that the number of SMS Trojans have been falling. In fact, during the third quarter, they made up only 6.2 percent of the threats that were detected.
Though mobile banking threats had seen somewhat of a reduction, they remain a serious concern. During the second quarter, there had been 5.9 million notifications, whereas the third quarter saw 5.68 million notifications. The decrease was definitely there, but at the same time, it was not great enough to be able to say that the problem is any less serious.
Kaspersky Lab Solutions reported blocking nearly 636,000 attempts to launch types of mobile security threats such as malware that would be able to steal money by way of the device user’s online banking. That figure was 17.2 percent smaller than it had been the quarter beforehand. Mobile banking Trojans were most likely to occur in Austria.


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BEIJING – In its continuing campaign to snuff out China-bound pornography on the Internet, the Chinese government has warned companies that provide third party billing that they should cease providing such services to companies that sell pornography and other lewd material online.
The warning, via the police, came on the heels of an investigation into a case in north China’s Hebei Province in which people were charged for selling memberships to porn sites using third-party payment services, according to the Shanghai Daily.
“Police in Hebei found that 23 people who allegedly owned and ran the “Love City” Website had gained 800,000 yuan (US$117,068) by selling more than 8,000 memberships through payment platforms such as AliPay, PayPal and YeePay,” the paper reported.
Service providers were warned that that they could be charged with complicity if they continued to deliberately provide such services. To drive the point home, the Ministry of Public Security, which made the announcement Monday, named Chinese portal Tencent Inc for “spreading lewd information,” saying the QQ personal blog spaces operated by the company were one of the largest sources of pornography and lewd content.
The announcement also mentioned two men who were arrested in recent months for making and posting supposedly lewd content to QQ. One of the men was reportedly paid in a virtual currency called “Q Money.”
In addition to its direct campaign against online pornography, the warning also indicates China’s intent to gain control of the use and proliferation of virtual – or universal – currencies, which can theoretically be used to purchase any products online, including hard goods that also can be purchased in a store.
A burgeoning market, the development and proliferation of universal currencies already is a fact of life in virtual worlds as well as the video game industry. Their use in adult entertainment is currently limited to a few companies, but is expected to grow exponentially in the coming years.


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Retailer Argos is adding 150 IT professionals to its workforce to help support its increasing focus on providing customers with a digital shopping experience.
Compare your salary and career progression with over 1200 IT professionals with Computer Weekly's 2017 UKI Salary Survey.
The jobs, which will be in its London tech hub in Victoria as well as its Milton Keynes headquarters, will include software engineers, machine learning experts and big data engineers.
Argos develops its own business-critical software to support the business, and therefore needs staff in-house. The staff are also required to support innovation as disruption changes business models in the retail sector.
Many retailers rely on IT service providers to support their digital journeys, so Argos’ hiring in-house skills could differentiate its offering.
The new tech roles range from graduate right up to principal level, and will work with technologies including Java 8, Kotlin, Hadoop, Spark, Python, Kafka and React.
John Rogers, Argos CEO, said: “Around 60% of our business today starts online, and over 70% of those sales are on mobile devices. This investment in our people will ensure we remain at the forefront of retail technology.”
He said the announcement is evidence of the company’s commitment to nurturing its own tech talent, ensuring Argos is in a good place to shop for its customers.
“We’re excited by what our teams are achieving so far, and we’re looking for more people who not only want to build today’s tech, but also think big, and create new experiences and functionality that our customers don’t even know they want yet,” said Rogers.
In 2014, Argos opened a “digital hub” in London that will focus on creating more agile and flexible ways of working. The office is above the Argos store in London Victoria and will be used as a satellite for teams working on major infrastructure projects.
Interested candidates can apply here.


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MasterCard has opened an R&D centre at its Asia regional headquarters in Singapore. The centre will focus on the research and development of new payment solutions including emerging payments, chip, contactless, mobile and e-commerce.
- Corporate drivers to get mobile payments at the pump
- Boon launches in the UK and adds Apple Pay support
- NFC Forum moves closer to interoperable NFC ticketing
- Mobile-only bank goes live in the UK
- Proxama integrates Discover’s D-PAS into EMV enablement solution


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It’s no secret that modern American life is all about the individual who is always on the go. Whether it’s heading to work, traveling to the gym or grocery or shuttling kids to all their extracurricular activities, today’s Americans spend 70% of their waking hours outside of the home -- and spend over 30% more time in their cars than they did just ten years ago. In that same ten-year time frame, consumers have been introduced to a vast array of new digital automotive entertainment concepts from streaming radio to in-dash entertainment options. But amid all of today’s choices one thing remains constant -- the desire of consumers for AM/FM broadcast radio in their cars.
Media may like to hype the next “shiny new object,” but a better gauge of what the future holds in terms of in-car audio entertainment is to simply look at what consumers want. AM/FM radio remains the go-to choice for American consumers when driving -- and by an amazingly large margin. Today, 84% of consumers listen to regular AM/FM radio in the car, with the next largest music option being CDs at 64% and Sirius XM at 22%. Almost 75% of all audio time spent in the car is spent listening to AM/FM radio, with Sirius XM next at 14% and owned music at 11%. All streaming is just 2%.
When asked, 82% of Americans say that the first thing they do when they get into their cars is turn on the radio. A recent IPSOS study estimated that 98% of consumers want an AM/FM radio with their new car purchase -- and an incredible 99% of consumers say they’re comfortable with how AM/FM radio operates in their cars, i.e. with buttons and knobs.
I’m not saying that consumers don’t love other options like apps, because they do, just not instead of radio, or to the degree of radio. A recent J.D. Power survey showed that nine out of ten consumers do not use built-in auto apps regularly a year after they purchase their new car. They also talked about “automakers spending billions on technologies that many consumers don’t use,” with consumers responding that they “did not find it useful” and that it “came as part of a package … I did not want it.”
Consumers have definitely spoken, and digital services are taking notice, stating right up front that they want to be like radio. At this year’s DASH 3.0 conference focusing on “Radio & the Connected Car: A Survival Guide for Radio Broadcasters,” Pandora made it a point to say that it aspires to the simplicity of AM/FM radio. There’s a natural ease that comes with listening to your favorite broadcast station while driving that simply can’t be matched.
There’s good reason for broadcast radio’s continued popularity. It offers listeners the voices and personalities they know, love and trust. It’s the best friend sitting next to you in the car telling you everything you need to know. And at the same time, it’s at the intersection of the consumer trends of digital, social and the connected consumer. With a USA Touchpoints study finding that two-thirds of radio is consumed outside of the home, radio is both digital and mobile. In fact, it’s the original mobile medium if you go back to the core definition of mobile as “on the move,” and it’s also always been a social medium, providing listeners with the opportunity to interact with their favorite on-air personalities long before the invention of social media. Think about the call-in phone lines, which have now morphed into Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, texting and all the other ways that DJs connect to their listeners today.
Today, consumers have the ability to listen to their radio stations whenever and wherever they want, whether it’s walking down the street, listening at home or riding in the ultimate mobile device -- the car.
Radio serves as a complement to your driving experience instead of a distraction. Simply pushing a single button gives you immediate access to the things you care about: News, entertainment, information, personalities and music that you know and love. In an increasingly mobile world, radio is still the anchor of the auto experience.
The opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillage/MyersBizNet management or associated bloggers.


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Welcome to This Week in Modern Software, or TWiMS, our weekly roundup of the need-to-know news, stories, and events of interest surrounding software analytics, cloud computing, application monitoring, development methodologies, programming languages, and the myriad of other issues that influence modern software.
This week, our top story concerns Dell’s record-breaking acquisition of EMC.
TWiMS Top Story
Dell Buys EMC in Largest Tech Deal Ever—USA Today
What it’s about: The headline kind of about sums it up, doesn’t it? Dell, along with the private-equity firm Silver Lake, bought storage giant EMC for a whopping $67 billion, the largest ever deal in tech history. It’s a bold bet by Dell, not just because of the price tag: As multiple journalists, analysts, and other industry watchers have noted, the deal seems to be bucking a trend: As many tech giants strip down to their core businesses to become more agile, Dell will become an ever bigger IT behemoth. Dell also acquires EMC’s controlling stake in VMware, too, though the company says VMware will remain a separate, public entity.
Why you should care: Here’s a case where “it depends” is the most honest answer. As the wide range of coverage attests, the impact of this megadeal depends on your perspective. There remain loads of unrevealed details that could determine the deal’s fate—and given that Dell and now EMC are private, those details will likely stay under wraps for a while. In the meantime, all signs seem to point to a common determinator: it’s all about the cloud. Sure, Dell will still compete with the likes of HP and others, but as The Information and others note, the “new” Dell will now directly compete with Amazon Web Services and other public cloud platforms, even if it’s not necessarily building its own public cloud offering. SiliconANGLE CEO John Furrier called it “the end of client-server computing” and a validation of the AWS model, for instance.
It’s also worth noting that EMC brings other assets into the fold: EMC itself has been on a shopping spree, completing a purchase of cloud software and IaaS firm Virtustream this summer, for example. Research firm IDC also notes in an opinion brief that Pivotal, a joint venture of EMC and VMware, “either standalone or combined with Dell Software, presents an opportunity for Dell to gain access to several new types of customers, the developer, and the operations technology (OT) part of the industrial Internet.”
- In Takeover of EMC, Dell Makes Ambitious Bet—The New York Times
- With EMC Deal, Dell Aims to Compete with AWS—The Information (Subscription required)
- How Will Dell Justify Its Massive Payout for EMC? —Network World
- EMC Customers Not Thrilled With Dell Deal—Network Computing
- Partly Cloudy: The Merger of Dell and EMC Is Further Proof That the Industry Is Remaking Itself—The Economist
What it’s about: Research firm Gartner Inc. has released its annual top-10 tech predictions for the coming year, and it’s no surprise to see hot topics like the Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, and 3D printing make their appearances. This year, Gartner’s calls weave together various topics into what the firm calls “the digital mesh,” including two related categories: “Smart Machines” and “the New IT Reality.” In short, the digital mesh reflects the billions and billions of connected devices and services worldwide and the massive amounts of data that is being generated as a result. Gartner’s list is a good temperature check on what we’ll be seeing and hearing more of in the months ahead—and also great conversation starters for anyone in the tech industry.
Why you should care: JAXenter ‘s recap of Gartner’s trends and the recent Gartner Symposium/ITxpo conference highlights a few trends of particular interest to the software community. For one, traditional architectures simply won’t support this so-called digital mesh, which will require increasing flexibility and scalability over time. Expect microservices and containers to play a big role in what Gartner’s calling the “mesh app and service architecture.” Another huge trend, one that’s not necessarily new but just about everyone seems to agree will continue growing: Massive amounts of data, and a corresponding need to make sense of it. As Gartner’s Heather Levy writes: “Organizations must learn how to identify what information provides strategic value, how to access data from different sources, and explore how algorithms leverage Information of Everything to fuel new business designs.”
- Top 10 Technology Trends Signal the Digital Mesh—Gartner
- Redefining the Role of CIO: A Gartner Symposium ITXPO 2015 Perspective—New Relic Blog
What it’s about: A funny thing happens when you bring in a bunch of Silicon Valley pros to remake how federal government agencies use technology: Those agencies start to resemble Silicon Valley firms, at least in their IT departments. Chef CEO Barry Crist tells FedScoop’s Greg Otto of a recent visit to the IT team at the Department of Homeland Security: “It felt and smelled like a Silicon Valley startup,” something he and others attribute to agile development practices, DevOps, cloud services, and other modern software tools, as well as significant cultural changes that enable IT pros to cut through red tape and move faster.
Why you should care: Hey, if the federal government can do it, so can you! FedScoop‘s piece highlights the growth and positive impacts of DevOps and modern tools in many government institutions, including NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) It details how DevOps, software, and transformative cultural change helped cut down on painful infrastructure maintenance—even if the latter piece, in particular, was anything but easy. JPL’s CTO Tom Soderstrom describes a legacy system that once took 130 people—who needed to be physically present to enter their passwords—to migrate between NASA data centers. A team member said they could take the app, put it in a Docker container, move it to AWS GovCloud and run it from there with a fraction of the effort. “By the time the offsite people said, ‘It won’t work,’ I said, ‘We already did it, it works,’” Soderstrom tells FedScoop.
- Mikey Dickerson’s 10 Tips for Dealing with Bureaucracy [Video]—New Relic Blog
- Inside Obama’s Stealth Startup—Fast Company
- The Incredible True Story of How DevOps Got Its Name—New Relic Blog
Mobile Is Not a Neutral Platform—Benedict Evans
What it’s about: Rumors of the mobile Web’s demise may be exaggerated, but don’t confuse it with the browser-driven desktop Web. Andreessen Horowitz’s Benedict Evans serves up a thought-provoking blog post on a fundamental difference between the Web browser on a desktop (and how it effectively became synonymous with “the Internet” for most users) and how we go online on our mobile devices: With the latter, “it’s the operating system itself that’s the Internet services platform, far more than the browser, and the platform is not neutral,” Evans writes. Platform is the key word, of course, and there are essentially only two choices: Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android. That gives Apple and Google tremendous power over what you see and do on your phone and other devices, thanks to APIs, UI/UX design changes, and other reasons.
Why you should care: For mobile developers, it’s a reminder that you’re likely going to be building at least two versions of your apps for the foreseeable future. Looking at both companies’ efforts to decouple content from an app and onto the home screen (or for other uses), and specifically Apple’s 3D Touch, Evans ask some key questions: “Can there be apps where this is the main UI? Can you use them for notifications?” And since 3D Touch isn’t on Android, “the fantasy of a cross-platform app gets even further away.” Evans also reminds developers that building iOS and Android apps cedes a great deal of control to the platform. That’s not necessarily news: If you want your app on the iPhone, you have to play by Apple’s rules. But the piece does a great job of illustrating just how different the mobile paradigm is from what most people think of as the Web. It’s also a good explainer for why developers and other stakeholders will continue paying close attention to Facebook’s ambitions for Messenger: The app may be the best current bet that a third platform that could disrupt the two dominant players.
What it’s about: Want to know precisely when those fair-trade avocados you’re pawing at the grocery store were harvested? You might soon be able get that date, and plenty of other data, thanks to the cloud. Fortune reports that high-end grocery chain Whole Foods Market is partnering with enterprise software firm Infor to build a new cloud platform to drive better data and competitive advantage across its retail merchandising and supply chain. One goal is to distinguish itself to consumers who think the food on one store’s shelf is the same as on another’s. It’s also intended to help Whole Foods catch up to the retail industry at large in terms of technology and automation: Fortune notes the company grew largely via acquisitions, and its operations are decentralized. To deploy a favorite tech term, its technology infrastructure wasn’t scalable, and needs to be standardized and modernized across its stores.
Why you should care: Have you heard New Relic say “every business is a software business” yet? Well, you’re going to hear it again: Every business, even a grocery store, is a software business. The Whole Foods technology makeover is about more than selling free-range eggs or organic leeks, too: The software implementation will effectively serve as a pilot for a potential new retailing software platform from Infor that extends well beyond the grocery business. Infor CEO Charles Phillips tells Fortune that much of the software used by retailers today was written before mobile, social, and other technology shifts forever changed the way people shop. Moreover, retail firms often rely on siloed software systems across different business units with little visibility and data sharing across these systems—a paradigm that can make it difficult to meet the needs of the modern consumer.
- How Nontechnology Companies Are Trying to Mimic Startups—The Wall Street Journal
- Software Development Lessons From Working in the Produce Aisle—New Relic Blog
What it’s about: If there are concerns on Wall Street about the state of the global economy, Silicon Valley doesn’t appear to share them. Venture capital funds have plowed $98.4 billion into new financing rounds worldwide through the first three quarters of 2015, according to the newest Global Venture Capital Report from KPMG and CB Insights. That means total VC funding in 2015 has already topped all of 2014 by nearly $10 billion, an 11% increase—with three months of deals still to come. While the U.S.—and especially California, where TNW notes VC investments have topped $11 billion for three consecutive quarters—remains the front-runner in VC funding, the KPMG/CB Insights report shows growth around the globe, especially in Asia and Europe.
Why you should care: If you can’t seem to get your software startup funded these days, you might not be trying hard enough—or you might need to be go back to the drawing board. CB Insights CEO Anand Sanwal said in a release: “The appetite for investment into fast-growing private startup companies remains insatiable.” For existing startups looking at their next financing rounds, the numbers are especially promising, with the median late-stage funding round hitting $35 million in Q3, up from $20 million in the same period last year. That’s being spurred by a staggering number of “mega rounds,” or deals of $100 million or more: There were 68 such deals in Q3 alone, bringing the 2015 total to 170 mega-rounds that total $19 billion in funding. Silicon Valley-based firms win the lion’s share of these deals, though Asia and especially China—aren’t far behind and are growing at faster rates.
- Global Venture Capital Report – Q3 2015—KPMG/CB Insights
Want to suggest something that we should cover in the next edition of TWiMS? Email us at email@example.com.
Tune In to the Future
Can’t get enough modern software news and commentary? Be sure to check out our new Modern Software Podcast. New Relic Editor-in-Chief Fredric Paul and guests discuss the most important things happening in the world of software analytics, cloud computing, application monitoring, development methodologies, programming languages, and more. Listen to the premiere episode or subscribe on iTunes.


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Emerging from a tumultuous past ten years into a consolidated future, ArcelorMittal South Africa outlined its results and objectives at an event in Sandton, Johannesburg on September 6 2016.
Addressing the conference, ArcelorMittal South Africa chairman Mpho Makwana described the legacy and history behind the company, saying that in ArcelorMittal, South Africa had a heritage of 103 years of steelmaking.
“For many years, having a steel mill was deemed to be a good economic asset, with a sound foundation for industrialisation,” said Makwana.
In present times, steelmakers compete with lighter metals and complex regulatory matters. One has to step back and say: is there something we can learn and something we can achieve to succeed more sustainability in this tough trading environment?”
Makwana said that what inspired ArcelorMittal to invest in the two editions of the Economic Footprint Study (AMSA Factor) was an endeavour to create a common framework or language through which we could engage all our key stakeholders so that we can engage and communicate transparently.
“We play a critical role in South African manufacturing and in the economy of South Africa. The critical success in achieving our country’s infrastructure investment aspirations as articulated in the NDP rests on a reliable local supply of steel, bricks and mortar. In the Factor Report we articulate how our corporate strategy is poised to support the successful implementation of SA’s NDP/Vision 2030,” he continued. “Our current contribution to GDP remains at an estimated 1.5% GDP. Despite a very tough economic trading environment, our value-chain supports up to 190 000 jobs.”
According to Makwana, steel plays a crucial beneficiation role for the country’s iron ore, adding R24.3-billion in value to its raw materials base. It also underpins several other key industries such as agriculture, construction, automotive and mining, with these top five industries contributing 15% of South Africa’s GDP and employing some eight million people.
“The sustainability of these sectors, as well as the role of steel therein, have far-reaching implications for our economy which behests our industry and government to sustain the partnership forged so far.
“When faced with dealing with all these challenges and the added challenge of Chinese imports, we fostered this spirit of partnership on basis of a broader strategic partnership moving forward as well as making a more meaningful contribution to South Africa Inc, concluding the agreement with the Competition Commission in terms of the R1.5-billion fine was part of that package.
“While this settlement has been published as a new thing, it is a matter of the past — as much as 10 to 13 years ago bad practices that culminated in these practices of poor market conduct were curbed a decade ago already. Our quest is now about how we move forward as a responsible citizen.
“If we look at the overall industry from a global perspective, it is cyclical and has been in the low phase of the cycle since the global economic crisis of 2008. In terms of BEE and transformation, an estimated R29-billion circulates in our supply chain, in terms of preferential procurement and enterprise development, this presents opportunities for black-women-owned entities and similar players to get closer to our suppliers. We have a dedicated programme of monitoring our top suppliers to become BBBEE compliant.
“My wish, as an example, is to have a factory where 100 people make knives and forks or where our products such as creative décor are made with our steel products — made possible by our Enterprise Development Programme.
When questioned about how happy he was with the level of transformation within the group, Makwana responded by saying: “Given the unfortunate history of our country’s past dispensation before 1994, one can never be fully satisfied with any large South African company; however, I am reasonably satisfied with ours. If we can get to where 30 to 40% of our executive is black, I would say we have made good progress. Looking at our Executive Team today I believe we are on track towards that.
“We are still on a journey. We are soon signing a BEE agreement that means we can tick the box on ownership and put that to bed.
“If we can also put 40% of our supply chain in the hands of women, I would also celebrate that as a remarkable achievement: we will make a contribution. We do need more brands that are inspired to use our steel.
On this journey it is imperative that the company’s competitive advantage be blended with the Nation’s quest for globally competitive brands that are manufactured with pride in South Africa. We already have the Proudly South African brand, but we need to really develop a Made in South Africa brand.”
Describing the importance of manufacturers using South African steel products, Makwana emphasised the importance of the role the company plays in the communities that surround it, not just from a social responsibility and skills development point of view, but how towns like Vereeniging, Saldhana and Newcastle are embedded with the sustainability of the company.
Protection and investment
Diminishing demand from the mining sector in particular was mentioned by ArcelorMittal South Africa chief economist, Chifipa Mhango, in his feedback on the entity’s latest Factor Report, used as a gauge on how the companyis perceived by its stakeholders.
“For the steel growth demand to be sustainable in the future, we need a minimum growth rate of at least five percent,” said Mhango. “Costs are also rising with the added challenges of China dumping products in Africa, particularly along the coastal countries. China is a very aggressive new player and we need to enact protection at a government level point of view.
“There is the added issue of an aging population in terms of skills base, which reveals the need for more investment in these in the future. What we are doing to improve as an industry player is to proactively address and invest in skills and education.”
Mhango summarised the impact steel manufacturing has on the country, saying: “Analysis based on ArcelorMittal South Africa’s footprint shows that every 1000 tonnes of steel produced locally adds R9.2-million to the GDP, provides three jobs directly and three jobs indirectly economy-wide. It enables domestic procurement spend of R5.3-million, of which SMME spend of R0.5-million beneficiates R5.2-million of value and contributes R0.13-million in taxes,” he concluded.


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Association for Manufacturing Technology (AMT)
Manufacturing orders in June jump more than 10% compared to May, but orders are still slightly down compared to the same period in 2022.
May manufacturing technology orders grew by almost 9% compared to April, but the YoY stats remain almost 20% behind.
New orders of manufacturing technology totaled $336.7 million in April 2023, according to the latest U.S. Manufacturing Technology Orders.
Manufacturing orders totaled $467.8 million in February, which is an improvement over January by 33%, but is down slightly from the same period in 2022.
Cutting tool consumption totaled $175.4 million in the United States for the first quarter of 2022, which is an increase of more than 9% compared to 2021.
April 2022 orders of manufacturing technology totaled $513.4 million, the second month in a row surpassing half a billion dollars.
Strong consumer demand drove continued investments in manufacturing technology in all stages of the supply chain, leading to more than $400 million in manufacturing orders.
Manufacturing technology orders are increasing since the start of the pandemic as companies find their footing.
Cutting tool consumption in the U.S. declined almost 10% in November compared to the previous month and almost 20% compared to November 2019.
Manufacturing orders totaled under $300 million in August according to the Association for Manufacturing Technology (AMT), which is down more than 20% from the same period in 2019.


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INDEPENDENCE, Mo. — Put a new spin on your laundry this weekend by doing it for free.
A new laundromat is making it possible for people who live in Independence.
Clean Laundry opened a new location Thursday near East 23rd Street South and Missouri 291 Highway in Independence.
As a welcome to the neighborhood, Clean Laundry said it’s opening its doors and allowing anyone who stops by to use its washers and dryers for free through Oct. 3.
The company said it has express machines that wash and dry a load of clothes in less than 10-minutes.
The laundromat also offers mobile-pay options and you can monitor your laundry from your cell phone. Clean Laundry also offers free high-speed Wi-Fi, TVs and USB charging stations for customers.
The location will be open from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily through Oct. 3. After that, the laundromat will be open daily from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.


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There is a rumor spreading on social media that Ralph Lauren is selling a shirt called “Mens New Ralph Lauren Short Sleeved Dual Polo N*gger-Brown.”
It’s not true, which might seem obvious, but it has fooled a bunch of people because the fake site purporting to sell the shirt is designed to look legitimate. Its URL is “ralph-lauren.us.com” and includes pages for a large catalog of other Polo Ralph Lauren products. The checkout system even collects billing and shipping details.
Counterfeit sites like these can be a headache for companies caught up in them—sometimes causing years of misunderstanding—and they are likely to become more common.
The site is registered using an email address from the Chinese instant messaging service QQ. And us.com domains can be registered by anyone, just like those ending in dot-com, dot-net, and dot-ninja.
A near identical scenario developed in 2012 when an online Abercrombie & Fitch store was selling “mpa11 N*gger Brown Pants.” At the time, Gawker attributed the epithet to a bad translation of the Chinese phrase for ”dark brown,” using software by a company called Kingsoft.
Incidents like this can haunt companies for years. A false rumor originating in the 90s that Tommy Hilfiger didn’t want minorities wearing the clothing he designed has dogged him and his company to this day.
David Silver, an executive at MarkMonitor, which provides similar services to CSC, told Quartz last year that spoofing of this sort is likely to become more frequent in the future as it is impossible to buy web addresses for every permutation of a brand name.
The real Polo Ralph Lauren site ralphlauren.com has no products matching the description on the fake site (and similar ones that appear throughout the web). The Dual Match Cotton Polo comes in six colors: bittersweet orange, deckwash white, french navy, polo black, and sapphire star—no brown.
The official Ralph Lauren website is registered through CSC Corporate Domains according to internet “whois” records and administered by PRL USA Holdings, Inc. CSC—among other services—protects its clients brand identities from hoaxes such as this one. There was no one at CSC available to immediately comment.
A spokeswoman for Ralph Lauren confirmed that the online store is a “rogue website” and told Quartz that the company is preparing legal action to get it taken down. She said they first learned of the site today, through social media. Ralph Lauren’s official Twitter account hasn’t mentioned it.


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Web browser Opera now permits its users to send crypto collectibles, like CryptoKitties, directly from its recently proclaimed in-browser crypto wallet. Claiming the feature is unique for the business as several other wallets do support collectibles along with MetaMask. Opera mentioning its official web blog said that:
“We believe that as associate increasing portion of our lives moves digitally, so will our collections of things.”
As a result for now, users of the beta-stage wallets would be able send their crypto-collectibles to each others, one thing it aforesaid antecedently that needed use of a digital marketplace associated with an exchange transaction to transfer possessions.
The Opera team mentioned that it believes the crypto collectibles trend is “just starting,” as the technological developments are becoming more friendly and easy. The online live services like games can progressively move toward a faster adoption.
Crypto collectibles like CryptoKitties have been possible employing the Ethereum ERC-721 standards for non-fungible tokens – one that enables each to own specific attributes which differ from other different tokens.
In the post, Opera also additionally stated that the company sees a use case for non-fungible tokens in “unlocking access to content or checking eligibility surely for digital services.” Opera is also increasing its non-public beta version of the wallet to transfer users via on on-line signup.
Further, the wallet would be soon delivering transaction notifications, with the firm confirming that it’ll monitor user’s transactions and inform them of their successful completed transaction status.


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We came across the following article this morning on “The Next Web” by NAPIER LOPEZ, and we though it worth posting as the benefits for businesses will be huge.
“Managing a Facebook Page is a crucial social strategy for many business owners today, and now Facebook wants to make it easier to interact with customers right from their own websites. An update to the Page Plug-in lets businesses add a message box and event information to their page.
The new messaging function does pretty much exactly what you expect. Customers can send messages directly from their Facebook inbox and they’ll show up via Facebook Messenger or the desktop chat interface.It’s not hard to see why this has several advantages over simply messaging someone on a Facebook Page, and it will likely have big implications for how people communicate with businesses – something Facebook’s been gunning at ever since it introduced Messenger Business.
A customer could place a food order on your site, and then immediately make a correction via Messenger. Customers could directly ask questions about items for sale, send in a complaint or provide feedback.
Of course, they could already do that via a Facebook Page, but people googling a business are much more likely to turn to its main website than a Facebook page.
Likewise, they can probably just call or email too, but many people will prefer the immediacy and personal interaction offered with chat, all on a platform they’re familiar with using.
In a similar vein, Facebook is adding events integration to the Page Plugin. That means that any modifications you make to an event on your Facebook Page will automatically be shown on your website, including allowing customers to subscribe to and be notified about any upcoming events.
This also adds an additional social element to your website. If I visit for information on a concert, I’ll be able to see which of my friends are going without having to check on Facebook. And the Plug-in is even smart enough to highlight events in your area.
These updates may not sound like much, but they’ll likely be a big part in Facebook’s bid to appeal to more businesses, allowing them to introduce more social features without expecting everyone to visit their Facebook page. Interested businesses can check out how to enable the feature on Facebook’s developer page.”


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TEXT OF STORY
Scott Jagow: Now, let’s set the way back machine to 1988.
That’s when Volkswagen closed its last U.S. car making plant. But the German car maker wants to make a comeback here. Alisa Roth explains.
Alisa Roth: BMW, Mercedes and Toyota already build vehicles here. It helps save on shipping costs, for one thing. Being closer to their American customers also helps them hedge against other costs, including fluctuations in currency rates.
Michael Robinet studies the global car market. He says if the dollar is weak against other currencies, as it is right now, cars assembled overseas can be very expensive to sell here. That’s been a big problem for VW.
Michael Robinet: They’ve had a lot of difficulties competing in this market, given the rise of the Euro vis-a-vis the U.S. dollar. And that is a major driver why they are finally deciding to locate production capacity in North America.
VW already has plants in Mexico. It even exports some cars made there back to Europe. Robinet thinks that could also happen to cars made at the new American plant.
Alabama, Tennessee and Michigan are the on the short list for the site. VW says it’ll announce the final choice in July.
In New York, I’m Alisa Roth for Marketplace.
We’re here to help you navigate this changed world and economy.
Our mission at Marketplace is to raise the economic intelligence of the country. It’s a tough task, but it’s never been more important.
In the past year, we’ve seen record unemployment, stimulus bills, and reddit users influencing the stock market. Marketplace helps you understand it all, will fact-based, approachable, and unbiased reporting.
Generous support from listeners and readers is what powers our nonprofit news—and your donation today will help provide this essential service. For just $5/month, you can sustain independent journalism that keeps you and thousands of others informed.


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Luxury clothing brand Burberry burned $37.8 million worth of its pricey trench coats, bags and perfumes last year to prevent them from being stolen or sold to the “wrong people,” according to The Times of London.
Burberry’s annual report shows that the London-based company incinerated $1,800 trench coats and $250 polo shirts among the $13.76 million in beauty products, and $24 million in ready-to-wear products and accessories it destroyed. That’s more than usual. The company said it’s burned $116 million worth of unsold Burberry products in five years.
Burberry, with a market capitalization of about $11.6 billion, isn’t the only high-end brand destroying unsold stock to protect the brand and keep the goods from falling into the hands of discounters. Retail chain H&M and luxury brands like Chanel and Louis Vuitton also have burned unsold stock, and experts say it’s a fairly common practice among brands trying to retain their exclusivity.
“The reason they are doing this is so that the market is not flooded with discounts,” Maria Malone, principal lecturer on the fashion business at Manchester Metropolitan University, told the BBC. “They don’t want Burberry products to get into the hands of anyone who can sell them at a discount and devalue the brand.”
Counterfeiters, Malone added, were “sticking the Burberry check on anything they could.”
Many people on social media lamented that the expensive check-printed items are going up in flames:
Much of the backlash has come from environmentalists, who take issue with the waste.
Burberry told the BBC that “the energy generated from burning its products was captured, making it environmentally friendly.”
“Burberry has careful processes in place to minimize the amount of excess stock we produce,” the company said. “On the occasions when disposal of products is necessary, we do so in a responsible manner and we continue to seek ways to reduce and revalue our waste.”
The company told Newsweek it was careful to minimize excess stock.
“On the occasions when disposal of products is necessary, we do so in a responsible manner, and we continue to seek ways to reduce and revalue our waste,” Burberry said in a statement.


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- Microsoft has launched a website 'warning' users about Google's 'tactics'
- It warns Google reads every email sent by users, scanning for key words
- Internet giant then tailors adverts based on the contents of emails
- Google: 'No humans read emails - and we don't use sensitive information'
The software giant has launched an advertising campaign warning people that Google reads every email sent by users, scanning for key words to target advertising.
A survey carried out by Microsoft found that 83 per cent of people felt that this was an invasion of privacy, while 93 per cent thought there should be an 'opt out' option for Gmail users.Microsoft has now set up a website - keepyouremailprivate.com - to tell people how Google makes money from emails.
It says: 'Google goes through every Gmail that's sent or received, looking for keywords so they can target Gmail users with paid ads. And there's no way to opt out of this invasion of your privacy. '
who do you trust less .........


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It is well known that the production and consumption of plastic – across the globe – is wreaking serious havoc upon the environment. Plastic Free July® is a key initiative of the Plastic Free Foundation; beginning in 2011 as an ongoing campaign aimed at combatting the use of plastic, while providing solutions for a future without plastic. Every July, this important movement is highlighted. As part of our support for this amazing initiative, we had a courageous conversation with Climate and Energy Campaigner Thandile Chiyavanhu. Thandile is a custodian of environmental issues, providing answers pertaining to our questions around plastic legislation in South Africa. How you can sign their petition here and a range of great insight. We hope this conversations will encourage you to question the area you live in and assist in the fight against harming our beautiful planet.
Why is it important to drive a plastic-free landscape, especially in the context of Africa?
Plastic is a public health threat, studies are increasingly showing how bad it is for our health, and how we are exposed to it through ingesting microplastics in our food and water. Plastic lasts forever, it’s concerning to think we are consuming this product and what impact it may potentially have on our health. But what is worse is that it is communities that are most vulnerable, which usually comprise of people of colour, are impacted the waste by plastic. Whether it be the air population they are exposed to by working in production plants and incineration plants, or the heightened marketing of, mostly, poor plastic package in low-income communities. It is a mess, in every sense.
Are there any African countries that are advancing this pursuit?
Yes, most certainly! But, South Africa isn’t one of them. Instead, they are trying to profit off of the plastic pollution crisis, if anything. Countries like Rwanda and Kenya, however, have taken drastic and necessary steps in curbing plastic consumption. They have some of the most stringent plastic regulations in the world – and it shows in the improvement of their natural environments. These countries have recognised that the profits associated with the trade of plastic can never measure up to the cost of the public health threats posed by plastic and acted accordingly to safeguard the health of their people. It’s very exciting that Ghana is championing the proposed Global Plastic Treaty, and that West African leaders are talking about a regional plastic ban by 2025. South Africa, however, remains unconcerned about the improvements to quality of life South Africans could potentially enjoy with the adoption of robust plastic ban .
How can someone join or be a part of the Plastic campaign with Greenpeace?
We are in desperate need of support in trying to persuade the South African government to change its stance on the Global Plastic Treaty. Leaked documents suggest that they are planning to reject the treaty at the ministerial meeting to discuss the treaty scheduled for September. Hopefully, if we get a large enough number of people, they will succumb to the pressure and join the effort. You can sign our petition here.
Are you providing any alternative ideas in place of plastic waste?
The only real way to move away from plastic is for corporations to adopt reuse and refill models. In Africa, we’ve done so for decades before this consumerist culture was imposed on us. There was a time when this was the mainstay; a time when you purchased a bottle of Coke in glass and you would return that bottle in exchange for a refill; or we used reusable diapers or menstrual products. For us, it’s about reclaiming our roots, and perhaps the world can learn something from it. There are definitely retailers that are testing our refill stations and other sustainable distribution models, but we need them to ramp up efforts, and introduce this model into our national retailers. These existing options can be rather expensive, but there are many affordable ways to include these practices into your life. There are many cultural practices that are intrinsically zero-waste and we need to re-claim those practices, quickly. It is already and emergency situation. We don’t have time to waste
More ideas for Conscious Living
If you love tips and ideas on Conscious Living, check out this interview featuring a beautiful Sustainable Basketry brand from Mozambique.


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Hauling Industry News
CES 2019: Freightliner Cascadia Trucks to Add Hands-Free Driving
Daimler Trucks North America will add hands- and foot-free driving capability to the latest version of its Freightliner Cascadia truck later this year, the company announced Monday at the start of the 2019 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
Additionally, the sister company to German passenger car builder Mercedes-Benz will invest $570 million to develop fully autonomous trucks over the next decade.
The features available in the 2019 Freightliner, the best-selling…


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The first beef to be produced using CH4 Global’s methane-reducing Asparagopsis feed supplement is being served to the public today, closing the international emissions-reducing loop.
Today’s event is the first step to continuous commercial supply of methane-reduced beef to the public anywhere in the world, and is a major milestone for CH4 Global’s methane-busting seaweed supplement.
CH4 Global became the first company in Australia to sign an offtake agreement for an Asparagopsis-based feed supplement when it signed a multi-million dollar deal to supply product to CirPro, an advanced food and protein manufacturer, for use with its commercial feedlot partners in South Australia.
CirPro’s beef is the first commercial production where cattle have been fed red seaweed (Asparagopsis armata and taxiformis), which drastically reduces methane emissions from cows, cattle and sheep by up to 90 per cent. Methane emissions from ruminants are a major contributor to global warming.
CH4 Australia’s General Manager Adam Main said Asparagopsis had progressed from being a proven methane-busting feed supplement to being incorporated into a feedlot operation, and now processed into beef products available to the market.
“These cattle produced 90 per cent less methane than their counterparts anywhere else in the world, taking a significant step towards lowering our global emissions,” Dr Main said.
“The beef we’re eating today from CirPro’s and its partner feedlot HBRural near Port Pirie, heralds the beginning of a new, South Australian-based supply chain that will inform and change the entire industry.”
CH4 Global’s ambitious methane-reduction plan is aiming within five years to have its Asparagopsis feed supplement being fed to 150 million cattle —10 per cent of the world total—and equivalent to a gigaton of CO2.
The supplement is formulated using Asparagopsis from both marine and tank cultivation and is being supplied by CH4 Global’s South Australian and New Zealand operations.
CH4 Global is currently in talks with three feedlots across Australia, which could see the industry rapidly expand to produce significantly more beef from cattle fed methane-reducing Asparagopsis supplements.
CirPro Chief Executive Reg Smyth said his company was excited to be the first to partner with CH4 Global to receive commercial supply of Asparagopsis supplement.
“This is an important time in our journey towards the creation of a carbon-neutral beef industry in Australia by letting everyone know that we can supply commercially-available, methane-reduced beef. It’s beneficial for the beef industry, it’s a first for Australia, it’s South Australia leading the world, and we are offering a choice for conscious consumers,” Mr Smyth said.
The market-leading beef will be served to media at the Weber Grill Academy at 10.30am this morning, ahead of an industry launch tonight where the low-methane beef will be gifted to
FoodBank SA & Central Australia, and Harvesting Potential.


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Cambridge Judge alumni collaborate to launch online platform mapping agribusiness in Africa.
AGRIinsight and Arcus Global have announced a new partnership to provide an online mapping platform to support agribusiness investment in the developing world, which will reduce the cost and risk of investing in Africa’s agriculture sector.
AGRIinsight, a member of the second cohort of Cambridge Judge Business School’s Cambridge Social Ventures programme, is a secure cloud-based platform designed to support the many organisations that work within the agricultural sector.
Arcus Global, co-founded by Denis Kaminskiy and Lars Malmquist (Cambridge MBA 2008), offers innovative cloud computing products and services designed specifically for the public sector.
Both AGRIinsight and Arcus Global benefitted from the support of charity Allia, which offers support through social innovation, social finance and workspace. Arcus is an anchor tenant in Allia’s Future Business Centre (FBC) building, while AGRInsight is using its incubator facility.
Arcus Global is building AGRInsight’s core platform in return for an equity stake in the business, a process made easier by sharing a working space in Allia’s FBC.
The platform launches in May 2016 and will drive new investment into African agribusiness by consolidating and mapping information in a quick, reliable and easy-to-use format. The platform aims to create new opportunities for income generation and profitable investments in this growing market, facilitating collaborations between investors, agribusinesses, farmers and suppliers.