text:
With the financial industry on the cusp of a significant shift to digital, ‘Will your job exist tomorrow?’ was the perfect question for CFTE’s Co-founder, Tram Anh, to put to an audience full of finance professionals at this year’s Money 20/20 conference in Copenhagen.
The response was overwhelming.
The rest of this article will explore the backdrop to Tram Anh’s talk at Money 20/20. It will attempt to put into context the changes that are occurring in the financial industry as a result of technological disruption.
Money 20/20 Europe
Money 20/20 Europe is a leading international conference. Thousands of professionals across various industries such as banking, advertising, media, investment, and technology attend the conference annually.
This years conference was held against a backdrop of record levels of investment in FinTech. According to a CBI Insights report, investment in FinTech is set to exceed 2016 levels.
With FinTech gaining momentum people were naturally eager to understand how it would impact their jobs.
Tram Anh delivers her message on jobs in Finance 2.0
Tram Anh was invited to Money 20/20 Europe speak about the impact of technology on jobs on the brand new Arena Stage.
The innovative stage is designed to enable maximum engagement from the audience. The stage utilises multiple screens on all sides, floor projections and circular seating to deliver an immersive experience for the audience.
Thus, it was the perfect stage (no pun intended!) for Tram Anh to deliver her message on the impact of technological disruption on jobs in finance.
Tram Anh’s talk was designed to be inquisitive and engaging.
She used polls and activities to get the crowd thinking more about how their roles within finance were beginning to changing with new technological innovations.
Even with a diverse crowd from a wide variety of backgrounds, a general consensus emerged. People agreed that technology was noticeably affecting their industries and consequently was also beginning to affect their jobs.
The audiences and their thoughts
A highlight from the talk was when she asked the audience:
What do you think your job will be in the next 5 years?
- My job will disappear
- My job will stay the same
- My job will be significantly different
For the answer, she pulled the audience onto the stage with her and via projections onto the ground floor, she asked them to choose a segment that corresponded to the three choices she had given.
Most people seemed to think their jobs would definitely change as a direct result of technological advancements. Some were insistent that their job would remain totally unchanged, no matter what happened in tech.
Nobody thought his or her job would totally disappear – not a single person.
Was the audience correct in their assumptions (after all, they are all professionals… many senior managers or CEOs)?
Or were they being too optimistic about the security of their positions?
Learning lessons from History
As much as we would like to, we cannot look into the future for answers.
However, it is possible to reflect on past data to make accurate predictions. Many parallels can be drawn between the financial and advertising industries.
In the past 2 decades, advertising has gone through a technological revolution, which has reshaped the industry and redefined jobs. Tram Anh drew on this data to illustrate what is happening in Finance now.
The Disruption of Advertising
If one looks at the total advertising industry, it has undoubtedly transformed during the last 10 years.
Upon closer inspection, it is revealed that, while Internet advertising grew to around 5 times its initial size, print advertising collapsed, shrinking by around 60%.
Overall, the advertising industry is bigger today than 10 years ago.
As the Internet grew as a network, new digital technologies such as search engines grew with it, changing how readers accessed and consumed information.
People began to spend more time online consuming content, thus the emphasis shifted from print to new business models that leveraged the power of digital technology.
This led to a subsequent decline in the sale of books, newspapers, and magazines and gave birth to an ecosystem of innovative businesses that live online.
Online advertising grows
Businesses like the Huffington Post, WordPress and variety advertising technology platforms were born. Some print newspapers, like The Independent, have even become digital pure plays as they look to move with the times.
With a shift in the way content is consumed came a shift in the way advertisers had to sell products. Nowadays, Google alone makes more advertising revenue than the entire US Print Media, see figure 1.
This overview shows that even when an industry grows, certain sectors can still shrink. This, of course, has implications for employment.
Overall, the total number of jobs in advertising has decreased slightly but not by much, which could lead one to believe that jobs have remained fairly unchanged. However, as before, this macroscopic approach to analysing the data is very superficial.
New jobs created
What really happened was some jobs disappeared, others were transformed and some entirely new positions have emerged.
Demand for digital skills such as data analytics, SEO, social media has grown as advertisers now compete for the short attention spans of online readers and consumers.
Figure 2 above, highlights the decline in print jobs was almost entirely offset by an increase in online publishing roles.
It is also worth noting that these figures don’t take into account the number of jobs created in other verticals like AdTech and digital marketing, meaning in actual fact the total number of jobs increased.
In other words,
- Hundreds of thousands of jobs disappeared in newspapers,
- Hundreds of thousands of jobs were transitioned to a digital world
And many totally new jobs were created.
What does FinTech mean for your job?
What Tram Anh concluded was that innovation in financial technologies will likely lead to:
- Jobs Totally Changing: In the advertising industry, the technological revolution meant almost everybody had to adapt from print media to online media. In finance, most jobs will experience a similar transformation.
- Jobs Disappearing: Technology will, unfortunately, lead to whole sectors of finance becoming obsolete with certain job roles disappearing. Print advertising as a segment saw a massive decline and with it, many jobs disappeared.
- New Jobs Being Created: As demonstrated by the advertising industry example, technology creates jobs. Both within existing industries and in new adjacent sectors that are born of a need to service facilitate the growth new technology brings.
- Which roles? Some new job roles can be predicted, others less so. For example, the explosion of data is increasing demand for financial companies to better manage their data, thus we can fairly confidently predict that demand for data specific skills will increase. Other roles likely to emerge are harder to predict. But just as blogging and social media have flourished we can expect similar parallels to emerge in Finance 2.0
The inescapable fact is, change is already happening.
Take the number of Cash Equity traders in Goldman Sachs’ New York Office. In 2000, there were 600 but today, following advancements in Automation and AI, there are only 2.
Most of the people in finance are now beginning to become more aware of the technology-driven changes like these.
The next step is for professionals working in finance to take proactive steps to ensure that they are best positioned to benefit from these changes.
It was on this principle, to help finance professionals transition to Finance 2.0, that CFTE was founded.
The FinTech courses CFTE is developing have been designed to educate and empower professionals to seize the opportunity technology creates.
For more information, register with us here.
Follow us on social media for the latest CFTE updates
In order not to miss any details, offers and events related to the launch of our new FinTech course, follow us on: LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook.


text:
When Google launched the Pixel 3, one of its key features, which eventually spread to other Pixels and Android phones, was Digital Wellbeing. The feature was intended to help users become aware of their smartphone use and detach when necessary. It turned out that it partly accomplished the latter by reducing Pixel phones’ battery life, unintentionally, of course. Google has finally spoken up and refutes users’ observations but will roll out some changes to improve the Pixel’s battery life in some other way.
It’s unclear by now who really “discovered” the fix but users all over the Internet are testifying that they gained hours of battery life just by disabling Digital Wellbeing. The commonly accepted theory is that the app may have a bug that is draining the battery more than it should while it monitors the phone’s use and resources.
Google promised to investigate the matter and now says there are no performance issues with the Digital Wellbeing app. That said, it did see some unrelated problems that could be affecting the Pixel’s performance. Those will be rolling out soon, probably in the next monthly update.
That statement, however, doesn’t seem to be flying with users. Many insist that simply turning off Digital Wellbeing, without changing anything else, has resulted in substantial improvement in battery life and even in performance. They find it impossible to believe the app isn’t to blame and some have even asked why it’s not possible to uninstall it.
Then again, Google knows its proprietary code better than users and those issues it noted might not be in Digital Wellbeing but could be causing it to act awry anyway. We’ll have to wait for those changes to land to find out if that’s really the case.

domain: news


text:
One of the biggest shifts seen in the stock market over the past 20 years is the increasing supremacy of technology stocks. Roughly two decades ago, General Electric and ExxonMobil were the pinnacle of market caps, valued at $319 billion and $283 billion, respectively.
Now, the current market leaders help illustrate the ongoing secular shift. Technology leaders Apple and Microsoft are the top dogs, with market caps of $2.76 trillion and $2.47 trillion, respectively, at this writing. Additional evidence abounds, as six of the 10 largest market caps belong to industry-leading technology companies.
Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have been the primary catalysts driving the stock market higher so far this year and will likely fuel the next cohort of “trillionaires.” Here are my predictions for two AI growth stocks that will be swept up by this secular tailwind and join this exclusive society over the next 10 years — and maybe much sooner.
Amazon (AMZN -2.99%) currently has a market cap of $1.46 trillion, and many believe it’s just a matter of time before the e-commerce giant joins the $2 trillion club. To reach that benchmark, the stock would need to increase by roughly 37% from Tuesday’s closing price. That works out to about 4% gains annually over the coming decade, a bar it should clear with ease.
It’s worth noting that the company nearly achieved this in July 2021, with a market cap of roughly $1.9 trillion, before economic headwinds took a toll. Amazon then earned the dubious distinction of becoming the first company in U.S. history to lose more than $1 trillion in market cap over the next 18 months.
Yet there are numerous catalysts that could fuel its growth. Weakening consumer spending in the midst of a historic downturn slowed its online retail growth to a crawl. There are signs the economy has finally turned the corner, which could, in turn, boost the company’s e-commerce sales. Cooling inflation will likely spark additional consumer spending.
Last year, Amazon represented roughly 38% of e-commerce sales in the U.S., more than its next 14 competitors combined. As the leading provider of online retail, it is well positioned to profit from the recovery.
Then there’s the matter of cloud computing. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the worldwide leader in cloud infrastructure services, controlling about 30% of the market, according to data compiled by market analyst firm Canalys.
Many businesses reined in cloud spending in response to the recent economic unpleasantness, but if the worst is over (and many believe it is), spending will resume, profiting Amazon along the way.
The emergence of generative AI earlier this year, which promises vast gains in productivity, has sparked a mad dash to adopt this next-generation technology. But the cost to create these systems and the large language models that power them is prohibitive to all but the most well-funded companies.
Cloud providers, including AWS, were quick to recognize the opportunity and are scrambling to make generative AI available on their platforms. There will no doubt be a commensurate uptick in cloud spending to access these AI algorithms, boosting Amazon’s fortunes.
While estimates vary, even conservative forecasts suggest there are trillions of dollars at stake. Analysts at Morgan Stanley suggest generative AI represents a $6 trillion opportunity, while Goldman Sachs pegs the market at almost $7 trillion. Whatever the case, accelerating adoption of AI will no doubt result in a commensurate uptick in cloud spending, which will be a boon to Amazon.
The rebound in digital retail along with the recovery of cloud spending (with a boost from AI) should give Amazon all the traction it needs to join the $2 trillion club, once and for all.
2. Meta Platforms
Meta Platforms (META -3.66%) currently has a market cap of $776 billion, and while some believe the stock will inevitably join the $2 trillion club, not everyone is in agreement.
The stock would need to increase by roughly 258% from Tuesday’s closing price to reach that mark, which amounts to approximately 10% gains annually over the next 10 years. Given the stock price increase of 570% over the past decade, that’s certainly within the realm of possibility.
One of the biggest hurdles is Meta’s recent price spike, with the stock gaining more than 150% so far this year (as of this writing). Driving those gains are Meta’s ambitious AI plans.
The company is working to develop an advanced generative AI system to rival that of OpenAI’s ChatGPT, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal. Meta is using Nvidia‘s H-100 AI processors, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s goal is for the system to be open source. Making the model free to all users would encourage collaboration, which could, in turn, supercharge development in the space.
Meta Platforms has a long history of employing AI technology to leverage the capabilities of its social media platforms. Its uses include targeted advertising, identifying subjects in photos, and surfacing the most-relevant content for users, among other functions.
Even without the AI connection, it’s likely Meta Platforms would make its way into the $2 trillion club, based on the dominance of its social media platforms. More than 3 billion people visit one of Meta’s quintet of apps each day: Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Threads. This consistent audience fuels the company’s digital advertising business, which generated revenue of roughly $114 billion last year, despite the worst downturn in more than a decade.
Meta’s expanding social media empire and the rebound in digital ad revenue should provide plenty of resources to help the company achieve its AI ambitions, giving it the fuel it needs to join the $2 trillion club.
Randi Zuckerberg, a former director of market development and spokeswoman for Facebook and sister to Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Danny Vena has positions in Amazon.com, Apple, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon.com, Apple, Goldman Sachs Group, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.


text:
Trying to get a little fun back into the weekdays? Microsoft has just announced its ‘Xbox Live Arcade Wednesday Party in a Box' deal. Microsoft is willing to shell out a free Papa John's pizza, 1000 free Xbox Live points, and free downloads of your favorite 80's tunes.
The official Xbox Live website says, "We're so excited about the great Xbox Live Arcade titles coming out this summer that we're gonna party like it's … um … 1986! Yep, we're inviting our friends over, cranking the Top Gun soundtrack (come on, you KNOW you wanna go back to the Danger Zone ), ordering pizza, and playing retro Xbox Live Arcade games."
All Microsoft asks in return is pictures of the party, and to tell them who was there and what went down. This offer is only good while supplies last and to apply send an email to email@example.com with the subject of ‘Arcade Party'. Your gamertag must be included in the body and is only available in the US.
Stay here at MyGamer.com for the latest news at it arrives.


text:
Ian Rogers, LVMH’s chief digital officer: ‘We sell culture, and the culture’s changed’
Ian Rogers turned heads in 2015 when he jumped ship from leading iTunes at Apple to join LVMH as its first chief digital officer. LVMH recently rolled out a multi-brand e-commerce site called 24 Sèvres, inspired by the company’s upmarket department store, Le Bon Marché. Digiday caught up with Rogers on the endeavor and the future of fashion brands.
Do fashion companies need to be tech companies?
It’s more about making sure technology is a prominent part of what you do. When the primary way you’re engaging with your customer is traditional marketing channels and physical stores, software is the back office. Once you’re building websites, apps and the customer experience online, software has to be more central.
When you joined LVMH, did you look directly to your experience in the music industry?
The music business is always going to be a reference point for me. Luckily, a lot of the same things do apply. I’ve always been interested in changing culture. At LVMH, we sell culture as a prerequisite to selling product — if you don’t buy the culture of the brand you’re not going to buy the product. The way that we communicate that culture has fundamentally changed due to the Internet.
A lot of people think LVMH has been late to the game digitally, but you’ve said before that being an early adopter isn’t always a good thing. Why is that?
For luxury, there’s very little value to being the early adopter. You don’t want to be on the luddite side of the curve, which traditionally is where luxury has been. The right place to be is just across the chasm, just before mainstream. The trick is to understand consumer behavior with these technologies deeply enough so that you can jump on board just as they’re crossing that chasm and heading toward mainstream adoption.
Should luxury companies take notes from Amazon?
Luxury companies need to offer something that Amazon does not, both online and off. The Lumière brothers invented moving pictures, but they didn’t invent narrative film. There were 30 years between the technology’s debut and the advent of the creative medium. That’s where we are today with luxury shopping. The store of the future doesn’t exist yet. The people who have spent their careers building retail at LVMH have a better shot at inventing it than technologists do. Technologists are building tools for price and convenience, but the people at LVMH know about customer experience.
How will 24 Sèvres differentiate?
People go to multi-brand sites every day for their curation of what’s new and hot. They want a point of view. Paris, which is so meaningful as a fashion curator, is really missing from the online multi-brand space today. Our selection is particularly Parisian and Rive Gauche. You see lots of sites advertising faster service, but we wanted to bring what’s special about Le Bon Marché to people where they are.
But it’s a crowded space.
Everybody out there is doing the same thing that Natalie Massenet [founder of Net-a-Porter] pioneered in 1999: a combination of editorial and commerce. That was appropriate at the time, but the internet has evolved to be a visual medium.
What will success look like to you and the 24 Sèvres team in year one?
Whether we have satisfied customers who are coming back to the site. Clayton Christensen, who wrote “The Innovator’s Dilemma,” talks about this idea of being “patient for growth, impatient for profit.” You can be patient for getting huge, but you have to focus on is finding a winning formula. When you find that, you can scale. For us, the question is: Do customers love it? If so, there’s plenty of time to grow that.
How gamers’ engagement with short-form video is changing
To better understand how modern gamers are engaging with short-form video, Digiday teamed up with Gamesight to pull key points from an exclusive report on gamers’ shifting video consumption preferences.
Inside SAG-AFTRA’s new deal with video platform Cameo
SAG-AFTRA and Cameo, the celebrity platform that connects talent and fans, have announced a new agreement that allows members to cover brand deals through Cameo for Business (C4B). Brands will be able to access more fan-favorite professional talent through SAG-AFTRA's health and pension plans.
Digiday+ Research: Extreme pessimism about the end of the cookie levels off among agencies
Agencies are still feeling out who they think the winners and losers will be as the end of the third-party cookie draws near, but they're doing so with notably less pessimism than they have in the past.
SponsoredWhat the measurement and currency discussion really means to TV advertisers
This article is also available in Spanish. Please use the toggle above the headline to switch languages. Visit digiday.com/es to read more content in Spanish. Ali Mack, head of TV and agency, Experian Major streaming video providers have recently made headlines by adopting new currencies for ad measurement, threatening Nielsen’s long-standing TV ratings monopoly. NBCUniversal, […]
Jose Cuervo Tequila celebrates UFC’s 30th anniversary with Kevin Holland, Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson ads
Mexico-based Jose Cuervo, is the first tequila brand to be a direct advertiser of the UFC with spots featuring UFC fighters Kevin Holland, a Cuervo ambassador, and Stephen "Wonderboy" Thompson.
Benjamin Moore is using OOH near big-box retailers to say their paint isn’t there, encouraging people shop local
The 140-year-old paint brand wants to make sure people know that it is only available at local retailers.


text:
Service Properties Trust Completes Sale of 10 Hotels
NEWTON, MA—Service Properties Trust (SVC) has completed the previously announced sale of 10 Hawthorn Suites by Wyndham branded hotels with 1,212 rooms and a net carrying value of $30.4 million for an aggregate sales price of $41.0 million, excluding closing costs. The proceeds from the sale will be used for the repayment of debt.
SVC also entered a short-term lease and revised purchase agreement for its five remaining Hawthorn Suites branded hotels with the same buyer. SVC has agreed to sell these five hotels with 430 rooms and a net carrying value of $10.7 million for $22.3 million and expects to complete the sale of these hotels by the end of the second quarter of 2021.
“We are pleased to have reached this restructured agreement for the sale and lease of these 15 hotels,” said John Murray, president/CEO, SVC. “In addition to closing on the sale of 10 hotels, we will receive lease income for the five remaining hotels at an 8% return until these hotels are sold, which we expect to occur in the first half of 2021.”


text:
Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla Inc., has informed his company that all new hires will have to go through him for personal approval, including temporary employees such as contractors, according to a report.
In an email sent on Monday, Musk instructed executives to send him a list of hiring requests every week, according to Reuters. He urged them in the email, however, to “think carefully” before sending the requests, per the report.
“No one can join Tesla, even as a contractor, until you receive my email approval,” Musk said in the email.
The email comes ahead of Tesla’s annual shareholders meeting on Tuesday.
TESLA OWNERS SUE CLAIMING SOFTWARE UPDATE KILLED EV BATTERY LIFE
The meeting will be held at the company’s headquarters in Austin, Texas.
TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY PETE BUTTIGIEG SAYS TESLA SHOULDN’T CALL ITS DRIVING SYSTEM ‘AUTOPILOT’
Musk, also the owner of Twitter, recently announced he would be stepping down as the company’s CEO and has named former NBCUniversal advertising chief Linda Yaccarino as the platform’s new chief executive.
Musk said hiring Yaccarino and allowing her to take over control of the business side of Twitter would free up his schedule for more time running Tesla.
The billionaire, who also owns and operates SpaceX, continues to schedule launches ahead of a goal to return man to the Moon.
Read the full article here


text:
Though IT professionals frequently prioritize patching software vulnerabilities, end users are often the weakest link in the security chain. Social engineering attacks–typically in the form of phishing–continue to be a popular mode of attack for cybercriminals, especially for those targeting individual users rather than large corporations. Email security firm Vade Secure published on Wednesday their list of the most-impersonated brands in the Q4 2018 Phishers’ Favorites report.
From the report, the 10 most impersonated brands in North America are:
- Bank of America
Given the ubiquity of Windows and Office, as well as other services including the Outlook.com webmail service and Xbox Live, Microsoft’s position at the top of the list should come as no surprise. Likewise, the report points to how lucrative such attacks are, as a single login provides complete access to a treasure trove of data stored in Office 365.
Office 365 phishing is also increasingly part of multi-phase attacks, in which “hackers harvest Office 365 credentials and then use those legitimate accounts to send spear phishing emails targeting those users’ colleagues or business partners,” according to the report. Because these attacks utilize legitimate accounts, they are an order of magnitude more difficult for security products to detect.
SEE: Job description: Information security analyst (Tech Pro Research)
Netflix jumped from third to second place in Q4, as users were targeted just ahead of the holidays with phishing attacks taking advantage of consumers, with with attacks spiking on Christmas. Likewise, the recent Netflix price hike provided an opportunity for phishers to attack users.
Financial services firms PayPal, Bank of America, and Chase round out the top five. Banks and money transfer services like PayPal are often easy targets due to the quick payoff of hacking these accounts. Nine of the 25 brands cited in the full report are in the financial services industry.
Global logistics firm DHL is in sixth place, jumping three positions with a sizable 24.5% in phishing attacks.
Facebook dropped one position to seventh place, with a 39% decrease in attacks. Given the increased scrutiny the company is giving to platform users in light of the Facebook data privacy scandal, as well as the lack of direct financial incentive for targeting Facebook accounts, the de-emphasis of Facebook among phishers is understandable. Conversely, LinkedIn jumped four positions with a 15.8% increase in attacks.
Cloud services Docusign and LinkedIn filled the eighth and tenth positions, respectively.
For those curious, Adobe was thirteenth on the list, Google placed fourteenth, and Apple placed fifteenth. Yahoo fell four positions to twenty fourth, a trend that appears likely to continue as popularity of the legacy search engine wanes.
The big takeaways for tech leaders:
- Microsoft is the brand hackers are most likely to impersonate in phishing attacks, due in part to Office 365. –Vade Secure, 2019
- Financial services firms represented nine of the 25 brands most likely to be spoofed by phishers. –Vade Secure, 2019


text:
The global fast food giant has partnered with Meat.The End in order to manifest menu items that satiate tummies with much less negative climate impact.
MSG is a common savory flavor enhancer. It is found naturally in tomatoes and cheese. It is recognized as safe by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and is not banned anywhere in Europe.
Fast food is convenient but devastating to the body and linked to a higher risk of dementia, with health damage passed on even to babies.
The widespread lockdowns and restaurant closures of 2020 drastically changed daily routines and how people accessed food and alcohol.
The worldwide convenience store chain is coming to Israel. Unlike Israeli convenience stores, 7-Eleven offers an experience with fast food, Slurpees and a different product experience.
McDonald's made a similar attempt to bring McFalafel to its Israeli restaurants in 2011, but quickly removed it from the menu after it didn't catch on.
In recent years, the local market for great burgers has really opened up, and there are so many great options, especially around the Mahaneh Yehuda shuk.
McDonald's has implemented contactless pickup and delivery of Big Macs, fries and other menu items across the China as the outbreak has unfolded.
The beloved Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) restaurant chain will be returning to Israel for a fourth attempt at breaking into the fast-food market.
Economists have compared the price of a Big Mac worldwide to gauge the relative strength of currencies - but the results should be taken with a pinch of salt.


text:
Ralph Lauren's (RL) stock declined Tuesday although the company reported adjusted fiscal first-quarter earnings per share that beat consensus estimates.
The New-York based apparel maker reported first-quarter adjusted earnings of $1.77 a share vs. $1.54 a year ago and better than the consensus estimate of $1.67.
The American mid-range to luxury retailer said first-quarter total comparable-store sales in constant currency were up 2% vs. a loss of 3% in the same quarter last year. Analysts polled by Bloomberg called for a 3.2% gain.
Ralph Lauren said its home market saw softer digital performance in the quarter but its digital business refocus has been paying off overseas. International online sales surged nearly 10% last quarter, fueled by a 22% spike in Europe.
The company saw stronger-than-expected sales in Asia (up 5% vs. 4.5% consensus), but missed in North America (up 1% vs. 2.3% consensus) and Europe (up 4% vs. 4.5% consensus).
Improving it "North America business against a more volatile backdrop" is the goal, said President Patrice Louvet in a statement.
The company expects second-quarter revenue growth of 1% in constant currency. Second-quarter operating margins ex-foreign exchange is expected to be up 40 to 60 basis points.
The stock was trading at $107.53, down 3.36%.
Save 76% with our Summer Break Sale. Subscribe to our premium site Real Money and become a smarter investor! Click here today to sign up!


text:
The lights are on
Ubisoft shared some of its financial data recently that showed, thanks to help from long-terms sales on open-world games like Assassin's Creed III and Far Cry 3.
Covering a six-month period ending September 30, Ubisoft showed $271.5 million in gross profits and $393.8 million is sales, both healthy increases compared to the same period in 2012.
Games published earlier this year, like Far Cry 3 and Assassin's Creed III, helped to fill out Ubisoft's backlog of games, which saw a 16% increase from 2012.
Ubisoft's CEO, Yves Guillemot, said the company is optimistic, but bracing for the next-generation of consoles in a statement accompanying the financial reporting. "We are confident in our capacity to rise to the short-term challenges posed by the transition phase, thanks to the very high quality of our games, which, combined with the upcoming arrival of the next-generation consoles and the traditional ramp-up of sales during the Christmas season will trigger positive momentum towards the end of the year."
Guillemot also seemed to recognize that Ubisoft's success has open-world gaming to thank, at least in part, for the company's continued success. "Open world games are becoming ever-more popular with gamers. These creations give gamers the freedom of expression and immersive experiences that are now central to their expectations. This deep-seated market trend – which Ubisoft has fully embraced – is going to move up another gear when the next-generation consoles arrive."
Ubisoft's big open-world, cross-gen release, Watch Dogs, received a delay recently into the second quarter of 2014, which forced the publisher to change its financial forecast.
Our TakeThings are looking good for Ubisoft as it moves into the next generation of gaming. We'll have to wait and see if and how Watch Dogs' delay will affect the company, but right now, the Assassin's Creed publisher is as strong as ever. If I were them, I would use those profits to make a new Prince of Persia game.
Email the author Kyle Hilliard, or follow on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, and Game Informer.


text:
Professor: Signs Of Economic Life Still Exist
JACKI LYDEN, host:
In Chicago, 20-year-old Doug Pearson(ph) is growing up.
Mr. DOUG PEARSON: I used to go out to 7/11 a lot and just do stuff like that. I used to make a lot of dumb purchases, like if I go to, like, a Best Buy or something, and I really don't need to do that. It was fun at the time, and I still do that, but I cut it down.
LYDEN: And in Northern Virginia, Steve Jones(ph) and Dianne Burns(ph) are singing the same tune.
Mr. STEVE JONES: Any kind of expenditure that can be put off is being put off.
Ms. DIANNE BURNS: I will be more careful about my spending, more careful about vacations, and probably limit them or not have them at all. I don't go out to eat as often. I eat at home, and then my husband and I might go to a movie as opposed to dinner and a movie.
LYDEN: Ditto for Jim Nusto(ph) in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Mr. JIM NUSTO: You know, we don't go out as much. We try to look at where we're spending our money. It ends up being kind of a time when everyone needs to look carefully at what they're doing.
LYDEN: And these are the folks who are still employed. People are changing their behavior because of the dismal economic news and because of the sudden, life-altering developments that occurred in January. Six hundred thousand jobs lost in one month alone. So why have companies cut back so dramatically?
Dr. SIMON JOHNSON (Economics, MIT; Co-founder, BaselineScenario.com): Well, the fundamental problem is that people don't want to spend money.
LYDEN: That's Simon Johnson, professor at MIT and co-founder of BaselineScenario.com, a global economy Web site.
Dr. JOHNSON: We started with the credit problem in the fall, and the banks were in trouble. Everyone remembers that, and that is still with us to some important degree.
But even more important is the fact that consumers have - 70 percent of the U.S. economy is consumption, things that you and I go out and buy for ourselves, for our households, for our kids - people are cutting back and everybody, rich people, middle-income people, poor people are all cutting back because they're scared. They decided they need to rebuild their balance sheets. That means they want to save a bit more and have a bit less debt.
And if everyone decides to save, say 5 percent, just 5 percent on average, of their household income in the United States, that is a big shock, a big change, and that's going to be a big recession.
LYDEN: It's hard to spend when you've just been laid off, or you're afraid you're going to be laid off at any moment. An unemployment rate of 7.6 percent is sobering, but it's not the only number out there. The Wall Street Journal points out that when part-time and underemployed workers are added in, as well as those who've stopped looking for work, the number jumps up to 13.9 percent. You can't blame consumers for being nervous, but the consequences of that anxiety are grave.
Dr. JOHNSON: There are people out there, optimistic, official people who are saying it's a V-shape, so sharp recovery. There are other people saying it's a U-shape, so you come back up later in 2009, maybe 2010. And there are other people, I'm afraid, rather a bit more like me, who are saying it could be Japan in the 1990s, where it's L-shaped. You go down and you stay flat, and then you lose a decade because lots of people around the world want to save more; very few people or firms want to spend more; and very few governments are in a situation where they can spend more. Pretty much the only exceptions are the U.S. government and the Chinese government.
LYDEN: Now, Japan had deflation for a decade, but didn't it also have the benefit of a robust global economy, charged in part by the U.S.?
Dr. JOHNSON: That's right. The one bright spot of Japan throughout the 1990s was exports. The global economy was strong, the Japanese currency was weakened. And so, they always had some job creation there, and they had profits and so on. If the U.S. has this problem and the rest of the world is booming, we could be like Japan. If the entire world has - everyone is trying to save and not sufficient spending, we can't export to Mars to get out of this. We're all going to go down together.
LYDEN: Actually, the U.S. economy hasn't ground to a halt. Some hospitals and schools have hiring freezes, but the high points in this week's jobs report were education and health care, fields that added a total of 54,000 new jobs in January.
The darker the clouds, the brighter the bright spots. I asked Simon Johnson who else is hiring.
Dr. JOHNSON: There's a range of people out there like Apple, great technology story, Amazon is hiring, consulting firms like McKenzie are hiring, United Airlines is hiring. So there are companies within particular industries who are doing well, they've got a good business and who need people.
LYDEN: Like Dreyer's ice cream, opening up a new plant in Laurel, Maryland.
Ms. DORI BAILEY (Director of Consumer Communications, Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream): I'm Dori Bailey from Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream, known in the East Coast as Edy's. We're hiring about a hundred new employees. We're looking for ice cream makers, ice cream movers - those are people that work in our warehouse - and also maintenance folks to help us keep up our equipment because we have so many new products in 2009 that we're launching.
LYDEN: Bailey says sure, people are eating out less, which means they're buying more ice cream to take home. So in 2009, Dreyers has to expand to meet increased demand.
Ms. BAILEY: We'll have Haagen-Dazs ice cream in cups. We'll also have a new, Skinny Cow truffle bar, and that's a 100-calorie, low-fat ice cream bar drizzled with chocolate. It's really excellent.
LYDEN: Another growth area, outside the freezer, the vegetable garden. The CEO of Burpee Seeds, George Ball, says business is booming.
Mr. GEORGE BALL (CEO, Burpee Seed): Two years of 20 to 30 percent increase - this is, is astonishing growth, it's incredible.
LYDEN: The Lubbock, Texas fire department is opening up a new station. In Omaha, Nebraska, a home health-care company is recruiting new nurses' aides. Some biotech companies are growing by leaps and bounds. Google and State Farm Insurance continue to flex their muscles.
And the biggest hiring push right now could be the 2010 Census. They are planning to hire about 1.4 million people, all told. Recruiting assistant Marjorie Short(ph) in the Northern New England district is testing 5,000 people for 1,500 jobs. They'll be the first wave of people who knock on your door with a handheld computer to count you. And many of them are the face of this new economy.
Ms. MARJORIE SHORT (Recruiting Assistant, Northern New England District, 2010 Census): I'm seeing a very large uptick in very highly qualified people who are out of work and who need jobs, people with, you know, Ph.Ds and people who are attorneys and retired corporate executives and people with master's degree, teachers.
LYDEN: Pockets of growth, of course, do not a robust economy make. So we're back where we started. Can the stimulus package the Senate hammered out last night change the shape of this recession, the L shape that economist Simon Johnson warns about?
Dr. JOHNSON: Well, I think if you really got the package right - of course, everyone says this - enough stimulus and sort out the banking system, which is really very tough, and deal with housing, you could climb out of the L sooner. So, how long does the L last? Does it have your lost decade? No. Could it be a lost half decade? Certainly. Could we just have two or three pretty dismal years and then recover? Yes, as long the rest of the world doesn't completely disintegrate around us while we're having this little hiatus.
LYDEN: So, L becomes, maybe, a U?
(Soundbite of laughter)
Dr. JOHNSON: A bathtub-shaped recession is what one of my colleagues is calling it because the question is which way you're going in the bathtub - the long way or the short way, and how slippery are the sides when you try to get out.
LYDEN: As long as we don't go down the drain. We spoke to Simon Johnson, professor at MIT. And for more of his succinct analysis, go to npr.org, and subscribe to our Planet Money podcast.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.


text:
SINGAPORE — December 15, 2020 — Preparations for the seventh edition of ITMA ASIA + CITME are underway as scheduled. Following the completion of the stand allocation exercise, some 1,650 exhibitors have started to receive their certificate of admission and stand details from December 14, 2020.
Despite the ongoing global coronavirus pandemic, the combined show continues to receive the support of exhibitors from 25 countries, including the world’s most established textile machinery brand names.
Among the major exhibitors allocated space are: CHTC, Danis Makina, Electro-Jet, Eton Systems, Fong’s, Groz-Beckert, Itema, Jeanologia, Karl Mayer, MS Printing Solutions, Muratec, Oerlikon Barmag, Picanol, Reggiani Macchine, Rieter, SDC Enterprises, Santoni, Saurer, Savio, Shima Seiki, Staubli, Toyota, Tsudakoma, Vandewiele and Vanwyk.
Dr. Dirk Burger, CEO/CSO of Truetzschler Group, said, “We have never missed any ITMA ASIA + CITME exhibition since its first edition was in Shanghai in 2008. While this has been a difficult year for everyone, we are glad that the exhibition will take place next year so that we can connect with our customers face-to-face. After all, the combined show is the most significant platform in Asia and so we still need to have a consistent presence in this important market.”
Fellow exhibitor Jordi Juani, Asia Division Director of Jeanologia, agreed, “ITMA ASIA + CITME is one of the most relevant shows where we release the latest information on our products and services. Since we are focused in the Asian market, we want to be closer than ever to our customers, attending the show and giving extra support through our China team and our new hub in Hong Kong.”
The show owners, CEMATEX and Chinese partners – the Sub-Council of Textile Industry, CCPIT (CCPIT-Tex), China Textile Machinery Association (CTMA) and China Exhibition Centre Group Corporation (CIEC), are pleased with the firm support and scale of the exhibition.
Ernesto Maurer, president of CEMATEX, explained, “The pandemic might have disrupted the world but exhibitors are eager to resume their marketing efforts. Therefore, the show has not suffered a significant change in support. While there have been some concerns about international business travel from some quarters, the combined show is still gearing up for a mega showcase.”
Wang Shutian, Honorary President of China Textile Machinery Association (CTMA) concurred, “Due to the global epidemic, some overseas participants have adjusted their exhibition plans. Still, we will have the presence of internationally renowned textile machinery manufacturers. Once conditions permit, we will be embarking on roadshows to promote the exhibition.”
ITMA ASIA + CITME will take place June 12-16, 2021, at the National Exhibition and Convention Centre (NECC) in Shanghai. It will be held over 6 halls with a gross exhibition space of 170,000 square metres. It is organized by Beijing Textile Machinery International Exhibition Co Ltd and co-organized by ITMA Services. Japan Textile Machinery Association is a special partner of the show.
The last ITMA ASIA + CITME combined show in 2018 welcomed the participation of 1,733 exhibitors from 28 countries and economies and registered a visitorship of over 100,000 from 116 countries and regions.
Posted December 15, 2020
Source: CEMATEX, CCPIT-Tex, CTMA & CIEC


text:
America's biggest internet provider, AOL, is revamping itself in a bid to woo more advertising revenue.
As thousands of the company's 22 million subscribers steadily decamp elsewhere to cheaper and faster internet services, AOL is hoping a new shopping site and a restyle of its .com website will boost income from advertisers, who are generally eager to spend online.
The in-store.com shopping site (minus the AOL branding) offers consumers, and more importantly the millions not in the AOL fold, help in finding a particular product through its 'pinpoint' service. The company hopes it will bring in both ad and ecommerce revenue.
A similar strategy has been followed with the imminent transformation of the website, which will feature free music and editorial content from Time Warner magazines.
Time Warner's vice chairman, Don Logan, who oversees the America Online division, says: "We have the opportunity to deliver sustainable growth over the next several years. If we don't do it, it's a failure of execution on our part."
Data sourced from Washington Post Online; additional content by WARC staff


text:
Related News & Articles
Producer hopes to be able to show something at E3 next year.
No date offered by the Nintendo of America president.
Will provide greater control in sword combat.
Miyamoto does his best to keep Zelda hype from spiralling out of control.
The Wii's premier launch title has already moved beyond the one million sold milestone in the US.
Nintendo's killer app makes its debut on the Wii, and doesn't disappoint.
Nintendo has confirmed that The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess for the GameCube will be released via the normal retail channels.
Nintendo has revealed that the only way to get hold of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess in Japan is via its online store.
Nintendo UK has confirmed that The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess will still be released on the GameCube in the UK.
The long wait is almost over, but is the Wii the right platform for Link?


text:
- Subscribe NowLimited Time Offer
Sign Up for the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal Afternoon Edition Newsletter
Send this story to a friend
ATK buys tactical gear maker Blackhawk
- Katharine Grayson
- Staff Writer
Alliant Techsystems Inc. (ATK) said Monday it has bought Blackhawk Industries Products Group, a maker of tactical equipment for the military, law enforcement and other markets.
ATK didn't disclose terms of its deal to buy Norfolk, Va.-based Blackhawk.
Eden Prairie-based ATK, which makes weapons and aerospace systems, said in a press statement that the deal will allow it to further expand its presence in the tactical gear market. Last year, ATK (NYSE: ATK) bought Eagle Industries Unlimited Inc., a Fenton, Mo.-based manufacturer of tactical equipment.
"The acquisition of Blackhawk supports our strategy of expanding into adjacent lanes while leveraging ATK's existing core competencies to deliver efficient growth and [earnings per share]," said Mark DeYoung, ATK's CEO and president, in a press statement.
firstname.lastname@example.org | (612) 288-2106
- Most popular
- Target CIO resigns in wake of data breach
- Mall of America closes on financing for expansion
- Target's new dress code dos and don'ts (Video)
- Total Wine owner slams efforts to thwart Minnesota expansion
- CEO of tech firm ILM Professional Services dies
- Seafood chain plans West End restaurant
- Wells Fargo buys Minneapolis towers for $217 million
- Ryan plans pitch, Mortenson plans party
- Famous Dave's fires president; Ex-Buca CEO is leaving board
- Target loosens its dress code
- Account Executive, Premium Seating Minnesota Timberwolves | Minneapolis, MN
- Accounts Payable Clerk The Goodman Group | Chaska, MN
- Registered Nurses - RN North Metro Surgery Center | Blaine, MN
- Macy's Rosedale Center, Roseville, MN: Retail Support Pricing Associate, Flex Team Macy's | Roseville, MN
- Senior Project Manager Technology Partners | Minneapolis, MN


text:
January 13, 2003 |
U.S. retail giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and British grocer J. Sainsbury each are expected to bid for Safeway Plc in what could become a three-way battle for Britain's fourth-largest supermarket chain, sources close to the situation said Sunday. Sainsbury is poised to bid about $4.8 billion for rival Safeway after another British grocer, William Morrison Supermarkets, agreed to a $4.25-billion all-stock deal to acquire Safeway last week. (Britain's Safeway is not associated with U.S.
August 28, 1998
* British retailer J. Sainsbury bowed to a threat of legal action from Nike Inc. by withdrawing from sale some unofficially obtained polo shirts that the giant U.S. company said are fakes.
April 20, 1994 |
Britain's biggest supermarket chain this week took on Coca-Cola Co., the world's most famous trademark, by launching its own brand of soft drink in what the country's media have dubbed a cola war. J. Sainsbury unveiled the look-alike Classic Cola in its 341 stores nationwide alongside familiar Coca-Cola cans from the U.S. soft-drinks giant. Sainsbury's brand boasts of "original American taste."
March 27, 2006 |
These are scary times for advertisers. New technologies such as digital video recorders are giving consumers the ability to avoid marketing messages, and that means the advertising of the future will have to do more than the advertising of today. It will no longer be enough for companies to interrupt television programs to tell people about products. They will need to produce communications of various kinds that are so entertaining or so helpful that consumers will seek them out.
March 27, 2004 |
Albertsons Inc., one of the nation's largest food and drug retailers, is getting a foothold in six New England states by buying the U.S. grocery business of British supermarket chain J. Sainsbury for more than $2.1 billion. The deal announced Friday would give Albertsons 202 Shaw's and Star Market stores and would raise its total holdings to more than 2,500 stores in 37 states.


text:
Reuters ) – Huawei has told Verizon that the US airline will pay more than 230 patents of Chinese telecoms maker's license and in total seek more than $ 1 billion, a person informed of the case said Wednesday.
Verizon was to pay to "solve the patent licensing issue," a Huawei Intellectual Property Licensing Executive wrote in February, the Wall Street Journal reported earlier. The patents cover network equipment for more than 20 of the company's suppliers, including large US technology companies, but these vendors would indemnify Verizon, the person said. Some of these companies have been contacted directly by Huawei, the person said.
The current patents range from core network equipment, cable device infrastructure to internet-by-thing technology, the Journal reported. The license fees for the more than 230 patents sought are more than $ 1
Huawei has been fighting the US government for more than a year. National security experts are worried that "back doors" of routers, switches, and other Huawei equipment may allow China to spy on US communications. Huawei has refused to help China spy.
Companies involved, including Verizon, have joined the US government and the conflict comes amid a growing feud between China and the United States. License fee requirements may be more about the geopolitical struggle between China and the United States than a demand for patent fees.
Huawei and Verizon representatives met in New York last week to discuss some of the patents in question and whether Verizon is using equipment from other companies that may violate Huawei patents.
Verizon spokesman Rich Young refused to comment "about this particular issue because it is a potential legal case."
However, Young said: "These issues are greater than just Verizon. Given the broader geopolitical context, any problem involving Huawei has implications for our entire industry and also raises national and international concerns."
Huawei and US Wireless operators T-Mobile US and AT&T did not respond to Reuters' comments requests. Sprint refused to comment.
The United States last month put Huawei on a blacklist that prevented it from doing business with US companies on a security basis without governmental approval, causing some global technology companies to cut the ties with the world's largest telecoms maker.
Washington is also seeking extradition of Huawei's Chief Financial Executive Meng Wanzhou from Canada after being arrested in Vancouver in December of December.
China has since pushed the pressure on Canada, stopped Canadian canola imports and in May suspended the permits of two large pork producers.
( Reporting of Arjun Panchadar in Bengaluru and David Shepardson in Washington; Editing Anil D & # 39; Silva, Sriraj Kalluvila and Sandra Maler )


text:
Rep. Dodge Presents ISBDC's EDGE Award to Local Business
STATEHOUSE - Today, Rep. Dick Dodge (R-Pleasant Lake) presented the Indiana Small Business Development Centers' (ISBDC) Economic Development and Growth through Entrepreneurship (EDGE) award to USCOMBATGEAR.com.
"It is great to have a businesses in the community be recognized by the state for their success," said Rep. Dodge. "Having a small young business in our community receive a distinguished award is a great indicator of our potential for economic growth."
Rep. Dodge, accompanied by Lt. Gov. Becky Skillman, presented USCOMBATGEAR.com, LLC, President James Nichols with the ISBDC's EDGE award for being an emerging small business.
USCOMBATGEAR.com, LLC, manufactures and supplies specialized weapon accessories to the U.S. Armed Forces and is located in Butler, Ind.
EDGE Award winners were chosen by the ISBDC's regional offices staff who have worked with the small business owners directly.
This is the second annual EDGE awards recognizing two ISBDC client companies from each of their 10 regions.
**Attached to the e-mail, from which this press release came, is a photograph of USCOMBATGEAR.com, LLC, with Rep. Dodge. From left to right: Lt. Gov. Becky Skillman, USCOMBATGEAR.com, LLC, President James Nichols, State Rep. Dick Dodge and Mrs. Nichols.**


text:
Discover one of our 28 local entrepreneurial communities »
Be the first to know as we launch in new countries and markets around the globe.
Interested in bringing MIT Technology Review to your local market?
Unsupported browser: Your browser does not meet modern web standards. See how it scores »
Move over, Rand McNally: Google Earth is becoming the standard tool for organizing geographical information.
Call centers might be able to teach “chat bots” a thing or two about passing the Turing Test.
Diesel from soybeans is a far better biofuel bet, research shows
Using carbon nanotubes as small electrodes might one day lead to safe and effective retinal implants.
Computer fans could get some relief from charged particles that create a cooling breeze.
The online auction giant wants developers and niche marketers to tie into its infrastructure, says eBay Research Labs’ senior director, Eric Billingsley.


text:
Asus has emerged as one of the chief players in the tablet market with its Transformer devices, and Hasbro isn't happy about it. According to PaidContent, the U.S. toy maker filed a lawsuit against Asus in a Los Angeles court last week, alleging that the Taiwanese firm is violating its intellectual property.
Hasbro is reportedly seeking both damages and an injunction that would bar sales of Asus' Transformer tablets. When inquiring about the lawsuit, PaidContent received this rather bellicose statement from Hasbro:
Hasbro continues to aggressively protect its brands and products and the specific actions we are taking today against Asus underscores yet again Hasbro's willingness to pursue companies who misappropriate our intellectual property for their own financial gain.
The site speculates that Hasbro might have a difficult case, since tablets and kids' toys aren't exactly easy to mix up. However, the recent Transformers film series has put the brand back in the limelight, and Asus might be pushing its luck by calling its latest tablet the Transformer Prime. The name conjures up not only the Hasbro franchise, but also the illustrious leader of the autobots.
I'd say Michael Bay and Shia LaBeouf have tarnished the Transformers franchise far more than Asus ever could, and they'll probably never face justice for their crimes. Alas, Hasbro has different priorities. (Thanks to TechCrunch for the link.)
|AMD reveals suitably massive Ryzen Threadripper packaging||54|
|GeForce 384.94 drivers are ready to break the law||0|
|Rumor: Specs of six-core Coffee Lake CPUs leak||24|
|Alphacool Eisblock HDX-2 and HDX-3 help M.2 SSDs beat the heat||12|
|Corsair Lighting Pro Expansion Kit lets builders turn up the lights||11|
|Gigabyte SA-SBCAP3350 puts formidable power on a single board||14|
|Adata D16750 power bank is tougher than the average juice pack||16|
|Deals of the week: fast memory, an AM4 motherboard, and more||18|
|Corsair RMx White Series PSUs take a walk on the snowy side||24|


text:
TradeExperettes webinar on the WTO Ecommerce Moratorium and Women, and the New Markets Lab Survey
The Chair of EFSA’s Legal Committee, Tendi Hlatshwayo of Ozow, represented us at the second TradeExperettes webinar on the “WTO Ecommerce Moratorium and Women”. The WTO moratorium refers to customs duties on electronic transfers. It is a global agreement that is renewed every 2 years – the next renewal comes up in March 2024. (See the lead article above). Readers will recall that this Newsletter has covered the issue many times since the UNCTAD “non-paper” by Mrs Banga, a researcher at UNCTAD, suggested that developing countries were losing billions of US$ in customs duties. The WTO, OECD and other bodies weighed into the debate, however, after some posturing, India, Indonesia and SA, signed up to the moratorium in 2022. The debate, however, continues – see above, the report on the AfCFTA Digital Protocol. Global interest has resulted in this webinar, and in a new survey which is being carried out by the New Markets Lab, an American think-tank which visited SA in July and met with both EFSA and EFA.
Become a member
Join the Ecommerce Forum South Africa and benefit from industry insights in South Africa and Africa.
Sign up to newsletter
Sign up to our newsletter and stay informed of the progress we are making at the Ecommerce Forum South Africa with government during Coronavirus.


text:
Staff Writer - CheersandGears.com
November 20, 2012
Here’s a question for you: How many platforms do Jaguar and Land Rover have? The answer is seven. Yes, seven platforms. They go as followed,
- Jaguar XF
- Jaguar XJ
- Jaguar XK/F-Type
- Land Rover Defender
- Land Rover Freelander (LR2)/Range Rover Evoque
- Land Rover Discovery (LR4)/Range Rover Sport
- Range Rover
So in a not surprising move, Jaguar and Land Rover is looking at cutting down their platforms from seven down to two to three as a way to save money.
Autocar reports that Jaguar-Land Rover is looking towards Volkswagen MQB platform as a case study to how do something like this.
“It won’t happen overnight. (Something like) VW’s MQB platform will take seven years to roll out across the models it will underpin,” said Jaguar’s global brand director, Adrian Hallmark.
William Maley is a staff writer for Cheers & Gears. He can be reached at email@example.com or you can follow him on twitter at @realmudmonster.


text:
DETROIT (WKOW) -- A big increase in sales means a big payday for General Motors.
The automaker reports its second quarter earnings nearly doubled to $2.5 billion. More than $1 billion is due to higher priced vehicles selling in North America.
It's the company's sixth straight quarterly profit.
5727 Tokay Blvd., Madison, WI 53719
News Tips: 608-273-2727 or email@example.com


text:
A minority owner of the Sacramento Kings is selling a 10 percent stake in the franchise, seeking to capitalize on the mushrooming values of professional sports teams, according to people familiar with the seller and his thinking.
In its annual ranking, Forbes in February valued the team at $1.1 billion, 15th in the 30-team National Basketball Association. Since then, the Houston Rockets sold for $2.2 billion, about 33 percent greater than the Forbes valuation. A stake sale in the Brooklyn Nets valued the team at $2.3 billion, 28 percent more than the Forbes estimate.
Former Houston Rockets and Astros President George Postolos, who is now a sports industry consultant, is representing the seller, according to the people, who asked for anonymity because the stake sale hasn’t been made public. Postolos and the Kings declined to comment.
It isn’t known which investor is selling the stake, which, because of its size, likely would come with a board seat.
Vivek Ranadive is the team’s managing partner. The other sizable stakeholders are Qualcomm Inc. Chairman Paul Jacobs and Raj Bhathal, founder of swimwear company RAJ Swim. A Qualcomm spokesperson said Jacobs isn’t selling his stake. An email sent to RAJ Swim’s corporate headquarters wasn’t immediately returned.
The Kings have climbed the NBA’s revenue list in the past year, lifted by the opening of the new Golden 1 Center. The arena sits in the middle of what’s called Downtown Commons, a collection of retail and entertainment venues part-owned by the team. This year, the arena has drawn more than 1.6 million customers who spent more than $71.5 million in the downtown area, according to analysts at Downtown Sacramento Partnership, a private, non-profit group.
Hall-of-Fame center Shaquille O’Neal also owns from 2 percent to 4 percent of the Kings, Forbes has said.


text:
In April, attendees of the Salone Internazionale del Mobile strolled the vast corridors of the 5.7-million-square-foot Fiera di Milano complex that began hosting the springtime furniture fair three years ago. While traveling to the Massimiliano Fuksas-designed facility in Milan’s outskirts, some may have noticed that a portion of their old stomping grounds, the Fieramilanocity, located near the city center, is now a construction site.
In 2004, CityLife, a consortium of French and Italian companies, won rights from Fondazione Fiera Milano to redevelop 2.7 million square feet of the massive 4.3-million-square foot exhibition center. The plan calls for a mixed-use mega-project containing residences, a museum, and office and retail space. Construction is scheduled for completion in 2014.


text:
According to the World Trade Organisation report on G20 trade measures like tariff increase, import ban, strict customer procedures, export duties have been introduced between mid-October and mid-May affected 2.8% of G20 trade. World Trade Organisation has also found evidence towards more open trade policies across sectors including the good, services, and intellectual property.
However, the WTO report also found evidence of steps towards more open trade policies across sectors, including goods, services, and intellectual property.
New import-facilitating measures, such as tariff reductions, the elimination of import taxes, and the reduction of export duties, covered an estimated $735.9 billion worth of trade, excluding policies relating to the pandemic.
This figure is the highest recorded since 2014 and is sharply higher than the $92.6 billion trade coverage of import-facilitating measures recorded during the previous monitoring period from May to October 2019.
“Historically high levels of trade-restrictive measures remain a source of concern, all the more so at a time when international trade and investment will be critical to rebuilding economies, businesses, and livelihoods around the world. That said, we also see some encouraging indications: not since 2014 have import-facilitating measures implemented during a single monitoring period covered more trade,” WTO director-general Roberto Azevêdo said commenting on the report.
The initial COVID-19 outbreak saw many governments introduce trade restrictions, over 90 percent of the export bans on medical products, such as surgical masks, gloves, medicine, and disinfectant. Since then, G20 economies have repealed 36 percent of these restrictions.
- Global Textiles2020.08.08CULTURE & COSTUMES OF THAILAND
- Fashion2020.08.06MUSTARD INDIAN LOOK
- Fashion2020.08.06Dazzling Haldi Look
- Fashion2020.08.06MUSTARD MOOD BOARD


text:
Other News »
Panasonic, Tesla to Build Big US Battery Plant
The companies announced the deal Thursday, but they did not say where in the U.S. the so-called gigafactory will be built.
HCL Reports 53.7 Percent Jump in Quarterly Net Profit
Following a July-June fiscal year, HCL said its consolidated Q4 net profit rose to Rs. 1,834 crore from Rs. 1,193 crore a year earlier.
The Growing Trend of Group Selfies, or Usies
The word - sometimes spelled usie, sometimes ussie - has been showing up in written material since at least April 2013, according to Vocabulary.com.
Microsoft Says Complies With Law in China Amidst Probe
"Microsoft complies with the laws and regulations of every market in which we operate around the world and we have industry leading monitoring and enforcement mechanisms in place to ensure this."
CVC Said to Be in Lead to Buy Epicor for More Than $3 Billion
CVC has so far prevailed over other buyout firms in the auction for Epicor, which is currently owned by private equity firm Apax Partners LLP.
Microsoft Says Government Officials Make Sudden Visit to China Offices
A spokeswoman for the company made the announcement on Monday, but declined to give any reason for the inspections.
Texas Governor's Startup Fund Is Not All It Seems
A closer look at the Texas Emerging Technology Fund, one of Rick Perry's signature initiatives, reveals that some of the businesses that received money are not all they seem.
Indian IT Industry Faces Gender Pay Gap of 29 Percent: Monster.com
The Monster Salary Index India IT Sector Report 2014 lists several other indices of comparative measurement between genders in the IT industry.
Commonwealth Games 2014 Opening Day Featured in Wednesday's Google Doodle
Commonwealth Games 2014 doodle can be found on the Google homepage across all Commonwealth countries.
Former Qualcomm Executive Pleads Guilty to Insider Trading
Prosecutors said Wang used nonpublic information to trade in Qualcomm shares in 2010 before a surprise dividend increase and stock repurchase.
More Other News »
Other Reviews »
Philips Hue LED bulbs review
Philips has produced the first kit of LED bulbs whose color and brightness can be wirelessly controlled from your iPhone.
More Other Reviews »
Other Features »
Inventors Struggle to Protect Patents in Africa
Personally Tech with Schneider Electric Country General Manager Nikhil Pathak
Bay Area Techies Ditch Phones and Tablets at 'Digital Detox' Camp
The Internship: Silicon Valley's Freshest Enjoy the Perks
Recent Stories »
Sentenced to 15 Years in Prison for Facebook Posts
Facebook Service Disrupted for Some Users
Windows 8.1 Loses Market Share for the First Time Since Release: Report
BSNL Reports Loss of Rs. 14,979 Crore in 2013-14; Prepares Revival Plans
Xolo Play 8X-1000 Smartphone With New Hive UI to Launch on August 6
Government Expected to Hold GSM, CDMA Spectrum Auction in February
Nokia May Rejoin Smartphone Market With Android Devices, Tip Job Listings
Virtual Friendships Thrive as Personal Connects Fade
Qi's New Wireless Charging Technology Can Charge From a Distance
Chinese Employees at Microsoft's Nokia Arm Protest Mass Layoffs
Read More »
In Mobiles and Tablets »
HTC J Butterfly
Karbonn Titanium S19
Nokia XL 4G
Maxx Mobile AXD21 MSD7 Smarty
Panasonic Eluga U
Micromax Canvas L
Samsung Guru Music 2
Samsung Metro 312
Samsung Galaxy Ace NXT
Samsung Galaxy Star Advance
Lava Iris 460
iBall Slide 3G 7345Q-800
Samsung Galaxy TabQ
Xiaomi Mi 3
Asus ZenFone 5
Motorola Moto E
Samsung Galaxy Core 2
Micromax Unite 2
Asus ZenFone 4 A450CG
HTC Desire 816
Gionee Elife S5.5
Asus ZenFone 4 A400CG
Nokia XL Dual SIM
Asus ZenFone 6
Gionee Elife E7 Mini
Micromax Canvas Knight
Lava Iris X1
Olympic Google doodles
Billionaire college dropouts
Mother's Day Google doodles over the years
Top 10 Google doodles of 2012
This Week In Tech - Week 16, 2012
Google's Project Glass and other augmented reality uses


text:
In this article…
Recently, PM Modi congratulated India for achieving its target of reaching $400 billion from exports in the current fiscal for the first time. It can certainly be seen as a landmark in the line of Atma Nirbhar Bharat. Similarly, in July 2021, PM Modi India wrote on Twitter – “India had doubled its tiger population four years ahead of schedule.” It indicates that on the environmental front, India has also been doing well. Also, India has successfully balanced world politics. Apart from this, recently IMF lauded India’s PM Gareeb Kalyan Yojna for protecting India from a situation of extreme poverty.
The objective of all these development should be ended with the progress of the Indian public at large. But people’s development is not in sync with the above developments as per our expectations from the current establishment. COVID-19 pandemic has affected different aspects of human beings. To some extent, it has given the opportunity for the government of India as well as provincial governments to take advantage of it. This phenomenon is neither new nor unique to India. It has been almost the same across the globe.
Pandemic: A protector to the government
Nearly two years back, on March 24, 2020, PM Modi called for a complete lockdown of the entire nation for 21 days in an order to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. People got scared and a kind of lawlessness was created. People started hoarding grains, and goods went out of stock. However, on this front, the government worked well in ensuring the proper supply of goods. But migrants in general and daily wage earners, in particular, were sandwiched between the governance system of ‘source state’ and ‘destination state’. They decided to walk toward villages for thousands of kilometers on bare feet without the active support of the government.
In my opinion, it was the second failure of the NDA-led government after demonetization. I said failure not mistake because we are well aware that villages still work as a shock absorber to global financial instabilities. During the Global economic crisis of 2008, India’s economy was not significantly affected because people went back to their villages and there they got some money through programs like MGNREGA. Over the years, the government has reduced financial allocation to MGNREGA. But during the lockdown, the pandemic compelled the government to give an additional allocation of Rs 40,000 crore to the previously allotted Rs 61,500 crore.
However, the government launched PM Garib Kalyan Yojna to defeat COVID-19 pandemic. To some extent, it was successful in protecting the people standing in lower strata. But it has ignored the middle class. In fact, it became an excuse to hide failures. That’s why we didn’t witness the effect of anti-incumbency in the last 5 state elections. People felt justified with the reason. For instance, we have witnessed people crying on road with cycles but were not criticizing the government for its failures. It indicates that the integral state (state along with the civil society – Gramsci) plays an important role in maintaining the hegemony of the party system.
Excessive contraction and shrinking public policy
In a time of crisis, it is advised to adopt the counter-cyclic policy. We can take a case study of the UK, whenever economic growth was down in history, then the British had increased their government expenditure. It doesn’t mean that on the one hand, spending is increased in the form of a new package, and on the other hand, spending is curtained to make it equal. Otherwise, it would become a zero-sum game and would not contribute to any significant effect on society. For example, the Government of India has suspended financial concession to senior citizens on the Indian railway which has still not been re-activated.
Similarly, the Government of India put a pause on LPG gas subsidy. Like senior citizen’s concession, it is still on hold. It is popularly advocated that Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) has a positive side of curtailing corruption by directly putting money into the beneficiary’s account. But it has a negative side also as we have been witnessing in the case of LPG subsidy. It gives direct control to the government. It has now become a new normal to purchase goods at market price. It won’t affect them very much if the government suddenly stops transferring money into their account. Thus, subsidy through account gives the intangible feeling that suppresses the feeling of protests.
Additionally, fuel prices are skyrocketed. We know that fuel price is closely related to everyone’s life. It leads to an increase in the prices of milk and vegetables. It has a spillover effect on other products as well. Currently, companies are either increasing the prices of their goods or decreasing the quantity for keeping the price the same due to cost-push inflation. Thus, increasing inflation and at the same time decreasing purchasing power will push to a deadlock in the Indian economy. This deadlock is explained by Marx famously that capitalism contained the seeds of its own destruction. Such inflation is also called regressive taxation where a beggar is also compelled to pay during price rise.
In the process of contraction, along with ignoring social justice by stopping financial concession to senior citizens, some of the unjust commercial practices are also followed by the Indian Railway. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) along with the consumer court has to take this into confidence. For example, very high charges are imposed in case of cancellation of a ticket, and no charge is returned in case of a Tatkal ticket cancellation. Similarly, in the case of cancellation of a normal ticket, the processing fee and taxes are not refunded apart from cancellation charges. While returning goods, even e-commerce places like Amazon and Flipkart refund shipping charges.
Liability of economic failure on the masses
Banking is a financial intermediary. It is an important driver of economic growth in India. People put their savings money in banks and that saving is translated into investment by the business class. Interest received by the bank is distributed between the bank as profit and the public as the interest earned. But the corruption in the banking system ended with zombie lending. It means they are giving loans to those firms that are unable to meet interest obligations from their income.
Consequently, banks face non-performing assets (NPA). Most of the NPA is generated in a public bank. It is compensated in two ways – First, the government uses taxed money to protect banks from failure (E.g. Mission Indradhanush). Second, Banks reduce the interest rate on public savings. Thus, the liability of failure in the case of NPA is shifted to the people. However, over a period of time, public deposit depreciates in banks. For example, in May 2022, the inflation rate is 6.7% but the saving rate in the State Bank of India (SBI) is merely 2.7%. Overall saving money put in SBI bank depreciates by 4% per annum (6.7% – 2.7%).
Similarly, Government demonetized the old currently. But demonetization didn’t add any significant value to our economic system. Rather it increased unnecessary costs, hamper small businesses, created a crisis for currency crunch, and create panic among people about the availability of currency. But the reform taken in the direction of GST (Goods and Services Tax) was a revolutionary step in the Indian economy. It was the need of the time. But the way the government implemented this scheme could be improved. Proper communication, rational thinking behind tax slabs, and fulfilling promises to compensate state governments (14% compounded annual growth rate in revenues) could be addressed in a more proper way.
Rising unemployment and declining purchasing power
Unemployment in India is increasing. According to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) data, the unemployment rate in the country grew to 7.83% in April 2022. With the New Economic Reform of 1991, people from villages started migrating to cities for better job opportunities and ensuring a standard of life. It reduces the possibility of disguised unemployment in the agriculture sector. The manufacturing sector is job intensive sector. However, the service sector can give high growth but won’t absorb much of the unemployment from the market.
But the present dispensation prefers “ends” instead of “means”. For them, data on high growth is more important than other factors. That’s why during the lockdown the government preferred to cut expenses in spite of the fact that India’s forex reserve was increasing even during that distressing period also. Due to policy paralysis, the automotive sector is on the decline. In 2016, Government aims to become a 100% e-vehicle nation by 2030. It created a kind of chaos in the minds of consumers as well as producers. However, later government restructure its objective and targeted sales penetration of 30% for private cars by 2030.
Similarly, the government directly jumped from BS-IV norms to BS-VI norms without any proper incentives. People didn’t purchase much in that period because they were waiting for the BS-VI norm vehicles. Additionally, this newer technology has increased the price of the vehicle, and that reduced demand in the market. Increasing prices of even general goods are not in sync with earnings. RBI report says that nearly 22% of the Indian population lives under the BPL tag. It means those people are not able to earn Rs23/day in villages and Rs32/day in cities. It can be relatively understood that a poor people (Under BPL) has to work 10 days to just buy a liter of mustard oil (Rs 220 per liter) provided he will not spend a single coin on the other stuff.
On the same line, the purchasing power of old age people is also declining. People in old age used to get pensions. They were in a position to spend on their health with pension money. But under the new pension scheme (NPS), the responsibility to the government has loosed. Their share will depend on the market. Their money is invested in the share market. Thus, it creates a situation of uncertain old age. Simultaneously, the government is decreasing its share of EFP (Employees’ Provident Fund). EPFO decided to lower the interest rates on PF deposits to an over four-decade low of 8.1% for its about 5 crore subscribers.
There is a need to revise the strategy of the Indian government. They should formulate policy in the interest of the greater masses. However, the government has taken some good steps like refraining from joining RCEP (Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership) to protect the interest of dairy farmers. Thus, Gandhi’s idea of the Talisman can be the guiding lamp for the current dispensation. It means before formulating any policy, we have to just think about whether this action would help the people standing in lower strata or not.
Hard work should be paid. It is free for all. Those who could not pay for the content can avail quality services free of cost. But those who have the ability to pay for the quality content he/she is receiving should pay as per his/her convenience. Team DWA will be highly thankful for your support.


text:
It seems like this year just keeps getting worse and worse for the ride-hailing company. After allegations of rampant sexism within their ranks and a lawsuit from google over self-driving technology, it really seems like Uber just can’t catch a break. Earlier today, an Italian court ruled that the corporation had to completely leave the country or be forced to pay a $10,600 fine for each day they remain active. Luckily the company has been given a 10 day grace period to remove their operations, but that’s still not a lot of time to completely shut down their operations and move elsewhere.
$10,600 may not seem like a lot when you consider Uber’s gigantic valuation of $70 Billion, but the company has been less profitable than they had hoped in the past year, bleeding billions in revenue in 2016. It will probably be in Uber’s best interest to remove themselves from the country even if they could afford the fine, but the company is committed to fighting the ruling and seeking to re-open their business in Italy as soon as possible.
“Thousands of professional, licensed drivers use the Uber app to make money and provide reliable transportation at the push of a button for Italians.” The company said in a statement, expressing their shock and disappointment at the ruling.
The opposition to the company has been fierce in several European countries, with taxi organizations largely the entities behind the pushback citing Uber as “Unfair competition”
It remains to be seen whether this string of setbacks will knock Uber over or if they will just be a momentary setback for the alternative-taxi behemoth.


text:
upswing in 2004
The cheers are up and high for the Year 2004 with the agriculture,
manufacturing and services sectors bringing the economy closer to
realising the Tenth Plan annualised growth target.
According to the latest data from Central Statistical Organisation
(CSO) the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate shot up to a
record 8.4 per cent during the second quarter of 2003-04. This was
after a decade of sluggish economic growth, when the Indian economy
found it impossible to achieve over six per cent of GDP growth rate
A high profile growth rate (8 per cent or over)means more income
to the government as well as the private sector. A 7 per cent growth
rate means better income for average person. Either ways, there
will be more disposable income with the consumers which will spur
the economic scenario manifold.
Source: Deccan Herald


text:
Skip to main content
Huge Black Hills wildfire 53 percent contained
Phone threat from cellphone in Moorhead area forces Benson tournament to end
Man found dead in Maplewood park identified
Cohasset man dies in vehicle accident in drainage ditch near Hector
Man dead in St. Paul cemetery vehicle fire
Bitcoin’s future as a digital currency will depend on consumer confidence
Give back by helping to feed the people around you
What did we Google in 2017? Hurricane Irma, Meghan Markle and a slime recipe
FCC's Ajit Pai dressed up as Santa and wielded a lightsaber to mock net neutrality rules
Saying goodbye to AOL's instant messenger
place a business brief
Minnesotan's move from wide receiver to cornerback pays off for NDSU
Frisco treat: Bison overpower Sam Houston State to advance to FCS championship game
Women's College Basketball: CLC outscores Spartans
Area Boys Hockey: Flyers fall to St. Paul Johnson
Alpine Skiing: Warrior boys win again - Brainerd girls second
Athlete of the Week
Five myths about bitcoin
Guest Opinion: The true tax gap: How about $12 trillion!
No need to plan kindness this season
ISD 181 Viewpoint: Beyond the chalkboard: Teaching & learning in today's classrooms
Reader Opinion: Support Boy Scouts
Send Your Opinion
Tullibees continue to decline in Green Lake
‘That evening hunt — that was worth the whole trip’
What's Up Outdoors: Let's get out ice fishing
Outdoor Notes for Dec. 10
BRAD DOKKEN: Despite no deer, muzzleloader hunt offers more fun than frustration
Outdoor Traditions Magazine
Always cover Norfolk Island Pine after purchase
Everything you need to know about smart speakers
Clergy View: Your victory
Open house set for restored Farwell church
Church News for Dec. 15
Science and Tech
This Was Brainerd
These men thought they adopted a mini piglet until she became Esther the Wonder Pig, darling of the internet
Entertainment Briefs - Dec. 14
Visual Arts - Dec. 14-20
Kid Rock to headline Moondance Jam 27
Hot enough to melt the ice - Davina and the Vagabonds to perform 2 shows
Her Voice Magazine
Special Issues and Magazines
Lakewood Health System, Staples, births
Essentia Health-St. Joseph's Medical Center, Brainerd, births
George E. Schwagerl
Diane Marie Kraemer
Betty Lou DeRosier
KLICK! & More
Crow Wing Co. In-Custody
On the Fly: Twitter feed
December 1, 2017
Column: Arguing net neutrality
Imagine cruising the internet, opting to visit your favorite site when the data stream slows to a crawl, the spinning wheel of death rears its...
December 1, 2017 - 9:00am
November 17, 2017
Verizon close to announcing digital streaming deal with NFL
Verizon Communications Inc, no. 1 U.S. wireless carrier, is close to a new deal with the National Football League for digital streaming rights,...
November 17, 2017 - 7:17pm
July 26, 2017
House panel wants Google, Facebook, AT&T CEOs to testify on internet rules
WASHINGTON - The chairman of the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday asked chief executives from companies representing the two...
July 26, 2017 - 9:07am
June 13, 2017
Sprint offers one-year free unlimited service aimed at Verizon users
NEW YORK - Sprint Corp is offering free unlimited data, talk and text for a year in an aggressive promotion launched on Tuesday, aimed at Verizon...
June 13, 2017 - 4:41pm
March 30, 2017
Verizon looking to launch online TV service
The No. 1 U.S. wireless carrier Verizon Communications Inc has been buying streaming rights from television network owners ahead of a nationwide...
March 30, 2017 - 5:42pm
February 16, 2017
AT&T expands access to unlimited plan after Verizon launch
NEW YORK -- AT&T Inc. said on Thursday, Feb. 16, it would make its unlimited data plan available to all wireless customers who pay a monthly...
February 16, 2017 - 4:24pm
February 13, 2017
Verizon's move to unlimited data ups ante in wireless war
NEW YORK—Verizon Communications announcement that it will once again offer an unlimited pricing plan marks a shift in its thinking as a...
February 13, 2017 - 12:58pm
July 6, 2016
Verizon raises wireless plan rates, offers more data
NEW YORK -- Verizon Communications Inc , the No. 1 U.S. wireless provider, said on Wednesday, July 6, that it would increase plan rates but expand...
July 6, 2016 - 10:07pm
September 4, 2015
Tech Savvy: Grid Down Part 1
Hey there, Tech Savvy fans! This week we start our mini-series on disaster preparedness from a tech standpoint.
September 4, 2015 - 10:29pm
August 14, 2015
Tech Savvy: Dog Days of Updates
Hey there, Tech Savvy fans! This week really feels like it's just dragging by. Summer is still in full swing, but we're at that sweet spot of...
August 14, 2015 - 11:44pm
May 4, 2015
Tech Savvy: Citing your sources
Hey there, Tech Savvy fans! This week I wanted to share my thoughts on a growing trend I've noticed that has become fairly prevalent on social...
May 4, 2015 - 9:00am
November 21, 2014
Tech Savvy: Fashion Savvy Season
Hey there, Tech Savvy fans! As promised this week I get to share with you a unique experience that I had this past week. I was invited to the first ever Verizon Tech Holiday Fashion Show at their Destination store in the Mall of America in Bloomington. I have to admit, when I was...
November 21, 2014 - 7:55pm
August 29, 2014
Look a G3! (No not the plane)
Hey there, Tech Savvy fans! As promised again, this week we're taking a look at another pretty fantastic device courtesy of our friends at Verizon...
August 29, 2014 - 8:39pm
August 26, 2014
Are you Xperia-nced?
Hey there, Tech Savvy fans! This week, as promised, we are going to take a look at one of the newer tablets out on the market, the Sony Xperia...
August 26, 2014 - 9:26am
July 3, 2014
POLICE: Man used Verizon job to send teens lewd photos
HUDSON, WI - A Minnesota man accused of sending pictures of his genitalia and lewd messages to teens over their cellphones obtained their phone numbers through his job at Verizon, authorities said. Barton G. Scott, 32, of Oakdale, Minn., faces two felony counts of exposing a child...
July 3, 2014 - 9:43am


text:
Khor Fakkan Container Terminal (KCT) is the only fully-fledged operational container terminal within the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that is located outside the Strait of Hormuz and an official said exports from Pakistan will take a day less if compared to Dubai, making the trade more efficient and cost effective.
Andrew Hoad, Chief Commercial Official at Gulftainer Co. Ltd, told Business Recorder that they certainly want to compete with their Dubai counterparts saying “competition is healthy”.
“It helps in making things efficient,” he said.
Gulftainer is the maritime port terminal operator in the state of Sharjah in UAE.
On a piece of paper, Hoad demonstrated how Khor Fakkan port is closer and unloading exports at this terminal is efficient as it takes a day less in comparison to Dubai.
Due to its unique geographic location, KCT has been one of the most important trans-shipment hubs for the Arabian Gulf, the Indian sub-continent, the Gulf of Oman and the East African markets.
The terminal also provides a valuable land bridge to the local container traffic imports into the UAE. Any container imported into the country through the Khor Fakkan Container Terminal reaches a consignee’s warehouse at least four to five days prior compared to the transit time if imported through any another container terminal within the UAE.
It thus provides a crucial service to importers and exporters within the country who believe in the value of money and assists them to maintain a lean and ‘Just in Time’ supply chain management strategy.
Gulftrainer has seven terminals in four countries, including the UAE, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the United States. The company also has associated logistics companies such as trucking and warehousing.
Gulftainer also has a joint venture for a trucking company with Pak Shaheen Group based in Karachi that was signed in 2006. The joint venture focuses on inland logistics and transportation in Pakistan. Pak Shaheen Group has operations through Karachi Port, Port Bin Qasim, Lahore Dry Port, Faisalabad Dry Port and every sea port and airport in Pakistan.
“The reason I am here (in Pakistan) is belief and confidence in Pakistan. There’s a lot of trade happening between Pakistan and the UAE. There’s a significant Pakistani trading community based in the UAE, particularly in Sharjah,” Hoad said.
“We believe in future growth in trade between Pakistan and the UAE,” he added.
“Pakistan is a big country with 220 million population. There’s a lot of economic activity. And we view it as a responsibility and wish to try and facilitate traded goods between Pakistan and UAE. And we believe Sharjah is an excellent gateway with the UAE whether it is coming through Sharjah Container Terminal or Khorfakkan Container Terminal.”
Hoad said that at both terminals Gulftainer offers good options, integrated packages, handling containers off the ships, trucking, warehousing, custom clearance and a lot of other associated services.
“One of the things we are trying to do is particularly project to Pakistan businesses what those services are. We are particularly interested in rice export from Pakistan and agriculture in general for both imports and exports. We are also interested in the textile sector,” he said.
Hoad said he is on a three-day fact-finding mission and has met representatives from the port trust, chambers of commerce, traders and trade specialists.
He said that they would be doing roadshows in Pakistan soon after Ramadan where they will promote specific segments where “we would tell them fast and cost effective access to the UAE market”.
Gulftainer is a privately owned company having blessing from the royal family of Sharjah.
“We would ensure that goods coming out of Pakistan get good quality service in terms of being cleared through the ports in Sharjah, quickly, efficiently, and cost effectively. We are hungry for business. We are hungry to facilitate exports from Pakistan to UAE.
“For example, a rice exporter in Pakistan signed up with us. Pak Shaheen could move its products by truck. When the goods come to the UAE, we have fast and efficient clearance through ports. We can then offer integrated trucking through our fully owned subsidiary Momentum Transport. We can store those products as well.
“When everything is under one umbrella, it is quick, cost effective and efficient.
“We right now want to serve Pakistan traders better. We would listen and come up with proposals,” he said.
Hoad does not think trade is going anywhere from Pakistan despite the economic difficulties, but there has to be a long-term view. He added that he expects Pakistan will come out of its hardships as opportunities exist.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023


text:
Apple tree grafting. Courtesy/wikipedia
Rory Gauthier at Bandelier National Monument announced a last-minute opportunity to watch grafting being done on the apple trees in the old orchard near the Visitor Center in Frijoles Canyon.
“We didn’t know when the supplies would arrive, and the grafting has to be done almost immediately. So it will be done beginning at 4 p.m. today. Anyone who is interested is welcome to come.”
For more information, contact the Visitor Center at 505.672.3861 x 517.


text:
FLORENCE, SC (WMBF) - Data from the US Department of Transportation shows the number of DUI fatalities in South Carolina has decreased since last year, but some people in Florence say the absence of free sober rides may have a negative impact on those stats for this upcoming year.
This time last year you could see ads for free rides during New Years Eve from Red Bone Alley, AAA and numerous cab companies - But not this year.
AAA spokesman says they've discontinued their free tow service on New Years Eve night because they believe it was encouraging people to over-drink because they knew there was a free tow available.
Many of the owners are saying the cost is just too much to offer free services, and the support from corporate and local sponsors is low.
Jimmy Deaton owns Southern Hops Brewing Company and Restaurant in Florence, and says he understands why some restaurants and bars have discontinued their free sober rides on New Years Eve night.
He says he tried to offer the service free himself, but ran into a few obstacles.
Deaton says the cost for starting a free service includes insurance, liability and driver's pay and just couldn't fork over the whole bill.
Many cab services have discontinued their free rides during the holidays because of the loss in support from corporate and local sponsors, making it difficult to keep up with the services financially.
But help is out there, Deaton received some funding through beer and alcohol sponsorship grants, but not enough to make the rides free.
he will be offering shuttle services Saturday night at Southern Hops for a small price.
"People are gonna be disappointed if they go somewhere that last year had a shuttle service, but I would love to put out the fact that it's expensive and it's not easy to put together... Some companies don't exist anymore, they didn't make it through the economy," said Jimmy Deaton.
He says the dwindling support for free sober rides will negatively impact business on New Years Eve.
"Some of the people just aren't coming out because there's not a safe ride home and obviously, you don't want to get yourself in trouble when leaving the establishment," said Deaton.