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At the Charlotte Smart Business Dealmakers Conference, a panel of C-suite executives, entrepreneurs, and an M&A financial adviser, led by moderator Greg Wilcox, a First National Bank Regional Manager, explored the state of the deal market and their respective organizational journeys amid a tightening interest- rate cycle, persistently high inflation, and challenging economic conditions.
One of those stories was from Griffin Brothers Companies Partner Mike Griffin. He says after he sold his car business, which had 10 locations in Charlotte, he created a family office and started looking to acquire smaller business.
“My theory was that if we're $22 million in revenue, we can maybe look for (companies with) $10 million in revenue and they'll be more fair multiples," Griffin says. "We pursued a couple deals in that level and they were still way higher than we would be interested in buying. At that point, we got a little frustrated and we started starting companies from scratch.”
They started their nine portfolio companies by finding a sharp leader in that profession and coupling the person with the business to grow it. Then, he says, they started acquisitions.
“We kind of cut our teeth in the business, then had an opportunity to look for acquisition growth," he says. "Because we didn't have to do things, we didn't pay premiums for companies.”
Compare Foods Supermarkets CEO Omar Jorge says real estate is not an afterthought for the business, real estate is the business.
“Location, location, location is one, two and three," Jorge says. "And a lot of our growth has been where the demographics of the neighborhood has changed and the existing grocery store can no longer be profitable there, we’ll go in and take over the lease, re-merchandise the store, do new types of advertising and really build up the business from there.”
The growth strategy, which has been deployed as several grocers have left the area, is to look at where customers are not being served and follow them there because another grocer is no longer doing the job.
In looking at acquisitions, Jorge says they go very deep into the analytics, much deeper than just sales and the balance sheet and the financials.
“We want to know what's the average cart transaction," he says. "How many customers do you have coming in every single week? What are the percentages in your departments? If you're in a heavily Hispanic area and your meat and your produce departments are below where they should be, we know that’s a growth opportunity for us. When we look at multiples, there's different ways to calculate multiples but there's so many variables that go into it. How long is the lease? What are the terms of the lease? Is there a percentage rent in the lease? Is this a landlord that we've worked with in the past and is easy to get along with? What's the situation with your employees? Why are you selling the business in the first place? So, there are so many variables before we even get to saying it's X of EBITDA, because that number might be 3x or maybe 6x, and 3x might be a horrible deal and 6x might be a fantastic deal. But you really need to get into the nitty-gritty of it and really see what you’re buying before you end up getting to that point.”
The current economy, he says, is likely going to slow down the deal pace significantly mainly because of the rise in interest rates. Many sellers were asking high multiples because they knew that money was cheap and there was a lot of buyers willing to spend that money because there was going to be very low interest on the debt. As the interest rates rise, he says multiples are going to have to adjust, as are seller expectations.
Nucor Corporation Retired Chief Financial Officer Jim Frias says the company had to look at adjacencies.
“We're looking at businesses that we really didn't have a lot of experience in," Frias says. "We're now in the insulated metal panel business. We’re now making garage doors. We’re a market leader in both those sectors and we weren’t in that business.”
Talent, he says, is so important when you buy a business that you don't know well. It needs good talent in it or you're going to dilute your own organization trying to repopulate talent in the leadership roles to make that business successful.
Businesses, he says, are all trying to create economic value chains, trying to invest capital in a way that generate returns higher than the cost of capital. Higher interest rates mean the cost of capital is higher. But for strategics like Nucor, the scales are tipped a little in their favor because they don't tend to rely as much on debt to finance transactions. Instead, they rely on a strong balance sheet.
“They're often competing with private equity for acquisitions," Frias says. "And right now, they probably have some advantages against some of the PE people they compete with in the past because the fact that rates are higher because they’re not as dependent on debt as part of their transaction execution.”


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PING pong tables will be springing up across Barnsley in aid of the Ping! street table tennis festival.
Over 17 ping pong tables will be set up across Barnsley and it is the third consecutive year the tables have come to town.
The Ping! festival will offically launch on Saturday June 9 and you will be able to play at various locations including the Better Barnsley Shop, Alhambra shopping centre, Central Library, Cannon Hall and Elsecar Park.
The tables will be delivered by Table Tennis England and is funded by Sports England, meaning It is completely free to use, people can just grab the bats and balls provided, find a willing opponent and get playing.
Coun Roy Miller said: “We hope to see people of all ages enjoying this year’s Ping! festival. Over 9,000 people joined in last year and this summer we want even more people to discover how much fun the game is."

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In the midst of reopening their former Carytown taco shop in new Scott’s Addition digs, the owners of Don’t Look Back are shutting down their other restaurant on Cary Street.
Best Friends Forever on Friday is closing its shop at 2915 W. Cary St., where it launched about a year ago as Eleven Months.
Co-owner Hamooda Shami said the closure wasn’t a function of BFF’s performance, but rather the need to focus on the brisk business they’ve experienced at Don’t Look Back Triple, the recently opened reincarnation of their Carytown taco shop that was displaced 10 months ago by a fire.
“We were in the black; the restaurant was performing well,” Shami said of BFF. “We just didn’t anticipate that we would be so slammed when we opened Don’t Look Back Triple … it’s been relentless.”
He is working with a local, independent operator to take over the Carytown location, but did not disclose details about the pending transaction.
Shami and business partner Nate Gutierrez opened Don’t Look Back Triple about a week ago in the long-dormant Triple Lounge space at 3306 W. Broad St. in Scott’s Addition – drawing in lines of taco fans after the restaurant’s 10-month hiatus.
“We’re happy because people didn’t forget about us,” Shami said. “Usually after 10 months, that’s it.”
Shami said the volume at the new space placed tremendous demand on staff, prompting him to shutter BFF and shift its remaining employees to the Scott’s Addition joint.
“Having to let go of Best Friends is bittersweet, but I’ve been in the restaurant industry for a long time, and after what we experienced at Don’t Look Back Triple, closing Best Friends was one of the easiest decisions I’ve ever had to make.”
With the closure, Shami said the remaining wait and cook staff at BFF have been transferred over to Don’t Look Back Triple.
Don’t Look Back Triple will be closed Monday for training, he said, but is open daily from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m.
“We’re going to have some additional training for the people that have come on board at Don’t Look Back,” he said. “But after the first week we had, we’re going to also use that time to take a breather.”
The Scott’s Addition location is nearly triple the size of its former digs in Carytown, Shami said, with 100 seats. The location also includes a gaming area with three pool tables (holdovers from its days as a pool hall), and a shuffleboard that’s on the way.
Like its former Carytown location, patrons will find many of their favorites on the menu, including shredded chicken, chorizo and shrimp tacos served gringo-style with cheese, lettuce, sour cream and salsa; or traditional with cilantro, chopped red onion and lime. The location also will offer burritos, quesadillas, nachos and Frito pie. Beer, wine and margaritas also are on the menu, as is a kid’s menu.
Meanwhile, the duo is working to open Don’t Look Back South, another new location at 7524 Forest Hill Ave. They hope to have it ready by summer, Shami said.
“We’ve got a lot happening, and it’s all good,” he said. “We’re loving the outpouring of love and support from everybody.”


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Pandora Media changes CEOs — but not its financial balance
Pandora will pay McAndrews $500,000 a year, plus a bonus of up to another half a million dollars.
McAndrews, 54, is a venture partner with Madrona Venture Group LLC, but he worked in the past at Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT). He's been on the board of directors at the New York Times Co. (NYSE: NYT) since 2012.
Kennedy, who had said back in March that he was leaving, will stay on at the company "during a transition period," but has quit as president and CEO and stepped down from the board.
Pandora (NYSE: P) is based in Oakland. The company has struggled to make a profit while pondering the paradox that the more listeners it attracts, the more it must pay in royalties for music they listen to. And Pandora hasn't so far been able to increase its revenue from advertising faster than those listener hours have been growing.
By some estimates, Pandora gives about half of its revenues to performers in the form of royalty payments.
In the quarter ended July, Pandora lost $36.4 million, pushing its accumulated deficit to $175.9 million.
Steven E.F. Brown is web editor at the San Francisco Business Times.
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Bakkt Warehouse launched its deposits and withdrawals for Bitcoin back on September 6th, 2019 and it has come a long way since then.
According to a recent blog post by Adam White, CEO of Bakkt, the cryptocurrency platform that is owned by Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), indicated they had secured its custody business in Bitcoin with an additional $500 million insurance policy.
The post added that the exchange is trying to make the asset accessible to more institutional investors and they have currently added 70 more clients to the Bakkt Warehouse. The post added,
“Beyond the $125M of insurance already in place at the Bakkt Warehouse, customers can now purchase more than $500M in additional insurance coverage, subject to underwriting criteria.”
In order to strengthen their rapport with the institutional customers, the exchange has also completed a SOC 1 Type I examination by KPMG and a SOC 2 Type II examination of the ICE infrastructure and enterprises. Bakkt aims to let its consumers and institutions to buy, sell, store, and spend digital assets, by connecting existing market and merchant infrastructure to the blockchain.
Additionally, the blog post also revealed a potential partnership between Bakkt and two of the largest financial institutions but the firms remained unidentified in the report.
Bakkt’s popularity has increased in 2020
From the chart above, it can be identified that the total Open Interest on Bakkt Bitcoin Futures peaked at a relatively lower level of $7.0 million and the average stood somewhere below $3.5 million in 2019. However, the interest has significantly picked up in 2020 as an all-time-high Open-Interest of $19 million was witnessed on February 19th. The average has also been high and improvement in terms of interest and customer engagement is definitely higher than the past year.
The recent announcement will only add to the current improving plot for Bakkt, as institutional capital continues to be soar in the Bitcoin industry.
Bakkt to launch BTC Crypto Mobile App
In mid-march, the exchange had also announced that they were planning to integrate the involvement of their retail investors through a Bakkt mobile application. According to White, the app would enable its users to aggregate their assets into a signal digital wallet and the application may possibly be available by the summer of 2020. His enthusiasm was highlighted in this statement,
“I’m excited at our potential to unlock nearly $1 trillion of digital assets when the Bakkt app launches this summer.”


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Buoyed by robust transactions since July, the nation’s leading steelmaker, Baoshan Iron and Steel Co Ltd (Baosteel), raised the ex factory price of hot rolled coils by CNY 150 (USD 24.5) per metric tonne for September delivery on Aug 13, and the price of other major products was marked up by CNY 120 per tonne.
It is the first time the Shanghai-based steel mill has increased product prices since May. Baosteel lowered prices for its main products in June and July on soft demand, and kept prices unchanged in August.
The steel market is showing signs of a rebound. In the 10 most recent trading days, benchmark Shanghai steel futures surged from CNY 3,418 per tonne to CNY 3,760 per tonne, reflecting strong confidence in the market, Shanghai Securities Daily reported.
Wuhan Iron and Steel Co Ltd, based in central China, also lifted its core product prices by CNY 100 per tonne for September delivery on Aug 12.
Several factors are working in favor of steel makers. Steel demand from property development, automobile and home appliance manufacturing is recovering; crude steel output has been falling for three consecutive months; and steel inventories keep dropping. These factors will shore up market sentiment, according to an analyst at Mysteel.com.


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Is China punishing Hong Kong? Since China took over the tiny country over the past few years, individual rights have disappeared using COVID as the rationale for taking freedoms away from Hongkongers. Now they are making it so the unvaccinated are treated as second-class citizens and banned from shopping malls, shopping centers, and wet markets.
The Standard reports on the tyrannical news coming out of China led Hong Kong:
Only vaccinated Hongkongers will be able to enter shopping malls, wet markets, supermarkets, and churches under a “vaccine pass” scheme to launch on February 24, Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor announced on Tuesday.
The government will also ban people from having cross-family gatherings involving more than two households in private premises, Lam said.
Earlier, the government had announced that unvaccinated people will be banned from entering a list of regulated premises including restaurants, gyms, cinemas, massage parlors and beauty centers under the vaccine pass.
In a press conference on Tuesday afternoon, Lam announced that six more premises will be added to the list of regulated premises, including shopping malls, wet markets and other markets, supermarkets, department stores, religious venues, and hair salons. Only people who received at least one vaccine jab will be allowed to enter the locations.
“From February 24, anyone entering the regulated premises need to use the LeaveHomeSafe app and present their vaccination records,” Lam said.
Religious venues such as temples and churches will be closed from February 10 until the launch of the vaccine pass on February 24.
The government will also add public transport into the list of regulated premises — meaning restrictions can be put on commuters — but will not impose any restrictions until the situation makes it necessary, Lam said.
“We are making it inconvenient for people… not mandatory for people to get vaccinated,” Lam said.
These latest actions make it more than inconvenient, those who are not vaccinated are being punished. With evidence showing that the vaccinated are a majority of those entering hospitals in vaccinated countries, the rationale for pushing the vaccines is not because the shots are life-saving or even working. They are likely more damaging than natural immunity and most people have had COVID by this time.
The COVID mandates, including vaccines, seem to be more about taking away individual freedoms than protecting people from a virus. Now in Hong Kong, the unvaccinated can’t go to the grocery store, use public transit, go to church or even meet with family. This is not about safety or health, this is about destroying freedom.
On a personal note, I lived in Hong Kong for a decade and left in June 2020. I had to walk through shopping malls to take the subway or to get to taxi stations. It’s very humid and hot so you did this all the time to get out of the heat. This action will prevent people from being able to purchase food as well.


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Urban Decay, the cult beauty giants, are celebrating their twentieth year this year and in celebration of this milestone the company have pulled out all the stops. Mere days after they released a whole new line of shadows and eyeliners, they’ve announced the new face of the brand: Ruby Rose.
If you thought they couldn’t get a better fit than Gwen Stefani, be prepared to be wrong because we cannot think of anyone better than the Orange is the New Black star. Let’s clear something up though, she is not their new ambassador, she’s the ‘Most Addictive New Vice’ which, whatever that means, is a role that was made for her. Wende Zomnir, the founding partner of UD, said “When Ruby Rose hit the scene, we were immediate hooked: with her badass look, f***-it attitude and playful spirit, she nails what it means to be feminine, dangerous and fun”. Who wasn’t hooked when Ruby Rose took to our screens at a stupid time in the morning because we couldn’t stop watching OITNB?
Speaking about her new role, Ruby said “Urban Decay believes in supporting individuality and personal self-expression – two values I hold very dear – because everyone deserves the freedom eto explore their personality and discover their true selves.” Though the brand have yet to release any details on what her partnership might entail, apart from the ultra-cool title, we’re very excited to see what they have in store for us. In the meantime, you can check out their other products at their website.
feature image: TOM SCHIRMACHER


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A team of entrepreneur is now $1 million dollars richer, following the finals round of the 43North startup competition.
Formed as part of the Buffalo Billion Initiative, 43North awards $5 million dollars to eight startups and gives them access to the free work space for a year.
SomaDetect was chosen as the 2017 grand prize winner. The company creates a sensor that dairy farms use to monitor milk quality the moment it's pumped.
With their million dollar investment, the company, from New Brunswick, says they will bring 25 jobs to Western New York and an additional 35 the following year.
“There are a million cows here in New York and that's the same number as across Canada, and so it makes a lot of sense for our company to be positioned in Buffalo and to be here for the long run,” said Bethany Deshpande, CEO of SomaDetect.
SomaDetect beat more than 500 other startups to win the million dollar prize.
The top eight finalists receive at least a $500,000 dollar investment. Some of those companies include Squire, who have developed a Barbershop app, and Suncayr, who have made an wearable indicator that lets you know when to reapply sunscreen.
Three companies from Buffalo made it into the top 16.


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Celine outlet reviews mackeeper 90 million to fix ongoing DNA bungles The Police Commissioner said he had lobbied both sides of celine outlet reviews mattresses politics for years to upgrade PathWest's facilities but if fell on deaf ears.
He said the current space at PathWest was simply too small to celine outlet reviews 94sv cater for new technology. "It's definitely a budget problem. we've had reports going back to 2006 from the Auditor General which has pointed out significant pressure at Pathwest saying there were significant problems with the infrastructure with its ability to expand and develop," he said. "It's all to do with funding we have made a case several times to both sides of government about trying to resolve this issue and we don't www celine com handbags seem to get anywhere with it. "The existing facility is too small there is no room for expansion, there is no room for the implementation of new technology." Mr O'Callaghan even suggested PathWest should be taken out of the hands of the Health Department, because it already had too much on its plate. "But it properly belongs in the justice system," he said. "I'm not suggesting for a minute police should have it; it could be run by the Attorney General or some independent agency.
But the way it's structured at the moment, the health (department) have celine luggage tote black a lot of issues celine black trapeze bag and for them, this is out on the periphery but it essential to me and the Attorney General to resolve.". .
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The Business of Fashion
Agenda-setting intelligence, analysis and advice for the global fashion community.
Agenda-setting intelligence, analysis and advice for the global fashion community.
Isabel Marant isn’t exactly the sort of brand you’d expect to do well during the pandemic.
On top of having had to intermittently close dozens of new stores only recently launched with backing from its private-equity owner, the brand is still heavily dependent on multi-brand boutiques and department stores, many of which struggled, slashed prices or even shut down for good last year.
With €178 million in sales for the 12-months ending September 2019, Isabel Marant is big for a designer label but small for a luxury brand. With a positioning that splits the difference between Sandro and Celine, Isabel Marant offers neither “look for less” bargains nor high luxury clout. And despite having attained some global notoriety over the years with its menswear-inspired coats, puff-sleeved knitwear and wedge sneakers, Marant’s 25-year-old business still makes the majority of its sales in Europe, where store traffic has been hammered by both virus containment measures and a collapse in international tourism.
All that might have made for tough going during a crisis when, by contrast, the rapid rebounds of blue-chip luxury brands like Louis Vuitton and of value players like Primark suggested that demand was increasingly bifurcating, driving sales at the high and low ends of fashion’s pricing spectrum, disfavouring the advanced contemporary segment where Isabel Marant sits.
And yet, 2020 did not spell disaster for the brand that kicked off a wave of French contemporary brands like Zadig & Voltaire, Ba&sh and Ami Paris, all of which export Parisian style credibility and insouciance at more accessible prices than luxury brands.
Isabel Marant’s sales fell by less than 15 percent in 2020, outperforming the broader luxury market, in which worldwide sales fell by an average of 23 percent, according to consultancy Bain. EBITDA, a measure of profit, remained “strongly positive,” according to chief executive Anouck Duranteau-Loeper.
“Isabel Marant has always sold to Londoners in London, to Parisians in Paris and Chinese girls in China. That highly localised base allowed the brand to be quite resilient,” she said, speaking to BoF the day before revealing the brand’s latest collection for men during Paris Fashion Week.
The relative strength of Marant’s business challenges the notion that the coronavirus crisis has pushed high-end fashion further towards a winner-takes-all dynamic, where only the most well-funded giants succeed. While it’s true that luxury conglomerate LVMH saw its fashion sales fall by just two percent last year, thanks to a quick return to growth at its flagship Louis Vuitton and Dior labels, mega-brand Gucci appears to have taken a bigger hit than Marant — analysts expect it to report sales that fell 20 percent in 2020.
Most of the smaller names in global luxury did even worse: Tod’s said sales fell 30 percent last year, while Ferragamo saw a 33 percent decline.
With international tourist flows still at a standstill, and brands preparing for a lengthy recovery, the resilience of more locally-focused propositions like Marant’s could also prompt some soul searching at luxury brands.
What did Marant do to keep making sales during the pandemic, and to protect the brand from going the way of Sonia Rykiel, Carven and other independent luxury labels that perished in recent years?
Clients left behind by luxury
Price positioning has been an important part of the equation. Marant’s $1,200 blazers, $700 sweaters and $600 sneakers are a reach compared to more accessibly-priced fare from French contemporary’s biggest brands Sandro, Maje, Claudie Pierlot (which form the group SMCP) or up-and-comer Ami Paris. But these prices remain far below those of Paris’ global luxury brands from Givenchy to Chanel, where a cocktail dress is usually priced well over $2,000.
In recent years, many European clients have felt priced out by top luxury brands which focused on chasing the global rich, and which became heavily dependent on selling to tourists at their flagships in London, Paris and Milan.
France still makes up around 20 percent of Marant’s sales, and the rest of Europe makes up another 35 percent. International tourists accounted for less than one-fifth of sales, the company estimates.
“Targeting China’s Generation Z is a good strategy, but it’s not our strategy. Isabel really wants to see her clothes in the street here in Paris,” said Duranteau-Loeper, who previously worked in LVMH’s fashion group and as managing director for Paco Rabanne fashion. “We’re sourcing 70 percent in Europe, so prices can’t be low, but we try to make sure it’s decent, so that for a French girl it wouldn’t be crazy to buy it.”
Occupying the price positioning left behind by global luxury brands has been a winning formula for French contemporary brands in recent years, according to Olivier Abtan, managing director for luxury at the digital consultancy Publicis Sapient. These brands are likely to have taken a heavy hit last year due to their reliance on Europe, where the impact of the coronavirus on shopping was most keenly felt, but their focus on selling to local consumers will likely help them to bounce back as the climate improves.
“Obviously these brands won’t be doing as well as ones who were strong in China, but I believe there’s still a wide space for them to grow,” Abtan said.
The positioning of its retail stores is another point that’s supported Isabel Marant’s resilience, Dureanteau-Loeper says.
While the brand has been investing in growing the share of its retail and direct e-commerce businesses — it currently has 55 stores versus just 10 when it was acquired by private equity firm Montefiore in 2017 — the brand has sought out “destination” shopping streets in Paris’ Marais, for example, while avoiding tourist thoroughfares like the Champs-Élysées.
Locals were more eager to return to these sorts of posh, pedestrian neighbourhoods following coronavirus lockdowns than to shopping malls or sightseeing hubs. And their sophisticated mix of stores can fuel a sense of exclusivity without the cost associated with major shock-and-awe-style flagships in locations like the Avenue Montaigne.
“Our clients feel like its still a best-kept secret,” Duranteau-Loeper said. Even with more stores, “we remain quite agile and flexible. We don’t have huge rents, so we can survive even when we have less traffic.“
Still, Isabel Marant is hardly out of the woods: sales falling between 10 and 15 percent this year means the business is almost back where it was at the time of its 2017 acquisition, with around 150 million euros in sales (albeit with higher-margin retail sales making up a bigger share).
Going forward, Marant will need to keep competing with smaller, but more competitively priced accessible-luxury brands, like Nanushka and Ami Paris. And while Europe’s top luxury brands are currently focused on leaning into the momentum they see in China, they too could find new ways to target more accessible price points.
During a January 26 call with reporters, LVMH’s chief financial officer Jean-Jacques Guiony said the company planned to focus on growing its European clientele to plug any gap from a prolonged downturn in tourism.
Federica Montelli, fashion director of Milan’s La Rinascente department store, says Marant’s appeal is still going strong among a certain cohort of fashion-forward women who want to dress up while cultivating a laid-back image. “It gives you a way of tapping into French daily chic. It’s got a good amount of fashion, but not too much, so you know you can wear it for many seasons,” she said.
And while luxury houses have shown they can find ways to market creativity at lower price points — as with streetwear-inspired luxury “merch” or tiny handbag styles in recent years — it seems unlikely that those brands would reduce prices for categories like tailoring, dresses and outerwear to a level that would compete for accessible luxury’s clients.
At the other end of the spectrum, Montelli says some clients are becoming warier of mass-market options after years of high-low dressing trends that saw clients mixing top luxury items with athleisure and fast-fashion. “The message of sustainability, of not over-consuming, has gotten through lately and we see that women would rather buy a few pieces from this accessible luxury segment than going crazy at Zara.”
Eyewear, new stores
As Isabel Marant tries to reinvigorate sales this year, the brand is rolling out new products to complete its range, including an eyewear line being produced through a licensing deal with Italian frames-maker Safilo. The first items from the line are being launched this winter with a campaign lensed by Juergen Teller.
“It’s important for styling. Your glasses are as big a part of your silhouette as your shoes,” Duranteau-Loeper said, adding that eyewear would also boost visibility of the brand.
The brand is also working to develop its nascent menswear line, which recently added a line of watches, and grew its share from less than two percent of sales in 2019 to more than five percent last year, as well as to increase the share of its more-profitable leather goods versus ready-to-wear. Three years after the brand launched the category, bags make up 30 percent of the Isabel Marant business.
Even after online sales (including through multi-brand partners like MatchesFashion) grew to 25 percent of the business last year, Duranteau-Loeper sees physical boutiques continuing to play a big role in driving growth. Many of the brand’s clients research products extensively online before visiting a store, but still prefer to try them on and buy them in person, she said.
As such, the company is maintaining plans to expand its retail footprint. After opening eight new stores in 2020, including satellites in Bordeaux, Dallas and Nanjing, openings for 2021 are set to include new locations in Zurich, Nice and New York City.
“We’re building the brand for the long term,” Duranteau-Loeper said. “We know this is a crisis, but it’s temporary. We know things will go back to normal, even if it’s a different normal.”


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Long time distant cousin of bigger-name sandwich shop Togo’s has been in the sandwich game for a minute (check their new logo, since 1971 to be exact). The past year, they have seen several branding changes, but according to a new report from the OC Register, this last month marked the beginning of a new series of transformations for the California sandwich chain. Such changes include several menu additions, a toasting process long absent from the restaurants repertoire and for several locations, remodeling of the entire storefront.
The new sandwiches that can be seen as part of their new toasting process are The Clubhouse, Chili Cheese N Beef, Pepperjack Pastrami and Uncle Tony’s Italian. The option to toast your sub will begin tomorrow, November 3rd. The last mentioned piece of news mentions that the chain hopes to add some 50 new West Coast Togo’s locations throughout the next two years. (Thx OC Register/FastFoodMaven)


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The Euro crisis has affected every part of the European economy, even in the rarified market of mega-yacht rentals in the Mediterranean.
A glut of yachts for rent, coupled with the slowing global economy and the Euro crisis, is creating unprecedented bargains in the charter yacht business this summer. Yacht brokers say there are roughly 750 boats over 100-feet long docked on the shores of the Med this summer waiting for customers – twice the number of previous years. And there simply aren’t enough rich customers to fill them.
With prices ranging from $200,000 to more than $1 million a week – not including food, fuel and beverages – demand for these vessels is restricted to the super-rich. But there’s no harm in looking.
Click ahead to see what kind of yacht is for rent at a discount this summer.
- Full Story: Renting a Super-Yacht Just Got Cheaper
- By Robert Frank
Posted 15 June 2012


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Regional nostalgia and emojis are popular with the readers of Buzzfeed, but are they a thing that the site’s readers would actually buy? The site recently purchased Scroll, a new company that Ben Kaufman, the founder of phone battery company Mophie and crowdsourced product design company Quirky, quietly began after the bankruptcy of Quirky. Kaufman’s new mission is to figure out how to get Buzzfeed readers to buy stuff. [More]
In its continuing quest to take over the content world, Comcast is once again splashing out with a big investment into journalism and listicle juggernaut BuzzFeed. [More]
Back in August, we mentioned that Comcast was working on something called “Watchable,” its attempt to cash in on the curated online video craze that all the marketing and advertising kids are talking about. We also hoped that “Watchable” was just a working title, because it’s not exactly an astounding endorsement of quality. Today, Comcast announced that it’s indeed launching Watchable, so-so brand name and all. [More]
Comcast’s continued plans to spend mountains of money and to take over the world continue apace: as rumored, NBCUniversal has dropped $200 million this week into journalism and cat gif juggernaut BuzzFeed.
Mickey D’s down under wants everyone to know that the parody McDonald’s letter making the rounds is indeed prankaliscious. Corporate Communications Manager Bronwyn Stubbs writes:
Note: This memo is a parodic spoof.


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Pixar animated movie “Soul” which had been set to hit theaters in November, will instead debut on the Disney+ streaming service on Christmas Day, Walt Disney Co DIS.N said on Thursday.
“Soul” will play in cinemas only in markets where Disney+ is not currently available, or will not be soon, the company said in a statement.
Disney is testing new ways to release first-run movies while the coronavirus pandemic limits attendance at theaters, particularly in the United States. The company is trying to attract more customers to Disney+, which has signed up more than 60 million subscribers worldwide.
“Over the last six months, marketplace conditions created by the ongoing pandemic, while difficult in so many ways, have also provided an opportunity for innovation in approaches to content distribution,” Disney said in a statement.
In September, Disney’s action epic “Mulan” skipped theaters and went straight to Disney+. In that case, the company charged Disney+ subscribers an extra $30 to watch “Mulan.”
“Soul,” which tells the story of a music teacher whose soul gets separated from his body, will be available to Disney+ customers starting Dec. 25 without an extra payment beyond the monthly subscription price.
Debut dates in markets where the movie will play in theaters will be announced later, Disney said.


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Wealthy consumers ramped up their spending in 2013, funneling more of their dollars into areas such as air travel, luggage, and video equipment.
Consumer spending soared among the wealthy in 2013, according to analysis by Morgan Stanley obtained by the Wall Street Journal. For small business owners, the data reveals what some of the hottest growth industries are.
"Spending on pleasure aircraft, boats, and other recreational vehicles has raced higher since April and is on track to double its growth rate in 2013 (to 8.5 percent compared with just over 4 percent in 2012)," economist Ellen Zentner wrote.
Though you probably won't move into the pleasure aircraft sector soon, if you're involved in e-commerce, you might consider getting more games and toys in your arsenal. Likewise, video equipment, electrical applicances for personal care, and sewing items were also high on wealthy consumers' shopping lists.
Other popular items included personal computers (up 16.7 percent from the previous year), luggage (up 17.8 percent), and televisions (up 22.3 percent).
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Singapore-headquartered startup Zilingo today announced that it has secured US$54 million in Series C round of funding within just three years of launching its online marketplace that connects online sellers/retailers in Southeast Asia with fashion lovers across Asia.
All of Zilingo’s earlier investors, including American billionaire Tim Draper, SIG, Venturra, Beenext, and Manik Arora, returned to co-invest in this financing round.
With this, Zilingo’s total funding raised to date has touched US$82 million.
“The fresh infusion of capital will be used to focus deeply and boost the Indonesia business, foray into other Southeast Asian markets and the cross-border businesses. The plan is also to further expand the supply base across Cambodia, Bangladesh, in addition to ASEAN markets,” Zilingo Co-founder and CEO Ankiti Bose told e27.
The latest infusion investment comes less than seven months after the e-commerce firm bagged US$17 million in Series B funding, led by Burda Principal Investments and Sequoia Capital India. In the past, Zilingo has raised two round of funding — US$8 million in late 2016 and US$2 million in November 2015.
Established in October 2015 by Ankiti Bose (CEO) and Dhruv Kapoor (CTO), Zilingo lets merchants upload and manage their inventory in any language using any currency. Sellers get facilities such as free shipping, free packaging, doorstep pickup and free and secure payment options.
In addition, it also helps sellers maximise their reach through various tools and strategies. This is important because Zilingo’s marketplace focusses on the long tail of merchants, also known as merchants who deal with niche products.
The startup launched its B2C platforms and apps in November 2015 across ASEAN to let fashion buyers buy from thousands of these merchants, who used the Zilingo Seller Platform at their offline/online store. Its B2B business, called AsiaMall, allows merchants around the world to buy wholesale from Asian suppliers.
Zilingo has currently listed over two million products across various categories, such as fashion, beauty and lifestyle. All kinds of fashion products (branded, non-branded, cheap and also from street vendors), including designer wear, indie labels, hijab, skirts, and pastels are available.
Today, Zilingo sells in Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore, ships internationally to four more countries, and has supply bases in Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, China, Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia.
The startup claims to have over 10,000 independent merchants currently using the platform.
“It has been an incredible few months for Zilingo. We have grown 11x in terms of revenue, launched a huge and successful TV campaign in Indonesia, which has resulted in a big spike in our Indonesia growth in terms of buyers, orders and sales. We have also expanded the merchant ecosystem to include a tremendous artillery of services, making Zilingo a one-of-a-kind product over 10,000 merchants across Asia,” Bose added.
Shailendra Singh, Managing Director, Sequoia (India) Singapore, said: “The Zilingo investment is special for Sequoia because our association started with a seed investment even before the Zilingo service was first launched. Ankiti and Dhruv have totally impressed us with the quality of team they have assembled, their innovative e-commerce strategy and playbook and their speed and quality of execution, all of which resulted in more than 10x revenue growth in the last one year. This new round was finalised weeks after the last one and is a ringing endorsement of how much potential the investor group sees in the company.”
Albert Shyy, Principal at Burda, said: “Zilingo is creating a complete ecosystem for merchants to grow their online fashion business in Southeast Asia and beyond: we believe there is an untapped opportunity across the entire Asian fashion value chain & continue to be very impressed with the company’s trajectory.”


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Marriott Hotels is betting in the future you will take virtual vacations.» Read More
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J.— The proposed auction date for the Revel Casino Hotel is too soon and a $3 million breakup fee that would go to a Florida developer if he's outbid for the recently shuttered site is inappropriate, a U.S. Bankruptcy Court trustee said.
DUBAI, Sept 13- Dubai retailing and restaurants group Marka will list its shares on the Dubai Financial Market on Sept. 25 in the market's first flotation for five years, the company said on Saturday.
The restaurateur who publicly blasted LeSean McCoy for leaving a 20-cent tip told CNBC he won't apologize for starting the controversy.
The peer-to-peer home-sharing website Airbnb faces new opposition in New York.
NEW YORK— A group of New York elected officials, community activists and housing advocates is launching a campaign against the home-sharing company Airbnb. Adriano Espaillat and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer. The company says it housed more than 400,000 visitors to New York last year.
Sept 12- Olive Garden owner Darden Restaurants Inc on Friday reported a quarterly loss, but its results were overshadowed by activist investor Starboard Value LP's release of its revised plan to boost Darden's profit and stock price.
An investor has some suggestions for how Olive Garden can improve its performance, down to the way it rations its unlimited breadsticks. In a nearly 300- page document, Starboard Value criticizes parent company Darden Restaurants Inc. for its management of the Italian restaurant chain.
Contemporary artist Domingo Zapata, and Scott Gerber, Gerber Group CEO, discuss the launch of "Studio" at the W New York Union Square hotel. Zapata used the lounge as his personal canvas to paint his interpretation of "Alice in Wonderland."
Darden Restaurants Inc.— whose restaurants include Olive Garden and LongHorn Steakhouse— lost $19.3 million, or 14 cents per share, for the three months ended Aug. 24. That compares with earnings of $42.2 million, or 32 cents per share, a year earlier. Sales at Olive Garden locations open at least a year fell 1.3 percent.
In a nearly 300- page treatise on what's wrong with Olive Garden and its management, investor Starboard Value suggests the Italian restaurant chain is being reckless with its unlimited breadsticks. The incredibly detailed document was released Thursday and lays out how Olive Garden could improve its performance.
LIMA, Ohio— Ohio highway patrol: Convicted killer of 3 high school students caught after prison escape.
TOKYO, Sept 11- Rakuten Inc, Japan's largest e-commerce company, has been actively considering launching a service like website Airbnb that would provide a hub to rent apartments and homes in Japan to short-term guests, two people with knowledge of the developing plans told Reuters.
WASHINGTON— A Wisconsin congresswoman arrested during a protest of wages paid to workers at McDonald's and other fast-food chains will not face an investigation by the House Ethics Committee.
Vail Resorts on Thursday agreed to buy out Park City Mountain Resort for $182.5 million in cash.
Sept 10- Atlantic City's Revel casino-hotel, which closed earlier this month after filing for bankruptcy, reached a deal to sell itself to a Florida developer for $90 million in cash, a fraction of the billions of dollars it cost to build.
ATLANTIC CITY, New Jersey— A Florida developer has offered $90 million for the Revel Casino Hotel that shut down last week, lawyers for the resort said Wednesday in court documents. The casino said in the bankruptcy court filing that Glenn Straub's Polo North Country Club, Inc., made the cash bid for the $2.4 billion resort.
Sept 10- Atlantic City's Casino Hotel, which closed earlier this month after filing for bankruptcy, reached a deal to sell itself to a Florida developer for $90 million in cash, according to court documents on Wednesday.
NEW YORK— Fall used to be off-peak for tourism everywhere except New England and other fall foliage destinations. Lara Berdine and Mark Petrella, New Yorkers in their 40 s, visit Italy each fall because "it's cheaper, the weather is cooler and we can see the country as it really is, rather than in high season when it's inundated with tourists," said Berdine.
SALT LAKE CITY— An upscale hotel chain has agreed to pay about $2 million to settle allegations that 43 Utah employees working in the country illegally had returned to work after they were flagged by an immigration audit and fired, according to federal authorities.
*Comes after a string of disappointing Tokyo debuts. TOKYO, Sept 10- Japan's largest recruitment company Recruit Holdings said it is planning an initial public offering worth $1.8 billion, which will test investor appetite for big Tokyo listings after some weak debuts this year.


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[by Suzanne Kurtz]
WASHINGTON, November 22, 2012 (JTA) – A scoop of Ben & Jerry’s may taste like heaven, and for company co-founder Jerry Greenfield, the business of making ice cream has a spiritual side as well.
“There is a spiritual aspect to business, just as there is to people,” Greenfield told a crowd of 300 last week at a networking event for the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington.
The ice cream company known for its colorful pint-size containers, funky flavors and creative marketing has implemented smart business practices that have advanced its bottom line as well as its do-good corporate culture.
Raised on suburban New York’s Long Island, Greenfield, 60, and his longtime friend and business partner Ben Cohen met in gym class in junior high school after discovering a shared dislike of running track. They were chubby kids who always enjoyed eating, Greenfield said, and both attended Hebrew school and had their bar mitzvahs at the Reform Congregation of Merrick.
Though a self-described “cultural Jew,” Greenfield said that his religious education helped sensitize him to discrimination, marginalization and the needs of “other people in society and around the world.”
In his mid-20s, after being rejected from some 20 medical schools and not content with working as a lab technician, Greenfield split a $5 Pennsylvania State University correspondence course in ice cream-making with Cohen and embarked on a new business venture.
In 1978, with $12,000 scraped together from loans and savings, they opened Ben & Jerry’s Homemade, Inc. in a renovated gas station in Burlington, VT. Their single storefront venture would grow eventually into a $300 million global ice cream empire owned by the Unilever Corp.
Neither Greenfield nor Cohen is still active in the day-to-day running of the company. Instead, Greenfield said, his present role with Ben & Jerry’s holds “no responsibility and no authority,” joking that it should be a position that those attending the federation event also strive for in their careers.
But their vision for an ice cream company that would be both profitable and care about the needs of society has left a lasting impact on both employees and customers.
“Simply operating this way had so many benefits for the company,” said Greenfield, as he detailed some of the values-driven business practices that also saw him and Cohen named U.S. Small Business Persons of the Year in 1988.
One oft-cited example of Ben & Jerry’s socially conscience business practices is its purchase of $8 million annually of chocolate brownies baked at the Greyston Bakery in Yonkers, NY, a nonprofit that offers job training and hires workers who might have a difficult time finding jobs elsewhere, such as ex-convicts, former substance abusers and welfare recipients.
“We came up with this popular flavor [for using the brownies] and the bakery is pretty happy with it, too!” said Greenfield.
In 1984, when the company needed to raise additional capital to grow the business, they let their Vermont neighbors “get a scoop of the action” by holding an in-state public offering.
“People of essentially any economic situation could participate,” said Greenfield, and one in every 100 Vermont families became shareholders in the company. “As the business supported the community, the community supported the business.”
In 1985, the company made a public stock offering and also established the Ben & Jerry’s Foundation. It began donating 7.5 percent of pretax profits to nonprofit organizations – the highest percentage of any publicly traded company at the time, he said.
“As you give, you receive,” Greenfield said. “As you help others, you are helped in return.”
He added, “And just because the idea that the good that you do comes back to you is written in the Bible and not in some business textbook doesn’t mean that it is any less valid.”


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As more stuff comes out about Apple's new handheld device - the iPad, a shitstorm has erupted between Adobe and Apple over the revelation that the new device will not support Flash technology.
Flash, for anyone who's been living under a rock for the past ten years is the software that runs embedded video and animated applications on your web browser. Anytime you look at a video on Facebook or YouTube or a newspaper website - you're using flash
In this Article Apple honcho Jobs is quoted as saying that Adobe Flash is a bug-ridden software that causes Macs to crash therefore he won't supported it, putting aside that Apple has promoted the Mac as virtually indestructable and by inference unable to crash, a more likely excuse is that supporting Flash technology would allow a lot of content providers to bypass Apple's App Store thereby cutting the company out of their lucrative profit share.
So here we have a touch screen device, with no connectivity to PC's a virtually proprietary Sim Card, that runs a limited selection of programs and has little to no customisation, I'll pass thanks.
Interestingly the same article quotes Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, known mostly for his reality-defying statement about what consumers want, here he actually hit the proverbial on the head...
"It was a bigger iPod Touch"


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Charter Hall Group has closed two separate transactions in Australia worth a total of A$1.25bn (€772m) with fuel giant BP and US private equity group KKR.
In the BP deal, Charter Hall and two of its funds are investing A$840m to buy a 49% stake in 225 convenience stores and fuel outlets.
Charter Hall’s service station deal comes on top of its purchase of the Arnott’s biscuit manufacturing facility in Sydney’s West from KKR for A$398.9m. KKR acquired Arnott’s in July.
In both instances, the deals have been transacted on a sale-and-leaseback basis.
Charter Hall’s managing director and group CEO, David Harrison, said the deals established significant tenant customer relationships with both BP and Arnott’s.
“Our success in partnering with global multi-national and Australian-based corporates in sale-and-leaseback activities continues to benefit our tenant customers while providing opportunities for our diverse range of investors and security-holders,” he said.
Charter Hall has created a partnership to be owned 50% by its listed Charter Hall Long WALE Reit (CLW), 30% by the Charter Hall Retail REIT (CQR) and 20% by Charter Hall Group to hold the BP assets.
CLW will have an equal share of the Arnott’s manufacturing plant with the Charter Hall Industrial Reit.
It is undertaking an underwritten A$350m equity raising to fund its share in the two transactions in what is the listed vehicle’s fourth capital-raising this year.
Charter Hall Industrial & Logistics CEO, Richard Stacker, said the Arnotts transaction was one of the largest individual industrial asset sales recorded in Australia.
He said Arnott’s was the market leader in Australian biscuits, with a portfolio of iconic products that could be found in 95% of Australian households, commanding about a 61% share of the Australian biscuit market.
The Charter Hall industrial fund will find the transaction from capital raised (A$725m) last October to fund acquisitions and an A$2bn development pipeline.
CQR is planning to sell some shopping centres to fund its share of the BP transaction.
The spate of acquisitions this year has increased Charter Hall’s assets under management by 25% from A$30.4bn to more than A$38bn.
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Softbank Operating Profit Increases as IPhone Lures Users
Softbank Corp. (9984), the Japanese mobile- phone carrier that agreed last month to buy a $20 billion stake in Sprint Nextel Corp. (S), boosted second-quarter earnings by luring users with Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPhone.
Operating income rose 6.7 percent to 210.6 billion yen ($2.6 billion) in the three months ended September, the Tokyo- based company said in a statement yesterday. The carrier is also considering reducing its stake in eAccess Ltd. (9427) to one-third after the 180 billion yen acquisition is completed, Softbank President Masayoshi Son told reporters in Tokyo yesterday.
Softbank has narrowed the gap in subscribers with bigger rivals NTT DoCoMo Inc. (9437) and KDDI Corp. (9433) by cutting basic fees and being the first in Japan to offer the iPhone series, adding the most net new users every year since 2007. By increasing smartphone subscribers, Softbank has also raised average revenue per user of data services including streaming video.
The result “should be positive for the share price in the near term,” Hitoshi Hayakawa, an analyst at Credit Suisse Group AG in Tokyo, wrote in a note to clients yesterday. “The market’s focus has shifted from results to the impact of the recent major acquisitions” of Sprint and eAccess, he said.
The carrier, Japan’s third-largest for mobile phones, seeks to increase users outside the country. The acquisition of a 70 percent stake in Sprint Nextel would add the Overland Park, Kansas-based company’s 56.4 million mobile subscribers, bringing Softbank’s total to 96 million in the U.S. and Japan, compared with 60.8 million for NTT DoCoMo, Japan’s biggest mobile carrier.
Son also is considering the “merits and demerits” of owning all of eAccess as initially planned, he said.
Softbank rose 0.8 percent to 2,527 yen in Tokyo yesterday. The stock has gained 11 percent this year, compared with a 1.9 percent advance for the broader Topix index and a 17 percent decline for NTT DoCoMo.
Softbank left unchanged its projection for at least 700 billion yen in operating profit for the year ending March. Operating income rose 7.9 percent to 402.8 billion yen in the six months ended Sept. 30, beating the 373.2 billion yen estimate by Hayakawa of Credit Suisse.
“Our earnings are running in top gear,” Son said. “It’s proof that the iPhone isn’t the only thing boosting our profits. We’re making various efforts, and that’s why we have strength to go overseas.”
The Sprint deal would be the biggest publicly announced outbound acquisition by a Japanese company since at least 2000, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Softbank will pay $12.1 billion to Sprint shareholders and the deal includes $8 billion of new capital, according to an Oct. 15 statement.
Son is pursuing an acquisition strategy that counts on smartphone users migrating to faster wireless networks to surf the Web and download or stream videos and music. Softbank is looking to ride the fastest growth in mobile communications since 3G started rolling out a decade ago with the emergence of Long Term Evolution technology.
LTE subscriptions quadrupled this year to 73 million and are expected to reach 1.2 billion by 2016, according to projections from IHS iSuppli. Some of the world’s largest handset makers -- Apple, Samsung Electronics Co. and HTC Corp. (2498) - - support the technology.
Softbank will increase capital spending to 700 billion yen this fiscal year as it seeks to keep capacity growth on pace with the increase in subscribers, then trim to 550 billion yen in the next 12 months, Son told reporters yesterday.
Softbank gained 320,200 subscribers in September, up from 217,200 in August. That compares with the 158,600 addition at DoCoMo. KDDI, the No. 2 operator that also started offering iPhone 5, attracted 224,900 users.
Softbank, the fastest-growing Japanese mobile provider, boosted earnings by more than sevenfold during the past four years with the popularity of the iPhone.
Net income fell 36 percent to 78.8 billion yen in the fiscal second quarter, according to yesterday’s statement. The sale of Yahoo! Inc. shares helped push profit for the same period last year to a record 122.5 billion yen.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Tighe at email@example.com


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If you're a Nicki Minaj and Beyoncé fan, then your Monday is about to get much better. Beyoncé and Nicki Minaj released their "Feeling Myself" music video on Tidal, Jay Z's music streaming service. As much as this is good news for fans of the two who've been waiting to see the video in full, if you aren't a Tidal subscriber you cannot watch it in its entirety. With that said, there are some photos to look at, along with a 30-second clip on Tidal's homepage.
In that short 30 seconds, you get to watch the two eat hamburgers, chill in bathing suits, dance like crazy, laugh like friends do, and make fake mustaches with their hair. Basically, it's everything fans have been waiting for. Again, those who don't have Tidal are probably going to be upset they can't watch the full video. However, it looks like a full version of the video has been uploaded on YouTube, which you can watch here for the time being.
How many more subscribers do you think Tidal will gain now that this video has been released? Will fans be able to resist? We'll have to wait and see. For now, enjoy these photos and videos of "Feeling Myself," which will probably become everyone's favorite summer jam.


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Asics is calling for real runners to upload pictures or images of themselves to the Asics Ayami Facebook app, with visitors encouraged to vote for their favourite.
The winner will feature in a campaign for the Ayami range next year, created by marketing agency Amsterdam Worldwide.
The competition continues a long line of digital campaigns from Asics. In August, it supported a campaign between digital music retailer eMusic and Intersport to provide free music downloads in aid of the latter’s Run Free Now campaign.
It was also one of the first advertisers to appear on the relaunched Men’s Health website in the autumn.
In July, Amsterdam Worldwide created an online hub for Vauxhall within Mothercare’s parenting website Gurgle as part of its £10m strategy promoting the relaunch of its Meriva family model.
This story first appeared on newmediaage.co.uk


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Arnott's horrified Australia when, in April 2016, they changed the recipe for their iconic Pizza Shapes. Sadness followed, then anger.
Within a few months, the company had reinstated the original recipe alongside the new variety, but the fear had been real. For News.com.au, I came up with a surprisingly simple recipe for making the original Pizza Shapes at home.
Find the full article and recipe here.


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The first so-called “smart gun” that uses biometrics to unlock for shooting will hit the market at the end of the year.
Biofire Technologies announced this month that it is taking pre-orders for its home defense gun that is intended to prevent unwanted access to children and criminals. This is either a big step forward in gun safety or a gimmick with unreliable technology, depending on who you ask.
Smart guns, otherwise known as personalized handguns, have been in development for many years. The CEO and Founder of Biofire Technologies, Kai Kloepfer, told The Epoch Times in an interview that this is the first “major innovation in how a handgun has been designed or manufactured in 50 years.”
Kloepfer, 26, has been working on designing a smart gun since he was a teenager. “This is a new option for gun owners to give them peace of mind that their children or criminals won’t get their hands on it.”
The Biofire Smart Gun is a handgun that can be stored with fingerprints and 3D facial recognition to unlock it to shoot. The company says unlocking works in the dark. The data is stored in the gun in encrypted form. The gun can have biometrics for up to five total authorized users.
The Biofire gun has integrated infrared sensors in the grip to keep it armed while the user is holding it. As soon as the grip is released, the gun locks. It is powered by a rechargeable lithium-ion battery that Biofire says lasts several months with average use and can fire continuously for several hours. The firearm only comes in 9mm caliber, but buyers are given multiple choices for color and style and left- or right-handed.
Kloepfer, who said he owns a lot of regular guns, said his product gives people an option for a “new and better choice.”
Gun rights groups have been leery that biometrics can function perfectly in self-defense scenarios. The National Shootings Sports Foundation (NSSF) represents gun manufacturers. Biofire is a member.
“Firearms are tools that individuals rely upon to save their lives and the lives of their loved ones. That necessitates a firearm to work, as designed, each and every time,” Mark Oliva, NSSF’s director of public affairs, told The Epoch Times. “Additional points of failure, including authorized-user technology, are concerns for gun owners. If that technology fails, that could be catastrophic for an individual depending upon it to save his or her life.”
The National Rifle Association (NRA) warns the stress of real life is different than product testing.
“Firearms have to perform in all situations—not just the predictable and controllable circumstances at a gun range,” NRAs spokeswoman Amy Hunter told The Epoch Times. “Self-defense scenarios are unpredictable and highly volatile, and thus far there have been concerns about the ability of a ‘smart’ gun to operate reliably in those circumstances.”
Hunter pointed out, “That is why even in states that have mandated and imposed smart gun technology, law enforcement has secured an exemption.”
Other considerations for the technology’s reliability are whether the user’s hand is wet or dirty, wearing gloves, sunglasses, hats, and other facial coverings. Biofire says that dual biometrics is designed to address all these issues so that the face or fingers can be used when one is not recognized.
Kloepfer acknowledged these doubts. “Our goal is to prove to the American public that this is a firearm that they can rely on in those unpredictable circumstances,” he said.
Smart Gun Politics
Smart guns have been politically controversial since New Jersey’s 2002 law mandated that only smart guns could be sold by retailers in the state once they were available for sale anywhere in the United States. The law created a huge backlash among Second Amendment rights advocates. In 2019, Governor Phil Murphy changed the law to require firearm dealers sell smart guns when they become available along with regular ones.
President Joe Biden campaigned on making all firearms sold have smart gun technology. He claimed in 2020 that “we have the technology to allow only authorized users to fire a gun,” even though there were no smart guns on the market.
Biden also stated that “the NRA and gun manufacturers are bullying firearms dealers who try to sell these guns.”
The NRA and the NSSF deny this.
“The NRA does not oppose the development of smart guns, nor the ability of Americans to voluntarily acquire them,” said Hunter. “The NRA does oppose laws that mandate Americans exclusively acquire or possess only smart guns, as a New Jersey bill attempted to do several years ago.”
Both the NSSF and Biofire oppose laws that mandate smart gun technology. Kloepfer said he has actively lobbied against laws that mandate smart guns.
About half of gun owners support developing smart guns, according to a Morning Consult poll in March 2022.
Mike Bloomberg Supports
The gun-control group funded by Mike Bloomberg, Everytown for Gun Safety, was given early access to test fire the Biofire firearm.
“The introduction of a smart gun to the consumer market is proof that, despite what legacy gun manufacturers may say publicly, the technology to accurately detect an authorized gun user is not only possible, it’s here already,” said Nick Suplina, senior vice president of law and policy at Everytown for Gun Safety, who tested the firearm. “Gun manufacturers now have a viable road map for innovating towards safety—and it’s on them to act.”
Everytown asserted in the statement have not gotten to market previously “in part because past developers faced stiff opposition from the gun lobby.” The group pointed to an NSSF article entitled, “Don’t Believe the Hype, Smart Gun Tech Still Not Ready for Primetime.”
The NSSF does not oppose the development or sale of smart guns. “The customer should be free to evaluate if Biofire’s technology is reliable enough to meet their needs,” said Oliva.
Kloepfer said his smart gun is designed with “high-precision engineering principles to make a meaningful impact on preventable firearm deaths among children,” referring to suicides and accidents.
Accidental deaths of children from guns get enormous media attention because of their tragic nature, but they are rare. A spokesman for the CDC told The Epoch Times there were 153 unintentional firearm deaths of children and adolescents aged 1 to 18 in the United States in 2021, the most recent year of final data.
The gun manufacturing industry has long provided a lock with every firearm sold at retail. When properly applied and used, the locking devices make the firearm inoperable. In addition, there are many types of safe firearm storage for when the gun is not on the owner, such as large safes, lock boxes, and electronic digital safes that use fingerprints to unlock.
There are other smart guns in development. In 2021, SmartGunz, LLC announced pre-sales of its 9mm smart gun Sentry pistol that costs $2,995. The firearm was then unlocked by wearing a specific glove but now works off a ring worn by the user. The company has been renamed Free State Firearms, LLC. It says its 9mm 1911 Sentry, which costs $2,495, will deliver in the third quarter of 2023.
BioFire, which is based in Broomfield, Colorado, raised $30 million in venture capital to develop the smart gun.


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HTC is releasing its PC-powered Vive Cosmos VR headset next month.
Originally unveiled earlier this year at CES, the Cosmos is HTC’s latest bid at a mainstream VR headset. Unlike the original HTC Vive, the Cosmos doesn’t require external sensors and uses fully tracked motion controllers. HTC has also upgraded the LCD panels, with a combined 2,880 x 1,700 resolution, and there’s a 110-degree field-of-view alongside a 90Hz refresh rate.
Ikea demonstrates its €15 Sonos remote control, launching soon.
The Symfonisk remote control now has an official product page showing a price of €14.99. First spotted on the French Ikea website by Tweakers, the remote is designed to control Ikea’s Sonos-compatible Symfonisk speakers and will begin shipping in the UK and beyond on October 1st, according to the reliable Dutch tech site. It’s not yet clear when it’ll be available in the US.
The small controller works like this: Push it down once to pause, again to play; push two or three times to skip tracks forward and back; or rotate the dial to the left or right to decrease or increase the volume. It works on a table or wall thanks to an included magnetic mount.
The Pixel 4 leaks are starting to feel even more frequent than the avalanche of early videos and photos that preceded last year’s announcement of the Pixel 3 and 3 XL. In the most comprehensive look yet at Google’s new phone, today we’re seeing two extensive video tours of the Pixel 4 XL.
The first comes from YouTube channel AnhEm TV, which has posted a six and a half minute clip featuring the white model. It has a matte back panel and matte black sides. The side texture is said to be reminiscent of the grippy metal finish from the black Pixel 2. There’s a lot going on, but it’s a nice callback to the “panda” styling of the older Pixel 2 XL.
Hands on: iPhone 11 review
The iPhone 11 has one big feature that will really matter to users, and more so than any other element: it's got a killer price.
While the iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Pro Max steal the show in terms of headline spec, the new iPhone has a lower price than the iPhone XR (the surprise hit from last year) and yet improves the spec in a few key areas.
It's got faster innards, a much, much improved camera and comes with iOS 13 as standard - and does so at a price that allows users to get a new iPhone for less than most top-end phones out there.
That said, it's far from the most advanced iPhone out there, so has Apple got a hit on its hands, or is it something that doesn't quite hit the spot?
New Amazon Echo gear on the way? Amazon teases big Seattle launch event.
At this rate, you’re going to need to build an extension on your house to accommodate all the Amazon Echo speakers out there: Amazon has just announced that it’s going to be hosting a large launch event in Seattle at the end of this month, September 25.
In what’s now becoming an annual tradition for the company, we’re expecting Amazon to reveal details on refreshed Amazon Echo speakers, as well as a likely expansion of its own-brand Alexa-enabled home appliances.
Sega Genesis Mini review
To coincide with the 30th anniversary of its iconic 16-bit console, Sega has released the Sega Genesis Mini, a compact reimagining of the console (known as the Mega Drive outside of the US) that comes pre-packed with 40 classic games – plus two bonus titles.
With Nintendo having scored some pretty noticeable success with its NES Classic Mini and SNES Classic Mini miniature remakes of its classic consoles, it’s not too surprising to see Sega take a similar approach. For anyone who grew up in the 1990’s, the fact that old rivals Sega and Nintendo are going head to head again is rather thrilling.
While this isn’t the first time Sega Genesis games have been available in a mini console, it’s the first time Sega has made an official product. That means you get the official branding and iconic shrunk-down design of the model 1 Genesis. For Sega fans and collectors, this makes it an essential purchase over those third-party consoles.


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Glyphosate Added to California List of Cancer-Causing Chemicals
According to the Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA), glyphosate, the active ingredient in the popular herbicide Roundup, will be added to a list of known carcinogens in the state of California. Monsanto, the maker of RoundUp, has been in a legal battle with consumers who claim that the company inadequately warned users of the risk of cancer associated with the product. This listing, which goes into effect on July 7, 2017, is a victory for the over 800 individuals who have sued Monsanto claiming that RoundUp caused their cancer.
Monsanto is already fighting back, calling California’s decision “unwarranted on the basis of science and law.” Initially, the company attempted to block the addition of glyphosate to the list in trial court, but was unsuccessful. OEHHA has announced that the listing of glyphosate will proceed, requiring companies in California that sell the chemical to add warning labels on packaging. California’s decision to officially classify glyphosate as a carcinogen and require a warning label on the product is a welcome advancement for those fighting against Monsanto’s irresponsibility.
If you or a loved one has non-Hodgins lymphoma cancer that may have been caused by exposure to Roundup, the experienced Mass Tort lawyers at The Yost Legal Group are here to help. Call The Yost Legal Group today at 1-800-YOST-LAW (967-8529) for a FREE, confidential, no-obligation consultation. At The Yost Legal Group, there is no fee or expense unless you recover.


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Sisa Week = Reporter Lee Mi-jeong Today (28th) marks the first week since the launch of Apple Pay in Korea. Since its release, it has received enthusiastic attention and made a right eye contact in the market. As a result, discussions on the introduction of Apple Pay are lively in distribution. However, Shinsegae Group, one of the Big 3 distributors, shows a cautious stance on the introduction of Apple Pay, and attention is focused on the background.
◇ Distributors are stepping up because of the great interest in Apple Pay
According to the industry, Apple Pay, Apple’s simple contactless payment system, started domestic service on the 21st in partnership with Hyundai Card. Apple Pay was the dream of iPhone users. As it has been a long-awaited service, the response at the beginning of the launch is hot. On the first day of its release alone, the number of devices registered with Apple Pay cards is known to exceed 1 million.
According to Counterpoint Research, 12.5 million iPhones were registered in Korea last year. It is expected that a significant proportion of iPhone users will sign up for Apple Pay. Counterpoint Research also predicted that more than half of users would switch to Apple Pay from other simple payment platforms by the end of the year.
However, there are significant limitations to the widespread use of Apple Pay by current iPhone users. First of all, the only card linked to Apple Pay is the Hyundai Card. Users of card companies other than Hyundai Card cannot use Apple Pay. Additionally, carrier card functionality desired by iPhone users is not supported.
Apple Pay is also limited. Apple Pay can only be used at merchants with a near field communication (NFC) terminal. Given that the domestic NFC terminal penetration rate is less than 10%, it is expected that there will be limitations to the rapid expansion of use.
As of the announcement on the first day of the launch, participating Apple Pay merchant brands are: △ 6 convenience stores, including CU and GS24 △ 12 department stores and shopping malls, including Lotte Department Store and Hyundai Department Store △ 10 mart and supermarket, including Costco and Lotte Mart Korea △ Coffee 19, including Twosome Place and Pascucci Places △ 7 sweets and desserts including Paris Baguette △ 13 restaurants including McDonalds △ 6 living and home appliances such as IKEA △ 20 hotels and resorts including Haevichi Hotel & Resort △ ing fuel and recharge shops including GS Caltex △ Movies including Kyobo Book Center There are 5 books and 7 leisure and travel destinations including △Seoul Land. There are 17 websites online, including Baedal Minjok and Musinsa.
In the middle of this, the decision of the ‘Big Distribution 3’ over the Apple Pay partnership was mixed. Although affiliated companies Lotte and Hyundai Department Store participated as affiliate brands right after the launch of Apple Pay, the Shinsegae Group does not support Apple Pay, except for Emart 24, a convenience store affiliate. In other words, Apple Pay cannot be used at Shinsegae-affiliated E-Mart, Shinsegae Department Store, Starbucks, Starfield Outlet, and No Brand Burger.
◇ Shinsegae, the Apple Pay partnership is lukewarm… “As it is in the early stages of its introduction, we are monitoring it”
Starbucks is a coffee franchise with a high preference for the young MZ generation in their 20s and 30s. Among iPhone users, there are many voices that Starbucks does not support Apple Pay.
Regarding this, a Starbucks official said, “We are watching as it is in the early stages of the introduction,” and “we are reviewing whether it should be introduced while monitoring various issues.”
Other distribution subsidiaries of the Shinsegae Group are known to be in a similar situation. Some say Shinsegae’s cautious move is concerned about a drop in the usage rate of its own simple payment service, ‘Surp Pay’. However, the Shinsegae side draws a line against this view, saying it is an excessive interpretation.
Sukpay is a simple payment service introduced by Shinsegae in 2015. Shinsegae has been working hard to expand the use of Sukpay online and offline for the past few years. In addition, Shinsegae has been striving to expand synergy with ‘Smile Pay’, G Market’s simple payment service under eBay Korea, which it acquired in 2021.
Meanwhile, when Shinsegae introduced Samsung Pay in 2015, it also reacted conservatively to related service partnerships. The partnership was not signed until a year after Samsung Pay was introduced. In line with this stance, Apple Pay support is also expected to be cautious.
|Apple Pay threatens the simple payment market, but its impact on the smartphone market is limited|
|2023. 03. 20||counterpoint|


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Video: Laptop Runs Android OS
In the video below, you can see the Android OS—originally designed for mobile phones—boot up relatively quickly and take full advantage of the laptop’s built-in HSDPA. Yes, you heard that right, a laptop:
Featured at the recently concluded Computex, it’s obvious that Google needs to change at least one thing: you don’t tell a laptop owner to turn of his or her “phone”. Interesting though how the apparently unvarnished version of the OS automatically adapts to a laptop’s larger-than-mobile resolution. According to the video’s uploader, Asus was publicizing their own Android-based laptop, but reportedly chose not to showcase a demo unit.
Compal, the company behind the laptop, is known as the outsourced manufacturer for big brands like Dell and HP. It specializes in the production of notebooks and computer displays.


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Do Brazilians crave Kraft Macaroni & Cheese? Will the Chinese dig Planters Peanuts?
Kraft Heinz, with its cupboards full of mature pantry staples that chug along in the U.S., is betting that some of Kraft's biggest legacy brands may have legs abroad in its new quest for growth.
The company, formed just over a year ago by a merger of Northfield-based Kraft Foods and Pittsburgh-based H.J. Heinz, took its first steps on that strategy last spring, when it pushed two of Kraft's best-known items—its Macaroni & Cheese dinners and Planters nuts—into the United Kingdom. Last month it introduced Planters to consumers in China. By the end of the year it hopes to take Macaroni & Cheese to Brazil.
Executives say that's just the start. Kraft Heinz plans to begin distributing Kraft products to more countries in Europe and the Middle East in the near future, CEO Bernardo Hees told analysts during a recent conference call. “We wanted to select fewer but big brands and segments in about eight countries to 10 countries to establish ourselves in the next two years to three years in a big way,” he said.
The growth strategy, analysts say, amounts to plucking low-hanging fruit: leveraging the former Heinz international distribution network to cultivate new business with legacy Kraft products previously sold only in North America.


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Buckle is protecting gig drivers by extending its signature rideshare and delivery auto insurance to those who drive in various U.S. regions for leading companies like Uber, Lyft, Instacart, Amazon Flex, Uber Eats, Grubhub, Favor, and others. Buckle, the inclusive tech-enabled financial services company, is the only insurance company in the U.S. designed specifically to protect gig economy drivers, providing coverage for personal, rideshare, and delivery in a single policy at affordable rates.
“One of the fastest growing occupations in the U.S., delivery drivers are in high demand and they need comprehensive and affordable insurance coverage fast,” said Sharon Fernandez, Head of Insurance at Buckle. “Extending our rideshare insurance, that provides both commercial and personal coverage in one affordable policy to include food and package delivery companies, means peace of mind for gig drivers during the busy holiday season and beyond when they can’t afford to lose their car following an accident.”
Buckle rideshare and delivery insurance underwrites coverage at affordable rates for gig drivers because the company foregoes the outdated and discriminatory credit score methodology geared for salaried employees, which penalizes gig workers, many with poor or no credit. The company uses non-traditional data sources, including star ratings and driving track records, crowdsourced from thousands of trips to price insurance policies, giving gig drivers the financial advantage.
Texas-based food delivery service, Favor, has recently partnered with the company, making Buckle’s gig insurance available to their drivers in over 130 cities across Texas. “With Buckle, our Runners can now get auto insurance tailored to their specific needs as gig economy delivery drivers,” said Jesse Jarvis, Favor’s Runner Community Liaison. “Runners are at the heart of Favor, and we are thrilled to provide easy access to an affordable insurance option that offers combined coverage on the road – whether they are delivering with Favor or driving for personal use.”
According to Techaeris, delivery is one of the fastest growing gig verticals and demand for meal delivery services in particular soared in popularity as the pandemic changed consumer behaviors. The restaurant delivery market alone is forecasted to rise to $33.2 billion in the U.S. in 2022, according to Statista.
Holiday online shopping is also reaching new highs in 2021. According to Practical Ecommerce, American consumers shopped early this year, spending $109.8 billion online from November 1–29, an increase of 11.9% over the same period last year, and $33.9 billion from Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday.
“For years, gig workers have been left out in the cold when it comes to adequate delivery insurance,” said Harry Campbell, Founder at The Rideshare Guy. “Drivers have typically had to rely on their personal insurance coverage, but many of the top insurers do not cover them in the event of an accident. Buckle has been a leader when it comes to rideshare insurance, and they are now bringing that peace of mind to delivery drivers across the country with their new gig auto insurance.”
For a limited time in December, eligible rideshare and delivery drivers who complete a successful quote will receive a $20 digital gift card. Buckle also assists with cancelling old policies so making the switch is easy in addition to saving money while gaining better coverage.
To get a free quote on gig auto insurance designed exclusively for rideshare and delivery drivers without a credit check and immediate coverage, go to www.buckleup.com or call 1.866.828.2553.


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Tim Goltser and Curtis Mason have been building things together since high school, when the two were the co-captains of their school’s robotics team. In college, Goltser and Mason teamed up to c
SOSV’s new fund makes it one of the largest pools of deep tech venture capital to be raised in recent years.
The app is designed to make people who usually play an instrument on their own feel like they’re part of a worldwide band.
Are you gearing up to secure funding for your startup or maybe you’ve raised a little bit already? If so, ensuring your cap table and data room are pristine could be the difference between a smo
Tiktok said today that it has partnered with ticketing company AXS to sell tickets for events worldwide. The ByteDance-owned app is introducing this feature in the US, UK, Sweden, and Australia at la
Zypsy, a design firm with a track record of helping early-stage startups, has launched a new and somewhat unique venture investment program. It will be offering 10 startups up to $100,000 of brand a
Tesla management told employees Monday that the recent layoffs — which gutted some departments by 20% and even hit high performers — were largely due to poor financial performance, a sourc
The Overture Maps Foundation today launched the first beta of its global open map dataset. With this, the foundation, which is backed by the likes of Amazon, Esri, Meta, Microsoft and TomTom, is getti
When Alex Katz founded Two Chairs in 2017, he firmly believed that in-person therapy is the most effective for behavioral health. Two Chairs used technology — a proprietary matching algorithm — to
The Oversight Board, Meta’s semi-independent policy council, is turning its attention to how the company’s social platforms are handling explicit, AI-generated images. Tuesday, it announce
The long-term goal with Rivos is to build chips primarily for servers that can handle intensive data analytics and AI workloads, including generative AI workloads.
Quilt promises its heat pump will be a sleeker design that can be installed in more places around a room than competitors’ offerings.
Google Wallet will finally launch in India — nearly two years after its relaunch as a digital wallet platform in the U.S. — according to a preview of the app that the company accidentally
As the Gulf region gains strategic importance in the tech war between the U.S. and China, Microsoft is making a big move into one of the Middle East’s oil-rich countries. On Monday evening, Micr
finmid is building an embedded finance product that targets that relationship between marketplaces and sellers, and raised a Series A round to further build out its product and enter new markets.
"We feel there are major gaps between the spirit of the EU regulation and these repositories in practice," the report authors write.
Meta-owned social network Threads is finally testing a "Recent" filter to sort search results.
Hello and welcome back to TechCrunch Space. I hope everyone had a great time at Space Symposium! Hopefully I’ll see you there next year.
Meta continues to field criticism over how it handles younger consumers using its platforms, but the company is also planning new products that will cater to them. On Monday, the company announced in
This is the second group to demand a ransom payment from Change Healthcare to prevent the release of stolen patient data in as many months.


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Assuming Amazon can execute a global rollout sooner rather than later, this is also potentially bad news for Apple, which has held a near-monopoly on online music since the launch of the iPod. Apple's iPod's sales are slowing rapidly--unit sales missed analysts' expectations in Q4--and an erosion of iTunes's dominance of downloads will open the door a crack for hardware competitors.
(Not that Apple has anything to worry about in the near term: As of this writing, on Amazon, 9 of the top 10 bestselling music players are iPods.)
Perhaps it's Sunday-morning brain fog, but it's not immediately obvious to us why Amazon would break with its announce-it-when-you-launch-it tradition to issue an airy release like this. Usually it's the industry leaders who follow this communications strategy--to deter would-be upstarts--and Amazon's not the leader in this business.
Update: One explanation for Amazon's early release -- an attempt to get Universal Music Group fully committed?
Amazon Signs Sony, Now Has All Four Majors DRM-Free
How's Amazon's iTunes Killer Doing? Well, Actually


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Uncut Fanzine 4
After releasing two independent print projects, Snaps and KCT Private Club, São Paulo-based Peruvian photographer Gianfranco Briceño is launching the fourth issue of Uncut, his new fanzine which was first launched a year and a half ago via social media as an art project. For the first time since its release, it is now also made available for pre-order online.
Uncut 4, developed in collaboration with beauty artist Dindi Hojah and editor Eduardo Viveiros, features twenty new faces across forty eight pages which are individually customized and hand painted by the photographer so that each copy of the publication is unique. The new issue features five different covers, and a new graphic project by designer Guilherme Falcão.
Make sure to pre-order your copy of Uncut 4 here.


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The State Of Our Ports 2015
Yesterday over fifteen hundred people gathered in Savannah to hear last year's record and the future of one of our city's biggest revenue sources. Director of the GPA, Curtis Foltz, gave a presentation, broadcast on a live feed, detailing the status of the nations fastest growing port and explained that the 2014/2015 fiscal year was the busiest year on record. "To have growth in every sector of our business is a once in a lifetime year." said Foltz.
With an eight percent jump in the tonnage from last year, amounting to about 32 million tons, that's over 530,000 more cargo containers that the ships usually carry. In 2000 the GPA was not even in the top ten in port size and productivity and this year they are now the #4 port in the country and the fastest growing. "We are a gateway to the South East and becoming a big deal in the national scene." Said Foltz.
Foltz says there are many reasons for the record numbers. "Very efficient and modern ports, great road and rail connectivity, demographic strength of growth in the southeast, favorable business climate that the governor and our general assembly have promoted."
As for the future of the GPA? Foltz finally announced that the deepening of the Savannah Harbor is underway and spoke about the Panama Canal Expansion Project which is expected to finish next year. Throughout all of this though the theme of the presentation was to maintain sustainability and remain environmentally conscious throughout the GPA's expansion process, showing that commerce and nature can co-exist.


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Global society is currently grappling with the challenge of climate change, or what is known as the climate crisis. The climate crisis refers to extreme changes in temperature and weather patterns that occur over the long term. One of the significant impacts of the climate crisis has triggered the emergence of new problems, namely food insecurity.
Food availability throughout the world is increasingly minimal due to the climate crisis. Hot weather, drought, floods, forest fires, extreme snow, and excess air humidity greatly limit plant growth.
As a result, not only is food stock limited, but the quality of the food in terms of the nutritional content we eat is also greatly reduced. Limited stock also makes food prices higher. It is not impossible that in the future we will no longer be able to choose what we want to eat because the food we currently enjoy is scarce due to the climate crisis.
The following series of foodstuffs are threatened with shortages due to the climate crisis.
Rice plants are threatened with a decline in productivity of 20-40 percent. Based on a report by Fitch Solutions Country Risk & Industry Research, as many as 3.5 billion global residents will be affected by a global rice production deficit of 8.7 million tonnes in 2023.
This condition is the worst rice deficit in the world in the last two decades. As a result, rice prices are expected to remain around current highs until 2024.
The causes of the global rice supply shortage are varied, starting from a significant decline in production due to bad weather in the largest rice producing countries such as China and Pakistan, as well as the war in Ukraine. Quoted via CNBC Indonesia, senior analyst at global food and agriculture bank Rabobank, Oscar Tjakra, warned that the impact of this condition would increase the cost of rice imports for large rice importing countries such as Indonesia.
The Indonesian sea is currently experiencing a temperature increase of more than 0.5 degrees Celsius and will continue to warm in the next decades. The climate crisis has affected the population, distribution and migration behavior of marine biota.
Moreover, the party most disadvantaged by this condition is none other than small-scale fishermen. According to the Mongabay website, fish catches are predicted to decrease by 20-30 percent in all regions by 2050. The fish catches most affected are sardines, selar tetengek, mackerel and skipjack.
Soybean raw material for tempeh/Photo: Freepik.com/Edgunn
Argentina, as one of the largest soybean producers in the world, experienced a decline in production of 4.5 million tonnes in the 2022–2023 period. Not to mention, soybean production in Ukraine throughout 2022–2023 will also decline to around 400 thousand tons due to the war.
Hot temperatures and drought affect world soybean production, which has an impact on Indonesia. So, don’t be surprised if in the future there is a possibility that tempeh and tofu will no longer be labeled as cheap food.
4. Chocolate and Coffee
Historically, coffee and chocolate commodities have long been considered luxury goods. However, chocolate and coffee could become rare and luxurious foods again due to rising temperatures, longer dry seasons, less rainfall, and new pests and diseases.
Environmental changes and unsustainable agricultural techniques have caused a crisis in cocoa and coffee production, even reducing their quality. According to the BBC, climate change could wipe out half of the land used for growing coffee worldwide by 2050, according to a 2015 study.
Harvest failure has caused chili production in the 2023 period to fall by more than 50 percent. The climate crisis makes chilies susceptible to disease so that their productivity decreases.
This condition can lead to an increase in the price of chilies which soars due to high demand. It was observed that the average price of red cayenne pepper in DKI Newsdelivers.com as of Tuesday (28/11/2023) reached IDR 102,463/kg.
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|Việt Nam is viewed as a major market for RoK multinational corporations such as Lotte and LG, as the companies have expanded investment in the country. — Photo VOV|Viet Nam News
HCM CITY — An event connecting technology ventures from Việt Nam and the Republic of Korea (RoK) was held in HCM City on Wednesday to strengthen cooperation and trade activities between businesses of the two countries.
It was organised by Vuccess Co., Ltd of the RoK, with support from the State Agency for Technology Innovation of the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency (Vietrade) of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, along with the Korea Institute of Science and Technology and Korea Techno-Ventures Foundation.
At the event, Vietnamese firms were updated on the latest technology and cooperation opportunities through 11 leading businesses of the RoK in various fields, including information technology, communications, power-electronics, garment-textile, chemistry, construction, energy and environment.
Bùi Hoàng Yến from Vietrade said that since Việt Nam and the RoK established diplomatic relations in 1992, their bilateral friendship has thrived. The countries have paid attention to fostering multifaceted co-operation, especially in economy.
The RoK is currently the third largest trade partner of Việt Nam, as well as the country’s leading foreign investor.
Việt Nam is viewed as a major market for RoK multinational corporations such as Samsung, Lotte and LG, as the companies have expanded investment in the country.
In addition, the RoK Government has introduced incentives for the effective implementation of the Việt Nam-Korea Free Trade Agreement, which paves the way for small- and medium-sized enterprises from the RoK to enter the Vietnamese market. — VNS