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Hyundai Genesis G80 luxury sedan launched digitally
South Korean automaker Hyundai Motor Co. launched its all-new Genesis G80 sedan domestically on Monday as it strives to maintain sales amid growing impact of the new coronavirus (Covid-19) epidemic on its activities.
The third-generation G80, launched under the independent Hyundai Genesis brand, is available in three versions with a 2.5-liter gasoline turbo, a 3.5-liter gasoline turbo or a 2.2-liter diesel engine, said the company in a press release.
The petrol models are equipped with a double fuel injection system which combines the strengths of a silent multi-point injection system and a powerful direct petrol injection system.The diesel model has an energy efficiency of 14.6 kilometres per litre.
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All three versions come with 10 airbags and a set of advanced safety features. They include a multi-collision braking system that automatically stops the vehicle when the driver loses control in a collision accident and a reactive safety seat system that puts the passenger seat in the correct position to protect the person next to the driver in the event of a frontal collision or sudden braking.
Hyundai has applied its new design language to the new G80 by adopting an aesthetic similar to the GV80 sport utility vehicle, launched in January.
Signature Genesis design elements include high-tech quad headlights and a crested grille that emphasises seriousness consistent with the positioning of the G80. The G80 has a minimalist design, with a dominant riding position surrounded by height-mounted control surfaces. Thin and wide air vents emphasise the width of the cabin, which has minimal physical buttons and new touch screen air conditioning.The centre console is equipped with a rotary electronic speed selector, offering a balance between simplicity and glamour.
The new G80 model will come at a starting price of $ 39,000 (around ₹29.40 lakh).
The first generation G80 was launched in 2008, the second generation G80 in 2013 and the upgraded second generation G80 models in 2016. The improved G80 is available in three versions with 3.3 petrol, 3.8 petrol or a diesel engine 2.2.
The manufacturer of the Sonata sedan and SUV Santa Fe seems to be aiming to increase sales of the new G80 on the domestic market to compensate for the drop in sales due to the harmful effects of the Covid-19 on the automotive industry.
Hyundai has suspended most of its factories in the United States, Europe and emerging markets such as Russia and India, in accordance with their guidelines to prevent the spread of the virus. Further suspensions are expected to occur if the pandemic continues.
Hyundai has seven national factories and 10 factories abroad: four in China and one in the United States, the Czech Republic, Turkey, Russia, India and Brazil.Their combined capacity reaches 5.5 million vehicles.
In 2019, Hyundai sold 56,801 Genesis models in the domestic market, down 7.4% from 61,345 units sold the previous year.In the US market, Genesis sales more than doubled from 10,311 to 21,233 over the same period.
Hyundai aims to sell a total of 728,000 vehicles under the acronyms Hyundai and Genesis this year, up 2.5% from the previous year.
The current Genesis range consists of the G70, G80 and G90 sedans and the GV80 SUV. Hyundai plans to add the GV70 SUV and an all-electric car by 2021.


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News tagged ‘rumors’
According to the latest report shared by a Japanese website Mac Otakara, Apple will release several new iPad Pro models, as well as the updated 128GB iPhone SE and the red iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus.
For the tenth year in a row, Apple has become the world's most admired company. The ranking was created by Fortune, it is based on feedback from 3,800 reliable analysts, industry experts, executives and other specialists. Such firms as Amazon, Starbucks, Berkshire Hathaway, and Disney follow Apple in the list.
It is Sunday today, which means it is high time I told you about the most interesting posts of the last couple of days. Let’s take a look at these posts right now.
Sonny Dickson has recently shared several images that show a secret case Apple uses to hide its iPhone prototypes during transportation. The case hides both front and back panels of the handset as well as its size. The images showing the case itself and documents it comes with have been published by MacRumors.
Earlier this week, a well-known analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has shared a report suggesting that the iPhone 8 may get a new 5.8-inch OLED display with a function area for virtual buttons and shortcuts. Several days before this report appeared on the Internet, a MacRumors forum member nicknamed deuxani created a beautiful iPhone 8 concept featuring an edge-to-edge display with a virtual Home button and the Touch ID fingerprint sensor embedded right in the screen. You can check out the concept images below.
Ming-Chi Kuo reports that the iPhone 8 may get a display with something called “function area”. According to the analyst, this will be a part of the OLED display located at the bottom featuring virtual buttons and some shortcuts for quick actions. The size of the front panel will be 5.8 inches, however, the “active area” of the display will be equal to only about 5.15 inches.
A Chinese firm called BOE Technology Group Co. may soon start supplying Apple with displays for new iPhones. According to Bloomberg, the company is currently building two factories in China that will produce AMOLED displays. Even though Apple has been testing sample displays manufactured by BOE for months, the final decision is yet to come. Both companies are currently in talks.
Apple has released two new ads highlighting the iPhone 7 Plus dual camera and its Portrait mode. The ads are called “Soul Mate” and “Creek”. Both are available on Apple’s official YouTube channel as well as below.
As the release of the new iPhone 8 rival, Samsung Galaxy S8, draws near, more and more leaked images and renders showing the device appear online. Today, Sammobile has shared several realistic and beautiful images showing how the S8 may actually look like. You can take a look at these images below.
It is Sunday, which means that we should take a look at the most interesting posts of the last couple of days. Let’s not waste our time and do this right now.
Update: 9to5Google reports that the image was photoshopped and thus is fake.
Samsung will unveil the Galaxy S8 next month, which means that the handset is ready or nearly ready. New image that was posted on the Chinese social network Weibo gives us a closer look at the upcoming iPhone 8 rival. The photo seems to be genuine, it shows us the bottom side of the new South Korean flagship.
According to the latest report from Tech Trader Daily, Apple may start the iPhone 8 production earlier than expected. This, however, doesn’t mean that the release of the device will take place earlier.
iPhone sales in China demonstrated a year-over-year decline in 2016, reports a research firm IDC. According to the researchers, Chinese customers are waiting for the iPhone 8 that is why the market share fell from 13.6% and 58.4 million units shipped in 2015 to 9.6% and 44.9 million units last year. Apple took the fourth spot in the IDC ranking, while OPPO, Huawei, and VIVO managed to surpass the Cupertino-based giant in both market share and units shipments.
It is Sunday today, so let’s take a look at the most interesting stories of the last couple of days.
Most of the posts this week deal with Apple’s iOS and semi-tethered yalu jailbreak that now works with all 64-bit Apple devices except the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. There are also several articles about the iPhone 8 and its specs, Apple’s financial results in the first quarter of fiscal 2017, and Apple Campus 2.
Indian IT minister Priyank Kharge has confirmed that Apple will start manufacturing iPhones in this country. According to the government official, these devices will be targeted at the local market.

domain: news


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Amid global debates around AI responsibility, safety and transparency, IBM has announced that watsonx.governance will become available in December to help businesses automate responsible, transparent machine learning and generative AI workflows.
IBM says watsonx.governance will help businesses shine a light on AI models and eliminate the mystery around the data going in, and the answers coming out.
While generative AI, powered by Large Language Models (LLM) or Foundation Models, offers many use cases for businesses, it also poses new risks and complexities, including training data scraped from corners of the internet that cannot be validated as fair and accurate, all the way to a lack of explainable outputs. Watsonx.governance provides organisations with the toolkit they need to manage risk, embrace transparency, and anticipate compliance with future AI-focused regulation.
Watsonx enabling business to reap the rewards of powerful AI models in a responsible way
As businesses today are looking to innovate with AI, deploying a mix of LLMs from tech providers and open source communities, watsonx enables them to manage, monitor and govern models from wherever they choose.
“Company boards and CEOs are looking to reap the rewards from today's more powerful AI models, but the risks due to a lack of transparency and inability to govern these models have been holding them back,” said Kareem Yusuf, Ph.D, Senior Vice President, Product Management and Growth, IBM Software. “Watsonx.governance is a one-stop-shop for businesses that are struggling to deploy and manage both LLM and ML models, giving businesses the tools, they need to automate AI governance processes, monitor their models, and take corrective action, all with increased visibility. Its ability to translate regulations into enforceable policies will only become more essential for enterprises as new AI regulation takes hold worldwide.”
Watsonx.governance is one of three software products in the IBM watsonx AI and data platform, along with a set of AI assistants, designed to help enterprises scale and accelerate the impact of AI. The platform includes the watsonx.ai next-generation enterprise studio for AI builders and the watsonx.data open, hybrid, and governed data store.
Earlier in 2023 IBM announced that it aims to train two million learners in AI by the end of 2026, expanding its AI education collaborations with universities around the world to collaborate with partners and deliver AI training to adult learners.
Its consulting arm, IBM Consulting, has also established a centre of excellence for generative AI with over 1,000 consultants with specialised generative AI expertise to help transform global clients’ core business processes like supply chain, finance and talent, as well as customer experiences and IT operations.
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Post Office partners Western Union for digital international payments
Western Union’s cross-border money movement platform will be accessible as an integrated service on a jointly branded online portal.
Businesses will be able to make use of Western Union’s WU-EDGE platform, which offers near real-time payments in 54 currencies, along with cash flow and profit protection tools.
“Working together with Western Union means we can offer customers the capability to transfer money online with ease – not just to bank accounts, but also to mobile wallets and retail agent locations in more than 200 countries and territories,” says Owen Woodley, CEO of financial services and telecoms at Post Office.
He adds: “Alongside our existing branch services, this online alliance with Western Union significantly expands the convenient access to money transfer services that the Post Office is proud to offer.”
Hikmet Ersek, president and CEO of Western Union, comments: “This collaboration marks an expansion of our strategy to open our platform to new alliances and solve the complexities of cross-border, cross-currency transactions for companies. From settlement to regulatory compliance, we’re uniquely positioned to help many companies meet customers wherever they are in the financial ecosystem.”
With 11,500 locations, Post Office has a larger retail network than the UK’s high street banks and building societies.


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A beloved Linda Vista sandwich shop destroyed in a 2015 fire will start fresh in the New Year, reopening Friday after vowing to come back stronger than ever.
K Sandwiches, located at 7604 Linda Vista Rd., burned down in August 2015 when an oven malfunction sparked a fire. Everyone was able to get out safely but flames gutted the building. Officials declared it a total loss.
Since then, the owners -- the Tran sisters -- have been slowly but steadily rebuilding their small business. After the devastating fire more than two years ago, co-owner Jennifer Tran told NBC 7 her family was not giving up and would one day open up shop again.
In the New Year, that day came.
“A lot of customers stopped by and said they’ve been waiting two and a half years for those,” said Jennifer Tran, owner of K Sandwiches. “It’s exciting. There’s so many customers! We didn’t know what it was going to be like when we opened the doors, but this is more than I expected!”
This month, the sandwich shop posted a message on Facebook announcing it would reopen on Jan. 5, thanking patrons for their continued patience and support.
On Friday, the shop opened to a long line of customers that wrapped around the building.
“I came here an hour before it opened and I was already at the back of the line,” said customer Victoria Teodormackey, towards the front of the line. “I’ve been here for about an hour.”
The lines appeared to remain an hour or longer for most of the morning. Towards lunchtime, J.R. Hong was at the back of the line, practically waiting in the crosswalk as the sidewalk filled up.
“The line is pretty long but I think it’s worth the wait,” said Hong. “I’m just hungry!”
K Sandwiches first opened in 2006. The counter-service deli and market is best known for its Vietnamese sandwiches, or "Banh Mi," made in every which way. Banh Mi is made on a Vietnamese baguette; the sandwich is typically topped with thinly sliced pickled carrots, cucumbers, cilantro chili peppers, pâté, mayonnaise and various meat fillings or tofu.
The eatery is also known for its spring rolls stuffed with shrimp, chicken, pork, as well as its fresh-baked bread, from baguettes to croissants. The smoothie and boba menu is a fan favorite, too.
“I drove down from LA,” said K Sandwiches Patron, Gerardo Garcia. “I got a phone call that the restaurant was open. I told my brother to just go. So we’re here to enjoy the beef sandwiches.”
Cheers to new beginnings for a small business.


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PREPARE to cut the cord. Charging your phone may soon be as simple as sitting down at your desk, thanks to a device called MagMIMO that can charge phones at a distance.
Wireless chargers already exist, but they require a phone to be right next to a charging pad. “With charging pads you have to remember to take your phone out of your pocket and place it on the pad, positioned in exactly the right way,” says Dina Katabi of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who is leading the team building MagMIMO.
“In our vision we wanted to have people’s phone charge the minute they are sitting next to their desk: they go to a meeting, they come back, the phone starts charging again,” she says.
At a distance of 30 centimetres, Katabi’s prototype can charge an iPhone 4s battery from dead to full in just under 5 hours. It doesn’t matter what orientation the phone is in – upside down in a pocket or flat on the desk – and the phone needn’t be stationary. Katabi is now working to boost the range.
The prototype can wirelessly charge the phone in your pocket from 30 centimetres away
MagMIMO borrows a trick from radio communications: advanced Wi-Fi routers can detect when a computer is connecting to them and boost the signal in their direction. MagMIMO does the same thing, but using magnetic fields instead of radio waves. An array of wire coils generates a magnetic field and when a phone disrupts that field, MagMIMO senses it and focuses on the phone by creating a slightly different field with each coil. The magnetic fields reinforce each other so as to maximise the strength of the overall field reaching the phone.
In testing the prototype, Katabi and her colleague Jouya Jadidian connected a small wire coil to the iPhone’s charging port. The magnetic field induces a current in this coil, charging the phone. Several models of phone already come with such a coil built in, and more will soon be on the market.
As well as eliminating “battery anxiety” for smartphone owners, robust wireless charging is crucial for making wearable technology like smart watches and headsets more appealing to consumers. These smaller devices have less room for batteries, says technology analyst Ross Rubin at Reticle Research in New York City, and our power outlets are already crowded with wires for topping up mobile devices.
“MagMIMO consumes as much power as existing solutions, yet it can charge a phone remotely without being removed from the user’s pocket,” the team wrote in a paper presented last week at the International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking in Maui, Hawaii. They note that, unlike strongly focused Wi-Fi, focused magnetic fields do not have a heating effect on human tissue.
“The dream is that we’d never have to worry about charging our gadgets again,” Rubin says. “Wireless power would be like Wi-Fi, in just about every home and many public places too.”
This article appeared in print under the headline “Wireless charge from afar”


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Please consider donating in support of Red Cross and their ongoing relief efforts for Ukrainians.
With your donations we were able to raise $35,000!
Discover all our new BC products, produce and proteins.
The Choices Nutrition team is excited to announce the return of in-store Nutrition Tours!


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Steve Breen - 12-05-08
By Steve Breen | 7:02 a.m. Dec. 6, 2008
- San Diego may do better without the Chargers
- Brain-inspired 'memcomputer' built; could surpass quantum computers
- Sales at the restaurants and stores at Headquarters center downtown show mixed results.
- Deadly Osprey crash spurred safety changes, heroics
- UCSD sues USC, alleges conspiracy to take Alzheimer's program


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Posted by Shirley Brady on May 26, 2011 06:00 PM
Arris looks at buying SeaChange.
Carrefour and Walmart closer to India greenlight.
Ford gears up for EV launch.
HP shakes up executive ranks.
Lady Gaga promotes AIDS awareness via social campaign with MAC.
Microsoft's Steve Ballmer talks up China opportunity.
Mike Tyson updates app to incorporate The Hangover 2.
NYC mayor Mike Bloomberg expresses support of same-sex marriage.
New York magazine gets into the deals business.
Presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty tackles Barack Obama on Twitter, while Sarah Palin launches East Coast tour.
Urban Outfitters accused of copying jewelry artist's work.


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After Telangana, Maharashtra has now invited Tesla CEO Elon Musk to set up a manufacturing plant in the state. Maharashtra State Water Resources Minister and State NCP chief Jayant Patil on Sunday tweeted that the state government is going to provide the SpaceX CEO "all the necessary help" to get established in India.
Patil's invitation came two days after Telangana's urban development minister KT Rama Rao gave a similar proposal to Elon Musk.
Also Watch: Deadlock over Tesla's India launch
The offers to Elon Musk to set up business in India came close on the heels of the billionaire American entrepreneur tweeting about the challenges his company was facing while dealing with the Indian government.
Tagging the same tweet musk, Patil tweeted, "Maharashtra is one of the most progressive states in India. We will provide you all the necessary help from Maharashtra for you to get established in India. We invite you to establish your manufacturing plant in Maharashtra."
Elon Musk had said in 2020 that Tesla would set up manufacturing plants for electric vehicles (EVs) in India. The EV major's subsidiary named India Motors and Energy Private Limited has been set up and is based out of Bengaluru.
India, presently, levies 100% tax on imported cars priced at over Rs 30 lakh ($40,000) inclusive of insurance and shipping expenses, and cars that cost less than Rs 30 lakh are subject to 60% import tax.
The government may mull reducing import duty along with offering other sops to Tesla but for that, the EV company would have to pump in setting up a manufacturing plant in India.
Copyright©2022 Living Media India Limited. For reprint rights: Syndications Today


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Is Beijing the new Trollhatten? And does Hyundai really hold the key to the future of Saab?
These are just two of the questions I’m left pondering following yesterday’s news that Koenigsegg Group had backed out of an agreement to purchase Saab from General Motors.
The Beijing connection comes by way of Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Corp (BAIC), which has been eagerly shopping around for a cut priced western based car maker of late. And, as those close to General Motors’ dealings on the Saab sale reveal, it appears the very last hope for the financially embattled Swedish car maker.
“Without a fresh injection of capital in the next 100 days, we can likely say goodbye to Saab as we know it today,” was how one senior European automotive industry analyst put Saab’s dire financial position to me this morning.
Right now it’s unclear what will transpire.
BAIC had, of course, already expressed its interest in Saab by announcing it was willing to fund a minority of the capital Koenigsegg was seeking to raise. The plan, say those in the know, was for Koenigsegg to act primarily as a go between in talks with General Motors, the Swedish government and European Union and for BAIC to eventually gain control of Saab once the deal and a government based financial rescue package had been sealed.


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Credit Suisse said on Monday that there could be more than 37,000 layoffs in the retail industry in 2016.
There have already been more than 24,000 retail-sector job cubs in 2016 and analysts say we are on track to have the most retail industry layoffs since 2010.
As retailers continue to file for bankruptcy, analysts say we could see sweeping layoffs. About two-thirds of layoffs tend to come in the first one-third of the year.
Bloomberg states that in 2010 there were 30,273 retail-based layoffs. Those numbers fell off from 2011 through 2015.
Bloomberg determined those figures by pulling data from news headlines. Layoffs that didn’t make headline news may not have been included in its numbers.
Credit Suisse calls the job cuts “almost routine over the past few months,” but “typical during a cyclical downturn.”
Among the big box companies to announce layoffs this year are Macy’s, Wal-Mart, and Nordstrom, among others.
“Most of the layoffs announced year to date are at the store associate level, as a result of retailers closing unproductive stores to ‘right size’ their brick-and-mortar footprint, or as a result of retailers attempting to reduce the number of employees per store,” Credit Suisse wrote.
“These layoffs are clearly an attempt to deal with the decline in brick-and-mortar productivity, as brick-and-mortar sales are lost to e-commerce while store expenses grow due to increasing wages,” the note added.
Sears announced on Thursday that it will close 68 Kmart stores and 10 Sears locations. Employees at those locations will have the chance to apply for other stores owned by the company.


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How many restaurants will reopen and what impact will the lockdown have on the Polish gastronomy market?
The National Crisis Conference for Gastronomy gave some answers. (May 12, 2020)
On Monday, May the 18th, the lockdown restrictions put on restaurants at the beginning of the COVID19 pandemic in Poland were finally lifted. According to the survey conducted during the MADE FOR Restaurants 2020 online Conference:
- 64% of restaurants plans to reopen this week and 34% will remain closed for a longer time
- 72% of restaurant owners want to make their menus shorter and simpler but at the same time 63% of them does not see any reason to lower the prices
- As much as 95% of conference participants will change the financial management in the company because of the lockdown
The National Crisis Conference for Gastronomy – MADE FOR Restaurants 2020 – took place online on May the 12th. It gave us the bigger picture of Polish gastronomy’s situation as well as the mood on this market. Despite the crisis of the whole HORECA optimism is predominant. Our virtual tour of the world of gastronomy (Italy, Russia, UK, Denmark and others) seems to confirm this optimistic approach. For example, restaurants in China, which have been open for over two months, are fully flourishing in the business.
The Conference gave its participants a comprehensive set of advice, knowledge and experience needed for the new reopening. In the agenda, you could find subjects such as:
- possible scenarios for small business,
- new target audience,
- growing importance of delivery,
- human resources,
- labour law and
- cooperation with suppliers
“Gastronomy needs a fresh start. We wanted to make our participants ready for the reopening: new business plans, new leaders, new guests, new technologies, in short – NEW US. Let’s take this pandemic as an opportunity for change. A chance to get rid of all inconveniences and all that was slowing us down. Let’s move only forward from now on!” – says Agnieszka Małkiewicz, head of FOR Solutions and originator of MADE FOR Restaurant conferences.
Crisis MADE FOR Restaurant 2020 gathered over 750 participants, 32 experts, 7 guests from abroad, 14 different specialists in the Program Council and over 8 hours of panels, discussions and interviews. It was the first event prepared on such a large scale in the history of Polish gastronomy.


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State of the News Media 2012
Mobile devices are adding to people’s consumption of news, strengthening the lure of traditional news brands and providing a boost to long-form journalism, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism’s ninth annual report on the health of American journalism.
Data: Year in the News
Follow the steps in this interactive to select among media sectors and news coverage categories. The data are based on more than 48,000 stories analyzed in PEJ’s News Coverage Index for the year.


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Is coffee good for you? It seems like we can never get a straight answer!
Well, neurosurgeon and chief medical correspondent for CNN Dr. Sanjay Gupta joined Rach in the studio to discuss what he thinks will be the biggest health headlines of 2019 — and the debate on coffee made the cut!
"One of the hardest parts of my job is the sort of flip-flopping," Dr. Gupta says. "People always say, 'Oh, you tell us one thing one day, you tell us something else the next day.'"
"Nothing worse for the flip-flops than coffee. It's one of the big health flip flops," he continues. "Is it good for you or is it bad for you? Most people don't know."
The doc explains that over centuries, coffee's reputation changed quite a bit. According to him, in the 1600s, coffee was a cure-all. In the 1700s, British women thought it caused impotence. In the 1800s, it was considered as bad as cocaine. But over the past few hundred years, people have referred to coffee as "basically being a health food," as Dr. Gupta puts it.
So, what's his answer?
According to Dr. Gupta, it's time to rejoice, because he says COFFEE IS GOOD FOR YOU!
Well, hold up, it's good for you in moderation.
He recommends no more than four 8-ounce cups (which is about 100 milligrams of caffeine each) of BLACK COFFEE a day. (That's right, forget the cream and sugar.)
"If you're drinking four cups of black coffee like this, you're getting a lot of benefit from a health perspective," Dr. Gupta says. "You'll still get the benefit if you add this other stuff [cream and sugar], but you're getting extra calories."
We are glad this centuries long flip-flop is FINALLY settled — for now, at least!
As always, check with your doctor about dietary decisions.


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Beaverbrooks has confirmed it will open all 70 of its stores on June 15, the earliest possible date permitted in England.
A comprehensive health and safety programme designed to keep staff and customers safe will see Perspex screens installed at consultation points, designated team members for shoppers, fewer selling zones, hand sanitising as people come in and reduced numbers allowed into stores.
Store staff will have their temperatures taken every day.
“Over the past few months, we have been developing comprehensive plans for this reopening, which put safety at the top of the list while ensuring we are able to resume the high level of personalised service our customers expect,” says Anna Blackburn, managing director of Beaverbrooks.
Personal protective equipment including face masks and gloves will be available for staff and customers, but they will not be mandatory.
Customers will be allowed to try on watches and jewellery thanks to a disinfection process that kills germs without damaging the valuable items.
Beaverbrooks has not shared any performance figures for the ten weeks of lock down. Retail analyst GfK said that store sales for watches in April dropped by 97%, but rising ecommerce sales had somewhat compensated so that overall sales were down by 82.3%.
Beaverbrooks initially closed its warehouse and ecommerce operation at the end of March, but restarted on April 15.
“It has been a challenging and uncertain time for all of us, but we are feeling optimistic about the future, our 960 colleagues are looking forward to reopening our doors to welcome customers again,” Ms Blackburn says.
Beaverbrooks stores in England will be open seven days a week though opening times may vary.
Stores will be open for all services including returns, repairs, services and click & collection.
The only exception will be cleaning of customer jewellery which we cannot be completed safely at this time.
Beaverbrooks is pending further updates from the Scottish Government on when its Scottish stores will be reopening.


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Woolworths Group CEO Brad Banducci has expressed frustration over the increasing aggression towards their staff, highlighting alarming incidents where employees faced axe attacks and gun threats. The company has seen a staggering 50% increase in such incidents compared to last year.
On average, Woolworths Group, which includes supermarkets, metro stores, and Big W stores, experiences about 420 assaults monthly. Brad Banducci emphasised that retail worker abuse and violence have become widespread, with severe cases like stabbings and bashings.
Woolworths is implementing various safety measures to combat this rising trend, especially during the peak shopping season. These include enhanced resilience and de-escalation training, virtual reality simulations for handling aggression, and a significant $40 million investment in CCTV upgrades throughout its Australian stores.
Mr Banducci shared distressing examples of recent attacks, including staff being punched and spat on and a delivery driver being forcibly removed from his truck at gunpoint. He stressed that such behaviour is intolerable in any work environment and necessitates continued investment in employee safety.
As the festive season approaches, Mr. Banducci urges customers to treat retail workers with respect and courtesy. Woolworths has launched an in-store campaign featuring radio announcements and posters to reinforce this message.
Bernie Smith, the NSW Secretary of the SDA – the union for retail workers, has endorsed this call for respect, stating that there is no justification for such aggressive behaviour towards staff members who are there to assist.


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From bare shelves to closed doors – 2020 in retail has been a year unlike any other. 2020 has been a year of extremes within the retail industry, and one where very unique purchasing patterns have emerged as customers grappled with new ways of living and working.
At the same time that the pandemic created huge shifts in the types of products we bought, and where we bought them from, other forces (that have been reshaping the retail industry in recent years) accelerated, leaving a retail landscape at the end of the year which has been transformed.
Expect the unexpected
The challenges faced this year by the retail industry, and the supply chain that feeds it, cannot be underestimated. After all, this is an industry that is based around forecasting – making educated guesses using historical data combined with predictions on where spending will be coming from.
The retail industry is not at all equipped to deal with the level of uncertainty that we saw in 2020, not to mention the dramatic changes to the way that we were forced to live (and work) this year in response to the pandemic.
It is not surprising, therefore, that there were gaps and shortages in the supply chain, especially at the beginning of the year where grocery retailers, in particular, struggled to keep up with demand in supermarkets.
This uncertainty has really characterized the whole of 2020 for the retail industry. In recent research by Capgemini, only 39% of retailers felt confident predicting their festive sales compared to 55% last year. It’s easy to understand their lack of confidence with ever-changing restrictions and lockdowns making footfall patterns and purchasing more erratic.
Uncertainty is never good for retailers, and 2020 also claimed more than its fair share of large retail victims. The last few years have seen a series of high-profile losses across the retail industry, and this year was no different.
“The speed of change has surprised large and small retailers, and we are now seeing some high-profile casualties,” said Andrew Goodacre, chief executive of The British Independent Retailers Association.
According to the Centre for Retail Research, 52 retailers have closed in the UK this year so far, affecting 4,726 stores (more than 2018 and 2019 combined) and with a loss of 95,227 jobs.
Arcadia and Debenhams may be the biggest names to have run aground this year, but many other household names, from Bon Marche, Cath Kidston, TM Lewin, Laura Ashley, and Oasis and Warehouse
The pandemic hit many of these businesses hard, especially clothing companies that saw demand for fashion crumble. However, it is unlikely that the pandemic alone has been the sole culprit although it will certainly have been the nail in many a coffin.
Online becomes king
2020 was the year that online shopping, which for a long time has been the fastest-growing sector of the retail industry, really came into its own.
“The changes that we were already seeing (internet shopping) have been significantly accelerated due to Covid-19. Pre-Covid, 20% of all non-food sales were on-line. In July that figure was as high as 50% and is still above 40%” explains Goodacre.
With lockdowns and tier restrictions forcing non-essential retail to close at various points in the year, it is unsurprising that customers have turned to online shopping to get what they need. Home delivery has become more prevalent than ever, along with a growth in other low-contact purchasing methods such as click and collect.
Even discounters such as Aldi have been forced to explore more options as the customer seeks the convenience and safety of online purchasing.
“Shop small” gets bigger
With news of larger retailers crumbling and the growing popularity of online shopping, it may feel as if bricks and mortar stores have a very gloomy future indeed. However, what is missing from the picture painted by these two trends is that there has been a resurgence of interest in shopping locally and supporting small and independent businesses.
“Working from home has driven a movement to stay local and shop local,” said Daniel Whytock, chief executive officer at DownYourHighStreet.com – a shopping website featuring independent shops.
“Smaller retailers who are able to adapt have come out on top compared to larger retailers who are too big to pivot quickly enough” he explains.
Nick Brackenbury, founder of retail software company NearSt agrees:
“We've seen a big trend towards localism, and people going back to their local areas. We've all heard about the massive shift in behaviors online, but what's been missed in that shift is the massive growth in people going online to find things in the physical, offline world around them. Compared to our pre-pandemic baseline we've seen a sustained tripling in the number of people going online to check stock in their local stores, before visiting."
With many independent retailers playing a vital role in supporting local communities during the pandemic, and with customers less willing to travel to larger shopping areas, the local shopping communities have seen a boost in visitors. This is particularly true for those who have learned to embrace their digital presence, and to use it to drive footfall.
As Goodacre summarises:
“Out of a crisis comes determination, urgency and creativity. We have seen many independents change their business model and improve their digital footprint to reach out to those shoppers going on-line...Where the large city centres have lost out, the surrounding areas have benefitted, and these are the areas where independents tend to be located.”
The message is clear - this may have been a tough, unpredictable year for many businesses. But the lifestyle changes created by the pandemic have given a new lease of life to local retailers - especially those who are able to service their customers online as well as in their bricks and mortar stores. It will be interesting to see if this "shop local" approach continues to flourish as we move into 2021.


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KG Mobility will cooperate with Kim Long Motors to distribute and assemble cars with a goal of 210,000 cars and a revenue of 4.6 billion USD.
In mid-November, the Korean automobile manufacturer KG Mobility had a meeting to discuss plans to expand cooperation with Vietnamese automobile manufacturer Kim Long Motors by assembling and manufacturing KG Mobility cars in Vietnam.
The two sides reached a consensus on cooperation at this week's meeting at the Vietnamese enterprise's factory in Thua Thien-Hue province. They also checked the progress of the KG Mobility factory that Kim Long Motors is building in the Chan May-Lang Co Economic Zone.
In March 2023, in KG Mobility's announcement about signing an agreement with Kim Long, KG Mobility said the goal is to achieve annual output at the factory of 15,000 cars in 2024 and 60,000 cars in 2029, with a maximum of 210,000 cars by the end of 2029 and revenue up to 4.6 billion USD. These models include the Tivoli, Korando, and Torres from 2024 and the Rexton and Rexton Sports Khan from 2025.
The two companies also discussed plans to bring Torres EVX and KGMC, newly launched electric buses in Korea, to Vietnam.
This cooperation is an expansion of the agreement signed between KG Mobility and Kim Long Motors in March to export knock-down (KD) cars to Vietnam for further assembly. This is KG Mobility's first global operation since changing its name from SsangYong Motor.
KG Mobility was established in 1954 in Korea under the original name Dong-A Motor, specializing in manufacturing personal and commercial cars. This car company is present worldwide, except for the US and Japanese markets.
After being acquired by Ssangyong Business Group, Dong-A Motor changed its name to resemble the parent company and began to cooperate with major car manufacturers. In 1991, Ssangyong and Daimler cooperated on technology, allowing the Korean automaker to gain a presence in many new markets without having to build infrastructure. This combination gave birth to the Musso car sold by both Mercedes-Benz and Ssangyong.
Ssangyong was continuously sold to other companies in subsequent periods, with the owners being Daewoo (1997), SAIC - China's largest state-owned car manufacturer (2004), and Mahindra - an automobile manufacturing enterprise (2011).
Financial difficulties constantly forced the Korean automaker to sell itself, and only after Mahindra became the owner did the company begin to get back on track.
In 2015, Ssangyong launched the Tivoli, and just a year later, they made a profit for the first time after 9 years of losses. 50,000 Tivoli cars out of nearly 107,000 cars sold in 2017 showed the importance of this car type in the company's strategy.
This is also the largest number that Ssangyong has achieved since 2003, when they sold more than 130,000 cars in that year. Also that year, the Korean car company also sold its best-selling models, such as the Rexton or Tivoli, in Vietnam, but did not achieve positive results and had to withdraw after more than a year.
In the following years, the financial situation of this car company was not good. In 2019, Ssangyong sold over 135,000 cars globally (decreasing by 6% compared to the previous year, of which the number of cars sold in the non-Korean market decreased by 20%), causing their revenue to decline sharply and leading to losses.
In 2020, SsangYong filed for bankruptcy in a Korean court because it could not repay a 54.4 million USD loan.
The company had to sell itself once again, with Edison Motors as its partner; however, this transaction failed due to payment problems. Therefore, under the choice of the Seoul Bankruptcy Court, the KG Group was appointed as an investor to take over Ssangyong to restructure this car company in 2022. The transfer was officially completed in last November after receiving court approval.
Before the KG Group took over, the number of cars that Ssangyong sold in 2022 had a great improvement, especially in the international market with the number nearly doubling compared to 2021. The company's losses also improved significantly, from 265 billion KRW (204 million USD) to only about 60 billion KRW (46 million USD). Ssangyong is expected to recreate the miracle it once did after being acquired by Mahindra.
The number of cars sold by Ssangyong before changing its name to KG Mobility (Cre: KG Mobility)
Since March 2023, the company officially changed its name to KG Mobility and intended to completely remove the name Ssangyong to avoid the current relatively negative brand recognition. Besides, the company has also taken strategic steps to expand its business market, including returning to the Vietnamese market.
As a market with great potential, it is understandable why Vietnam has received so much attention from this Korean car company. The meeting to plan specifically for production is an affirmation of the plan in Vietnam.


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IN a response to observers on the motive behind the acquisition of ExxonMobil’s 60 percent equity in Mobil Oil Nigeria, MON, Plc , Bestman Anekwe, Chairman of the acquirer, NIPCO Investments Limited, NIL, said it is a strategic feat to support NIPCO’s continuous growth and expansion in the downstream sector of the nation’s oil and gas industry.
Speaking through the Managing Director, Venkataraman Venkatapathy at the Company’s extraordinary general meeting, Anekwe said the development would also help in solidifying its enviable status in the sector.
”Strategically, this acquisition will allow us to broaden our geographical diversification, adding a new platform to the Company’s network of businesses and would also afford us the opportunity to apply our model for retail, creating value through improved efficiency and productivity in MON”, he said.
Anekwe explained that with MON’s 270 ‘Mobil’ branded fuel stations at various strategic locations of the country, and its huge blending and distribution unit of world class ‘Mobil’ branded lubricants used and trusted by people not only within Nigeria but across the world, NIPCO felt compelled to bid for the acquisition .
According to him, NIPCO would continue to maintain the Mobil brand on its retail outlets as well as continue to blend and sell Mobil brand of lubricants under branding license from ExxonMobil
NIPCO, he said, made its debut into the retail market in 2009, but as at November 2016, the company was successfully running 180 fuel stations across various locations scattered across the country, adding that this track record of success has given the firm foretaste of the enormous potentials in the retail sector, and has in turn, engendered a voracious appetite for growth and expansion
Anekwe noted that in line with its vision, the company seized the opportunity to purchase 6.67 percent of MON shares when it presented itself a few years ago and became the second largest shareholder after ExxonMobil.
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Now that Ice Cream Sandwich is real, manufacturers can start talking about the roll out. The good news is that ICS looks Tegra 2 friendly so it should run on most of the first generation Honeycomb tablets. Asus and Acer have both confirmed that their respective tabs will get the update but haven’t detailed the launch schedule. That’s the bad news, which really isn’t all that bad in and of itself. → Read More
Well, developers, it looks like Google will soon be releasing the code for Ice Cream Sandwich to the Android Open-Source Project. Thanks to a Google+ post penned by Jean-Baptiste Queru, the Technical Lead of the Android Open Source Project, and his link to an email written by Google engineer Dan Morrill, we do indeed have confirmation that Android 4.0 source code will see the light of day.
Motorola’s Droid Razr made quite the splash yesterday thanks in part to its impressive hardware, but the Android build that it runs seems bit quaint now thanks to Ice Cream Sandwich. No worries, though: if you pick up a Droid Razr when it ships in November, you should be getting the Android 4.0 update in early 2012. → Read More
Say goodbye to Android as you know it. Ice Cream Sandwich (otherwise known as Android 4.0) is coming, and it’s the biggest upgrade Android has seen to date.
But fancy new software isn’t the only thing Google’s been working on: they’ve also just announced their new flagship Android device, the Samsung-made Galaxy Nexus. I got to spend a solid chunk of time with both the new hardware and the new… → Read More
While hardware junkies like myself may have spent the past few weeks drooling over the Galaxy Nexus, the onstage demo of Android 4.0 (a.k.a Ice Cream Sandwich) proves that the software powering the device is just as impressive (if not a little moreso).
Our hands-on with the Galaxy Nexus and Ice Cream Sandwich will be coming shortly, but here’s a quick rundown of what Android 4.0 will be… → Read More
Oh, what’s that Google/Samsung? You’ve canceled next week’s Ice Cream Sandwich/Nexus Prime event? That’s cool. I mean, sure: pretty much all of the tech press has non-refundable plane tickets and hotel rooms already… but hey: at least we all get to work from San Diego for a few days now!
Regardless, most of what they would’ve announced is leaking out now anyway. The latest leak to spring up… → Read More
Why is it that random eBay shoppers always seem to have the best luck? In what has to be one of the most fortuitous purchases I’ve seen in a while, someone picked up a Nexus S off of the auction site that just happened to be running a build of Google’s latest Android update: Ice Cream Sandwich.
Well, that’s the story, anyway. Thankfully, our lucky buyer was able to contain his or her excitement… → Read More
Late last night the Android community was taken hostage by a rogue Twitter user. @tfleming223 started tweeting lines from a cryptic poem said to contain launch details about the upcoming Nexus phone and Ice Cream Sandwich Android release. But in true Internet douchbag fashion, this guy would only release parts of the poem when certain users followed him and he reached 1,000 followers. Well, as… → Read More
With an October/November launch window more or less confirmed, the next burning question is which devices will get to benefit from the Ice Cream Sandwich treatment first. Motorola’s Sanjay Jha mentioned last month that he’d like his company to be first to market with an ICS device, but now another vendor has thrown their official support behind the latest update.
While at Salesforce.com’s Dreamforce conference, Google chairman Eric Schmidt let fly a juicy tidbit as he ran through how Android came to be. According to him, the next big version of Android is being prepared for release in the October/November timeframe. → Read More


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Apple Ramps Up Hiring in China with Over 250 Open Positions
The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple appears to be ramping up its hiring in China, with over 250 currently open positions posted on the company's website. Alongside the usual positions of retail specialists and store leaders (there are currently 8 Apple Stores in China in the major cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu and Shenzhen), Apple is hiring for a number of technical and administrative positions including an "environmental affairs program manager" and a "security specialist".
Earlier this month, it was reported that two Apple suppliers and manufacturers, UniMicron and Foxconn, were accused of dumping large quantities of heavy toxic metals into nearby rivers. There have also been frequent accusations of labor law violations, with Pegatron (the company widely rumored to be the manufacturer of the upcoming iPhone 5C) being the most recent in the limelight. It therefore comes at no surprise that at least some of the positions Apple is hiring for are intended to help address these issues and comply with local regulations.
The environmental affairs program manager will be based in China’s capital Beijing, the center of political power. According to the job description, the candidate has to “ensure that Apple’s products and processes meet and surpass regional and national environmental regulatory requirements.”
The hiring push in China also comes just as Apple has begun hiring in Taiwan for what has been reported to be a new research and development center focused on iPhone projects.
The Chinese market has been an especially difficult one for Apple, even as it has seen tremendous growth there over the past several years. The company has been in talks with China Mobile, the country's largest carrier, for several years and yesterday it was reported that the two sides have nearly reached an agreement for China Mobile to offer the iPhone. In a conference call last month, Apple's CEO Tim Cook said, "I continue to believe that in the arc of time here, China is a huge opportunity for Apple".
Although nearly all of Apple's products are manufactured in China and the country is now responsible for around 15% of Apple's total revenue, the company still holds a relatively low share of the smartphone market, and recent slowing of momentum saw Apple post a 14% decline in revenue year-on-year to $4.6 billion. In the second quarter of 2013, Apple ranked seventh in the Chinese smartphone market, falling to just 5% from 9% a year earlier.
Apple changed the strategy for iOS 17 later in its development process to add several new features, suggesting that the update may be more significant than previously thought, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reports.
In January, Gurman said that iOS 17 could be a less significant update than iPhone updates in previous years due to the company's intense focus on its long-awaited mixed-reality...
Following nearly six weeks of beta testing, iOS 16.4 is expected to be released to the public as soon as this week. The software update includes a handful of new features and changes for the iPhone 8 and newer. To install an iOS update, open the Settings app on the iPhone, tap General → Software Update, and follow the on-screen instructions.
Below, we have recapped eight new features and...
Some Apple employees are concerned about the usefulness and price point of the company's upcoming mixed-reality headset, The New York Times reports.
Apple headset concept by David Lewis and Marcus Kane Initial enthusiasm around the device at the company has apparently become skepticism, according to eight current and former Apple employees speaking to The New York Times. The change of tone...
Apple showcased its mixed-reality headset to the company's top 100 executives in the Steve Jobs Theater last week, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
In the latest edition of his "Power On" newsletter, Gurman explained that the "momentous gathering" is a "key milestone" ahead of the headset's public announcement planned for June. The event was intended to rally Apple's top members of...
We're still almost six months away from the official unveiling of the iPhone 15 lineup, but it seems like every day we're learning more about what to expect from the next-generation models. Notably, this week gave us our clearest look yet at what appear to be some changes for the volume and mute control hardware.
iOS 16.4 and associated releases are also right around the corner with some new ...
Apple today released iOS 16.4, the fourth major update to the iOS 16 operating system that initially came out last September. iOS 16.4 comes two months after the launch of iOS 16.3, an update that added Security Keys for Apple ID.
iOS 16.4 and iPadOS 16.4 can be downloaded on eligible iPhones and iPads over-the-air by going to Settings > General > Software Update. It can take a few minutes...
We saw a lot of great deals on Apple products and related accessories this week, including Samsung's iMac-like Smart Monitor M8 for $250 off, a 30 percent off spring sale at Anker, and the year's best prices on numerous AirPods models. All of these deals are still available to purchase right now, so we're recapping them and more below.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these ...
This year, all iPhone 15 models will include Apple's Dynamic Island that unifies the pill and hole cutouts at the top of the display, but there will also be a material change to the feature that wasn't included in the iPhone 14 Pro models.
According to a new tweet by Apple industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the proximity sensor on the iPhone 15 series will be integrated inside the Dynamic Island ...
Top Rated Comments
And even so, if the government had all that tax income, they'd just spend it on more stupid wars... and whatever else.
1) China has fairly tight capital controls that make it difficult to take money that you've earned inside China and move it outside of China. This forces businesses to shift spending in China in order to use the money they've earned there but cannot take out.
2) If you follow how China's state-controlled business deals work, you will know these two stories are related:
* Apple creates R&D Engineering center in China with hundred of open positions.
* China Telecom (a state-run business) finally agrees to sell iPhones after years of holding out.
It's called Quid Pro Quo.
Spot on. Most do not realize that the Justice Roberts Supreme Court ruling recognizing corporations as "persons" created a serious loophole for corporate tax dodging and campaign contributions. There is so much corruption on both sides it's astonishing. I'm very troubled by the recent move in defending the "1%" through examples of a "free market" (an illusion) and capitalism. None of them will earn a fraction of what these people earn. My father was an investment banker with Bear Stearns until retiring in the late 90's. Most are "born into" money and status, very common among my family's "social circle" in the financial sector. It is an "old boys" club, wealth is passed down through generations and success "earned" (i.e. stolen) from many living paycheck to paycheck. Trickle down economics doesn't work. The wealthy are wealthy for one reason: they're cheap. They do not invest their earnings into their company unless it directly benefits them. Defending them is tantamount to a jewish man defending the Third Reich.
I was bewildered by the uproar and mockery of the "Occupy Wall Street" movement. Defending the bankers and investors who played god with their money by betting against defaults and voodoo mathematical "derivatives" claiming to support a "free market" was rather ironic. Instilling "groupthink" into the masses that capitalism is a working economic system merely benefits the very people that created this mess and walked away wealthier. The CFO's and top level executives let lower level executives fall on their swords, while Bernanke and others sold stock before the '08 collapse the likes of which came close to an international "Great Depression".
The collapse of Iceland's economy involving the Icelandic Bank Kaupthing is a perfect example of an unchecked capitalist system. A rather complicated bank that was destroyed at the hands of the banks former chairman and Robert and Vincent Tchenguiz. Numerous internal documents from Kaupthing Bank from just prior to the collapse of Iceland's banking sector, which led to the 20082009 Icelandic financial crisis, show that suspiciously large sums of money were loaned to various owners of the bank, and large debts written off. The government took control and did not bail the banks out, and now Iceland is returning to a prosperous stance pre-2000. Many key players made off with private jets, multi-million dollar homes. March 2013 saw the opening of new prosecutions in Reykjavík against the bank's former chairman and other leading employees for 'orchestrating five large-scale market manipulation conspiracies', in what was the largest prosecutation related to the 2008 Icelandic financial crisis so far.
This is an example of what occurred globally. I had an econ professor once state, "The difference between capitalism and communism is that communism doesn't hide under a veil of a 'free market'". Rather profound.
We have become so polarized by our media and politicians that the cold war has been replaced by Islamic terrorists (Halliburton has to make their money somehow) and red flag terms relating Socialism to Marxism/Communism. We're well behind other first world nations in education, standard of living, longevity yet we continue to cut funding while funneling more federal tax dollars to a military that outspends North Korea 75 to 1.
We have become pawns in a sociopolitical game of chess, too distracted fighting each other to collectively work together, holding elected officials accountable for back room deals and policies. Most don't even know the true definition and concept of a Socialized Democracy. Hint: it's been alive and well in the U.S. for a long time. Without it, public schools, firemen, police, infrastructures wouldn't exist. We're so emotionally volatile most become enraged, comparing socialism to communism, while the U.K., Canada, France, Germany, Australia and many others laugh at us. Open your eyes and minds, stop fighting each other and work collectively. History has shown change occurs by unifying a populace, we will never change for the better if we're easily divided with rhetoric most do not understand.
It's a shame you ignore:
1) All the American workers and students that see this sort of stuff going on - it deters them, others, and then CEOs and politicians have the nerve to scapegoat rather than finding a mirror. Especially as some of Apple's higher-ups, including an erstwhile CEO, were college dropouts yet demand people with college degrees... or find ways to blanketly blame the educational system, despite enough circumstantial evidence to prove they are being greedy cheapskates
2) Why do "American" companies offshore jobs to communist countries to help build their economies up with? What next, someone will blame Obama (despite "American" companies propping up communist nations for years or decade, long before Obama, and if Obama bothered to put his foot down he'd be blamed by the same whiners either way...)
3) Apple's lobbying to get Congress to give it a free ride as opposed to it paying its own way. Why doesn't Apple move to China all the way?
4) CORPORATE WELFARE - nuff said
5) As we lose jobs here, there is less money for government to get via taxation so how does the corporate welfare in #4 continue to get doled out?
There. I think that starts to balance things out a tad. At least you assumed that the US would just be spending such tax revenue on wars (often to protect the companies that move to Communist countries, since why else would we otherwise need to have a presence in so many countries?)
Don't think different.
Good luck on the edification process...
Apple is company - a singular term for an entity comprised of people. US English usually puts groupings as being singular terms. UK English usually uses plural terms - it's one of the few times I disagree with any UK English protocol as well...
When readers like you and me and others refer to companies or people therein as "they", it's sloppiness on our part. A company is a thing, not a person, even if it is comprised by people.
Yes. More or less.
But calling is "stupid" is unfair, I think - untrained and undereducated in technology and programming is more like it.


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This Tuesday marked the birthday of Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. He is depicted in the non-fungible token (NFT) EthBoy, dressed in a harlequin outfit. The 4th edition of this generative artwork is inspired by Pablo Picasso’s “Paul as Harlequin”.
An edition dedicated to the birthday of Ethereum’s founder
The NFT is part of the ETHEREAL collection, for which Jones has collaborated with musicians Alotta Money and DJ Don Diablo. For the next five years, a new version of Ethboy will be released on the NFT Async Art platform every six months.
The recently released animated version, called TRANSCEND, was produced in association with Grammy award-winning DJ Sasha and will be displayed on Oxford Street in London.
Art that evolves over time
With Async Art, digital artists can produce asynchronous art, which evolves over time and reacts to external data and stimuli. The art evolves daily based on factors such as the price of Ethereum, the cost of gas fees, and other elements. The most recent issue, which was produced in a single copy, honors Buterin’s birthday on 31 January.
In a press release, Jones said the aim of the collection was to weave a story about Buterin’s life. He added that this five-year collaborative initiative would certainly go down in history as a masterpiece and a grail for the 10 collectors and partners involved. Jones also noted that many people in the Web3 world think in terms of months rather than years.
First work of art sold for nearly $150,000
Since the publication of the first volume of the collection, the NFT field has seen a number of changes. These include debilitating market conditions and new trends in digital art. However, Jones says that while the demise of FTX has undoubtedly had an impact, the NFT art space is still alive and kicking.
In 2020, Jones collaborated with artist Alotta Money to produce the first edition of EthBoy. The digital art piece was sold at auction for 260 ETH, which was equivalent to $141,536 at the time.
The artwork shows Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin dressed as a medieval harlequin. Leaning on a velvet chair, he stares intently at the viewer in the distance. The graph implies that Ethereum is on the rise. According to one of the co-creators of the painting, Trevor Jones, this is one of the highest amounts paid in terms of money for a piece of crypto art to date.
Digital artworks can now reflect external data and stimuli. This is thanks to a breakthrough made possible by the blockchain-based art market and the Async Art platform, where EthBoy was published. According to Jones’ website, EthBoy will change daily in response to environmental events beyond anyone’s control.
A work that exists in only one copy
The painting is the first programmable artwork of its kind to be published on Async. The platform was launched in February 2020 and was already selling for over $600,000 when the painting was sold.
The artwork is a 1/1, a word used in the industry to describe a digital work that has a single copy. The value of NFTs is cryptographically derived from rarity. Any digital object presented as an NFT can be protected by the same foundation that ensures that each Bitcoin is unique and cannot be used twice.
The rare painting was acquired by Twitter user Maxstealth in a one-day auction. But the image is more than just a collector’s item as its distinctive qualities continue to earn money for its owner and the artists.
Between July 30, the anniversary of the launch of the Ethereum system, and Vitalik’s birthday on January 31, each animation will span 182 days of changes.
The owner of the EthBoy NFT and the two artists will each receive one-third of the proceeds from the sale of each work. If further programmable development of the original work is required, a “small amount” of the proceeds may be used to fund it.


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Mother founding partner Stef Calcraft sells share for £6m
By Anne Cassidy, campaignlive.co.uk, Thursday, 04 October 2012 05:20PM
Mother co-founder Stef Calcraft has resigned from the agency group's boards and is selling his 25 per cent shareholding back to the company for £6 million, but remains in his role.
Calcraft’s £6 million shareholding will be payable over the next three years, with the first installment of £1.5 million payable last month.
Calcraft, one of Mother’s five founding partners, will continue in his role as director at Mother full time.
Calcraft said: "The primary concern for all of us has been to ensure Mother’s ongoing success. To do this and preserve Mother’s independence, we have funded the share buyback using our own money without debt or selling to an outside shareholder. I remain fully committed to Mother and it will remain business as usual."
This article was first published on campaignlive.co.uk
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Up to date news on developments in the automotive industry.
Biggest Outdoor Test Drive Festival Returns to MOA
The 2017 AUTO FOCUS PRE-CHRISTMAS TEST DRIVE FESTIVAL or the PCTDF was
successfully staged once again at SM Mall of Asia concert grounds on
November 16-19, 2017. Considered to be the country's biggest outdoor test
drive event, and following its summer edition last May, the Pre-Christmas
was once again set-up to be a veritable one-stop shop for prospective car
buyers and a must-visit event for die-hard car buffs. A wide range of
competing standard and luxury/premium models from participating exhibitors
like BMW, Ford, Honda, Isuzu, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Subaru, Suzuki, and Tata
showcased their latest model line-ups and offered test drives were on
display and made available for test drives.
After the blessing ceremony, cocktails were served during the opening night
where top executives from different automobile companies, guests and select
motoring media enjoyed a night of food and drinks. The PCTDF is organized
by Sunshine Television as part of its annual trilogy of automobile industry
service and merit programs alongside the recently concluded Auto Focus
People's Choice Awards and the Auto Focus Media's Choice Awards.


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BYFIELD — Emmy Cole of the Byfield’s Governor’s Academy is hoping to turn unwanted items into someone else’s treasure with her second annual Govs Goes Green clothing sale next month.
On May 10, Cole and Newburyport’s Salvation Army will open a one-day thrift store, selling donated clothing from the private school in exchange for canned goods, non-perishable foods and personal care items.
Cole, a sophomore, has been collecting clothing from the students, faculty and friends of the Governor’s Academy for two weeks. With many of the students boarding during the school year, as they return overseas and across the country for summer vacation, many throw away old clothing rather than pay for expensive shipping or storage costs. Cole hopes she can turn that waste into an opportunity for both the middle class and the less fortunate.
“We want to make high-quality clothes accessible to local people,” she said. “Then, we want to feed local people. The idea is keeping things local, because... there’s this discrepancy of accessibility in our neighborhoods, right down the road from you. So we’re trying to help different types of people through just one project.”
The Govs Goes Green project started last year when Cole opted out of a school sports requirement to do community service instead. A Chicago native, Cole grew up with a mother who made a point of exposing her to the overwhelming disparities of wealth between nearby neighborhoods. In high school, she wanted to do the same for her fellow students.
“I got thrown into a private school up here and there’s this exorbitant amount of wealth and opportunities,” Cole said of her freshman days. “This contrast being realized, ‘Hey, there is this issue of accessibility right down the road. How can we use a boarding school setting to our advantage?’”


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Social media platforms—especially Facebook—are lifelines for many companies' success. Facebook itself is full of dozens of such stories, with many businesses increasing customer engagement and sales by dozens or even hundreds of percent.
Not all businesses are so lucky, though. A few have found that their Facebook experience hasn't been as successful.
For example, dozens of American and European firms have been ripped off by a chain of Chinese online vendors that sell knockoffs of the original design and use the original designers' photos and other content, according to a recent investigative BuzzFeed article. Kore Wear has seen its content ripped off by Zaful, a China-based knockoff site that uses Kore's photos to sell $12 versions of a designer swimsuit that the company sells for $249.
Welcome to the dark side of Facebook, where the tools that businesses use to win friends and make sales also open the door to imposters, thieves, and charlatans.
Criminals can all too easily use Facebook to rip off the design, ideas, and content of legitimate sites. Stealing a Web image is as easy as right-clicking. Even measures to prevent right-click image downloading aren't foolproof; all an image thief needs to do is take a screenshot to capture an image.
Several years ago, the Web was full of stories about fake Facebook merchant and business pages. For example, pages with permutations of the term "Coca-Cola" (misspelled, without a dash, etc.) were being used for purposes other than promoting the soft drink by people who had nothing to do with the brand.
For the past year or so, Facebook has been cracking down on the phenomenon. Although many fake pages still exist, several others have been rooted out. So have the fake profiles often recruited to "like" fake pages.
The problem that businesses face today is not a wholesale theft of their identity but theft of parts of it—just enough to cause reputation issues. Clothing sites that have had their photos ripped off by the Chinese sites are now linked to those sites, if not electronically then at least by association. Customers who order knockoffs from fraudulent pages and end up with inferior merchandise now may create an unfavorable opinion of the genuine brand.
Another danger, known as freebooting, has gotten a lot of attention in recent months.
In a freebooting scam, Facebook users take YouTube videos that don't belong to them and post them on their Facebook page as their own to fill it up with content.
Because of the way Facebook handles video, users have an incentive to download a YouTube video and upload it directly to Facebook. That hurts the income stream of owners of the video on YouTube, which pays them per view, unlike Facebook. (Facebook users who have seen the video are less likely to click on it again when they come across it on YouTube.)
A company that uses YouTube to spread its message could find its videos hijacked, spreading someone else's message on someone else's Facebook page. Facebook recently released a tool to allow content owners to keep track of their property, but freebooting is still a major problem.
There are hundreds of stories online about stolen logos, website designs, images, sketches, blog posts, and anything else that moves online being purloined by someone else.
Many advice pages cover the importance of copyrighting content, registering logos, watermarking photos, and other protective measures. All those are important steps, but they are unlikely to prevent theft.
Most content thieves figure the Internet is big enough that their victim won't be able to track them down.
Even when a victim discovers his or her cyber-tormenter, the wheels of cyber-justice turn slowly. Getting platforms, ISPs, or law enforcement to take action against offenders is often like pulling teeth. Moreover, cases are often difficult to prove, as pirates often change things just enough to get by plagiarism laws.
But there are still things a business can do to protect itself.
The first step is realizing that content is likely to be stolen.
Content on Facebook and other social media platforms needs to be as dense as possible and tied up with the name of the brand as much as possible.
For example, videos should prominently feature the name of the company and its website in as many scenes as possible. (The name doesn't have to be at the center of each video frame but should be noticeable.) Images, too, should include identifying information likely to be annoying to scammers, reducing the likelihood that they will bother stealing it.
Another tactic is to involve putting together elaborate presentations, consisting of images, videos, infographics, and more, that are part of a single "unit." The combination of elements and media make it difficult to pull something out for pirating purposes.
For example, if a cyber-crook has to resort to image, graphic, and video editing to extract the image of a model wearing a dress to sell his or her "discounted" version (which doesn't even look like the one in the stolen image!), the cyber-crook is more likely to search for lower-hanging fruit.
Protecting your content is like protecting a car from being stolen (with the assumption that car thieves are going to target nice vehicles). What can owners of such vehicles do?
Make stealing your content as difficult as possible. The more alarms, codes, wheel locks, etc. that a car thief has to go through, the more likely the thief is to turn his or her attention to another vehicle.
The same is true for Web content. The harder cyber thieves have to work for content, the less likely they are to steal it.
Make them work for it.
You may like these other MarketingProfs articles related to Social Media:
- Four B2B Event Marketing Takeaways From TikTok
- The Content That Marketers Want From Social Media Creators
- Generation YouTube: The Social Media Habits of US Teens
- Instagram Reels Benchmarks for 2022 [Infographic]
- How to Build a LinkedIn Employee Advocacy Program That Doesn't Fall Apart
- 25 Twitter Marketing Tips That Actually Work [Infographic]


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Ring of Honor's Mark Briscoe is selling his teeth on Ebay. Or rather, he's selling his custom dentures, along with a hand-written letter of authenticity, and a "king size candy bar of your choice".
Follow this link to check out the official Ebay listing; right now there are over 20 bids, and the current price is set at over $100.
Have a news tip? Attended an event and want to send a live report?


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Cheddar cheese prices enjoy a bump on Tuesday
With some of the highest single day price gains ever, Tuesday of this week proved to be a highlight for Cheddar cheese prices in the spot market on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
Cheddar barrels gained 12 cents per pound on Tuesday while Cheddar blocks tacked on 9.5 cents per pound. Price increases for cheese had begun on Friday, Oct. 14, in the spot market.
On Wednesday of this week, Cheddar barrels shed 2 cents of the recent price gains to close at $1.59 per pound. One carload was sold to put the week's total at 10 sales.
The Cheddar block price held at $1.68 per pound as four carloads were sold on Wednesday. Offers to sell one carload each of barrels and blocks were not covered.
The AA butter spot market price dipped for the 3rd consecutive trading day. The 1.25-cent drop on Wednesday left the price at $1.7550 per pound as one carload was sold to raise the week's total to five sales. An offer to sell one carload was not covered.
Grade A non-fat dry gained 1 cent on Wednesday to close at 88.25 cents per pound. One carload was sold to bring the week's total to six. A bid to buy one carload was not filled and an offer to sell two carloads was not covered.
Class III futures lower
Class III milk futures prices were posting losses of 2 to 24 cents per hundred for all months through June of 2015 in trading early on Wednesday afternoon. Despite the significant gains in the Cheddar cheese price on Tuesday, no monthly futures price showed more than a 31 cent per hundred gain compared to a week earlier.
The futures prices stood at $14.71 per hundred for October, in the $15s for all months from November 2016 through April of 2017 and in the $16s per hundred for all subsequent months through September of 2018.
In the dry whey futures market, the 31.925 cents per pound for October was also the lowest on the trading board. For all following months through December of 2017, the prices were in the mid to upper 30s in cents per pound.
A negative PPD
The September producer price differential (PPD) for the Chicago base zone in Federal Milk Marketing Order 30 is a minus 2 cents per hundred. Because of the transportation factor in the formula, the PPD reaches a negative 22 cents per hundred for the most distant milk receiving plants.
With the negative PPD, the volume of milk pooled in Order 30 for September was down to just below 2.313 billion pounds. Usage of the pooled milk for the month was 12.6 percent in Class I (fluid milk bottling), 7.7 percent in Class II (soft dairy products), 74.5 percent in Class III (cheese production) and 5.2 percent in Class IV (butter and milk powders). The pooled milk had component averages of 3.77 percent butterfat, 3.08 percent protein and 5.77 percent other solids.
The national milk production report for September was released on Thursday afternoon of this week.
Dairy export report
On Monday of this week, Cooperatives Working Together reported the receipt of a total of 23 bids for financial support on the export of dairy commodities. Bids were submitted by Foremost Farms USA, the Maryland and Virginia Milk Producers Cooperative, Dairy Farmers of America, the Northwest Dairy Association (Darigold) and the Tillamook County Creamery in Oregon.
Those bids are on contracts for a total of 2.308 million pounds of Cheddar, Gouda, and Monterey Jack cheese and 859,803 pounds of butter going to buyers in Asia, the Middle East and Oceania. Deliveries on those contracts are scheduled until January of 2017.


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DUBLIN, CA: Edelman has won a $3 million account to make the public a little less afraid of mushrooms.
The Mushroom Council, the marketing arm of the US mushroom industry, picked Edelman as its AOR to educate a public that is often wary of how to buy, handle, and cook mushrooms, said Bart Minor, president and CEO of the organization. The Council represents both mushroom growers and importers.
"Mushrooms are out of sight, out of mind," said Minor. We're not like apples or tomatoes or beef. We're not a staple, or a center of the plate item. We're an add-on. So people aren't as sure how to use mushrooms."
The Council last worked with an agency -- Lewis & Neale -- five years ago. Since that relationship ended, the Council watched mushrooms sales flatten, and decided it was time to wake up the public about mushrooms.
The account, which Edelman pitched with sales promotion agency Seismicom, will focus not just on the consumers, but also retailers and the food service industry.
In addition to educating these audiences about how to buy and cook mushrooms, Edelman will also focus on mushrooms' nutritional story, which has also gone unnoticed, said Edelman SVP Susan Hughes.


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What's the next big food trend? If you ask Jeff Miller, Dunkin' Brands' (DNKN) executive chef since June, it's fermentation. "They're starting to teach it in culinary schools—classes on fermentation and how it affects food," he says of the genre that includes pickles, beer, cider, and even yogurt. "We watch trends and see how they move from fine dining to casual dining and then to fast food."
Miller isn't alone in picking up on pickling. Fermentation was called a "hot culinary trend" by NPR. And it offers some health benefits. But if Dunkin's top chef talks it up, might that signal the coming of a pickled doughnut?
The chain has in fact already tried a kimchi doughnut in Korea and a yogurt-filled variety in Greece. "We get pretty adventurous with doughnuts," Miller says. "I don't know that you'll see a kimchi doughnut [in the U.S.], but you never know. We try a lot of things in the lab."
The more likely and far less daring application for pickling at the doughnut chain: sandwiches. That food category has become a heavy Dunkin' focus these days, and Miller admits "it might be the most apt way to bring it into our menu."
Dunkin's sandwich sales have grown by double-digit percentages in the past few years, the company reported at a recent investor event. Food is now roughly 16 percent of sales, with bakery products making up 23 percent and beverage 57 percent. Dunkin' Donuts is working on redesigning restaurant kitchens to have quicker sandwich stations as it plans to further develop this part of the menu. With or without the pickles.


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Brands set to benefit from video streaming service
New partnership opens door for brands to revolutionise their management and delivery of video content
The launch of a new partnership, announced today, is set to revolutionise the way brands and business manage and deliver video content to digital devices with unparalleled security, quality, functionality and greater user experience.
By joining forces, Octopus TV - a cloud based video content management and delivery platform - and integrated brand communications agency 438 Marketing have developed the technology to open these sophisticated services to brands and businesses of all sizes.
By combining Octopus TV’s cutting edge cloud-based video content storage, management and delivery, as well as live streaming technology, and 438 Marketing’s design and UX expertise they will be able to create more engaging websites, applications and online solutions for all size and types of business. This will open new revenue streams for brands and enable them to reach and engage with customers in a simple and affordable way.
Andrew Eborn, Founder of Octopus TV, said: “There is huge demand for brands to increase engagement with customers and embrace the exciting opportunities presented by technology. By expanding our innovative services alongside 438 Marketing we will make this a reality and enable companies of any size - from the largest brands, broadcasters and distributors to individuals, producers and sales agents - to enjoy the benefits of a robust and user-friendly solution that will save them time and money when managing and delivering digital files and enabling increased engagement with customers.”
Andy Brennan, Digital Director of 438 Marketing, said: “2016 and 2017 have long been tipped as the years that the more sophisticated delivery of video content will boom, and this new complete offer to brands gives us a tried and tested platform on which to build a range of proprietary cloud-based products and services which we’ll be rolling out over the next 12 months, focusing initially on the entertainment, sports and security industries.”
Find out more at: www.438marketing.com and www.octopustv.com
This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Kirsty Hunt .
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Home > News > Biocon to set up joint venture in Dubai
July 30th, 2007
Biocon to set up joint venture in Dubai
Biocon Ltd, India's leading biotechnology firm, has entered into an agreement with Neopharma, a leading Abu Dhabi-based pharma company owned by an Indian, to set up a joint venture (JV) in Dubai's biotech and research park - Dubaitech.
The new venture, christened Neobiocon, will manufacture and market bio-therapeutics in the Gulf region and fulfil the vision of the UAE's former president, late Sheikh Zayed Al Nahyan, to provide 'health for all' at affordable price, according to a company statement here Monday.
Neopharma plans to foray into European markets and work on nanotechnology-based products. Its facility is recognised as a regional contract manufacturing hub for European and Canadian firms.
Graphene reduces wear of alumina ceramic March 26th, 2015
Application of Graphene Oxide in Body Implants in Iran March 26th, 2015
Nanorobotic agents open the blood-brain barrier, offering hope for new brain treatments March 25th, 2015
Nanotechnology in Medical Devices Market is expected to reach $8.5 Billion by 2019 March 25th, 2015
Industrial Nanotech, Inc. Announces Next Large Order from the Oil and Gas Industry March 26th, 2015
Quantum compute this -- WSU mathematicians build code to take on toughest of cyber attacks: Revamped knapsack code offers online security for the future March 26th, 2015
Thousands of atoms entangled with a single photon: Result could make atomic clocks more accurate March 26th, 2015
Square ice filling for a graphene sandwich March 26th, 2015
NXP and GLOBALFOUNDRIES Announce Production of 40nm Embedded Non-Volatile Memory Technology: Co-developed technology to leverage GLOBALFOUNDRIES 40nm process technology platform March 24th, 2015
Young NTU Singapore spin-off clinches S$4.3 million joint venture with Chinese commercial giant March 23rd, 2015
Halas, Nordlander awarded Optical Society's R.W. Wood Prize: Rice University researchers recognized for pioneering nanophotonics March 21st, 2015
EU Funded PCATDES Project has completed its half-period with success March 19th, 2015


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Kubota Farm Machinery, KFM, officially opened its new tractor production facility in Bierne, France. Just 10 km from the port of Dunkirk, the new plant is ideally located to export tractors throughout the EU as well as to North America and Asia.
When the plant is up to full production capacity, it will produce 3,000 of its 130 to 170hp M7001 tractor models a year. Although based in an existing 37,000 sq/m factory first purchased in 2013, Kubota Farm Machinery has invested in excess of €40 million in the plant and will 165 local employees to assemble tractors. Of these, 24 were sent to Kubota in Japan for initial training, with Japanese Team Leaders also overseeing employees in France.
The aim is to ensure the new plant meets Kubota manufacturing standards and mirror those of existing Kubota plants in other parts of the world. “The new M7001 series are ‘Made by Kubota. In Europe’, that is key,” says Dave Roberts, Managing Director of Kubota UK. “Kubota chose Bienre as a production site carefully.
The new plant is well placed to receive components from suppliers in the EU and is close to the major port at Dunkirk to facilitate exports to markets in the Asia and North America. Of equal importance, we have access to a workforce with a tradition in manufacturing.”
All key work stations are currently overseen by a team of Kubota specialists from Japan, with the company essentially saying every step of production is checked and double checked. Kubota knows it has to get these new tractors right from the outset if it is to gain a foothold in the ‘larger’ 130hp plus sector.
It is anticipated that France will be the largest market for the M7001, with the EU in total expected to take around 1,500 M7001 tractors a year. Around 1,000 will be exported annually to North America and 500 to Asia. Sales in the UK will take time to build, Kubota needing to extend its reach into the agricultural sector by expanding its dealer network, but the company is certainly bullish about its future.


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It’ll be a crazy day when there are more Fiats on the road in America than Chryslers.
Perhaps the best news for Fiat fanatics is the “sporty hatchback,” which will be the famous Abarth version that won Europe’s 2008 Car of the Year Award.
The station wagon could be based on the sexy Alfa Romeo Kamal concept, which should help Americans shed the wagon stigma of the ’70s. I don’t care what logo ends up on the front of this baby – I’d drive it all day long.
Come 2011, get ready to see fleets of Fiats cruising your city. I’m going to predict right now that these cars will hardly get to know dealers’ lots before flying off them and into garages across the country. The other side of that, unfortunately, is sure to be premium prices without a lot of negotiation room, which is something Chrysler salesmen aren’t used to. I think they’ll adapt pretty quickly, though!
In addition to the four Fiat 500 versions already slated to arrive, there could be a fifth: a micro SUV. Hey, if MINI can do it, why not?
I’m genuinely excited to see Chrysler shack up with Fiat; these are products much more relevant to the U.S. market than losers like the Sebring. In early 2011, you can count on me stepping foot inside a Chrysler dealership for the first time in years and taking a test drive.
Will you try out a new Fiat when they arrive at Chrysler dealerships in 2011?


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Nintendo is not yet done with its hybrid console-Nintendo Switch. If the recent report is to be believed, it appears that the console will have to undergo more system revisions. This is very interesting considering that Nintendo is scheduled to release the Nintendo Switch Lite and the Pro variant this year.
Nintendo is having a great time with its hybrid console. The Nintendo Switch has impressive sales and is still on track doing so. A month from now, the lite version and a revision of the console are scheduled to launch in China. But, it appears that more great news is coming for fans of the hybrid console.
A few weeks ago, there were several claims that Nintendo was planning to release two variants of the Nintendo Switch. These are the portable type and the Pro type. The rumored pro-type was never developed, and some thought that the latest refresh variant of the regular model recently announced was replacing the pro concept, that is if it really existed.
But, according to the Wall Street Journal, this assumption is not accurate. It can be recalled that the WSJ was the first one to report about the two Nintendo Switch variants earlier. The report now claims that more hardware revisions are scheduled for the hybrid console, but no details about the time frame or release window were shared.
The latest news is no longer a surprise considering that the Japanese hybrid console maker has a reputation of developing multiple revisions to their gaming consoles and handheld devices. When you consider the Nintendo Switch, you can certainly say that Nintendo does not appear to be treating the home console and the handheld versions more different than former handhelds. Is the report hinting about the Pro version of the hybrid console?
Meanwhile, Nintendo recently announced that it is going to release "The Witcher 3" on the Nintendo Switch. The news was a great surprise to many fans of the popular open-world RPG. The porting to the hybrid console is currently done by saber Interactive in close cooperation with the CD Projekt Red.
The news also earned many questions especially Nintendo Switch' capability to launch the game considering the amount of storage that it would need. "The Witcher 3" on Nintendo Switch will be released in Complete Edition. This means that all the downloadable contents and expansions rolled out by the game developer since the game was released will all be there.


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With "diabesity" becoming an epidemic and the cost of fighting conditions related to obesity rising by the minute, there seems to be little doubt that Americans have a problem with food—and not just any food—but the highly processed, high fat, high sugar foods that have become staples of our culture.
But is it possible that Americans are starting to "opt out" of the junk food culture?
From the Organic Authority Files
Economic times are tough around the world, but so is the global health crisis, and several iconic junk food brands seem to be feeling the pinch.
A few weeks ago, snack maker Hostess shut its doors after a third of its workers went on strike and rejected a pay-cutting deal to help the company through bankruptcy. The work stoppage was the last straw for the maker of Twinkies and Ho Hos, but the company had already filed for bankruptcy and was already hurting. Were the company's financial problems part of the broader recession? Almost certainly. But could it also be that consumers were making different choices—reaching for something other than Twinkies?
In October, McDonald's reported its first sales slump in more than a decade. In a statement, McDonald's said, "October's sales results reflect the pervasive challenges of today's marketplace." Is it possible they were acknowledging not only a change in the global economy, but a change in people's tastes as well? Only McDonald's knows, but with the the launch of their first ever all-vegetarian restaurant, it certainly seems that the company is thinking about change.
Even the soda giants are riding the seas of change. PepsiCo reported a huge 14 percent drop in profits in the second quarter of 2012. And although Coca-Cola hasn't released the same sort of numbers, the release of a new UK website called the Coca-Cola "Work it Out" calculator tells consumers how much exercise they would need to do to work off a single coke—walking for 30 minutes; yoga or pilates for 32 minutes; vacuuming for 51 minutes; or salsa dancing for 21 minutes.
The change may be glacially slow, but it seems to be coming; we can only hope that this is a trend that continues as consumers continue to vote for health with their forks and their wallets.


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Macy's CEO lauds first Thanksgiving opening
Conservatives bashed Macy's via social media for the inclusion of a drag queen and a musical number from the Tony Award winning Broadway musical Kinky Boots during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
Just hours after the 87th Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade ended, some 15,000 people lined up outside the New York flagship store for what the retailer hopes will become another tradition: shopping. CEO Terry Lundren was at the Herald Square store when
Fall Out Boy performs as Nickelodeon's SpongeBob SquarePants, Dora The Explorer and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles kick off the holidays at 87th annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on November 28, 2013 in New York City.
Macy's annual Thanksgiving Day Parade, with its giant balloons, decorative floats and musical performances, is usually a joyous event. So it was unusual to see a group of animal rights protesters among the cheering crowds at Thursday's parade in New
The big balloons soared along with the crowd's spirits Thursday as the annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade made its way through the streets of New York City.


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ANM Group unveils Farm Profit Programme
Summer show schedule announced
We are delighted to announce the summer show schedule is now available to view and that our show van will be in attendance for all to enjoy.
Success at Thainstone’s plant, machinery and equipment auction
ANM Group announces the results of its machinery, and equipment sale which took place on 2nd July 2016.
28/07/2016 at Thainstone Centre, Inverurie
06/08/2016 Commercial Vehicles, 4x4's, Excavators, Digger Loaders, Trailers etc
26/08/2016 Show and sale of store cattle and weaned calves
28/11/2016 Scotland’s Premier Two-Day Winter Event
ANM GROUP COMPANIES