Business Editors/High Tech Writers
RESTON, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 20, 2000
Proxicom, Inc. (Nasdaq: PXCM), an e-business consulting firm and development company, today said that its previously announced acquisition of U.K. e-business consultancy Clarity IBD, Ltd. was finalized and closed yesterday, April 19, 2000.
London-based Clarity, with a team of more than 80 consulting professionals, now has become part of Proxicom's existing U.K. operations.
About Proxicom:
Proxicom, Inc. is an Internet development and e-business consulting company that delivers innovative Internet-based solutions and applications for Fortune 500 companies and other global, forward-thinking businesses. Our 800 strategy, creative and technology service professionals provide specialized e-business development expertise for the following global industries: Energy & Telecom; Financial Services; Retail & Manufacturing; and the Service Industries, which include the media and entertainment, travel and transportation businesses. Founded in 1991 as a systems integrator, Proxicom has developed and built e-businesses for such blue-chip companies as America Online, General Electric, General Motors, Merrill Lynch, Marriott International and NBC, among many others. With its headquarters in Reston, Va., Proxicom has U.S. offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Houston, and Sausalito, Calif., and European offices in London, Munich, Rome and Madrid. For more information, please visit http://www.proxicom.com or call 1-877-PROXICOM.
Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Aug. 28 -- CompUSA Inc. announced a marketing alliance Friday with America Online Inc. under which the Dallas-based computer retailer will begin selling machines configured to help new users get on the Internet.
The CompUSA brand computers will come pre-loaded with software for America Online, the world's leading Internet service provider with more than 18 million users, and CompuServe 2000, which is AOL's budget-priced service.
Each computer will have a customized keyboard with a special button that will call up the AOL sign-on screen. AOL customers now generally direct a mouse and click on a screen icon to start the program.
"People love convenience," said Wendy Goldberg, a spokeswoman for Dulles, Va.-based AOL. "That has been our secret sauce: ease of use and convenience."
Under the agreement, AOL and CompuServe customers will receive discounted rates for CompUSA's customer support service, called Dial-a-Tech.
CompUSA and AOL also said they will develop training classes on how to use AOL software effectively for a variety of tasks, including managing personal finances. The classes will be offered at certain CompUSA stores nationwide.
The computers will have built-in modems from 3Com Corp., recommended by AOL for maximum compatibility with the company's network.
Financial terms of the alliance were not disclosed. The PCs will be available this fall, the companies said. Prices and configurations have not been determined, said Suzanne Shelton, a spokeswoman for CompUSA, the nation's largest retailer of personal computers.
The alliance illustrates the value of the "newbie" to Internet companies. Surveys from Zona Research Inc. show that inexperienced Internet users are more likely to remain loyal to their service providers.
"By catching these new users early in the game," the Redwood City, Calif.-based firm said in a report, "AOL can begin to develop their brand loyalty and possibly create AOL members, and consequent revenue streams, for life."
Online services have also been seeking to build loyalty from new users with deals that offer free or deeply discounted PCs to those who sign up for long-term contracts. Many of those who have accepted those deals are first-time PC buyers.
In its announcement Friday, CompUSA noted that it will continue to offer a $400 discount on any PC to customers who purchase three years of CompuServe 2000 service.
CompUSA shares rose 6 cents to $7.19. AOL fell $1.31 to $99.13.
Visit The Dallas Morning News on the World Wide Web at http://www.dallasnews.com/
Subscribers to fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) services get considerably more bandwidth for the buck than those who receive their Internet and video services through cable or DSL, according to a new report commissioned by the Fiber-to-the-Home Council.
The survey of more than 2,000 broadband subscribers, drawn randomly from a nationally balanced panel of more than 3.2 million consumers by the market research firm RVA LLC, also found that overall satisfaction among FTTH users continues to lead that of other broadband subscribers, with those answering "very satisfied" at 74 percent--up from 71 percent a year ago--compared to 54 percent for cable users and 51 percent for DSL.
With regard to cost of service relative to download connection speed, the RVA survey results showed FTTH subscribers paying $2.91 a month per megabit of bandwidth, compared to $3.83 for cable subscribers, $16.40 for DSL, and $49.38 per megabit for fixed wireless service.
As of April 2011, fiber-to-the-home services were available to more than 18 percent of North American homes and were connected to more than 7 million of them. RVA estimates that there are now 170,000 North American households receiving FTTH service with connection speeds of at least 100 megabits per second, and a total of 347,000 receiving 50Mbps service. Both of these figures were more than double those from last year's survey report.
With regard to consumer-tested download speeds, FTTH households continue to outpace subscribers of other services, with average speeds now at 19.7Mbps--up from 16.6Mbps in last year's survey--compared to an average 13.3Mbps for cable households and 2.9Mbps for DSL. On upload performance, the relative gap between FTTH and cable modem was wider, with FTTH subscribers averaging 5.4Mbps and cable subs averaging 2.7Mbps, with 0.7Mbps average upload speed for DSL.
"This year's survey shows that end-to-end fiber services are extending their lead over other broadband technologies in speed, value and customer satisfaction," said Dan O'Connell, president of the FTTH Council. "We expect this trend will continue as bandwidth requirements for the latest video and other applications continue to accelerate, and growing numbers of consumers expect to be able to access them through their telecommunications providers."
The RVA survey continued to find popularity of FTTH services among people who work from home, with FTTH subscribers reporting working an average 1.2 days per month more from their homes than cable subs, and home-based businesses in FTTH households showing significantly higher annual revenues than those in households using other types of broadband--an estimated $54,891. Based on this and on typical take-rates for FTTH services, RVA estimates that FTTH communities see an influx of $500,000 in home-based business revenues for every 1,000 homes passed.
Nearly 100 New Brand Names Added and Redesigned Site
Built by Customer Feedback
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y., Sept. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- World premier Internet auto parts retailer Wrenchead.com launches full e-commerce operations, adds nearly 100 new product lines and redesigns the site using customer feedback. It was announced today by Gus Conrades, CEO of Wrenchead.com.
"This is part of Wrenchead.com's continued leadership in auto parts retailing and this initial platform expands product selection, adding nearly 100 new product lines, which will be fully integrated into the Wrenchead.com product line," said Conrades. "Wrencheads have access to the broadest and most comprehensive line of autoparts on-line, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, by logging-on to http://www.wrenchead.com."
Wrenchead.com catalogs over 1.5 million SKU's including replacement parts, and the hottest selling truck and sport compact accessories, all accessible by logging-on to http://www.wrenchead.com.
Previously announced on September 13th, Wrenchead.com entered into an agreement with Nichols Publications to provide the 140 volumes of Chilton's Total Car Care series on automotive maintenance and repair (Repair Procedures Information or RPI) information on-line.
On August 16th, the CBS Corporation (NYSE: CBS) acquired a 22 equity stake in Wrenchead.com, Inc. In exchange, Wrenchead.com will receive $33 million of advertising, promotion and other consideration, over a term of four years, across CBS's media. These properties include television, radio and outdoor. Infinity Broadcasting Corporation (NYSE: INF), the Company's majority-owned out-of-home media subsidiary, will receive a pro rata share of the investment.
Based in White Plans, N.Y., Wrenchead.com sells over 1.5 million brand name auto and truck parts, accessories, performance products and consumer merchandise on the web. Wrenchead.com strives to enrich the experience of people who love cars and trucks, by offering help with installation, maintenance, repair for the motorsports enthusiast, hobbyist, collector and the do-it-yourselfer. Wrenchead.com can be reached on the web at http://www.wrenchead.com.
And when is the right age for a child to receive a laptop?
Pension Fund Trustees have a wide discretion in paying benefits from their pension scheme to the deceased member's dependants. In the process of exercising their discretion, they usually acquire a lot of information about the personal circumstances and relationships within the family. At a time of bereavement and when the family may be in straitened financial circumstances, the Pension Fund Trustees need to exercise their discretion with care to ensure that any money reaches and benefits those for whom it is intended.
The family situation may be such that Pension Fund Trustees know if they pay money destined for a minor child, to their parent or guardian, that that money might be misused.
Or they may fully trust that parent/guardian to keep the money until the child is 18 but be unsure of their ability to invest it wisely and safely to ensure the child benefits.
Or the sum may be substantial, and the Pension Fund Trustees may feel the amount should not be paid out until the child is older, say at 23 or 25. In this case, the money must be held on trust, with all the investment and tax compliance that that involves and with which the parent/guardian may not be best placed to deal.
Some Pension Fund Trustees resolve the issue by themselves setting up trusts for deceased members' children and appointing either the Pension Fund Trustees or a Pension Administrator as Trustee and running the trusts themselves. This may be appropriate for small funds with a short time to run, but may not be for longer, more complicated trusts.
The high level of duty of care imposed on any Trustee, particularly since the Trustee Act 2000 and the increased burden of regulation, in particular the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 makes managing such Trust Funds internally less and less attractive. The Trustee Act 2000 imposes under Section 1 a high level of duty of care; Section 4 imposes a duty to invest having regard to defined standard investment criteria including the need to diversify investments. Trustees need to balance the requirement to preserve funds and take an appropriate investment approach with the need to generate real return for their beneficiary, for whose benefit the money is being held. Although Pension Fund Trustees are governed by the above in their administration of their huge pension funds, they may well feel their time is not best used managing relatively small individual amounts.
Unsurprisingly therefore, Pension Fund Trustees are looking more and more to external solutions, where they can exercise their discretion, make a payment out to a child into a Trust managed by external Trustees, in full confidence that the external Trustees will manage the trust fully and efficiently.
But often the amounts going into the Trust are relatively small and the cost of setting up a bespoke Trust with full discretionary management of investments is prohibitive.
The Solution
So Tesco, Morrisons, IBM, Dixons and Rolls Royce use the Death Benefits Trust service developed by Thomas Eggar LLP almost fifteen years ago.
Pension Schemes can sign up to a service specifically created as a solution to this issue. The death benefit is paid to Thomas Eggar Trust Corporation Limited, a professional Trustee, to hold in trust for the child until vesting age. The Trust Corporation liaises with the parent/guardian over any needs of the child, invests the money on behalf of the child, produces annual accounts and deals with all tax reporting and compliance, and is responsive to any needs of the child prior to vesting by making distributions for educational or other purposes. Thomas Eggar LLP now manages 450 death benefit trusts for over 40 top company pension schemes like these mentioned, offering a streamlined, effective, low cost service to enable Pension Fund Trustees to pay out, secure in the knowledge that the funds will be invested safely and wisely, that all tax, legal and trust compliance will be taken care of, and that active consideration will be given to the individual circumstances of each beneficiary to ensure that money is released appropriately for the child during their minority or preserved intact until vesting, depending on their individual needs.
And while the Trust Corporation will generally release money early to enable internet access for those in secondary education, I am afraid they will refuse requests for a pink Barbie laptop for a 5 year old.
The contents of this brochure are intended as guidelines for clients and other readers. It is not a substitute for considered advice on specific issues. Consequently, we cannot accept any responsibility for this information or for any errors or omissions.
Thomas Eggar LLP is a limited liability partnership registered in England and Wales under registered number OC326278 whose registered office is at The Corn Exchange, Baffin's Lane, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 1GE (VAT number 991259583). The word 'partner' refers to a member of the LLP, or an employee or consultant with equivalent standing and qualifications. A list of the members of the LLP is displayed at the above address, together with a list of those non-members who are designated as partners. Regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. Lexcel and Investors in People accredited.
Thomas Eggar LLP is not authorised by the Financial Services Authority. However, we are included on the register maintained by the Financial Services Authority so that we can carry on insurance mediation activity which is broadly the advising on, selling and administering of insurance contracts. This part of our business, including arrangements for complaints and redress if something goes wrong, is regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. The register can be accessed via the Financial Services Authority website. We can also provide certain further limited investment services to clients if those services are incidental to the professional services we have been engaged to provide as solicitors.
Thesis Asset Management plc, our associated financial services company, provides a comprehensive range of investment services and advice. Thesis is owned by members of Thomas Eggar LLP but is independent of and separate to it. No lawyer connected with Thomas Eggar LLP provides services through Thesis as a practicing lawyer regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. Thesis is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Thesis has its own framework of investor protection and professional indemnity cover but Thesis clients do not enjoy the statutory protection of solicitors' clients.
Mr Michael Taylor
Thomas Eggar
76 Shoe Lane
London
EC4A 3JB
UNITED KINGDOM
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(c) Mondaq Ltd, 2011 - Tel. +44 (0)20 8544 8300 - http://www.mondaq.com
OTTAWA, Ontario -- Huawei, TELUS and Carleton signed a more than $1.4 million deal today to establish a research lab dedicated to enterprise cloud services. Located in Carleton University's new Canal engineering building, the Huawei-TELUS Innovation Centre for Enterprise Cloud Services will give students, faculty and industry an opportunity to research real-world problems associated with cloud computing such as security and performance issues.
"Huawei continues to focus on customer-centric innovation in support of Canada's thriving Digital Economic Strategy," said Sean Yang, President of Huawei Canada. "In addition to the joint innovation centre we announced with TELUS earlier in the year, this new lab, another strategic partnership with TELUS, is dedicated to enterprise cloud services, and underscores our commitment to bringing leading technologies and solutions to our key customers. We have a long-term commitment to the Canadian market, and will continue to contribute to the local community by sponsoring, funding, and collaborating with universities across the nation."
"The research that will be undertaken in this new lab will lead to solutions for real-world problems associated with the field of cloud computing," said Ibrahim Gedeon, TELUS' Chief Technology Officer. "This agreement continues to demonstrate the value of our choice of Huawei in terms of the right strategic partner for now and into the future."
"This innovative partnership will lead to exciting research and development possibilities for Carleton students and staff at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. The new lab being located at Carleton in the nation's capital is yet another sign that high tech is again on the move in Ottawa, providing our students with hands-on, real-world experience that will give them a competitive edge in the Ottawa job market," said Rafik Goubran, dean of the Faculty of Engineering and Design at Carleton University.
The lab will be used to drive student interest in cloud services with Huawei equipment leveraging TELUS services to benefit course work, senior-year projects and graduate research. The lab will be directed by a member oversight committee led by representatives from Huawei, TELUS, and Carleton University.
Cloud computing allows people to acquire resources on demand from a service provider (SP) and store data on the service provider's system rather than hosting this information on their own computers. The term "cloud computing" refers to the information which is processed and stored on computers that are offsite, often in a location unknown to the client and accessed via the Internet. Enterprise cloud computing offers resource sharing within one business or enterprise and provides secure, fast and flexible sharing of computer power, storage and software focusing on one company's or business's individual demands.
About Huawei
Huawei is a leading telecoms solutions provider serving 45 of the world's top 50 telecom operators. Huawei's products and solutions have been deployed in over 100 countries and support the communications needs of one third of the world's population. The company is committed to providing innovative and customized products, services and solutions to create long-term value and growth potential for its customers. For more information, visit Huawei online: www.huawei.com. Follow us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/huaweipress and YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/HuaweiPress.
About TELUS
TELUS (TSX: T, T.A; NYSE: TU) is a leading national telecommunications company in Canada, with $9.9 billion of annual revenue and 12.3 million customer connections including 7 million wireless subscribers, 3.7 million wireline network access lines and 1.2 million Internet subscribers and more than 350,000 TELUS TV customers. Led since 2000 by President and CEO, Darren Entwistle, TELUS provides a wide range of communications products and services including data, Internet protocol (IP), voice, entertainment and video. In support of our philosophy to give where we live, TELUS, our team members and retirees will, by year-end 2011, have contributed $245 million to charitable and not-for-profit organizations and volunteered 4.1 million hours of service to local communities since 2000. Ten TELUS Community Boards across Canada lead TELUS' local philanthropic initiatives. TELUS was honoured to be named the most outstanding philanthropic corporation globally for 2010 by the Association of Fundraising Professionals, becoming the first Canadian company to receive this prestigious international recognition. For more information about TELUS, please visit telus.com. To learn more about TELUS' commitment to the community, please visit TELUS.com/community.
About Carleton University
Located in the nation's capital, Carleton University is a dynamic research and teaching institution with a tradition of leading change. Its internationally recognized faculty, staff and researchers provide more than 25,000 full- and part-time students from every province and more than 100 countries around the world with academic opportunities in more than 65 programs of study, including public affairs, journalism, film studies, engineering, high technology, and international studies. Carleton's creative, interdisciplinary and international approach to research has led to many significant discoveries and creative works in science and technology, business, governance, public policy and the arts. As an innovative institution Carleton is uniquely committed to developing solutions to real-world problems by pushing the boundaries of knowledge and understanding daily.
M2 PRESSWIRE-May 26, 2011-BUYINS.NET: SUSQ SqueezeTrigger Price is $8.61. There is $112,963,248 That Short Sellers Still Need To Cover.(C)1994-2011 M2 COMMUNICATIONS
RDATE:25052011
BUYINS.NET / www.squeezetrigger.com is monitoring SUSQUEHANNA BANCSHARES INC (NASDAQ:SUSQ) in real time and just received an alert that SUSQ is crossing above its primary SqueezeTrigger Price, the price that a short squeeze can start in any stock. There are 13089600 shares that have been shorted at the volume weighted average SqueezeTrigger Price of $8.61. To access SqueezeTrigger Prices ahead of potential short squeezes beginning, visit http://www.squeezetrigger.com .
From August 2009 to April 2011, an aggregate amount of 205841040 shares of SUSQ have been shorted for a total dollar value of $1646728320. The SUSQ SqueezeTrigger price of $8.61 is the volume weighted average price that all shorts are short in shares of SUSQ. There is still approximately $112,963,248 of potential short covering in shares of SUSQ.
SqueezeTrigger.com has built a massive database that collects, analyzes and publishes a proprietary SqueezeTrigger Price for each stock that has been shorted. The data has then been integrated into an automated trading platform which can be used to connect to a live online broker and automate your trading of short squeeze events. It is extremely powerful with lightening fast execution at a very low price. Both the trading software and SqueezeTrigger data feed are available at http://www.squeezetrigger.com .
SUSQUEHANNA BANCSHARES INC (NASDAQ:SUSQ) - Susquehanna Bancshares, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides retail and commercial banking, and financial services in the mid-Atlantic region. Its retail banking services include checking, savings, and club accounts; check cards; debit cards; money market accounts; certificates of deposit; individual retirement accounts; home equity lines of credit; residential mortgage loans; home improvement loans; automobile loans; personal loans; and Internet banking services. The companys commercial banking services comprise business checking accounts, cash management services, money market accounts, land acquisition and development loans, commercial loans, floor plan, equipment and working capital lines of credit, and small business loans. Susquehanna Bancshares non-bank subsidiaries offer commercial, property, and casualty insurance; and risk management programs for medium and large sized companies. The company also provides traditional trust and custodial services, as well as acts as administrator, executor, guardian, and managing agent for individuals, businesses, and non-profit entities. In addition, it offers investment advisory, asset management, and brokerage services for institutional and high net worth individual clients, as well as provides retirement planning services. Further, the company provides equity management of assets for institutions, pensions, endowments, and high net worth individuals; and consumer vehicle financing services. As of December 31, 2009, it operated 221 branches and 29 free-standing automated teller machines. The company was founded in 1982 and is based in Lititz, Pennsylvania.
The SqueezeTrigger database of approximately 1 billion short sale transactions goes back to January 1, 2005 and calculates the exact price at which the Total Short Interest is short in each stock. This data was never before available prior to January 1, 2005 because the Self Regulatory Organizations (primary exchanges) guarded it aggressively. After the SEC passed Regulation SHO, exchanges were forced to allow data processors like SqueezeTrigger.com to access the data. Total Short Interest is the number of shares shorted but not yet covered, and is different from total short volume. To access SqueezeTrigger Prices ahead of potential short squeezes beginning, visit http://www.squeezetrigger.com
About SQUEEZETRIGGER.COM
WWW.SQUEEZETRIGGER.COM is a service designed to help bonafide shareholders of publicly traded US companies fight short selling. SqueezeTrigger.com has built a proprietary database that uses Threshold list feeds and short sale time and sale data from NASDAQ, AMEX and NYSE to generate detailed and useful information to combat the short selling problem. For the first time, actual trade by trade data is available to the public that shows the attempted size, actual size, price and average value of short sales in stocks that have been shorted. This information is valuable in determining the precise point at which short sellers go out-of-the-money and start losing on their short trades.
SQUEEZETRIGGER.COM has built a massive database that collects, analyzes and publishes a proprietary SqueezeTrigger for each stock that has been shorted. The SqueezeTrigger database of nearly one billion short sale transactions goes back to January 1, 2005 and calculates the exact price at which the Total Short Interest is short in each stock. This data was never before available prior to January 1, 2005 because the Self Regulatory Organizations (primary exchanges) guarded it aggressively. After the SEC passed Regulation SHO, exchanges were forced to allow data processors like SqueezeTrigger.com to access the data.
The SqueezeTrigger database collects individual short trade data on over 7,000 NYSE, AMEX and NASDAQ stocks and general short trade data on nearly 8,000 OTCBB and PINKSHEET stocks. Each month the database grows by approximately 50,000,000 short sale transactions and provides investors with the knowledge necessary to time when to buy and sell stocks with outstanding short positions. By tracking the size and price of each month's short transactions, SQUEEZETRIGGER.COM provides institutions, traders, analysts, journalists and individual investors the exact price point where short sellers start losing money and a short squeeze can begin.
All material herein was prepared by SQUEEZETRIGGER.COM, based upon information believed to be reliable. The information contained herein is not guaranteed by SQUEEZETRIGGER.COM to be accurate, and should not be considered to be all-inclusive. The companies that are discussed in this opinion have not approved the statements made in this opinion.
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AUSTIN, Texas -- The following information was released by the University of Texas - Austin:
A new partnership between The University of Texas at Austin and Harvard University has been created to help improve teaching and learning through educational innovation and technology.
Steven W. Leslie, executive vice president and provost at The University of Texas at Austin, said the partnership brings together top educational researchers from the Mazur Group at Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and Department of Physics with educational innovators from The University of Texas at Austin. They will lead the implementation and dissemination of cutting-edge, evidence-based, interactive strategies of instruction that leverage educational technology to improve student learning and success. The primary vehicle for the collaboration will be the university's new Course Transformation Program, a state-of-the-art effort to advance pedagogical innovation, effective teaching and student success in general education courses.
The Course Transformation Program already is transforming large, lower division gatekeeper courses at The University of Texas at Austin to improve student academic success and increase learning gains. The project eventually will reach more than 40,000 students in a five-year period.
Dr. Gretchen Ritter, vice provost for undergraduate education and faculty governance at The University of Texas at Austin, is director of the program, which is being developed and implemented by the university's Center for Teaching and Learning under the leadership of Dr. Harrison Keller, vice provost for higher education policy and executive director of the Center for Teaching and Learning. Ritter said the initiative is a key part of a campaign by the university's president, William Powers Jr., to make The University of Texas at Austin a leader in reinventing higher education for the 21st century.
"Universities around the country are increasingly aware that the Internet has significantly changed the way our students learn," Ritter said.
She said advising for the project is provided by two faculty led panels u the Research and Assessment Advisory Panel, co-chaired by Dr. Chandra Muller, a professor of sociology, and Dr. Paul Resta, the Ruth Knight Millikan Centennial Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, and the Educational Technology and Learning Analytics Advisory Panel, chaired by Dr. Bruce Porter, chair of the Department of Computer Science.
Leslie said innovative, technology-enhanced approaches to teaching and learning "will help us better connect to all of our students, better support their academic and professional development and better prepare them for tomorrow's workplace."
"The Course Transformation Project's integration of educational technology and scientific approaches to ensuring student academic success unique to this partnership will place The University of Texas at Austin and Harvard at the forefront of undergraduate education reform," said Dr. Julie Schell, postdoctoral fellow from Harvard and lead collaborator.
Schell is the senior educational researcher in the Mazur Group at Harvard. Dr. Eric Mazur, the Balkanski Professor of Physics and Applied Physics and area dean of applied physics at Harvard, heads one of the largest physics research groups at Harvard and is an internationally renowned laser physicist. Mazur also is the developer of Peer Instruction, an innovative, evidence-based teaching and learning method used in thousands of classrooms throughout the world.
"I'm excited to be part of a faculty-led push to innovate in lower-division courses across the campus at The University of Texas at Austin," Mazur said.
The Mazur Group develops and researches technology-based learning methods that drive student success by transforming conventionally taught courses. More information about the Mazur Group can be found at: mazur.harvard.edu.
iShop Town announces the launch of their Alumni Association Cash Back Program. Authorized alumni groups and organizations are entitled to 15% cash back on all qualified purchases at iShop Town.
Pasadena, CA (PRWEB) June 15, 2010 - iShop Town, an ecommerce retailer of officially licensed sports gifts and merchandise, introduced a new cash back program for qualified alumni associations. Alumni associations that register at iShop Town will be qualified for 15% cash back on Internet sales where buyers mention the alumni association during purchase.
In order to be eligible for the iShop Town cash back program, alumni groups must register with iShop Town before any purchases are made and place a link on their website to iShop Town. "This not only lets us know that the person we are dealing with has the authority of make decisions, but let's alumni members at websites easily find and shop with us" said the CEO of iShop Town. "We know how difficult it is for alumni associations to fund raise and this helps them raise funds and it helps us with increased exposure. It really is a win/win situation" he continued.
Although the iShop Town Cash Back Program is geared toward their selection of NCAA gifts and merchandise, iShop Town also provides a selection of MLB merchandise and NFL gifts.
"As far as we know we are the only sports themed website to offer a cash back program to alumni programs. We expect this program to give us a competitive edge over an ever growing field of sports themed websites" state the CEO of iShop Town. "Selling sports themed gifts is a multi-billion dollar industry and we hope that our cash back program gives us enough momentum to firmly establish iShop Town as a serious player in the field".
Interested alumni groups should visit the iShop Town cash back program for specific details and to register their organization.
About iShop Town:
iShop Town (http://www.ishoptown.com) is a Yahoo based store headquartered in Pasadena, California that offers a variety of merchants an ecommerce platform to showcase their products to consumers with the goal of providing a first class shopping experience. Free fast shipping on top quality sports merchandise is the cornerstone of the service as well as providing the security of shopping that comes with a Yahoo based ecommerce store.
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Read the full story at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2010/06/prweb4131414.htm.
Byline: ANTON ANTONOWICZ
IT has taken 30 years of political and social repression for Iranians to take to the streets once more.
As someone who married an Iranian in 1979, the year that the Shah was toppled and the Islamic Republic declared, I thought it was only a matter of time.
Only a matter of time before the young demanded freedom. Only a matter of time before a world of possibilities shown to them on the internet dawned on Iran.
Only a matter of time until suppressed women stood up and said: "No more."
But why now?
Take away the image of 27-year-old Neda Agha-Soltani bleeding her life away on a Tehran pavement posted on the internet.
And the short answer is: the economy.
Inflation officially stands at 25%, unemployment has reached 17% and the real income of the average Iranian today is no higher than it was in 1975.
Incompetence and its own aggressive foreign policy is at the root of it.
To meet its own energy needs, Iran imports 40% of its petrol because its own dilapidated refineries cannot meet demand and cannot be repaired because their parts are subject to international sanctions.
Then there's corruption. Almost threequarters of the economy is owned by the state or by religious foundations.
Bribery is a way of life.
Meanwhile, Iran is home to some two million drug users. Prostitution flourishes beneath the veil with 85,000 women selling sex in Tehran as AIDS cases soar.
But the regime has now finally been confronted by the people - a people demanding it bows to their will.
A people once left quietly grumbling about the price of meat, hurling rocks. And a young woman bleeding her heart out.
CAPTION(S):
RIOT Police break up demonstrators
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 29 Asia Pulse - T-Systems, the enterprise customer unit of Germany's Deutsche Telekom, sees its business in the Asia Pacific growing between 30-50 per cent despite the challenging economic environment.
Its Singapore and Malaysia chief executive officer, Thomas Jakob said the Asia Pacific markets would shield the company's operations from a slowdown as companies globally were looking at opportunities for cost structure by venturing into lower cost destinations in Asia.
"At the moment, if you look at opportunities for growth globally, it is actually in the Asia Pacific," he told Bernama at the recent launch of the new Deutsche Telekom Centre in Singapore.
He said T-Systems had also seen a growing demand for international telecommunication services from multinational corporations as they expanded into new regions.
As the Malaysian market was growing faster that others in the region, Jakob said it would be the focus of the company's expansion in the Asia Pacific.
The company is looking for suitable buildings in Malaysia to facilitate its operations.
It is understood T-Systems requires bigger facilities over the next 12-18 months to manage the infrastructure and information technology (IT) for Shell's global data centres.
Earlier this year, T-Systems took over the three of Shell's data centres in the Netherlands with one each in Malaysia and the United States.
T-Systems intends to make Malaysia a centre for service management and turn the local data centre into its operational hub for the Asia Pacific region.
"Five hundred employees from Shell have joined us and they will be based in Malaysia. The next focus is to leverage on these assets and expand the scope of operations over the next six months," Jakob explained.
He said T-Systems was also working on external market opportunities in Malaysia, adding the company, had a couple of contracts now.
"We are already servicing the local clients and intend to expand the business significantly over the next year," he added.
As part of its commitment to Malaysia, T-Systems acquired MSC Malaysia status in January.
In the Asia-Pacific, T-Systems provides information and communications technology (ICT) solutions to multinational customers including Airbus, Allianz, Bosch, Infineon Technologies, Mitsubishi Motors and Volkswagen.
Moving forward, Jakob said T-Systems's strategy in the Asia Pacific was to focus on expanding its partnership with global customers even more while building stronger ties with selected local leaders in the automotive,manufacturing, services and finance sectors.
According to Jakob,the difficult economic climate at present, actually translated into opportunities for T-Systems as customers were looking at ways to become efficient by focusing on their core business.
"The outsourcing model in general is becoming more prevalent at this time and is a positive driver for our business growth. We believe that we will double our revenue over the next two to three years in the Asia Pacific," he said.
T-Systems posted a revenue of 12 billion euros last year and was a leading provider for the automotive and telecommunications industries as well as the public sector.
It offers network-centric ICT services ranging from data centre operations and global services based on the Internet Protocol (IP) to the development and management of applications.
(BERNAMA-OANA) 29-08 1122
Byline: Cara Garretson
IBM Internet Security Systems (ISS) on Wednesday announced a virtual e-mail security appliance that runs alongside other
applications on a single piece of hardware, instead of requiring a dedicated device.
Slated for availability this month, the virtual appliance is based on ISS' Proventia Network Mail Security System and is designed
to block all the abuses entering an organization via e-mail, including spam, phishing attacks, viruses, worms and other malware,
as well as monitoring of outbound e-mail, according to company officials.
Exemplifying the trend among data centers to consolidate hardware components and their management, the new virtual appliance
from ISS lowers the cost of e-mail security while simplifying the tracking, auditing, and prevention of messaging threats,
officials say.
The new virtual security appliance combines features from ISS' intrusion-prevention systems, and can protect organizations
from both traditional and image-based spam.
As with the existing Proventia products, the new appliance can be managed via a centralized console, the IBM Proventia Management
SiteProtector, which also works with ISS' entire suite of security products, officials say. At launch the virtual appliance
will work with VMware, and the company plans to add compatibility with other virtual environments in the future.
Pricing for the virtual appliance depends on the number of users in an organization. For example, a company with 1,000 employees
would pay $7 per user, officials say.
IBM's ISS is not the first company to release a virtualized version of an e-mail security appliance; Proofpoint last year
released a version of its Messaging Security Gateway for VMware.
IBM acquired ISS last August for $1.3 billion.
Byline: Don Pierson
CHICAGO _You have to admire, or at least acknowledge, Lovie Smith for doing it his way. For his sake, you have to hope the Bears dare to offer him a new contract worthy of his own daring.
Whether it was entirely Smith's idea to once again distance the 2006 Bears from 1985 is not known at the moment. But when Smith mentioned he and defensive coordinator Ron Rivera are heading in different directions, you can bet Smith wanted nothing to do anymore with 1985.
Maybe it's nothing more than the decision of a practical man. Rivera never was the first choice of Smith or general manager Jerry Angelo in 2004. They wanted Rod Marinelli, but Tampa Bay wouldn't allow him out of his contract. So they turned to Rivera, who turned into a much more manageable sidekick than Buddy Ryan ever was for Mike Ditka.
Still, you have to wonder. Smith and his Bears just returned from a Super Bowl trip, a trip in which they got schooled by a former mentor, Tony Dungy, and his Colts. It was a Super Bowl in which Smith saw Rivera and the legendary 1985 Bears get at least as much attention as Smith and his 2006 Bears.
Day after day, Rivera was surrounded by reporters asking about his latest interview prospects, asking about the 1985 Bears, asking about Ryan, about Ditka. When they asked about the 2006 Bears, it was usually in the context of 1985, how they compared, how Brian Urlacher was like Mike Singletary, what the accomplishments of 1985 meant to players barely alive then.
Rivera did his best to answer cordially, rarely failing to mention "Coach Smith" in the most respectful terms. An ungrateful, scornful Ryan, Rivera was not.
If Smith felt threatened by the specter of 1985, he certainly did the right thing in severing all ties.
Dave Wannstedt paid homage to Ditka and then resisted most overtures regarding all things 1985. He even allowed himself to be talked into an encore performance by Richard Dent, as a pass rusher, not a coach, and felt he got burned by the experience.
Dick Jauron was second-guessed for refusing to make room on his coaching staff for Mike Singletary, who figured his sterling reputation would make up for his lack of coaching experience. Jauron tried to accommodate Dent as an assistant pass-rushing coach.
After Smith hired Rivera, the two were invited to Ditka's restaurant for a pep rally of sorts with other members of the 1985 Bears. Former Bear Shaun Gayle recalls the group was "out of place" in imposing their opinions on the new staff, yet were appreciative that Rivera and Smith appeared to pay attention.
Rivera said Smith sat quietly in the back of the room while Ditka and others gave their blessing.
Tradition is a wonderful thing, and burdensome too.
By losing the Super Bowl, Smith's Bears not only failed to write their own history, they succeeded in magnifying previous history. The 1985 Bears, who needed no embellishment, got exactly that as the facts now scoff at any attempt to compare.
Twice, Rivera tried to hire 1985 Bear Leslie Frazier as his secondary coach. Frazier, once defensive coordinator of the Cincinnati Bengals, caught on with Dungy's Colts, helped beat the Bears and is now defensive coordinator of the Minnesota Vikings.
Smith was nowhere close to the NFL in 1985. When he pays homage to those Bears teams of the 1980s, it's more by request than refrain, more duty than desire. There soon will be a note of resentment, if it's not that way already.
Smith and Ditka might agree on Ditka's observation that the past is for cowards. One thing you can't call Smith is timid.
The euphemism "different direction" can mean any number of things.
It could mean an honest difference in philosophy. It could mean a personality conflict. It could mean jealousy. It could mean the Bears thought Rivera's continuing search for a head-coaching job would distract him from 2007 duties.
It could mean a deliberate and calculated severing of 1985 ties. It could mean Smith studied the Super Bowl video and decided Rivera was to blame for the third-down failures.
It could mean the Bears didn't want to pay Rivera what he might have demanded on a new contract, in which case Smith may have had nothing to do with the decision. After all, the top defensive coordinators in the NFL get paid more than Smith got as the lowest-paid head coach in the league at $1.35 million.
Any way you slice it, Smith is on his own more than ever. His team. His defense.
No more comparisons to 1985. No more help from alumni, or interference, whichever way you choose to look at it.
___
(c) 2007, Chicago Tribune.
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MICROS Systems, Inc. , a leading provider of information technology solutions for the hospitality industry, and The CBORD Group, Inc., a leading supplier of privilege control solutions for healthcare facilities, corporations and colleges and universities throughout North America, are celebrating 20 years of delivering fully integrated transaction processing for campus, corporate and health care dining establishments.
Today, CBORD serves over 600 clients, and its privilege control and cashless systems are robust tools for managing individual and departmental privileges and accounts in any institutional environment. MICROS Systems is a global provider, with hospitality and retail implementations exceeding 150,000. But when the relationship between these two technology leaders began in 1984, business technology was very young. There was no public Internet, the stand-alone PC was just beginning to appear on individual desktops, and networking was a cable to your printer.
Today's MICROS point-of-sale solution, with its extensive functionality and intelligence, is vastly different from the company's first CBORD installation. Nevertheless, the objectives remain the same: to streamline and optimize operations to serve customers and clients better while protecting and growing revenue.
"Clear focus, continual innovation and consistent profitability have established us as an outstanding leader in the managed services markets of higher education, business and industry, and health care," explained CBORD Vice President, Bruce Lane. "By partnering with MICROS, we have enhanced CBORD's capability with turnkey sales, implementation, and support. And in MICROS, we found a world-class vendor having the interest and capacity to provide high standards of delivery excellence to our marketplace."
"We continue to meet each other's mission statements, believing that only by viewing the end user customer as partners can we serve all our stakeholders effectively," noted Alan Hayman, MICROS Executive Vice President. "We're thrilled that a company whose founder, John Alexander, was voted Entrepreneur of the Year by Deloitte & Touche in 2003, is ranked among the top MICROS value added resellers year after year."
About The CBORD Group, Inc.
CBORD was founded in 1975 to serve the needs of campus auxiliary services. With the introduction of its first campus card system in 1979, CBORD has grown to serve the largest installed base of campus card and cashless systems users across North America, with over 600 clients. CBORD's Odyssey PCS(TM) is its sixth generation campus card system and represents state-of-the-art network and internet-enabled privilege control services. CBORD's Odyssey platform also provides integrated housing management solutions for universities as well as interfaced operations with industry-standard CBORD food management software. The CBORD Group, Inc. is headquartered in Ithaca, New York. To learn more visit CBORD at http://www.cbord.com/ or email us at solutions@cbord.com.
About MICROS Systems, Inc.
MICROS Systems, Inc. provides enterprise applications for the hospitality and retail industries worldwide. Over 150,000 MICROS systems are currently installed in table and quick service restaurants, hotels, motels, casinos, leisure and entertainment, and retail operations in more than 130 countries, and on all seven continents. In addition, MICROS provides property management systems, central reservation and customer information solutions under the brand MICROS-Fidelio for more than 15,000 hotels worldwide, as well as point- of-sale and loss prevention products through it's subsidiary Datavantage for more than 50,000 specialty retail stores worldwide. MICROS stock is traded through NASDAQ under the symbol MCRS.
For more information on MICROS and its advanced information technology solutions for the hospitality industry, please contact Louise Casamento, Director of Marketing at (443) 285-8144 or (800) 638-0985. You can also visit the MICROS website at http://www.micros.com/ or send an email to info@micros.com.
The MICROS logo is a registered trademark of MICROS Systems, Inc. All other product and brand names are the property of their respective owners.
CONTACT: Louise Casamento, Director of Marketing of MICROS Systems, Inc., +1-443-285-8144
Web site: http://www.micros.com/ http://www.cbord.com/
