Category Archives: Companies

iWonder Pro – enterprise level surveillance and control software for iPhone, iPad and iPod

Schools and businesses that issue iPad, iPhone or other iOS devices to their students or staff now have a way to control where those devices can go on the internet, monitor where they have been, and lock them down to only appropriate sites.

Life Record Technologies, creators of the consumer based iWonder Pro application to control and monitor children on iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices, releases the first enterprise level surveillance and control software for schools, hospitals and businesses.

“With the release of iBooks 2 featuring text book support by Apple Inc. its inevitable that schools will now start issuing iPads to students and staff as regularly as they issue text books today.”, says Michael Pike, Chief Software Architect of Life Record Technologies. “We’ve also noticed a lot of healthcare facilities deploying iPads to their staff, and our software allows all of the devices to be managed, observed and secured with ease.”

iWonder Pro Enterprise allows schools and businesses with as little as one iOS device, with up to 10,000 devices to manage them all in one place, including profiles to let certain types of users go to certain types of sites while restricting the others while using any Wifi or cellular network. iWonder Pro Enterprise is the first and only enterprise level surveillance system designed specifically for iOS.

iWonder Pro Enterprise is available now in the Apple App Store starting at $99.99.

More information can be obtained from the iWonder Pro Enterprise website at http://www.iwonderpro.com.

Via EPR Network

Revel Systems was officially announced as the winner of the Business iPad App of the Year Award

On January 31, 2012 Revel Systems was officially announced as the winner of the Business iPad App of the Year Award. This weekend at Macworld | iWorld, it was clear early on that the Best Business iPad App awards came down to two remarkable companies: Square, led by Jack Dorsey, and Revel Systems, led by female entrepreneur Lisa Falzone. Both of the nominees were a hit with the crowd, and both were in the payment industry, which is the fastest-moving market for iPad apps. Even though voters were presented with an impressive field of nominees, the battle was clearly dominated by these two competitors.

While competition was fierce between Square and Revel, here’s a breakdown of the vote: First of all, users chose Revel Systems as the most useful business iPad app. Revel was also found to help with a wider array of business functions, with seven to Square’s four. Square was found to have over 100,000 users, while Revel Systems has fewer than 100,000. As far as which offers the simplest user interface, both companies were tied. Finally, users chose Revel Systems as the company with the best customer support.

In the end, Macworld users declared Revel Systems iPad POS the winner. Lisa Falzone, CEO and co-founder of Revel Systems, told iPad Biz Apps today that “Revel is honored to have won such an award, and thanks all of the voters at Macworld | iWorld for voting for them.” A wide range of powerful apps were represented, but Revel’s sophisticated level of functionality and wide range of applications led to its selection as the best iPad business app.

Even though Square has been nominated for a Crunchies award, and has over 100,000 customers, users found that it only supplies a payment app. On the other hand, Revel Systems offers a fully functional Point of Sale system to manage every task that store owners encounter on a daily basis. This can explain why Revel has landed deals with many heavy-hitters like Popeye’s Chicken in Georgia (popeyes.com), Illy Coffee in San Francisco (illy.com), U-sushi in San Francisco (u-sushi.com), Camille’s Sidewalk Café in Oklahoma (www.camillescafe.com), and other big franchises. On the other hand, Square’s clientele is largely restricted to businesses that only require a few simple operations, including farmers’ markets, taxi cabs, and street vendors.

Now that the competition is over, Ms. Falzone is back to leading Revel Systems to the top of the Point of Sale marketplace. She has raised $3.7 million in her “A” round of funding last year and is gearing up for her “B” round. The recent victory of Revel Systems has cemented Ms. Falzone’s place among today’s top women entrepreneurs, and she looks forward to the future of what Revel Systems will accomplish. Moving forward, the company hopes to facilitate growth through its open API, which allows all companies to integrate into Revel—creating new opportunities for local commerce to thrive into the future.

Via EPR Network

Business iPad App Of The Year Award

Business iPad Apps are in high demand fueling the future of American businesses. Now BiziPadapps.com has brought you a contest to see which Business iPad apps are the best for 2011. Vote today for your chance to be the winner for Business iPad App of the Year Award. Voting stops Jan 15th 2011. Winner will be announced Jan 31st 2012.

Much like the crunchies award but we are focused on just businesses that are leading the way into the future using the Apple iPad apps which can help businesses excel into the future. Apple iPad Apps like Drop Box, Docusign, Square and others are among the few that were nominated.

List of iPad Business Apps of the year Nominees that made it to the TOP TEN BUSINESS APPS OF THE YEAR:

In alpha order:

DocuSign
Drop Box
GoCal for Google Calendar
Highrise HQ
iTookOff Paid Leave Tracker
Revel Systems iPad POS
Mint for iPad
Instapaper
SpeakEasy Voice Recorder
Square Payment

With over 500,000 thousand votes so far find out who the winners are for this years contest of Business iPad App of the Year Award. Criteria for this year: which iPad app contributes to businesses and helps them excel.

Via EPR Network


Muozi.com – Africa’s Hottest Social Networking Site Is Seen As The Second Coming Of Facebook!

African and Global web users have already spoken: social networking site fanatics find Muozi as the most convenient and user-friendly site and the toughest competitor of Facebook in Africa.

www.Muozi.com is a social networking site that allows people from different parts of Africa to connect with their family, friends, as well as old lost friends anytime and anywhere at their own convenience. This social networking site is a true hit among grownups and teenagers.

The target audiences of this newly launched site are not only the Africans but the global web users as well.Owner and Founder, Patrick Ndukwe a Master’s degree holder in Information System and a graduate of BA in Philosophy and BA in Economics once said in an interview, “I am positive that Africans has to have a social network engine that will do to Africans the same thing that Facebook, MySpace and others like it are doing to the developed world. Muozi.com was born out of the need to equalize the techno-gap; the need to give Africa what other developed world has.” “Muozi has about 15 partners with all having degrees in Law, Marketing, journalism, film & Video, Music and PR.

These partners are both here in the US and in Africa. Muozi have music artist and film producers on board as partners.”, Ndukwe told the interviewer.Ndukwe also specified how Muozi has partnered with some Universities in Africa and have a lot of professors on board as partners. “We, at Muozi take pride in what we are hoping to achieve, which is creating a bridge to Africa from developed world; we will take the best of what is in the develop world and bring it to Africans as relates to Social Networking and technology in general.”

Muozi users are also permitted to add or incorporate a “Documents tab” for every group if they want. Users are authorized to upload and display documents in group.

Furthermore, all users are also allowed to download documents, print, share, rate documents, add tags, categorize and leave a comment without a glitch. Other than that, the group designers or creators are free to set or place a document uploading option or document viewing permissions for different respective groups.

“Muozi is just starting; we intend to equalize the cost of calling Africa or calls from Africa as close to FREE as it can be in the near future”, Ndukwe expressed with great excitement.

Muozi also offers flash video chat, instant messaging service, and more! There are also separate tabs or sections for blogging, classified ads, forums, games, as well as videos. Users can share anything with their families and friends wherever they are.

Furthermore, in an interview conducted by the research team of Muozi.com, Nuji a new Muozi user said, “I am very impressed with the layout and the features offered by this social networking site, it is far better compared to other social networks that I came across with. I am personally recommending this site to my fellow social networking fanatics. Keep up the good work Muozi!”It’s undeniable that Muozi is truly the new face of social networking in Africa. This site allows people to create free account and log in to the website using their existing account on facebook, twitter, google and other selected social networking sites. These are the primary reasons why Mouzi is considered as the toughest competitor of Facebook today. Muozi is a private company connecting Africans to the world at large.

Via EPR Network

Intelligent Intranet Software Supplier and an On-Line Mind Mapping Software Provider Announce a Strategic Technology Partnership

Interact, a leading supplier in intelligent intranet software and MindMeister, providers of on-line mind mapping software, are pleased to announce a strategic technology partnership. The agreement allows the two companies to combine their industry leading software solutions.

MindMeister is the market leading and multiple award-winning web-based collaboration solution that uses proven mind mapping concepts to facilitate multi-user planning, brainstorming, and project management sessions all from within a standard web browser.

Interact Intranet is an easy to use, collaborative turnkey solution trusted by over 250,000 users. It is an intelligent intranet solution that learns as people use it, adapts and automatically connects relevant information to people. Powerful enterprise networking tools actively promote internal communication, collaboration, idea sharing and cross-organisation participation. It is modular in its architecture allowing organisations to add the components, resources, and services that are required as the business evolves and grows.

As a result of the new integration, Interact Intranet users will be able to access the MindMeister mind maps via the intranet to brainstorm or plan new projects. They will be able to simultaneously work with colleagues on the same map and see changes as they happen within the intuitive and familiar intranet interface.

Commenting on the partnership Scott Hitchins, Global Partner Manager at Interact said: “At Interact we are continually looking to establish new strategic alliances to build-upon and reinforce our intranet platform and we are very excited about the partnership with MindMeister.”

“We constantly seek to innovate and develop Interact Intranet to add value for our users. Creativity and collaboration are the basis of every successful business and the MindMeister mind mapping and visual thinking application is a natural extension to our existing collaborative capabilities. Like Interact Intranet, MindMeister has an intuitive user interface so the integration offers the best solution for functionality and ease of use.”

Interact Intranet is an ideal platform for forming strategic relationships. With over 250,000 users worldwide and an ever-expanding list of high-profile customers, opportunities are consistently being produced to cross-promote new solutions for the end-user via the Interact Intranet Partner Program.

Via EPR Network

Bitrix’s all new Intranet Portal 8.0 – Collaborate, Communicate and Socialize

Bitrix Inc., an enterprise 2.0 software company that develops portal solutions for businesses, announced the all new Bitrix Intranet Portal 8.0 – designed to revolutionize online collaboration.

“The new version of the product embodies the principles of Enterprise 2.0. We call them “Three Cs” – Collaboration, Communication and Corporate Culture. The perfect integration with MS Office Outlook, built-in instant messaging server, collaboration tools and personal dashboard – they all allow companies to improve business efficiency and enhance decision making.” said Sergey Rizhikov, CEO of Bitrix, Inc.

The Bitrix Intranet Portal 8.0 is a real breakthrough in Enterprise 2.0 solutions. For the first time in IT history, the unique instant messaging server, XMPP/JABBER, has been built right into an Intranet Portal. All you need is to install one of widespread clients for JABBER – Miranda IM, Trillian Pro, Adium or any other, depending on your operating system (Windows, MAC, or UNIX). Connecting through your mobile device also just got easier. Any handset will get along and all you need to do it to synchronize your handset with the portal. Once you are logged in you can see who all are online, chat with colleagues, share files with them and even set your mood status.

Two-way integration with MS Office Outlook – Bitrix Intranet Portal has complete, two-way synchronization with Microsoft Outlook contacts, calendar (appointments) and tasks. Now you don’t need to flip between screens to keep track of your meetings. You can add events to the Outlook calendar and your personal portal calendar will be automatically u p d a t e d.

Booking a meeting room – Bitrix Intranet Portal 8.0 allows you to see which rooms are available and when, streamline and manage scheduling processes in real-time, request equipment or setup services at the time of booking. It’s a dream come true for anyone who schedules meetings — and anyone who has to attend them.

Personal dashboard – Bitrix Intranet Portal 8.0 allows you to customize the layout of the main and personal user page according to your personal preferences. You can modify the look and feel of the portal page by including different columns such as events, working groups, company news and RSS-feed information about weather, traffic, etc. A few clicks and your personal portal is ready!

Proactive Protection – build in Proactive Protection Module is a robust combination of proactive filter (Web Application Firewall), disposable passwords, fast and effective anti-malware, protection of authorized sessions, activity control, intrusion log, Control Panel page access blocking by IP, Stop List and integrity control tools to defend against the majority of Internet risks.

Check out the Bitrix Intranet Portal 8.0 today with a 30 day trial offer: http://www.bitrixsoft.com/products/intranet/demo.php#tab-trial-link 

You can even test a live system – just visit our virtual lab: http://www.bitrixsoft.com/products/intranet/demo.php 

Bitrix Intranet Portal 8.0: http://www.bitrixsoft.com/products/intranet/index.php#tab-ver8-link 

Proactive Protection Module: http://www.bitrixsoft.com/products/cms/features/proactive.php

 

About Bitrix

Bitrix, Inc. specializes in the development of content management systems and portal solutions formanaging web projects and multifunctional information systems on the Internet. Bitrix specialists, by their considerable efforts and skill, developed the Bitrix Site Manager software—a standalone application that provides complex web solutions. This software tech-corp was established in 1998 by a group of IT specialists. Bitrix continues to hold a leading position in the web development market, always offering high-standard solutions to its clients and partners.

Via EPR Network

Start-Up Weebiz.Com Launches With The Promise To Give Away 1.000.000€ To Its Most Influential Company

Weemagine, a Portuguese Web 2.0 startup, is launching Weebiz.com (its first product). Weebiz is just like a business expo, but with the utilities of a social network, where companies from all around the globe can leverage their business contacts to find opportunities and achieve success.

To promote and incentivize further networking, Weebiz is going to offer a prize of ONE MILLION Euros to its most influential company.

Registering a company and using Weebiz is free, although there are First-Class accounts that give company profiles an Authenticated badge as well as other advantages like permanent business headlines, unlimited products, etc.

All First-Class accounts will be eligible to win the 1.000.000€ challenge and the winner will be the company that uses Weebiz to its full potential (which will be determined by a score, calculated according with a formula available at Weebiz.com).

João Santos, General Manager of Weemagine, believes that “In a moment of economic uncertainty and fragility, more and more companies are finding that the internet is a platform bursting with opportunities. Web 2.0 applications and social software have proven to be highly efficient and cost-effective tools whose usefulness is nowadays unquestionable. So, in a moment when businesses must find new markets and clients, partners and alliances, new ways to promote themselves and their brands, Weebiz aims at providing them with exactly the kind of new approach to business that they need to succeed in the rough economic environment of today.”

About Weemagine:

A technology startup based in Leiria, Portugal. Weemagine is an ambitious project of a small team of enthusiastic, senior year students and recently graduates from the University of Coimbra.

Via EPR Network

2008’s Most Popular Web 2.0 Sites

Today we are living in web 2.0 times more than ever before. PR, press coverage, buzz, evangelism, lobbying, who knows who, who blogs who, who talks about who, mainstream media and beyond – all of those words found in the dictionary of almost every new web site that coins itself as web 2.0, but as the global economy crisis is raising upon us promising to leave us working in a very depressed business environment with little to no liquidation events at all for the next years the real question is: who the real winners in today’s web 2.0 space are based on real people using their web properties since 2005 the web 2.0 term was coined for first time. Since then we have witnessed hundreds of millions of US dollars poured into different web 2.0 sites, applications and technologies and perhaps now is the time to find out which of those web sites have worked things out. We took the time necessary to discover today’s most popular web 2.0 sites based on real traffic and site usage and Not on buzz or size of funding. Sites are ranked based on the estimated traffic figures. After spending years in assessing web 2.0 sites applying tens of different from economical and technological to media criteria in an effort to evaluate them we came up to the conclusion that there is only one criterion worth our attention and it is the real people that use a given site, the traffic, the site usage, etc., based on which the web site can successfully be monetized. Of course, there are a few exceptions from the general rule like sites with extremely valuable technologies and no traffic at all, but as we said, they are exceptions. Ad networks, web networks, hosted networks and group of sites that use consolidated traffic numbers as their own or such ones that rely on the traffic of other sites to boost their own figures (ex.: various ad networks, Quantcast, WordPress etc.) are not taken into consideration and the sites from within those respective networks and groups have been ranked separately. International traffic is of course taken into consideration. Add ons, social network apps and widgets usage is not taken into consideration. Sub-domains as well as international TLDs part of the principal business of the main domain/web site are included. Media sites including such covering the web 2.0 space have also been included. Old buys from the dot com era are not considered and ranked accordingly.

Disclaimer: some data based on which the sites below are ranked may not be complete or correct due to lack of public data available for the traffic of respective sites. Please also note that the data taken into consideration for the ranking may have meanwhile changed and might possibly be no longer the same at the time you are reading the list. Data has been gathered during the months of July, August, September and December 2008.

Today’s most popular Web 2.0 sites based on the traffic they get as measured during the months of July, August and September 2008.

Priority is given to direct traffic measurement methods wherever applicable. Panel data as well as toolbar traffic figures are not taken into cosndieration. Traffic details as taken from Quantcast, Google Analytics*, Nielsen Site Audit, Nielsen NetRatings, comScore Media Metrix, internal server log files*, Compete and Alexa. Press release, public relation and buzz traffic and usage figures as they have appeared in the mainstream and specialized media are given with lower priority unless supported by direct traffic measurement methods.

*wherever applicable

Web Property / Unique visitors per month

  1. WordPress.com ~ 100M
  2. YouTube.com ~ 73M
  3. MySpace.com ~ 72M
  4. Wikipedia.org ~ 69M
  5. Hi5.com ~ 54M
  6. Facebook.com ~ 43M
  7. BlogSpot.com ~ 43M
  8. PhotoBucket.com ~ 34M
  9. MetaCafe.com ~ 30M
  10. Blogger.com ~ 27M
  11. Flickr.com ~ 23M
  12. Scribd.com ~ 23M
  13. Digg.com ~ 21M
  14. Typepad.com ~ 17M
  15. Imeem.com ~ 17M
  16. Snap.com ~ 15.7M
  17. Fotolog.com ~ 15.6M
  18. RockYou.com ~ 15M
  19. Veoh.com ~ 12M
  20. Wikihow.com ~ 12M
  21. Topix.com ~ 11.5M
  22. Blinkx.com ~ 11M
  23. HuffingtonPost.com ~ 11M
  24. Technorati.com ~ 10.6M
  25. Wikia.com ~ 10.8M
  26. Zimbio.com ~ 10.3M
  27. SpyFu.com ~ 10.1M
  28. Heavy.com ~ 9.3M
  29. Yelp.com ~ 8.9M
  30. Slide.com ~ 8.5M
  31. SimplyHired.com ~ 8.5M
  32. Squidoo.com ~ 8.1M
  33. LinkedIn.com ~ 7.5M
  34. HubPages.com ~ 7.2M
  35. Hulu.com ~ 7.1M
  36. AssociatedContent.com ~ 7M
  37. Indeed.com ~ 5.4M
  38. LiveJournal.com ~ 5.2M
  39. Bebo.com ~ 5.1M
  40. Habbo.com ~ 4.9M
  41. Fixya.com ~ 4.5M
  42. RapidShare.com ~ 4.5M
  43. AnswerBag.com ~ 4.4M
  44. Metafilter.com ~ 4.3M
  45. Crackle (Grouper) ~ 4M
  46. Ning.com ~ 3.8M
  47. Breitbart.com ~ 3.8M
  48. BookingBuddy.com ~ 3.7M
  49. Kayak.com ~ 3.6M
  50. Blurtit.com ~ 3.2M
  51. Kaboodle.com ~ 3M
  52. Meebo.com ~ 2.9M
  53. Friendster.com ~ 2.7M
  54. WowWiki.com ~ 2.8M
  55. Truveo.com ~ 2.7M
  56. Trulia.com ~ 2.7M
  57. Twitter.com ~ 2.5M
  58. BoingBoing.net ~ 2.4M
  59. Techcrunch.com ~ 2.2M
  60. Zillow.com ~ 2.2M
  61. MyNewPlace.com ~ 2.2M
  62. Mahalo.com ~ 2.1M
  63. Vox.com ~ 2M
  64. Last.fm ~ 2M
  65. Glam.com ~ 1.9M
  66. Multiply.com ~ 1.9M
  67. Popsugar.com ~ 1.6M
  68. Addthis.com ~ 1.5M
  69. Pandora.com ~ 1.4M
  70. Brightcove.com ~ 1.4M
  71. LinkedWords.com ~ 1.3M
  72. Devshed.com ~ 1.3M
  73. AppleInsider.com ~ 1.3M
  74. Newsvine.com ~ 1.3M
  75. Fark.com ~ 1.2M
  76. BleacherReport.com ~ 1.2M
  77. Mashable.com ~ 1.2M
  78. Zwinky.com ~ 1.2M
  79. Quantcast.com ~ 1.2M
  80. StumbleUpon.com ~ 1.1M
  81. SecondLife.com ~ 1.1M
  82. Magnify.net ~ 1.1M
  83. Uncyclopedia.org ~ 1M
  84. Weblo.com ~ 1M
  85. Del.icio.us ~ 1M
  86. Reddit.com < 1M
  87. Pbwiki.com < 1M
  88. AggregateKnowledge.com < 1M
  89. Eventful.com < 1M
  90. Dizzler.com < 1M
  91. Synthasite.com < 1M
  92. Vimeo.com < 1M
  93. Zibb.com <1M

Web 2.0 sites having less than 1M unique visitors per month even though popular in one way or another are not subject of this list and are not taken into consideration. We know for at least 100 other considered really good web 2.0 sites, apps and technologies of today, but since they are getting less than 1M uniuqes per month they were not able to make our list. However, sites being almost there (850K-950K/mo) and believed to be in position to reach the 1M monthly mark in the next months are also included at the bottom of the list. Those sites are marked with “<“, which means close to 1M, but not yet there. No hard feelings :).

If we’ve omitted one site or another that you know is getting at least 1M uniques per month and you are not seeing it above, drop us a note at info[at]web2innovations.com and we’ll have it included. Please note that the site proposed should be having steady traffic for at least 3 months prior submission to the list above. Sites like, for example: Powerset and Cuil, may not qualify for inclusion due to their temporary traffic leaps caused by buzz they have gotten, a criterion we try to offset. For other corrections and omissions please write at same email address. Requests for corrections of the traffic figures the sites are ranked on can only be justified by providing us with the accurate traffic numbers from reliable direct measurement sources (Quantified at Quantcast, Google Analytics, Nielsen Site Audit, Nielsen NetRatings, comScore Media Metrix, internal server log files, other third party traffic measurement services that use the direct method. No panel data, no Alexa, no Compete etc. will be taken into consideration).

* Note that ranks given to sites at w2i reflect only our own vision for and understanding of the site usage, traffic and unique visitors of the sites being ranked and does not necessarily involve other industry experts’, professionals’, journalists’ and bloggers’ opinions. You acknowledge that any ranking available on web2innovations.com (The Site) is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation that you, or anyone you advise, should buy, acquire or invest in any of the companies being analyzed and ranked on the Site, or undertake any investment strategy, based on rankings seen on the Site. Moreover, if a company is described or mentioned in our Site, you acknowledge that such description or mention does not constitute a recommendation by web2innovations.com that you engage or otherwise use such web site.

The full list

LOTO’s bilingual engine goes to work for China’s media

LOTO Online, a Beijing-based Internet technology company, is expanding to provide bilingual web platform services to China’s major media outlets, such as People’s Daily Online and CCTV.com. LOTO‘s proprietary and unique patented technologies help its clients achieve 3 main goals: (1) increase the amount of original content the clients are able to provide; (2) allow the clients to be the first to publish in English, content that was previously available only in Chinese; and (3) enlarge their circulation amongst foreign readers at home and abroad. Utilizing LOTO’s platform, China’s media can now be originator of its news in English and be the first to publish in English, breaking news which was previously reported only in Chinese. This boost in foreign circulation allows readers all over the world to now get first-hand news, printed in English, from the original Chinese sources.

Recently, People’s Daily Online was swift to report first-hand on the incident related to Microsoft Windows Genuine Advantage, also referred to as the “Black Screen.” People’s Daily Online published a series of English articles that were cited by over 30 English media providers and English content websites. The New York Times Online published an article referencing the original piece published by People’s Daily Online, providing links to the article and also a Chinese blog covering the incident. The People’s Daily articles were also cited by Australian news blog, Bigblog, the Malaysian online media, Daylife.com, the US news website, Congoo.com and the US online news community, Topix.com.

“Now, with this rapid dissemination of news, the viewpoints of China’s netizens and authorities are able to be reflected in foreign Internet circulations almost immediately,” Johnson Jiang, LOTO founder and CEO, said.

LOTO increases translated content and information available to English readers all over the world. This results in greater access to original sources of information that come from different perspectives. A whole new path has emerged for Chinese ideas, opinions, and news to reach the rest of the world. Following the 2008 Beijing Olympic and Paralympic Games and the upcoming Shanghai World Expo and Guangzhou Asian Games (both in 2010), LOTO’s bilingual engine stands to be a powerful online resource for netizens all over the world. It will offer a new perspective on China’s news, culture, traditions and history.

LOTO’s emergence onto the news scene has revolutionized global searching. Previously, news searches using popular engines such as Google and Yahoo would often return only a few search results originating from China’s media. The bulk of results are usually translated articles published by foreign media. LOTO bypasses this step.

“The issue was that much of the searching was, and still is, done using English keywords, while news reported by China’s media, for the most part, was in Chinese. This created a huge gap between information sought after and information actually accessed. But now, with LOTO’s platform, emerges a solution to the problem of worldwide access to information,” Jiang said.

LOTO’s unique technology has removed language barriers between people across the globe. The first and only one of its kind, LOTO’s bilingual engine is based on a human-machine interactive translation system, dynamic translation memory technology and vast, continuously growing databases of keywords, including one dedicated to Chinese news. For the first time ever, netizens are given the ability to search for news outside their native country using only English keywords to return dozens of relevant news reports that have been published by original media outlets such as People’s Daily Online and CCTV.com.

Via EPR Network

More Internet press releases

REGIS Corporation Deployed The First Firewall-Protected Payment Terminal In The World From Talentbeat Inc.

REGIS Corporation, the beauty industry’s global leader in beauty salons, hair restoration centers and cosmetology education over 13,500 locations worldwide, deployed the first firewall-protected payment terminal in the world. The solution utilizes the PCI-certified payment platform whizPay™ from TalentBeat Inc., which accepts REGIS payments for gift cards, credit cards (Visa, MasterCard, AMEX, Discover, Diner, JCB), and debit cards.

By implementing this solution, Regis Corporation expects to enforce high-level security measures to protect the security of their credit/debit card customers while utilizing the robust, fast and accurate platform for its high volume, complex processing needs.

The solution is integrated into the whizPay™ ASP platform developed by TalentBeat which is fully PCI certified and provides a global multicurrency payment gateway, making store-level integration standard across all geographies.

About Regis Corporation
Regis Corporation, headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is the beauty industry’s global leader in beauty salons, hair restoration centers and cosmetology education. As of June 30, 2008, the Company owned, franchised or held ownership interests in over 13,500 worldwide locations. To learn about REGIS, please visit www.regiscorp.com.

About TalentBeat
Headquartered in Boston, TalentBeat, Inc. is a global IT consulting and technology service company specializing in industry-specific solutions, strategic outsourcing and integration services for last nine years. TalentBeat is a premier provider of electronic payment solutions combined with CRM, loyalty and gift solutions in both traditional and alternative payments channels.

whizPay™ is a modular multipurpose, PCI-certified platform enabling merchants to provide a personalized, rich experience for their customers with integrated CRM and Rewards solutions on both gift and credit cards. The platform is designed as SAAS (Software as a Service) enabling merchants to pick and choose specific features to suit their corporate strategy. This “Pay as you Grow” platform enables merchants to reduce operational costs and avoid huge upfront investments in payment solutions. The whizPay platform is integrated into a majority of POS devices, shopping carts and processors worldwide, making the deployment and integration extremely efficient. The platform also provides multicurrency, mobile payments, IVR Self Service Solutions, Virtual terminal and WebServices for third party integration as part of the platform providing several avenues to accept payments.

Via EPR Network

More Retail press releases

 

Microsoft’s stock has fallen 13% since its offer for Yahoo

We have read tons of stories and points of views about the potential deal between Microsoft and Yahoo over the past weeks. We guess all people did. Everything seems already being said about the deal. Yet, something interesting popped up in the news today. It turns out that Microsoft is the big loser from the situation with Yahoo’s acquisition because it has lost 13% of its market capitalization since it has announced its bid to buy Yahoo almost a month ago.

After Microsoft’s stock has fallen 13% since its offer for Yahoo, the Microsoft’s offer price seems to have also been reduced to $29 – $41.7B as of today. Yahoo shares, by contrast, closed at $29.66 on the NASDAQ on Friday, indicating that investors’ expectations are for Microsoft to raise its bid.

While the software giant’s founder and chairman has taken a back seat to CEO Steve Ballmer in the Yahoo bid, Gates wasted no time in tempering expectations if Microsoft failed in its effort to buy Yahoo.

Chairman Bill Gates said yesterday that they are not planning to raise the bid for Yahoo and called the current offer “very fair.” Instead Bill Gates said they are having plans to invest heavily — and they said they can afford it — in anything but web search to compete against Google, with or without Yahoo. Just like what we have always been thinking — it is all about Microsoft vs. Google and Yahoo was only an instrument — Gates’s statement reconfirms it: “Google is the only company with “critical mass” in Web search.”

Yet, he admits that they’d get there faster if the great engineering work that Yahoo has done and the great engineers there were part of the common effort

“There is nothing new in terms of the process. We’ve sent our letter and we’ve reinforced that we consider that it’s a very fair offer,” said Gates, who remains the public face of Microsoft, even though he plans to switch to a part-time role at the company in June to focus on his philanthropic work.

What will happen with the stock prices of both companies if a deal does not go thru? We think both companies will get punished by the public market and have their stock prices reduced. Yahoo’s hit is expected to be stronger. 

More

http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=MSFT
http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=yhoo
http://uk.reuters.com/article/technology-media-telco-SP/idUKN1819990520080219
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-6231021.html
http://mashable.com/2008/02/18/bill-gates-were-not-raising-the-yahoo-bid/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/01/yes-we-were-right-yahoo-was-seriously-undervalued-microsoft-offers-446b-for-the-company-a-62-premium-over-their-value-from-yesterday/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/02/is-google-going-to-be-the-winner-from-the-microsoft-yahoo-deal/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/04/google%e2%80%99s-chief-legal-officer-vs-microsoft%e2%80%99s-general-counsel/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/08/one-after-another-the-potential-competitive-bidders-for-yahoo-drop-off-is-yahoo-going-to-surrender-to-microsoft/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/09/end-of-speculations-yahoo-rejected-microsoft%e2%80%99s-offer/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/11/yahoo%e2%80%99s-official-response-to-microsoft%e2%80%99s-offer-no/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/12/and-here-is-what-microsoft-has-to-tell-yahoo/
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/080211/aqm241.html
http://finance.yahoo.com/q?d=t&s=msft
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/09/magazines/fortune/yahoo_rejects_bid_report.fortune/?postversion=2008020914
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/fffc1006-d5e8-11dc-bbb2-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1
http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2008/02/05/yahoo-the-five-scenario-analysis/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/08/yahoo-board-to-determine-fate-of-company-today/
http://www.techmeme.com/080201/p78#a080201p78
http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_8149194
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2008/tc2008021_885192.htm?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/02/AR2008020200568.html
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/02/02/MN8OUQGNB.DTL&type=tech
http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080201/microsoft-to-yahoo-two-days-to-respond-or-else/
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/02/hold-everything-we-may-get-another-yhoo-bidder.html
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/01/what-would-a-combined-microsoft-yahoo-look-like/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/01/ballmers-internal-e-mail-to-the-troops-explaining-the-yahoo-acquisition/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/02/news-corp-scrambles-to-bid-for-yahoo/
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/02/microsoft-yahoo-combined-financials.html
http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=206107168
http://mashable.com/2008/02/10/yahoo-aol-merger/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/10/wait-yahoo-and-aol-i-was-looking-forward-to-something-moreintelligent/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/09/microsofts-80-billion-and-growing-yahoo-headache/
https://web2innovations.com/money/2008/02/09/end-of-speculations-yahoo-rejected-microsoft%e2%80%99s-offer