| 20 Billion in 30 Days
They are plugged in, wireless, blogging, podcasting and texting. That's today's holidays. The Postal Service has products and choices to help meet these growing and changing needs. "In the time it takes you to download a tune or a video for your iPod, you can create your own postage and design unique greeting cards online. You can order free, environmentally friendly packaging or find the nearest Post Office with late hours while you're watching the late, late show," said Delores Killette, vice president and consumer advocate. "That's today's mail." With 37,000 Post Offices around the country and a virtual Post Office only a click away, the Postal Service, like Santa, is everywhere during the holidays.
Never Let Them Go
Those intensive retention efforts reflect a challenge that many companies are just beginning to grasp: The world's best strategies for bringing new talent in the front door won't do you much good if you've got a steady stream of experienced employees walking out the back. For that reason, Berbee and other Microsoft partners rely on a variety of strategies to keep their employees happy -- and on the payroll. A Changing Employment Marketplace
Two decades ago, employee turnover was seen more as a nuisance than a strategic disaster. There were plenty of other eager young candidates hitting the job market to fill an empty spot. That all changed with the IT boom of the mid-1990s, when suddenly there were more available jobs than candidates. Now, with the job market recovering from the economic downturn of earlier in this decade, it's becoming clear to many that a company's survival depends on its ability to keep its workers.
Cyber bank robbers threaten ecommerce
Cyber criminals are surfing into online banks with you to steal your money. Password-stealing Trojan horses used to be all the rage. The software would nestle itself on a PC after opening a bad email attachment or visiting a malicious website. But in response to the increased adoption of stronger authentication, cyber criminals are changing their tactics, according to Alex Shipp, a senior antivirus technologist at MessageLabs. During a panel discussion at the RSA Conference 2006 on Thursday, Shipp said: "We have recently seen a move away from stealing username and passwords." The new "bank-stealing Trojans" wait until the victim has actually logged in to their bank. "It then just transfers the money out." Shipp said: "All of the authentication, little keys you have to have in your hand, biometrical things, it doesn't matter.
AmeriCommerce Shopping Cart Software Announces PayPal Certification
AmeriCommerce announces certified integration between the AmeriCommerce Shopping Cart Software and the new PayPal Express Checkout service. This new service adds to the existing PayPal payment methods AmeriCommerce integrates with including Website Payments Pro, Website Payments Standard, and the Payflow Pro gateway.
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Bear Stearns' Wild-Card Shareholder
The latest hit: a nearly 7% plunge following the expected news on Jan. 8 that James Cayne would step down as chief executive of the beleaguered investment bank. In all, Lewis, the single largest shareholder in Bear, has watched the value of his 10% stake erode from $1.2 billion to $840 million. The 70-year-old Lewis has endured such losses before in his far-reaching and eclectic portfolio. The Tavistock Group, which he founded in 1978, has stakes in 170 companies that span the real estate, financial-services, manufacturing, entertainment, and restaurant industries. He uses at least five fast-moving investment funds—Aquarian Investments, Nivon, Mandarin, Darcin, and Cambria—to trade currencies and make more opportunistic moves like his Bear bet. And one of Lewis' hallmark strategies is to troll for cheap plays, then patiently wait years for the payoff.
Dell spends $340m on summer of SAM
Dell said it is spending around $340m to buy Asap Software, a software asset-management (SAM) company, as part of an effort to simplify how customers can communicate with it. Asap is one of the leading SAM companies, with offices in France and the US. SAM is becoming increasingly important as legislation such as Sarbanes-Oxley and pressure from organisations such as Microsoft and the Business Software Alliance puts increasing pressure on companies to maintain compliance. The acquisition will "strengthen Dell's existing software business by integrating Asap's complementary expertise in managing software licensing, purchasing, renewals, and compliance", Dell said. It said it anticipates closing the deal in the third quarter of this financial year. According to David Marmonti, president of Dell EMEA, the acquisition will mean Dell customers "will have one of the world's leading software-solutions providers as a single point of expertise and accountability for software licensing, compliance, renewal and asset management".
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