Apple Inc, which just became China’s number one smartphone vendor, expects to open stores in another five cities based on advertisements that it placed for retail staff.
It is hiring staff for its stores in Guangzhou, Shenyang, Tianjin, Nanjing and Dalian, where they currently don’t have outlets, Bloomberg News reported on Friday, citing advertisements posted on Apple’s website.
Apple has 15 stores in the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong by 2014, and the firm plans to lift that to 25 soon.
Hong Kong Customs and police have raided four properties, seizing nearly 4000 fake items in an ongoing clampdown on counterfeit rings in the city.
The raids occurred in Mong Kok and Tsim Sha Tsui and resulted in the arrests of four men aged 23-47.
The seized goods have an estimated value of HK$3.37 million (US$434,000) were seized. During an operation, suspected counterfeit goods were found mixed among genuine products in a retail store in Mong Kok. They were sold at the discount price to the genuine products. After further investigation, Customs officers found some more suspected counterfeit goods in a warehouse in Tsuen Wan. A total of 438 suspected counterfeit goods were seized in this case, valued at about $1.17 million. The arrested 47-year-old man has been released on bail pending further investigation.
Three other clandestine storehouses keeping and selling suspected counterfeit goods were also smashed by Customs during the operations. The enforcement actions there resulted in the seizure of about 3500 items of various kinds of suspected counterfeit goods for sale, including watches, handbags, leather goods and sunglasses, with an estimated value of around $2.2 million. Three men, aged 23 to 28, were arrested.
The Customs Divisional Commander of Intellectual Property Transnational Investigation Division, Mak Wai-chung, said Customs and police will continue to conduct joint enforcement actions to more effectively combat the sale of counterfeit products. He reminded consumers to shop at retail stores with good reputations or at the official stores of the brands.
Under the Trade Descriptions Ordinance, any person who sells or possesses for sale any goods with any forged trademark, or applies a false trade description in the course of trade, commits an offence. Upon conviction, offenders are liable to a maximum fine of $500,000 and imprisonment for five years.
Isetan Mitsukoshi has adopted a new branding positioning – and promises a new in-store concept which will make its debut in Malaysia.
In a message to shareholders, CEO Hiroshi Ohnishi says the company has adopted a new corporate message for 2015 ‘This is Japan’, which will lead to a new in-store concept shortly to be launched in Kuala Lumpur’s Lot 10 shopping centre.
“Since generations past when Mitsukoshi and Isetan operated as kimono merchants, we have always had an eye for quality. From the sense of touch as silk meets the skin, the sound as the obi closes, through to the fragrance and taste of the experience – refining the five senses has always been an essential component of our trade.
“Under our Japan Senses initiative to date, we have also been able to source the very best of Japan’s culture and fine products and deliver this widely to our valued customers,” Ohnishi explains.
“From now on, we will build on this product range and place a focus on communication in all its forms including the grace and beauty of Japanese omotenashi to present This is Japan as part of our management strategy and further refine our corporate activities.”
A new ‘Japan mall’ will open inside the Isetan Kuala Lumpur Lot 10 store as part of the company’s overseas launch of This is Japan.
He explains of the concept: “In 2015, we intend to provide new value and continue to aim toward realising our group vision of being the world’s foremost retail services group.”
In other moves, in Japan it will remodel the interior and art floor (5F) and baby and childrenswear floor (6F) of its flagship Isetan Shinjuku Main store this spring.
“We will also open Isetan Salone select stores in Tokyo Midtown, Harajuku Alta in spring, and Japan Duty Free Ginza on the eighth floor of Ginza Mitsukoshi in autumn.”
Ohnishi says the company’s goal is to create new value to truly move its customers – “by no means an easy task”.
“Each and every one of our staff must transform themselves to stay ahead of the changing interests of our customers. Because of this, we position employee training and development as the most important action that we can take toward achieving our group vision, and we are reforming our human resource structures with a focus on how our stylists (salespeople), who work in closest contact with our customers, can provide satisfaction and move our customers through the sales experience.
“In 2015, we will focus even more closely on transforming our storefronts to satisfy our customers.”
Of 2014, Ohnishi said price levels rose due to the weaker yen as well as April’s sales tax increase.
“While we have seen signs of recovery in personal consumption in some areas, lacklustre economic conditions are continuing, mainly in the regions.
“Our business faced reactionary drop-off after the strong demand leading up to the increase in consumption tax; however, the Isetan Mitsukoshi Group has been warmly supported by our customers, and we have turned the corner toward recovery.
“Nevertheless, we still expect the economic environment to remain severe in the retail industry, and we must further accelerate our corporate reform in order to continue to grow.”
Social media and chat app Line is getting into the grocery retailing market with the launch of an online supermarket for Southeast Asia.
Line, with 181 million monthly active users at the last count, will launch the supermarket service first in Thailand on February 4, reports TechInAsia.com. It promises discounts on some everyday groceries that people need to stock up on often, such as bottled water, coffee, and instant noodles. There will be free delivery for Thai shoppers.
Thailand is one of the Japan-based app’s top markets, where is has 36 million active users at present.
The new service was announced by Line’s eCommerce partner, aCommerce, which handles all the supplies, warehousing, and shipping.
“Food and consumer goods-based ecommerce businesses have been around for quite a while now, especially in developed markets like the US and Korea,” said Sedong Nam from Line Plus Corp.
“However, only recently are we starting to see the shift towards mobile-first with on-demand businesses that extend to every part of our life. This campaign is our first step towards moving into developing our channel exclusively for the emerging online groceries category.”
Nam added that the messaging app faces a challenge in this new space and needs “to educate both consumers and retailers in the region on the benefits of mobile commerce.”
Line first experimented with eCommerce in the region in late 2013 with flash sales for make-up products.
Line’s online groceries store will expand to Southeast Asia at an unnamed date. This will likely be limited to certain cities, rather than covering entire countries.
The line between menswear and womenswear has become increasingly blurred: girls are stealing from the boys, men’s designers are showing cinched waists, and unisex lines are on the rise. So what better time than now to create a gender-neutral shopping experience?
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd’s financial arm is seeking regulatory approval to access the Chinese national police’s database so consumers can open online bank accounts with a mug shot.
The financial arm, which operates the PayPal-like Alipay service, is planning to use the Face++ facial recognition system developed by partner Megvii Inc. The idea is that this would allow consumers to set up accounts without having to physically go to a bank,
Megvii Chief Executive Officer Yin Qi said in a recent interview.
“In terms of technology, everything has been sorted,” said Yin, 27, who dropped out of Columbia University’s doctorate program in computer science to co-found Beijing-based Megvii, whose latest round of funding values the company at US$100 million. “We are just waiting for regulators to approve.” The plan helps illustrate how Alibaba is joining the likes of Facebook Inc, Google Inc. and Baidu Inc. in embracing biometric technologies and artificial intelligence. Megvii’s application uses facial scans held in a Ministry of Public Security database drawn from legal identification files on about 1.3 billion Chinese.
The grass isn’t always greener on the other side.
After years of fuelling the growth of luxury labels, there are signs that the global high-end consumer is starting to cool – placing a renewed emphasis on the importance of the United States and its affluent shoppers.
According to a recent report by KeyBanc analyst Edward Yruma, weakness in the global economy, a strong US dollar and ongoing geopolitical issues are contributing to a slowdown among consumers who live overseas.
Mattel recently announced the appointment of Christopher A. Sinclair as the company’s new chairman and interim Chief Executive Officer.
inclair, who has served as a member of Mattel’s Board of Directors since 1996 and as Independent Lead Director since 2011, has extensive experience in leading global, multi-brand, consumer-focused companies.
He was Chairman and CEO of Caribiner International Inc. from 1999-2000, President and CEO of Quality Food Inc. from 1996-1998, and prior to that served in senior roles at PepsiCo, including as Chairman and CEO of Pepsi-Cola Company, and President and CEO of PepsiCo Foods & Beverages International and Pepsi-Cola International.
“I look forward to engaging with the entire Mattel community as we work to deepen our connections with children and parents through expanded product innovation and improved retail execution. We will be working during the coming months to revitalize the business and to identify the right leadership for Mattel as it enters its next phase of growth and value creation,” Sinclair said in a statement.
MasterCard and BOC Services, the acquiring subsidiary of Bank of China, recently signed an agreement to making MasterPass available to Chinese merchants.
A MasterPass wallet allows mobile shoppers to quickly and easily check out on any device, by simply clicking the “Buy with MasterPass” button.
They can also securely store MasterCard and other branded credit, debit and prepaid card information, along with shipping addresses, so that they can be easily accessed when paying for purchases.
This service is currently accepted by over 70,000 merchants in sixteen countries including China, as well as Australia, Canada, Czech Republic, France, Italy, New Zealand, Poland, Romania, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, Taiwan, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom and the United States.
In China, merchants including Ctrip.com, Osell.com, and Ceair.com will be among the first business implementing the service.
Zhuang Dawei, General Manager, BOC Services Shanghai Branch, said the goal is optimize shoppers’ payment experience, and in the process, create more business opportunities for merchants.
“Every digital device now has the potential to become a commerce device and Chinese consumers’ demands and spending habits are changing, too. This is bringing new challenges to the foundation of business – payment. This new cooperation will enable more Chinese merchants to utilize the powerful technology of MasterPass, creating more cross-border business opportunities,” added Dennis Chang, General Manager, China, MasterCard.
The new casino is an imposing structure on Manila Bay with 6 gleaming golden towers surrounding a giant egg-shaped dome, and industry and government leaders hope it will attract cashed-up tourists from other parts of Asia
Manila aims to rival Macau and Las Vegas in terms of gaming revenues, and the “City of Dreams” is the latest in a string of casinos that have opened in recent years.
The new casino is an imposing structure on Manila Bay with 6 gleaming golden towers surrounding a giant egg-shaped dome, and industry and government leaders hope it will attract cashed-up tourists from other parts of Asia.
The casino is a joint venture between the country’s richest man Henry Sy, Australian billionaire James Packer and Lawrence Ho, son of Macau casinomogul Stanley Ho.
“The goal is to find the best (sites) in Asia … The Philippines is one of the fastest growing economies anywhere in the world. We’ve seen the market really pick up,” Ho told reporters.
Australian billionaire James Packer (right) and Melco crown co-chairman and with his co-chairman Lawrence Ho (center) during a press conference on the opening of the City of Dreams mega-casino in Manila on February 2, 2015. Photo by Ted Aljibe/AFP
Ho also acknowledged the huge cost of building the resort. The Philippine government requires a minimum $1 billion investment for new casinos built in the area.
Packer said jokingly that the resort was inspired by Hollywood movies “Casino” and “Oceans Eleven,” and Robert de Niro, Martin Scorsese, and Leonardo DiCaprio have appeared on giant billboards and TV commercials to promote the casino.
The 6.2-hectare complex is the second of 4 mega resorts to open on reclaimed portions of the bay, just a few hundred meters from the city’s slum communities.
The City of Dreams’ golden dome, called the “Fortune Egg,” houses two exclusive nightclubs, including Pangaea, where Picasso copies hang beside pictures of safari animals on walls covered in fake snakeskin.
TGI Fridays Inc. is equipping servers with 8-inch tablets so they can quickly and accurately process orders and payments while at the table.
The devices use Windows 8.1, running Oracle’s MICROS Restaurant Enterprise Solution (RES) 5.4 on Oracle’s MICROS mTablet E-Series mobile point of sale devices.
Servers can carry these tablets from table to table to take orders and respond promptly to guest requests. It improves table wait and helps regulate the pace of orders sent to the kitchen.
“TGI Fridays is rethinking how technology can lead to restaurant innovation,” said Tracy Issel, general manager of Worldwide Retail, Consumer Goods, Hospitality and Travel for Microsoft. “We are helping it change the way food orders are processed and wait staff and managers do their jobs, reinventing the customer experience, one restaurant at a time.
Many restaurant technology solutions rely on proprietary hardware or custom ruggedized devices, built to withstand the abuse of a kitchen environment. Such solutions can be expensive and take a long time to develop and deploy.
Oracle’s MICROS RES 5.4 allows TGI Fridays to manage the various aspects of running a restaurant, from tableside ordering to traffic and queue management, all from one solution and in a much more cost-effective way.
“Windows 8 gave us a platform that allowed us to develop a new user interface, which gives our servers even better tools to delight our guests and make their experience even more enjoyable,” said TGI Fridays Vice President and CIO Tripp Sessions.
The Chinese yuan (renminbi) overtook the Canadian and Australian dollar as a global payments currency in November 2014, and now takes position behind the Japanese Yen, British pound, Euro and US dollar, data from SWIFT shows.
Brussels, 28 January 2015 – After nearly one year firmly positioned at #7, the Renminbi (“RMB”) has entered the top five of world payment currencies since November 2014, overtaking both the Canadian Dollar and the Australian Dollar by value.
Just two years ago, in January 2013, the renminbi was ranked at position #13 with a share of 0.63 percent. In December 2014, it reached a record high share of 2.17 percent in global payments by value and now trails the Japanese Yen which has a share of 2.69 percent.
“The rise of various offshore renminbi clearing centres around the world, including eight new agreements signed with the People’s Bank of China in 2014, was an important driver fuelling this growth,” said Wim Raymaekers, Head of Banking Markets at SWIFT.
Overall, global renminbi payments increased in value by 20.3 percent in December 2014, while the growth for payments across all currencies was 14.9 percent. It has been showing a consistent three digit growth over the past two years with an increase in value of payments by +321 percent.
Over the last year, renminbi payments grew in value by 102 percent compared to an overall yearly growth for all currencies of 4.4 percent.
SWIFT is a member-owned cooperative that provides the communications platform, products and services to connect more than 10,800 banking organisations, securities institutions and corporate customers in over 200 countries and territories.
Already reeling from a handful of scandals, Japan’s fast-food industry faces a new problem: diners are no longer heading out for meals like they used to.
“Japanese consumers are choosing to buy their meals at convenience stores and eat at home,” said Japan Food Analyst Association (JFAA) chairman Hiroyuki Kamiya.
While the trend started a few years ago as convenience stores introduced new product lines, the consumption tax hike to 8 percent from 5 percent last April that pushed the economy into a technical recession and a string of employee exploitation scandals have accelerated the trend, he said.
McDonald’s said on Wednesday that Don Thompson will retire as President and CEO and as a member of the Board of Directors after nearly 25 years of service to the company, effective on 1 March. The Board has elected Steve Easterbrook to replace Thompson as President and CEO. Easterbrook was also elected to the Board of Directors, filling the vacancy created by Thompson.
Prior to this promotion, Easterbrook was Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Brand Officer, leading McDonald’s efforts to elevate its marketing, advance menu innovation, and create an infrastructure for its digital initiatives. An accomplished, McDonald’s veteran, Easterbrook previously served in key leadership roles across the company’s global business, including president of McDonald’s Europe.
In addition, Pete Bensen, Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, is promoted to the newly-created role of Chief Administrative Officer. In his new position reporting to Easterbrook, Bensen will oversee a number of functions supporting the company’s operations. Kevin Ozan, who currently serves as Senior Vice President and Corporate Controller, will succeed Bensen and is promoted to Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.
As CFO, Ozan will report to Bensen and will be responsible for managing the global financial organisation and leading the development and execution of the company’s fiscal strategies. Ozan brings broad financial experience and has held senior-level positions in the company’s Finance, Investor Relations and Accounting departments with assignments in both the US and European markets.
The McDonald’s Board of Directors on Wednesday elected Bensen and Ozan to their respective positions, which will also be effective on 1 March.
Courts Asia, the operator of retailer Courts Megastore, began with construction of its second outlet in Indonesia on Thursday, as the company races to tap into the country’s growing middle-income group.
The three-storey structure will boast 20,400 square metres of retail space in Bumi Serpong Damai, a satellite city located south of Jakarta, said Terence Donald O’Connor, Courts Asia’s executive director and group chief executive.
That would dwarf Court’s first store in Bekasi, which offers 12,000 square metres of soft retail space and is currently the biggest Courts Megastore in Southeast Asia.