One year on and Easyjet have announced the progress of AVOID (Airborne Volcanic Object Identifier and Detector) system and calls upon the aviation industry to work together to avoid further disruption in European airspace from future volcanic activity.

The budget carrier will be fitting the new equipment to 20 of it’s fleet and it is hoped it will radically change air travel, giving Easyjet the ability to navigate around future ash clouds without incurring risk.

The AVOID system is effectively a weather radar for ash. The system comprises of infrared technology fitted to aircraft to supply images to pilots and an airline’s flight control centre. These images will enable pilots to see an ash cloud up to 100 km ahead of the aircraft and at altitudes between 5,000ft and 50,000ft. This will allow pilots to make adjustments to the plane’s flight path to avoid any ash and therefore greatly reducing any future disruption to air travel.

The next phase of the project is to further test the equipment by flying close to volcanic ash. The testing is expected to take place over the next few months. In addition to the larger roll out of the AVOID system, Easyjet plans to have the AVOID equipment certified and ready to fit to one of its aircraft in the event should another volcano erupt in Europe. EasyJet believes that if 100 aircraft (20 of which would be EasyJet aircraft) across Europe were to be fitted with AVOID equipment, this would provide comprehensive coverage of the continent.

However, this year the luxury diamond brand De Beers have invested in Hollywood inspired technology with its groundbreaking 3D window displays in both London and New York.

Using cutting-edge technology, the enchanting world of De Beers comes to life in a specially created 3D film by Holition. The film is shown on customized Alioscopy screens which remove the need for 3D glasses to be worn, delighting and surprising the throngs of unsuspecting Christmas shoppers.

Unbelievably realistic and multi-dimensional, the innovative 3D technology will transport passers by into the mesmerizing world of De Beers, bringing the beauty, allure and power of its jewellery seemingly within reach in the heightened reality of three dimension moving imagery.

The Shogun was aimed squarely at company executives who had little interest in cars, but loved to have all the toys and gadgets that such a vehicle could offer.

The sad fact was that Mitsubishi could not make enough of these vehicles and other manufacturers began taking the Japanese offering very seriously, particularly when Mitsubishi shot itself in the foot by increasing the price for the later model.

Nowadays of course there is no better way to take little Johnny the half mile to school than in the safe confines of an enormous 4X4 and these lovely vehicles are often to be found parked half on the pavement half on the road blocking  school entrances around the country.

But hopefully the days of the gas guzzling utility vehicle will soon be over, if we were really as concerned about the planet as we make out to be there would be no market already.

It is another Japanese manufacturer who is making the headlines in 2010, at last we are being offered a vehicle, albeit not four wheel drive, but a vehicle none the less that can carry five adults and no matter how fast it is driven it will still record zero emissions.

The Nissan Leaf has been marketed as the world’s first mass produced, affordable, zero emission vehicle and interest in the car in Europe, has been strong, with 12,000 customers signing up for updates.

Government incentives make the Leaf an interesting proposition to anyone looking to renew their vehicle during the coming year, with first delivery in Europe expected in Portugal in January 2011.

Deliveries to the Republic of Ireland and the UK are scheduled for February and March 2011 respectively, with orders being taken in ROI staring from July 30th and in the UK from September 1st this year.

The US and Japanese markets have exceeded expectations with pre-orders of 23,000 vehicles since April, this high demand means that the car will now not be launched in the Netherlands until June 2011.

If you want to be one of the first in the UK to own this world first vehicle, there is only a few weeks to wait until orders from the UK will start being taken. Make sure to go compare car insurance before you make any commitment to order and don’t expect to be among the first cars delivered if you have not already registered with Nissan.

As outlined in Deloitte’s paper “2010 FIFA World Cup. A Turning Point for South Africa,” South Africa is reaping the rewards of hosting the Cup, including infrastructure improvements, an economic boost, and an increase of national pride.

“South Africa has been likened to a mix of the developed and developing world,” said Lwazi Bam, Public Sector Industry Leader, Deloitte Southern Africa. “On the one hand, a strong technological and economic base put it on a par with the well-developed nations of the world. On the other, infrastructure shortfalls have contributed to keeping it from realizing its full economic potential. This major global event is a catalyst for much-needed infrastructure improvements.”

The need to move tens of thousands of fans, teams, and accompanying supportpersonnel rapidly from one place to another prioritized the strengthening of South Africa’s transportation system.  The country completed much of the
first section of its new high speed Gautrain passenger railway and added bus lines.  Highways were upgraded and the city of Durban was able to finish the country’s first new green field airport in five decades.  These infrastructure projects have increased employment opportunities and provided workers long-term skills and training.

One of the challenges in building the infrastructure for the event was generating power without an unduly adverse environmental impact. New stadium facilities include such environmentally-friendly features as natural ventilation and rain water capture systems.

In addition, host cities have undertaken large-scale tree-planting projects in an effort to soak up excess carbon dioxide.  As a coal-dependent economy, South African faces challenges; however, these steps move the country toward greener energy sources.

To ensure security, the minister of police has consulted with officials from more than 30 different countries whose nationals are in the country, resulting in an unprecedented level of international cooperation.

Seeking to balance a welcoming atmosphere with rigorous security standards, 40,000 police officers, 25 percent of the country’s total force, have been assigned to the Cup.  All of these activities have required a renewed spirit of cooperation between national and local agencies and departments.

Greg Pellegrino, Global Public Sector Industry Leader, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, said;

“South Africa has already realized many of the benefits hoped for by any national host of a major international sporting event. The event has provided a boost to national infrastructure improvements, increased employment during the global financial crisis, and provided a unifying rallying point for a still-developing nation. Moving the FIFA World Cup from a developed economy such as Germany, to an emerging economy such as South Africa, and to a continent that has never hosted the Cup, creates an important precedent for future hosts such as Brazil in 2014,”

Warning that victims of cyber crime during the World Cup don’t have to to be in South Africa to be conned, Symantec say that criminals will be using the furore of the tournament to suck in victims globally.

Grant Brown of Symantec says;

“We saw a 60% increase in activities like phishing, web-based attacks and other cyber crime during the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the Fifa World Cup is a considerably larger event. There will be at least one billion soccer fans actively following the event, which presents an opportunity for cyber-criminals.”

Brown says that criminlas tend to use topically related e mails to lure some of their victims, noting the recent disasters in Haiti and Chile as a case in point.

“Scam and phishing messages in February accounted for 19% of all spam. Spammers continued to use the earthquake in Haiti, and the recent earthquake in Chile, as another vector to utilise. They also used other current high-profile events, such as recent auto recalls, to deliver spam messages.” said Brown.

Symantec has launched a special website for the World Cup, where it will keep internet users up to date with related attacks.

Meanwhile they remind internet users to avoid clicking on suspicious links in email or instant messages.

Never fill out forms in messages that ask for personal or financial information or passwords, a reputable charitable organisation is unlikely to ask for your personal details via email.

When in doubt, contact the organisation in question through an independent, trusted mechanism, such as a verified telephone number, or a known internet address that you type into a new browser window. Do not click or cut and paste from a link in the message.

Managing Director of Easynet, Chris Stening gives businesses a timely reminder of what they might expect in less than two weeks time and offers the following advice:

“Traditionally, small businesses face a dilemma when deciding whether to allow employees to follow major sporting events during office hours. Whether it is through their PCs, phones or even pocket radios it is likely that fans will find a means of following the football regardless. This year however, small businesses need to consider the technical issue of bandwidth provision with large numbers of fans, especially those who are part of ‘generation Y’ who instinctively look to the internet to follow live events, using their work internet connections to follow the tournament.

We’d urge businesses to act now to avoid any reduction in connectivity or productivity. Smaller companies should audit their ongoing and future bandwidth requirements and ensure that their connection can support their most critical applications as well as managing spikes in demand. For example, one person viewing full HD streaming via the BBC’s iPlayer requires 1.5Mbps, so to have five people using this kind of service without impacting upon other services would require a minimum connection of at least 8Mbps without considering the bandwidth required by apps such as VoIP or email.”

Key Recommendations from Chris Stening, managing director, Easynet Connect:

- Early kick-off. Planning ahead will help you avoid paying the price of being caught by surprise and having productivity suffer as a result. It also means that businesses can avoid making reactionary decisions and measures once the football is underway.

- Match analysis. Speak with your ISP to get a full picture of how much bandwidth your business requires on a day-to-day basis as well as during peak times. This should give you an idea of the impact of staff using web streaming services upon other services, upon which you can base your decisions. It will also give you a picture of how heavily your business relies upon bandwidth.

- Team selection. It may be that your business is in need of increased capacity anyway, in which case it may be a good time to upgrade your current package, switch provider or to set up an extra line, such as an ADSL connection to carry low priority web traffic. If so, consider all of the technologies and packages available and make sure the option you choose is fully suited to your business and has the right back up options and service level agreements in place – it may be better value than you might think.

- Substitutions. There are technologies which can help businesses needing to manage their bandwidth. For example, MPLS technology lets businesses prioritise bandwidth for particular types of traffic, protecting the data transfer to the applications which your business relies upon.

- Rules of fair play. Web usage policies are far from a case of one policy fitting all and are completely dependent upon your staff and your business. Business should remember however that many people do still rely on their work as their primary means of accessing the web and the tools that it can provide. With the popularity of smartphones it is likely however that workers will find ways to follow the action regardless.

- The off-line rule. Don’t forget that you can keep up to speed with the football via traditional means without using up any bandwidth. Buying radios or even a TV for the office can be seen as a real treat and morale booster for your workers. Sensible usage will be advised but it is a sure-fire way of protecting your connection.

- Extra time. Consider using flexible working as a means to allow employees to make up for time spent watching matches out of the office. This also avoids the prospect of claiming sick leave in order to watch games.

The seven-year-old Intelius gave over $360,000 to more than a dozen local and national nonprofit organizations in 2009, with nearly $260,000 of that amount going to Washington State nonprofit organizations. With just 260 employees, 2009 donations set a record for the company.

Intellius was founded by Naveen Jain in January 2003 as an information commerce company whose services include background checks, pre-employment screening, criminal checks and an award-winning identity theft prevention service.

In the seven years since it was founded Intellius has become one of the Top 100 most trafficked business sites on the web, offering crucial information for a myriad of commercial applications.

It is no surprise given the business acumen and generosity of the CEO Naveen Jain, that he learnt his trade under Bill Gates at Microsoft, where he became a senior executive before launching his own InfoSpace business in 1996.

Since then Jain has moved from strength to strength, working seven days a week, often for eighteen hours a day, it is no fluke that his businesses have become so successful.

my guide to uni

Leicester based entrepreneur Marcel Gashi is only eighteen years old and yet has already tasted business success ranging from an online department store to website design and is one of the youngest businessman to attract venture capital investment. On top of that he has also had his first book Dream Less, Win More, published recently.

His latest venture is aimed firmly at students looking at placements for university and with the help of venture capital investment Gashi will launch the Free to use website in April.

MyGuideToUni.co.uk is set to change the way that thousands of young people search and find the right universities for themselves.

The website will provide students with an unrivalled fast and simple way to compare all that is on offer from over 125 universities across the UK.

For the first time this breakthrough new website will provide students with one central platform at which they can view each university’s page and promotional material. It will also be possible to find out about and book places on open days through the website and through SMS and Email mediums. Users can request a prospectus and apply online for any course they wish, all within just a couple of clicks.

MyGuideToUni.co.uk have created a toolbar which is to be distributed across 6th form colleges. The toolbar will enable students to search for a university by either course or distance. Someone wishing to study law within 50 miles of their home for example, would simply input their postcode and request all law courses within a 50 mile radius.

The idea has taken 12 months to become a reality for Gashi who has astounded the business world for his ability to win investment from the London and Rome based Venture Capital group Leoni Sceti.

When the site officially launches at the end of next month it will offer universities various new media combined with traditional marketing methods to reach 1.2 million students between the ages of 16 – 19. There will also be 12 regional MyGuideToUni.co.uk road shows enabling universities to meet thousands of potential students face to face.

Gashi says that this is his most exciting venture to date and added;

“My Guide To Uni was founded purely in order to help individuals across 6th form colleges and others keen on moving to higher education to find the right university. During its development and with the support of my investors we have been able to create something very special for both students and universities, and I am confident that all will significantly benefit from this new service once it fully launches.”

For more information on this project visit info@myguidetouni.co.uk

There are a host of reasons for choosing to outsource your printing needs rather than printing your mail shots, flyers, leaflets and posters yourself. The factors fall into the following fairly obvious categories: cost, quality and convenience.

Firstly, even if you have invested in a good quality colour printer, it is never going to work out cheaper than having your printing done professionally. It won’t take long to calculate that in paper and printer consumables your outgoings are likely to be prohibitive when it comes to printing in even fairly modest quantities of, for example, the leaflets you require.

A key finding of one reputable trade magazine, having carried out a recent test to ascertain in-house printing costs, makes sobering reading. They found that a single A6 sized photograph cost a full 43p to print on a desktop inkjet printer. When multiplied by the modest print-run figure of 500, the resulting figure for a batch of A6 leaflets containing full ink coverage is a staggering £215. Online printing firms will supply the same item for less than a quarter of that price. And when a greater quantity is ordered, then of course the unit cost plummets even further. This is not something that can be said for the office printer on your desk.

As far as quality is concerned, the paper stock which commercial printing can accommodate is simply not able to be handled by the desktop printer. The weight and finish of the paper is what gives the end-user that essential impression of professionalism. But if for no other reason than the fact that few office printers can print right up to the edge of a sheet of paper, it is necessary to turn to the commercial print suppliers. Even when it comes down to cutting the finished item down to size, the professionals win hands down. Naturally enough, when it comes to business cards, there is absolutely no alternative to using a good company with its dedicated equipment.

Finally, outsourcing to one of the many online print services, some offering a next-day service along with free shipping, frees up office space and staff time for more vital tasks. The savings made on efficiency and convenience scarcely need mentioning.

In a nutshell, the advantage of hitching one’s business to the cloud (in other words,  to the Internet and existing servers) is that it eliminates the need as a business owner to install and run applications on your own or on a customer’s computer. Equally, the costly burden of maintenance and support is scrapped. The cloud is a hugely attractive option because of its on-demand nature and the fact that it functions in real time.

The cloud is no great mystery. Many of us are using public clouds already, even just by having our archive of instant messages logged on Skype at Google Talk or on msn. When you access them, you are using the cloud.

In business terms, getting access to the cloud tends to take the form either of pay-per-use or of subscription. Secondly, many opt for a private cloud, but where savings are a significant factor in the decision, a Community Cloud is possibly a better choice. This way, the workload is shared among various customers. Costs are cut because the infrastructure is owned by the provider. There is no need, therefore, for it to be purchased for on-demand computing tasks initiated by the firm’s users.

A related benefit is that with the cloud comes easy adaptation to fluctuating user demands, the upside being that you do not need to install additional hardware or software. There are time-saving advantages too, simply because cloud technology kicks in faster than its traditional counterpart. A positive spin-off is fast recovery. Best of all, your team of employees have access to work-related data from any location.

The answer, therefore, to the question ‘Can the cloud save my business?’ is as follows: If clunky outmoded technology is holding you back and incurring unnecessary expenses, then, yes, switch to the cloud.