Month: October 2010

In a move that’s not only turning heads around the world, but will surely garner renewed interest in the fast food chain, McDonald’s locations in Hong Kong are now offering to hold wedding receptions. McDonald’s Wedding Packages include: a Baked Apple Pie Wedding Cake, party balloon dresses and children’s toys as party favors – and McDonald’s will be catering the event, of course. The events will feature adaptations to “traditional Chinese wedding games” such as the “french fry kiss” as pictured below.

A spokesperson has stated that McDonald’s sees this as a “business chance”, to provide those who may have had their first dates and proposals occur in the chain, the ability to hold their nuptials within a McDonald’s location. According to McDonald’s Hong Kong director of corporate communications and relations Helen Cheung, the chain has been receiving about “ten calls a month” to inquire about the services.

Some analysts, while skeptical, are saying that the weddings may become a hit, maybe mostly due to price. Traditional Chinese weddings are reportedly becoming a financial burden for many HK-newlyweds and this gives Hong Kong residents a ‘low-cost’ alternative.

In the 21st century, consumers are becoming more and more used to the concept of unlimited rates – especially in the electronics sector: Unlimited text messages, unlimited evenings and weekends minutes on our cellphones. unlimited TV show and movie streaming and so on. Now for those of us who still pay for much of our music and access all of it through Apple’s iTunes, a new form of unlimited rates may be arriving soon in the form of unlimited music downloads.

The New York Post has reported that Apple may be in discussions with several music labels on getting on board. It is alleged that the unlimited plans will come in two price structures – one at $10 a month and the other at $15 a month. While current stateside competitors have similar plans, analysts believe Apple’s push to an unlimited service is because of the two big competing services that may soon join the North American market – Spotify and Google Music.

While Google Music and Spotify have yet to break into the market, Apple’s move is preempting their arrival by rallying for their own service to get started beforehand. This will give Apple a stronger user-base to pull from when and if the newcomers come into town. The concept is to give their current consumers the service so that when The Big G comes a knocking, there will be less reason for Apple lovers to cross the floor.

In the 130 year history of the internal combustion engine (ICE), automobile engine design has never reached the end of it’s lifecycle. Sure engineers have enlarged them and made them a little stronger, but the basic design has not changed since the engine’s inception. In 2013, it looks like the internal combustion engine – and it’s 1876 deisgn – will be getting a makeover. Detroit-based EcoMotors has released a new rendition of their conceptual engine: the Opposed-Piston Opposed-Cylinder Engine, or OPOC for short.

As many technologies seem to be trending towards in the 21st Century, the OPOC will be sleeker, better, faster and stronger. Engineered by twenty-year Volkswagen veteran and designer of the German diesel engine, Peter Hofbauer, the new engine will produce energy at twice the rate as a traditional ICE. Current engines use a single piston per cylinder, with each cylinder pumping “like a fist against a ceiling”; while the OPOC brings a dual-piston per cylinder design with two pistons “that come together and pull apart like hands clapping”. This means piston cycles can occur twice as fast – producing twice the power. While previous renditions of the two-stroke engine have generated large amounts of exhaust, EcoMotors believes their sixth generation OPOC changes all that with a cleaner design. Investors seem to agree: this past July, Bill Gates sunk $23.5m into the engine. This investment helps EcoMotors helps reduce the oft-run-into barrier of entry: capital requirement. The attention the investment is drawing will also help the company’s brand image.

EcoMotors’ CEO, Don Runkle, is a former employee of General Motors and was involved in the development of the EV1 all-electric car. Time will tell if a American Auto All-Star can bring the American industry back to the forefront

The release of Nokia’s newest smartphone, the N8, marks not only a return to form for the Finnish hardware giant, but a new chapter in the cellphone industry’s story. In recent years, Nokia has seen it’s once mighty grip on the cellphone market hemorrhage to laughable lows. The major reason for such a disastrous fallout in the late 2000’s for the manufacturer was it’s failure to advance it’s software: Symbian OS. While Apple’s iOS, RIM’s Blackberry OS 6 and Google’s Android OS have steadily taken over the smartphone market – mostly due to their expansive selection of mobile applications – Nokia refused to enter the same game (Symbian has one-fiftieth the amount of apps as Apple’s iOS), relying on a strong hardware reputation to drive sales.

At the turn of the decade, many of the world’s leading phone makers have made the jump to the universal Google platform (Sony Ericsson, Taiwan’s HTC, Motorola, LG and Samsung each offering a variety of handsets) due to low adoption costs and the platforms venerable popularity. While many analysts have criticized Nokia’s abstinence from the open-source platform, Nokia has been steadfast in defense of their decision to invest in themselves rather than a second-party platform such as Android. Despite the large costs Nokia could save from R&D from adopting Android, they have made a good choice in differentiating themselves from the competition. The issue with all these phone makers joining Google is that consumers will have issues distinguishing between brands and this will result in universal low profitability across the industry. Nokia’s self-investment gives them comparative advantage to the competition by differentiating themselves from the droning Androids. With Nokia’s reintroduction as a major player in the smartphone market, competitors and consumers alike can be sure that the smartphone software war will go on along several fronts well into the new decade.

It has been almost a full week since RIM announced their newest product: The Blackberry Playbook. Since this announcement, much has been made over what the new entrant’s role is in the tablet market. Instant comparisons have been made to market incumbents like the Dell Streak, the Samsung Galaxy Tab and (especially) the Apple iPad.

What RIM brings in light of their late arrival to the party is a bag full of features the iPad lacks. Ability to support both Adobe’s Flash (a common technology to many websites, also a technology Apple has loudly foregone), front facing camera for web-conferencing and the hardware required for heavy multitasking (including four times as much RAM – random access memory – as Apple’s tablet). RIM believes that the device’s increased online flexibility, ability to handle many programs at a time and inherent ability to connect video feeds with other devices will appeal to potential consumers – especially those in the business class.

Given this, how concerned should Apple be about losing market share to their traditional tech rival (Blackberry and the iPhone have waged war in the cellular phone market for years)? The answer lies in how large the market will expand. Apple shouldn’t fear losing current iPad owners, who are almost universally pleased with their purchases, but the competition’s feature-packed offerings may draw future tablet buyers. The kicker here is the fact that most people who would consider purchasing such a device have already bought iPads, and with the next generation iPad, competitive features will conceivably be added by the time the Playbook enters the market.

In the last 18 months, the Canadian Wireless scene saw major changes as new competitors and adjusted price plans were introduced. Wind Mobile and other new entrants have arrived on the scene. Upcoming competitors like Shaw and MTS are setting themselves up to join the party. This incoming pressure has caused “The Big Three” networks – Rogers, Telus and Bell – and their respective flanker brands – Fido and Chatr under Rogers, Virgin and Solo under Bell and Koodo under Telus – to make at least some adjustments in their price plans.

While price wars have yet to really get started, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the real new battleground for marketshare will be through methods of distribution. Though all providers seem to have some form of kiosk/storefront of their own, it seems the new method of reaching consumers is through outlet/second-party distribution. Telus has moved into Black’s Photo stores, Rogers has gained a foothold within Sony Stores (and some Shoppers Drug Marts), and Wind has blown into Blockbusters. Not only that, but establishments that do not traditionally sell wireless goods are starting to join up. With Loblaws/Canadian Superstore outlets opening a “Mobile Shop” in many of their locales featuring most of the Canadian providers and Canada Post set to do something similar in 2011, it is clear that providers want to be present in unconventional locations. Let the battle begin.