Dec 7, 2021 | Business
Toyota Motor North America announced today that North Carolina Greensboro-Randolph Megasite has been chosen as the location for Toyota’s new $1.29 billion automotive battery manufacturing plant, to be named, Toyota Battery Manufacturing, North Carolina (TBMNC).
When it comes online in 2025, TBMNC will have four production lines, each capable of delivering enough lithium-ion batteries for 200,000 vehicles–with the intention to expand to at least six production lines for a combined total of up to 1.2 million vehicles per year.
The $1.29 billion investment, including funds to develop land and facilities, made by Toyota and Toyota Tsusho will be partially funded from a total investment of approximately $3.4 billion previously announced on October 18, which did not include funds for developing land and facilities, and is expected to create 1,750 new American jobs.
“The future of mobility is electrification and the Greensboro-Randolph Megasite is the ideal location to make that future a reality,” said Ted Ogawa, CEO of Toyota Motor North America. “North Carolina offers the right conditions for this investment, including the infrastructure, high-quality education system, access to a diverse and skilled workforce, and a welcoming environment for doing business. Today marks the beginning of a mutually beneficial partnership with the Tar Heel state as we embark on our journey to achieve carbon neutrality and provide mobility for all.”
In addition, as the company continues its efforts to reach carbon neutrality for its vehicles and operations by 2050, Toyota is committed to using 100% renewable energy at this new facility to produce the batteries.
Copyright ©2021 JCN Newswire. All rights reserved. A division of Japan Corporate News Network.
Nov 25, 2021 | Business
WHISHWORKS, a global IT services consultancy and expert Salesforce partner, announced today their partnership with Litify, a fully integrated legal Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform. Litify selected WHISHWORKS as one of its expert Delivery Partners, to ensure accelerated time-to-value for its clients.
Built on Salesforce, Litify is an all-in-one, powerful and flexible platform that enables lawyers to manage and standardize every aspect of their business from one interface. With a host of out-of-the-box features, legal professionals have all they need to manage their entire business from one single platform.
“We want our customers to fully leverage the platform capabilities and improve their practices, client experience and operations. We selected WHISHWORKS for their extensive experience and expertise in Salesforce, to ensure our clients are onboarded and enabled with the flexibility and customizability they need to future-proof their business,” commented Ian Padrick, Vice President, GTM & Alliances from Litify.
WHISHWORKS’ certified consultants are expertly versed on both Salesforce and Litify. They will ensure the platform is set-up and tailored to the specific needs of each client. Providing expert support and user enablement, they will empower legal professionals to leverage Litify and drive efficiencies throughout their customers’ lifecycle.
“We are very excited that Litify selected WHISHWORKS to accelerate time-to-value and success for their customers,” said Edward Davies, VP Sales at WHISHWORKS. “Litify is the number one platform built exclusively to help firms in the legal industry run smarter. Litify’s customers can count on our expert consultants to deliver quality services utilizing best practice and governance, so they are up and running with Litify in no time.”
Litify has started offering the opportunity to new clients to use WHISHWORKS’ expert services from October 2021. This is an optional value-add service and WHISHWORKS will provide a detailed statement of work with specific timelines and costs prior to any engagement.
Salesforce is a trademark of Salesforce.com, Inc.
About Litify (www.litify.com):
Founded in late 2016, Litify’s mission is to empower the legal community to standardize their best practices and deliver optimal outcomes for their clients with the most flexible and fully integrated business transformation platform for lawyers. The singular platform streamlines and automates task management, document generation, matter management, client communications, and more while providing data-driven insights that help law firms and corporations scale and increase their bottom line. Built on Salesforce.com, Litify is a secure, extensible, and rapidly evolving platform.
About WHISHWORKS (www.whishworks.com):
WHISHWORKS, a Coforge company, is a global IT services and consulting firm, specialising in accelerating business outcomes through digital enablement, seamless connectivity and data transformation. We work with an ecosystem of digital innovators, including Salesforce, MuleSoft,Tableau and Microsoft Azure to develop leading solutions that enable digital transformation and growth.
Sep 27, 2021 | Business
Inmarsat, the world leader in global, mobile satellite communications, has secured a significant new commitment to its Fleet Hotspot internet portal service, following an extension of its Fleet Xpress service agreement with leading liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) transport group Petredec. Fleet Hotspot has been designed by Inmarsat to give crew onboard access to high-speed connectivity with the freedom to use their own devices.
As the owner of one of the most modern fleets of specialised LPG carriers in the market, Petredec is a longstanding Inmarsat customer, which recently renewed its Fleet Xpress service agreement across 27 operational ships and extended it to 10 newbuilds. Part of the renewal saw the Singapore-based owner commit for the first time to Inmarsats fully managed Fleet Care maintenance, repair, and support service, and the Fleet Data IoT platform for data collection, transfer, storage, and analysis.
Petredec is also committed to the highest standards where crew connectivity is concerned and is a signatory of the Neptune Declaration on Seafarer Wellbeing and Crew Change. The Inmarsat renewal led to trials of Inmarsats Fleet Hotspot service. Rather than having crew demand for connectivity compete with operational bandwidth, Fleet Hotspot offers seafarers internet access via a dedicated portal, with billing options for owners including separate Master Service Agreements.
Based on crew satisfaction feedback from a pilot Fleet Hotspot installation, Petredec is fast-tracking the adoption of the crew portal fleet-wide, replacing a previous crew connectivity service based on subscription. On completion, all 37 owned Petredec ships will be equipped with Fleet Hotspot, supported by the dual Fleet Xpress antennas on board.
The powerful moral case for ensuring crews can stay in touch with friends, family, and the outside world has been laid bare during Covid-19, but there is also a direct link between crew happiness and retention of the best crews, said Neil Giles, Fleet Technical Manager Petredec. Its a link that results in safer operations onboard multi-million dollar assets, greater vessel efficiency, and business competitiveness.
We are pleased that Petredec will be expanding their commitment to crew welfare, safety, and operational efficiency through Inmarsats portfolio of services, said Gert-Jan Panken, Vice President Merchant at Inmarsat Maritime. The company is in the vanguard of shippings digitalisation journey and leverages technology to realise goals on safety, the environment, efficiency and crew welfare. Our experience is that early adopters of IoT-based solutions quickly see the benefit of measurable performance gains whilst the commitment to crew welfare boosts moral.
Further Information
About Inmarsat
Inmarsat is the world leader in global, mobile satellite communications. It owns and operates the worlds most diverse global portfolio of mobile telecommunications satellite networks, and holds a multi-layered, global spectrum portfolio, covering L-band, Ka-band and S-band, enabling unparalleled breadth and diversity in the solutions it provides. Inmarsats long-established global distribution network includes not only the worlds leading channel partners but also its own strong direct retail capabilities, enabling end to end customer service assurance.
The company has an unrivalled track record of operating the worlds most reliable global mobile satellite telecommunications networks, sustaining business and mission critical safety & operational applications for more than 40 years. It is also a major driving force behind technological innovation in mobile satellite communications, sustaining its leadership through a substantial investment and a powerful network of technology and manufacturing partners.
Inmarsat operates across a diversified portfolio of sectors with the financial resources to fund its business strategy and holds leading positions in the Maritime, Government, Aviation and Enterprise satcoms markets, operating consistently as a trusted, responsive and high-quality partner to its customers across the globe.
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Aug 18, 2021 | Business
Apple today unveiled its first class of 15 Black- and Brown-owned businesses on the cutting edge of green technology and clean energy, who will join the companys Impact Accelerator to support equity and opportunity in the environmental sector. Part of Apples Racial Equity and Justice Initiative, this program will help to combat systemic barriers to opportunity, while also advancing innovative solutions for communities most impacted by climate change.
The 15 businesses are based across the US from Silicon Valley in California, to Detroit, Michigan, to tribal nations across the Midwest and driving innovation in energy efficiency, solar, green chemistry, recycling, and other environmental areas. Many share a specific focus on bringing clean energy, opportunity, and vital services to vulnerable and underserved communities.
We are thrilled to welcome our first Impact Accelerator class, and look forward to seeing how these innovative businesses will expand their work to protect the planet and our communities, said Lisa Jackson, Apples vice president of Environment, Policy, and Social Initiatives. On our journey to our 2030 carbon neutral goal for our supply chain and products, were determined to help create a greener and more equitable future for all people. The businesses were partnering with today are poised to become tomorrows diverse and innovative industry leaders, creating ripples of change to help communities everywhere adapt to the urgent challenges posed by climate change.
Selected companies will participate in customized training, and have access to Apple experts and an alumni community. The Impact Accelerator is tailored to support Black-, Brown-, and Native American and Indigenous-owned businesses that share Apples focus on innovation and commitment to the environment as they achieve their next stage of development. Following the three-month virtual program, the companies will be considered for opportunities to act as suppliers to Apple as it works to become carbon neutral for its supply chain and products by 2030.
Meet the Companies
BlocPower
Founder and CEO: Donnel Baird
Climate Technology Company in Brooklyn, NY
BlocPower aims to make American cities greener, smarter, and healthier by turning aging, inefficient buildings into state-of-the-art structures. Since its founding in 2014, BlocPower has retrofitted more than 1,200 buildings in disadvantaged communities across 26 cities with smart, eco-friendly, electric heating and cooling systems.
Mosaic Global Transportation
Founder, President, and CEO: Maurice H. Brewster
Transportation Firm in San Jose, CA
Mosaic Global Transportation is a minority-owned, multimillion-dollar international ground transportation company that specializes in employee shuttles, commuter services, and meeting and events businesses. Aiming to replace gasoline-operated vehicles that are used for these programs with electric vehicles, the company is deeply committed to giving back to the community.
Volt Energy Utility
Co-Founder and CEO: Gilbert Campbell III
Utility-Solar Energy Development Firm in Washington, D.C.
Volt Energy Utility develops, finances, and operates utility-scale solar projects for private and public clients. One of the firms unique offerings is the Environmental Justice Power Purchase Agreement which serves as a funding source for various programs dedicated to expanding the benefits of clean energy to underserved communities and constituencies. Campbell co-founded Volt Energy over 10 years ago, which developed several distributed generation projects. He founded Volt Energy Utility with the clear intent to provide services and expertise to satisfy the increased demands for utility-scale solar.
Bench-Tek Solutions
Founder and CEO: Maria Castellon
Manufacturing and Automation Company in Santa Clara, CA
Bench-Tek Solutions is a Silicon Valley-based manufacturing company that specializes in making laboratory and industrial workbenches. They focus on building ergonomic and environmentally friendly furniture for different types of workspaces. Maria Castellon founded the company in 2002 after immigrating to the US from Mexico for college. She found work as a janitor at IBM, which led her to launch her career at a workbench manufacturing company and ultimately start her own business. Today, Bench-Tek operates with a diverse workforce, serves a vast clientele, and maintains a strong standing in the manufacturing industry.
GreenTek Solutions
Founder and CEO: Anuar Garcia
Recycling and Reuse Company in Houston, TX
GreenTek Solutions is committed to repurposing, refurbishing, recycling, and reusing technology products and offering extensive IT asset services for buying, selling, and liquidating equipment. The company is consistently finding ways to anticipate future tech trends, environmental concerns, and client needs.
Diversified Chemical Technologies, Inc.
President and Chief Financial Officer: Karl Johnson
Chemical Safety Firm in Detroit, Michigan
Diversified Chemical Technologies, Inc. is a technology, specialty chemicals, and services company with manufactured product lines in adhesives, process chemicals, CIP/COP cleaners, facility cleaners, metal working fluids and lubricants, and MRO service solutions. The company operates on the Diversified 1 Systems model to promote excellence, stewardship, and sustainability in their leadership and throughout the company, believing it creates value for their stakeholders, reduces their carbon footprint, and keeps them socially responsible. The company is a manufacturer of janitorial chemicals and has evolved to supplying the largest consumer products, healthcare, automotive, and general manufacturing companies with a broad spectrum of custom-developed product solutions.
Oceti Sakowin Power Authority
Chairman and Head of the Board of Directors: Lyle Jack
Clean Energy Developer in Tribal Regions Across the Dakotas
The Oceti Sakowin Power Authority is an independent, nonprofit governmental entity formed by six Sioux tribes to jointly develop tribal renewable energy resources by financing, developing, constructing, and operating power generation and transmission facilities for the wholesale market. Their mission is to work together to deliver power and sustainable development, bringing jobs and economic development to their reservation communities, and preserving the earth for future generations. This power project is on track to create large-scale wind and solar power developments in the country with plans to produce up to 2 gigawatt hours of emissions-free electricity in the Midwest.
Vericool, Inc.
Founder and CEO: Darrell Jobe
Packaging and Shipment Company in Livermore, CA
Vericool is a company focused on making sustainable, environmentally friendly packaging that can replace expanded polystyrene (EPS) and other petroleum-based foam packaging for shipments that need to stay protected. Vericool produces patented, high-performing packaging solutions made from natural ingredients that revolutionize the way cold chain products are shipped. Vericool is committed to a diverse workforce and reducing prison recidivism by providing equal employment opportunities to those in need of a second chance.
Dunamis Clean Energy Partners
Founder and CEO: Natalie King
Environmental Solutions Company in Southfield, MI
Dunamis Clean Energy Partners is a technology, manufacturing, and engineering firm focused on energy efficiency and environmental service solutions. Dunamiss founder and CEO, Natalie King, led the company to become a multimillion-dollar corporation with over 150 employees throughout Southeastern Michigan.
VMX International
Founder, President, and CEO: Vickie Lewis
Environmental Services Company in Detroit, MI
As an environmental services company, VMX International provides solid waste collection, recycling, regulatory, and project management services to government, commercial, industrial, and construction customers across the US and Canada. Since it was founded in 2001, VMX International has grown and diversified to a staff of over 50 full-time employees stationed across the nation.
Argent Associates
Founder, President, and CEO: Beatriz Manetta
Technology Consultancy in Plano, TX
Founded in 1998, Argent Associates has built its legacy by creating innovative supply chain solutions while keeping its commitment to environmental protection. Manetta immigrated to the US from Argentina as a young girl and worked for 20 years in corporate America. She used her learnings to launch her own business where she is now president and CEO. Today, Argents emphasis on a diverse technology-driven ecosystem has won the company numerous awards for their work, leadership, and diversity in the workforce.
Inspectorio
Co-Founder and CEO: Carlos Moncayo
Supply Chain Solutions Firm in Minneapolis, MN
Inspectorio is a cloud-based SaaS solution focused on creating dynamic and risk-based quality and compliance programs with the goal of building an interconnected, sustainable, and transparent supply chain. Today it is used by over 15,000 network participants across the globe, including some of the largest brands and retailers in the world. Moncayo was the youngest Latin American CEO to join the Group of Fifty and was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.
Group O
CEO: Gregg Ontiveros
Supply Chain Solutions Firm in Milan, IL
Founded in 1974 as a small Midwest packaging distributor, Group O has grown into one of the largest Latino-owned businesses in the United States. As an end-to-end business process outsourcer serving some of the worlds largest brands, Group O specializes in integrated supply chain solutions designed to optimize operations while reducing waste. They are committed to environmental stewardship through several programs and policies that reduce not only their own carbon footprint, but that of their clients. As a certified MBE, Group O is dedicated to building a diverse workforce in addition to working with and mentoring other minority-owned businesses and suppliers.
RFG-MPW Environmental & Facility Services
Chairman and CEO: Roderick Rickman
Industrial Cleaning and Environmental Service Firm in Detroit, MI
RFG-MPW is the leading provider of integrated, technology-based industrial cleaning, facility management, water purification, container management, and environmental services in North America. The company assists in enhancing operational efficiencies, improving reliability, and minimizing costs to ensure their clients have a safer and cleaner work environment to deliver high-quality products.
L2S Engineering, LLC
Founder: Laurie Ann Sibani
Mechanical, Electrical, and Plumbing Engineering Design Firm in Leesburg, VA and Apollo Beach, FL
L2S Engineering, LLC is a Native American-, woman-owned mechanical, electrical, and plumbing engineering design firm that provides services in multiple states. Its mission is to achieve new heights in engineering excellence by providing services that will help their clients achieve their sustainable environmental goals and reduce their carbon footprint. Sibani is an electrical engineer with extensive design and project management experience, and prides herself on developing efficient solutions for her clients.
About Apple
Apple revolutionized personal technology with the introduction of the Macintosh in 1984. Today, Apple leads the world in innovation with iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Apple TV. Apples five software platforms iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS provide seamless experiences across all Apple devices and empower people with breakthrough services including the App Store, Apple Music, Apple Pay, and iCloud. Apples more than 100,000 employees are dedicated to making the best products on earth, and to leaving the world better than we found it.
Mar 29, 2021 | Business
Diamanti, the company that streamlines Kubernetes applications and data management for global enterprises, today announced that Douzone, a leading information technology and solutions provider in Korea, has selected Diamanti as the infrastructure for its database and software services. With Diamanti, Douzone will complete its essential migration to Kubernetes and containers.
“Legacy infrastructures often lead to low performance and frequent failures, especially when the applications hit peak load with concurrent access by many customers,” said Hyun Soo Jung, Managing Director, Douzone. “To improve how Douzone delivers services, we are transforming our infrastructure to bare-metal, increasing cloud performance and enabling software innovation with Kubernetes. Diamanti D20X offers us a scalable, reliable architecture, allowing us to continue providing excellent customer service.”
Douzone selected Diamanti’s D20X bare-metal, hyperconverged infrastructure. The new environment now includes several nodes, replacing several tens of legacy, VM-based infrastructure. D20X significantly reduces Douzone’s data center footprint while improving the performance by more than a factor of 20. The organization runs its MariaDB instances on Diamanti and plans to expand as it migrates additional workloads to support the business services.
“Increased Kubernetes adoption signals that containers are the ideal choice for IT modernizations,” said Shankar Sivaprakasam, vice president and general manager for Diamanti’s AJP region. “With a successful proof of concept, we are pleased to help Douzone as the organization continues its transformative journey to a cloud-native applications service provider.
Diamanti offers complete full-stack solutions as software only or on x86 hyperconverged hardware. These solutions include:
Diamanti Spektra, the only multi-cloud, multi-cluster Kubernetes management platform for secure multi-tenancy and enables the migration and replication of stateful applications across clusters with Ultima.
Diamanti Ultima, a standalone software product based on Diamanti’s Kubernetes data plane management solution. Ultima empowers enterprises to migrate and failover stateful applications between on-premises and cloud clusters while maintaining persistent data. Ultima also lowers the total cost of ownership (TCO) by avoiding or minimizing certain cloud provider charges for backup, data protection, disaster recovery, and multi-zone availability capabilities.
Diamanti Ultima offload with x86 hardware. Offload is a fourth-generation PCIe card that delivers I/O acceleration by offloading network, storage, security and management. This card frees up the host CPU by offloading I/O processing to deliver 10x to 30x performance improvement with low deterministic latency.
About Diamanti
Diamanti is solving the challenge of container-based hybrid clouds with the best enterprise-optimized platform for managing Kubernetes applications and data. Diamanti’s Kubernetes platform enables enterprises to adopt and expand Kubernetes on-premises rapidly and in the cloud, with security, high availability, and resilience built-in. Based in San Jose, California, Diamanti is backed by venture investors ClearSky, CRV, Engineering Capital, Goldman Sachs, GSR Ventures, Northgate Capital, Threshold Ventures (formerly DFJ Venture), and Translink Capital. For more information, visit www.diamanti.com or follow @DiamantiCom.
About Douzone
Douzone Bizon is a leading ICT company in Korea, providing ICT solutions and services for companies, institutions and agencies. Douzone provides products and services including accounting programs; ERP; cloud; groupware; information security; electronic tax invoices; mobile solutions; electronic fax and many others.
Press Contact
Laura Finlayson
Communications Director, Diamanti
[email protected]
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