Amazon Changes Its Return Policy And Other Small Business Tech News This Week – Forbes

(Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg)

Here are five things in technology that happened this past week and how they affect your business. Did you miss them?

1 – Amazon changes its return policy – and merchants are concerned. 

The online retail giant has changed its return policy to state: “U.S. seller fulfilled returns that are within Amazon’s returns policy will be automatically authorized.” (Source: CNBC)

Why this is important for your business:

In other words – all returns are accepted automatically. Currently, merchants have the ability to evaluate returns for product damages or other reasons before giving a customer’s money back. That protection has been taken away. If you’re an Amazon merchant, you will have less control over when a customer wants a product returned and will be forced to refund money regardless of the reason. Amazon believes that by making the return policy easier, more customers will be likely to buy.

2 – Instagram is now making it easier for your customers to buy your products.

The popular social media platform has launched new tools to help your customers research (“tap to view”) your products and pay (“shop now”) based on that research. (Source: Forbes)

Why this is important for your business:

Facebook and Twitter are adding tools to make it easier to buy products from their sites. Now it’s Instagram’s turn. If your customers are also Instagram users, you can drive more information to them and make it easier for them to buy – right from their mobile device.

3 – Microsoft announces its Slack killer.

The software giant is releasing in the first quarter of 2017 “Microsoft Teams” to compete against Slack’s popular messaging services. (Source: Forbes)

Why this is important for your business:

If you’re an Office 365 user and also want to take advantage of Slack’s collaboration and messaging features, now you can…in Office 365. Teams has the entire Microsoft Office 365 suite, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, SharePoint and Power BI, integrated into it. (My company is a Microsoft partner.) Next up: Teams will offer collaboration functions across different companies.

4 – Twitter has added business auto-replies for Direct Messages.

The social media network has announced that it is rolling out quick replies and welcome messages for businesses that communicate with their customers via Direct Messages. (Source: Engadget)

Why this is important for your business:

This is further proof that Twitter is expanding itself into a full-blown customer service tool. If, like many companies, you’re using Twitter for this function, now you can build in automatic replies (“thank you for contacting us” or “we’re aware of the issue”) when customers send a Direct Message in the hopes of improving their experience.

5 – YouTube adds new tools for its creators to help fight trolls.

Creators can now “pin” a well-liked or popular comment to the top of the thread, show appreciation and – most importantly – enable you to “hold potentially inappropriate comments for review.” In other words, give you better control over negative comments. (Source: The Next Web)

Why this is important for your business:

As the use of video grows, so too do the number of small businesses that rely on YouTube to deliver sales, training and other educational information. These tools will make the service more business-friendly and improve your visitors’ experience.

BONUS: Scientists have created bomb-sniffing spinach plants.

 Researchers at MIT have embedded nanoparticles in the leaves of live spinach plants that can “signal to a smartphone if molecules found in common explosives are present in the soil.” (Source: Forbes).

Hmm…maybe Popeye was on to something.

Gene Marks owns The Marks Group, a 10-person technology consulting firm and is also a small business expert, speaker and columnist at other major outlets.

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Business plan, honesty called keys to winning small-business loan – Danbury News Times

Photo: Carol Kaliff / Hearst Connecticut Media

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Monica Guevara, center, is part of a panel during a seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016. Also on the panel are Nelson Merchan, left, and Sheila Hummel. Robert Barghause, instructor of finance at the university, far left, is the moderator. less

Monica Guevara, center, is part of a panel during a seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016. Also on the panel are Nelson … more

Photo: Carol Kaliff / Hearst Connecticut Media

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A seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” is held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016.

A seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” is held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016.

Photo: Carol Kaliff / Hearst Connecticut Media

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A seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” is held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016.

A seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” is held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016.

Photo: Carol Kaliff / Hearst Connecticut Media

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A seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” is held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016. The seminar, moderated by Robert Barghause, instructor of finance at the university, left, included Nelson Merchan, Monica Guevara and Sheila Hummel. less

A seminar called “Access to Capital for Small Business” is held at Western Connecticut State University Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016. The seminar, moderated by Robert Barghause, instructor of finance at the … more

Photo: Carol Kaliff / Hearst Connecticut Media

Business plan, honesty called keys to winning small-business loan

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DANBURY — Hoping to land a small-business loan?

Have a solid, bulletproof business plan in hand when you approach a lender. Don’t lie about or hide any financial issues. Be involved with your business. Beware of Internet lenders.

Those actions were among the recommendations of panelists at the “Access to Capital for Small Business” event held last week at White Hall on the campus of Western Connecticut State University. The event featured two discussions: one on traditional sources of capital, such as banks, and another on nontraditional sources, such as state or nonprofit agencies.

As the economy improves and loans become somewhat easier to obtain, demand continues to soar for small-business loans. In 2015, the Small Business Association announced its SBA 7(a) loan program had reached its yearly cap by July 23, granting more than 45,000 loans. That high demand is continuing this year.

Michael Sauvageau, who owns the startup business Noteworthy Chocolates in Bethel with his wife, Jennifer, received $28,000 in a kickstarter campaign to get the company off the ground. The problem is, the couple has spent $40,000 already. They are seeking a small-business loan for supplies, packaging and marketing.

“Marketing is the way you get the name out there so we need some money for that,” Sauvageau said after attending the event at Western. “We spent last year incubating this and dipping into our savings. The idea is to get capital for a buffer, but lenders want you to have a history and we’re a startup. We understand banks don’t want to take risks and startups are inherently risky. It’s tough to get access to capital unless you have a rich uncle, which we don’t.”

Sauvageau said he spoke with a banker following the event and has a meeting set up to discuss a loan application. He remains optimistic about his prospects.

“We have infinite faith,” he said. “It just takes time to get things going.”

It’s good to have faith, but it takes much more to get an idea off the ground and obtain the funding to help do so. For starters, it takes a solid business plan.

“Get that business plan in working order, whether you’re seeking traditional or nontraditional lending,” JoAnn Cueva, director of the Greater Danbury Chamber of Commerce, said as she delivered the event’s closing remarks. “It’s a key component when seeking a loan.”

The business plan is such a vital part of the loan application process that each of the six panelists at the event last week discussed the importance of having a good one.

“I’m a big fan of the business plan. That’s the map of where your business will go,” Monica Guevara, director of underwriting at Valley Economic Development Center. “Know who your customer is, put in your experience, and give projections and assumptions. But also tell us how you got to those numbers. It’s not just putting numbers in there; substantiate them.”

Valley Economic Development Center is an alternative lender for small businesses. The nonprofit organization is a place to turn when banks or government loans are not approved. Rates for loans from her organization are generally higher than traditional loans.

A good business plan is not necessarily a long one, however, said Sheila Hummel of the state’s Department of Economic and Community Development. The DECD offers a variety of financing options, including the Small Business Express Program designed to spur job creation in the state.

“Be as concise as possible. You don’t need a 40-page business plan,” she said. “For a startup business, it’s so important to have a solid business plan.”

Hummel said her agency has funded 22 businesses in Danbury but she’d “like to see more.”

For small-business owners struggling with their business plan, free help is available through the Connecticut Small Business Development Center. The SBDC offers advice to small-business owners on topics such as business evaluations and plans, financial projections, access to capital, state incentives, marketing and what it takes to start a business. The advice is free as a service of the Small Business Administration.

Nelson Merchan is the local SBDC business adviser and holds office hours, by appointment, at the Greater Danbury Chamber of Commerce, Danbury Innovation Center, Newtown Library and Brookfield Chamber of Commerce. Visit www.GrowCT.com and register at “request business advising” to set up an appointment.

“The business plan is key, but before you do a business plan, do a business evaluation. It’s less time and money. If the evaluation shows good potential, then move on to the business plan,” Merchan said. “We can also work on financial projections. We want to see the numbers. Make sure you keep them reasonable.”

Hummel, Guevara and the three banker panelists all stressed open communication and honesty when it comes to applying for a small-business loan.

“Tell us everything,” Darren Piper, vice president of commercial lending at Savings Bank of Danbury, said. “The quickest way to have a deal turn sour is for the lender to discover something that wasn’t disclosed by the borrower. It may not seem like a big deal to you, but be open, honest and up front. If it’s not on the tax return, it doesn’t exist.”

Vincent DiGilio, vice president at Union Savings Bank, added: “Communication is important, but it’s on the banker to make sure there are no surprises.”

While the bankers, including Anthony Giobbi of Newtown Savings Bank, said they like building relationships and giving loans to small businesses, they can’t approve all the applications because of their fiduciary responsibility to customers.

“That’s why the regulations are sometimes onerous,” Giobbi said. “At the end of the day, we want to make sure our depositors’ money is safe.”

Robert Barghaus, an instructor of finance at Western, moderated the alternative sources of capital portion of the event. He said that 60 percent of small businesses two years or younger can’t get funding because of the sometimes onerous regulations.

“Small businesses are the future of the country so we need to figure out a way to get funding to these businesses,” he said.

Cbosak@hearstmediact.com; 203-731-3338

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How to get free publicity for your small business – USA TODAY

Theranos Exits Lab Business – Forbes

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Fox Business

Theranos Exits Lab Business Forbes Last night laboratory testing business Theranos announced that it would lay off 340 people, or 43% of its workforce, and get out of the business of administering blood tests–a business which has drawn the scrutiny of multiple government agencies and … Theranos to Lay Off More Than 40% of WorkersFox Business all 77 news articles »

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The Art Of Business Networking Without Expecting A Business Deal – Forbes

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Forbes

The Art Of Business Networking Without Expecting A Business Deal Forbes Networking can be a powerful way of generating new business. Armed with a well-planned strategy, entrepreneurs and business owners, descend on networking events, working the room with clear business goals and high expectations of achieving them.

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The US jobs market hasn't looked this good since the 1970s – Business Insider

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The US labor market has not looked this good since the 1970s, judging solely by initial jobless claims. 

The number of first-time filings for unemployment insurance fell to 249,000 last week, according to the Department of Labor. 

That’s just 1,000 more than the lowest level of this economic cycle hit in April. 

The four-week average of claims, which evens out some of the week-by-week volatility, fell by 2,500 to 253,500, the lowest level since December 8, 1973. 

Economists had forecast that claims climbed to 256,000 last week from 254,000 prior, according to Bloomberg. 

Because it’s a weekly data series, it tends to be volatile and subject to revision. But the claims report is one of the most timely ways to gauge how the labor market is doing, and usually gives an early warning when things are going south. 

But right now, claims tell us that the labor market is solid. The weekly print has not risen above 300,000 for 83 straight weeks, the longest streak since 1970.

The claims numbers come ahead of the September jobs report on Friday, which is forecast to show that the US economy added 172,000 nonfarm payrolls, according to Bloomberg. Renaissance Macro

SEE ALSO: Here’s JPMorgan’s comprehensive guide to markets heading into the final quarter of the year

NOW WATCH: KRUGMAN: The richest Americans should have a tax rate over 70%

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Fujitsu considers selling its PC business to Lenovo – PCWorld

IBM Is Buying Consulting Firm for Its Washington Connections – The … – New York Times

What do you do if you are IBM, supposedly one of the most reliable of blue-chip companies, and you want to acquire another company that is, shall we say, a little more ethically and morally challenged? You convince everyone that the new acquisition will allow IBM to advance the practical applications of the supercomputer named Watson, its mysterious and envelope-pushing entry into the exploding world of artificial intelligence.

That is the impression conveyed last week with IBM’s announcement it would acquire the Promontory Group, a consulting firm made up of scores of former Washington financial regulators, for an undisclosed amount. Added to IBM’s suite of consulting services, Promontory is somehow going to put Watson in a position to help financial institutions grapple with the millions of pages of new financial regulations its many executives put in place during their former careers as regulators in Washington.

According to an IBM news release, more than 20,000 new regulations were created in 2015 alone, and the “complete catalog†will exceed 300 million pages by 2020, “rapidly outstripping the capacity of humans to keep up.†IBM estimated that complying with these regulations costs financial institutions $270 billion a year. “This is a workload ideally suited for Watson’s cognitive capabilities intended to allow financial institutions to absorb the regulatory changes, understand their obligations, and close gaps in systems and practices to address compliance requirements more quickly and efficiently,†IBM wrote.

Other than defeating “Jeopardy†champions, what Watson can do is not exactly obvious to the layman, but I am willing to give IBM the benefit of the doubt that Watson can do something or other to help big banks deal with their extraordinary regulatory requirements.

It is the next part of the news release that had me in stitches: “Promontory’s professionals will train Watson, which will learn by continuously ingesting regulatory information as it is created and through interaction in real-world applications.†Really, IBM?

The 600 Promontory consultants worldwide, among them Mary L. Schapiro, a former chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and Eugene A. Ludwig, the former comptroller of the currency (and the founder of Promontory), are going to train Watson while it ingests the mountain of regulations that they once helped write? I don’t think so. Nor do I think any of the other Promontory consultants are up to the task of training Watson, whatever that means. But Mr. Ludwig, of course, is on board.

“Combining Promontory’s expertise with IBM’s extraordinary technological capabilities such as Watson will permit us to directly address our clients’ greatest challenges in innovative and powerful ways,†he said. “It will enhance our mutual commitment to risk management and regulatory compliance excellence, and our results will benefit customers and the overall financial system.â€

Let’s be clear: Since Mr. Ludwig founded Promontory in 2001, it has become a safe haven for former financial regulators looking to jump-start their post-Washington earnings stream. It has become one of the biggest facilitators of the revolving door between Washington and Wall Street. For instance, in 2012, Promontory hired Julie L. Williams, a former chief counsel of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. She was swapping places with Amy S. Friend, who was a Promontory managing director for two years until 2013, when she landed the chief counsel job at the O.C.C. Before Promontory, Ms. Friend was chief counsel to the Senate Banking Committee.

On Promontory’s advisory board are such prominent aficionados of the revolving door as Arthur Levitt, who is a former S.E.C. chairman; Frank G. Zarb, a former “energy czar†and banker at Lazard and Citigroup; Kenneth M. Duberstein, a former chief of staff to President Ronald Reagan; and Alan S. Blinder, a former Federal Reserve vice chairman and a professor of economics at Princeton.

What Promontory has become is the new Fannie Mae, in the sense that like Fannie Mae in days gone by, former regulators and political operatives could always find comfort and lucre within its brick walls.

Franklin Raines is perhaps the ultimate example of the role Fannie Mae used to play in providing succor to former high-level government officials. Mr. Raines, a former partner at Lazard in New York, served as vice chairman at Fannie Mae until President Bill Clinton tapped him to be the director of the Office of Management and Budget from 1996 to 1998. He then returned to Fannie Mae as chief executive. He served for the next six years, receiving compensation of more than $90 million, before being forced out of the job after an accounting scandal. Now, of course, Fannie Mae is a ward of the state and no longer provides former government officials with a lucrative safe landing. That role now belongs to Promontory.

Mr. Ludwig is a law school friend of Mr. Clinton, and his firm has represented an all-star lineup of banks big and small. It has also taken some heat for its cozy ties.

Last year, Promontory paid $15 million to settle charges with the New York State Department of Financial Services that it had “watered down†reports that it had prepared for a British banking client, Standard Chartered. Standard paid $340 million in 2012 to settle accusations from the New York State regulators that it had purposefully hidden $250 billion worth of transactions with Iranian customers. Standard Chartered later reached a settlement, for $327 million, with the Justice Department and the Federal Reserve, among others.

Before the settlements, the bank paid Promontory $54.5 million to help investigate the misconduct and make an independent report to regulators. But New York banking regulators called Promontory’s independence into question, saying it had succumbed to pressure from the bank to sanitize its report to the regulators. As part of its settlement last year, Promontory agreed to sit out consulting jobs in New York for six months.

But the firm’s deep connections to Wall Street and banking remain, and it is obvious that IBM bought Promontory for these connections. There is little debate that Promontory has proved its worth as a repository of well-connected financial regulators. Training Watson has nothing to do with it.

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IBM Is Buying Consulting Firm for Its Washington Connections – New York Times

What do you do if you are IBM, supposedly one of the most reliable of blue-chip companies, and you want to acquire another company that is, shall we say, a little more ethically and morally challenged? You convince everyone that the new acquisition will allow IBM to advance the practical applications of the supercomputer named Watson, its mysterious and envelope-pushing entry into the exploding world of artificial intelligence.

That is the impression conveyed last week with IBM’s announcement it would acquire the Promontory Group, a consulting firm made up of scores of former Washington financial regulators, for an undisclosed amount. Added to IBM’s suite of consulting services, Promontory is somehow going to put Watson in a position to help financial institutions grapple with the millions of pages of new financial regulations its many executives put in place during their former careers as regulators in Washington.

According to an IBM news release, more than 20,000 new regulations were created in 2015 alone, and the “complete catalog†will exceed 300 million pages by 2020, “rapidly outstripping the capacity of humans to keep up.†IBM estimated that complying with these regulations costs financial institutions $270 billion a year. “This is a workload ideally suited for Watson’s cognitive capabilities intended to allow financial institutions to absorb the regulatory changes, understand their obligations, and close gaps in systems and practices to address compliance requirements more quickly and efficiently,†IBM wrote.

Other than defeating “Jeopardy†champions, what Watson can do is not exactly obvious to the layman, but I am willing to give IBM the benefit of the doubt that Watson can do something or other to help big banks deal with their extraordinary regulatory requirements.

It is the next part of the news release that had me in stitches: “Promontory’s professionals will train Watson, which will learn by continuously ingesting regulatory information as it is created and through interaction in real-world applications.†Really, IBM?

The 600 Promontory consultants worldwide, among them Mary L. Schapiro, a former chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and Eugene A. Ludwig, the former comptroller of the currency (and the founder of Promontory), are going to train Watson while it ingests the mountain of regulations that they once helped write? I don’t think so. Nor do I think any of the other Promontory consultants are up to the task of training Watson, whatever that means. But Mr. Ludwig, of course, is on board.

“Combining Promontory’s expertise with IBM’s extraordinary technological capabilities such as Watson will permit us to directly address our clients’ greatest challenges in innovative and powerful ways,†he said. “It will enhance our mutual commitment to risk management and regulatory compliance excellence, and our results will benefit customers and the overall financial system.â€

Let’s be clear: Since Mr. Ludwig founded Promontory in 2001, it has become a safe haven for former financial regulators looking to jump-start their post-Washington earnings stream. It has become one of the biggest facilitators of the revolving door between Washington and Wall Street. For instance, in 2012, Promontory hired Julie L. Williams, a former chief counsel of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. She was swapping places with Amy S. Friend, who was a Promontory managing director for two years until 2013, when she landed the chief counsel job at the O.C.C. Before Promontory, Ms. Friend was chief counsel to the Senate Banking Committee.

On Promontory’s advisory board are such prominent aficionados of the revolving door as Arthur Levitt, who is a former S.E.C. chairman; Frank G. Zarb, a former “energy czar†and banker at Lazard and Citigroup; Kenneth M. Duberstein, a former chief of staff to President Ronald Reagan; and Alan S. Blinder, a former Federal Reserve vice chairman and a professor of economics at Princeton.

What Promontory has become is the new Fannie Mae, in the sense that like Fannie Mae in days gone by, former regulators and political operatives could always find comfort and lucre within its brick walls.

Franklin Raines is perhaps the ultimate example of the role Fannie Mae used to play in providing succor to former high-level government officials. Mr. Raines, a former partner at Lazard in New York, served as vice chairman at Fannie Mae until President Bill Clinton tapped him to be the director of the Office of Management and Budget from 1996 to 1998. He then returned to Fannie Mae as chief executive. He served for the next six years, receiving compensation of more than $90 million, before being forced out of the job after an accounting scandal. Now, of course, Fannie Mae is a ward of the state and no longer provides former government officials with a lucrative safe landing. That role now belongs to Promontory.

Mr. Ludwig is a law school friend of Mr. Clinton, and his firm has represented an all-star lineup of banks big and small. It has also taken some heat for its cozy ties.

Last year, Promontory paid $15 million to settle charges with the New York State Department of Financial Services that it had “watered down†reports that it had prepared for a British banking client, Standard Chartered. Standard paid $340 million in 2012 to settle accusations from the New York State regulators that it had purposefully hidden $250 billion worth of transactions with Iranian customers. Standard Chartered later reached a settlement, for $327 million, with the Justice Department and the Federal Reserve, among others.

Before the settlements, the bank paid Promontory $54.5 million to help investigate the misconduct and make an independent report to regulators. But New York banking regulators called Promontory’s independence into question, saying it had succumbed to pressure from the bank to sanitize its report to the regulators. As part of its settlement last year, Promontory agreed to sit out consulting jobs in New York for six months.

But the firm’s deep connections to Wall Street and banking remain, and it is obvious that IBM bought Promontory for these connections. There is little debate that Promontory has proved its worth as a repository of well-connected financial regulators. Training Watson has nothing to do with it.

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Minter Ellison moves to take on big four – The Australian Financial Review

Jon Finlay (L) and Andrew Cunningham from Minter Ellison.

by Edmund Tadros

Minter Ellison has fired another shot in the battle between law firms and major consultancies by hiring a team of four executive pay specialists as part of a strategy to expand its reach to non-legal consulting work and grow revenue to $600 million by 2020.

The firm has also revealed it grew annual sales by 6.5 per cent to $456 million in 2015-16, amid a flat legal market.

The law outfit is further broadening its range of services, including legal process management software and other digital services, as it aims to increase sales by almost eight per cent annually on a compound basis over the next four years to reach the $600 million target.

The move into non-legal advisory work comes as KPMG, EY, Deloitte and PricewaterhouseCoopers – big multi-disciplinary firms with revenue ranging from $1.37 billion to $1.92 billion – have made aggressive moves to provide legal services to clients they normally would have directed to law firms.

Accounting Partnership survey

Law partners

SOURCE: FIRMS | DATA EDITOR: EDMUND TADROS | INTERACTIVE: LES HEWITT

Revenue

Partners

Lawyers v accountants 2015-16 revenue ($m)

Revenue/partner

Law Partnership survey

The advisers

Lawyers v accountants Number of partners

Lawyers v accountants Revenue per partner ($m)

Lawyers v accountants Law practice partners

Law Partnership survey

Accounting Partnership survey

Australian Financial Review Interactive infographic

Interactive infographic by Les Hewitt

In-house referrals

Minter Ellison has poached Jon Finlay from advisory firm Willis Towers Watson Australia, where he was head of board and executive remuneration, to take on a similar role at the law firm.

Mr Finlay, along with his team of three experts, will provide salary strategy advice, firstly to the law firm’s merger and acquisition clients, and then directly to the wider market.

“It’s really about focusing everybody from being a trusted legal advisor to being a trusted adviser,” Mr Finlay, a consulting veteran of 35 years who has worked at three of the big four accounting and advisory firms, said.

“And for more of that referral work to be staying in-house rather than moving off in other firms in other disciplines.

“One of the biggest things that clients want is that you can refer them to someone you would use yourself and it won’t get out.”

Remuneration advisory is a niche area with prominent independent firms such as Egan Associates competing with global firms such as Mercer, KPMG, EY and PwC.

KPMG has 25 staff in its Performance and Reward practice, EY has more than 70 consultants in the reward consulting space and PwC also has a remuneration practice.

Minter Ellison intends to grow  the remuneration practice to eight staff by 2020, said Andrew Cunningham, the law firm’s innovation and networks leader.

“We think that a leading practice in the market will be about double the current size,” Mr Cunningham said.

“What’s really interesting is the growth strategy. It’s not about voting in a team that does something new. It’s about extending existing services.

“We think we’re unique amongst the Australia legal firms in having the legal and consulting together in one package.”

Ahead of the pack

The firm has jumped ahead of its legal rivals with the overt move into non-legal consulting work.

Herbert Smith Freehills and Ashurst both said their non-legal advisory services were offered only as part of their legal practices.

“[We have a] range of bespoke value-add offerings to complement their core legal services and which address clients’ key needs and opportunities, but nothing that [we] package up as a formal consultancy practice proposition,” said Arriarne Kemp-Bishop, a spokeswoman for Herbert Smith Freehills.

Ashurst spokeswoman Lillian Birchall said: “We have that remuneration advisory capability in-house, aligned with our Corporate, Employment and Tax practices, but we don’t have a separate remuneration advisory in the works.”

​Allens, Clayton Utz, Gadens, King & Wood Mallesons and Norton Rose declined to comment.

Law start-up LegalVision does non-legal consulting work to clients to improve the operation of in-house legal teams.

“We’ve been doing more and more tech [and] consulting work for clients,” said Lachlan McKnight, the firm’s CEO.

His staff run clients through a workshop process to identify problems and come up with potential solutions.

“Our development team can then build a tech solution, or our lawyers [and/or] strategists can help put in place a new process,” he said.

Minter Ellison v Big Four

Minter Ellison is one of the largest law firms in Australia by revenue and partner numbers with 202 partners and 961 lawyers.

But its desire to emulate the big four accounting and advisory firms brings it into competition with professional service giants that have at least double the number of partners and thousands of professional services staff, and who all have their own legal service arms.

PwC has the largest legal team of 75 working in areas including corporate advisory, regulation, finance and employment law.

Deloitte has more than 40 lawyers who focus on taxation.

“The legal market is large enough for both the external legal firms and the legal practices within the accounting firms to have a key role and reflects the evolution of client’s needs for legal services in Australia,” said James Fabijancic, the lead partner at Deloitte Lawyers.

KPMG has 40 lawyers working across areas such as mergers and acquisitions, equity capital markets, corporate advisory and foreign investment.

“Our primary approach is to work on an integrated basis with our colleagues across KPMG to deliver a full service solution to our clients, however, we also deliver legal services on a standalone basis to certain clients,” said David Morris, the head of KPMG Law.

EY has more than 30 lawyers working in areas like commercial law, mergers and acquisitions and employment law.

edmundtadros@afr.com.au

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The Top 7 Jeff Bezos Quotes on Business, Technology, and Life – Motley Fool

Image source: Getty Images.

It’s good to be Jeff Bezos. The Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) founder and CEO has seen his personal fortune balloon in tandem with the rise in his company’s stock. His $67 billion net worth  makes him the fourth richest person in the world today.

Bezos is also regarded as one of the most inspirational and quotable business leaders today. Here are just a handful of some his wisest words on success, business, technology, leadership, and life.

Jeff Bezos on business

Much of Bezos’ success can be attributed to his untraditional views on business and strategy, views that he embedded in Amazon from day one. In his 1997 letter to shareholders, Bezos laid bare his intentions for Amazon:

We believe that a fundamental measure of our success will be the shareholder value we create over the long term. This value will be a direct result of our ability to extend and solidify our current market leadership position. The stronger our market leadership, the more powerful our economic model. Market leadership can translate directly to higher revenue, higher profitability, greater capital velocity, and correspondingly stronger returns on invested capital. Our decisions have consistently reflected this focus.

Bezos — and Amazon, by extension — is also unique in his customer-centric business philosophy. Here’s how Bezos characterizes his and Amazon’s approach to winning and keeping customers:

We never think of ourselves as tied to any specific technologies or skill sets. We think of ourselves as tied to our customers, and we’re trying to work backwards from their needs, and we’ll learn whatever skills we need to service our customers. 

Jeff Bezos on failure

Bezos’ brilliance shines through in his attitude toward failure. In fact, he describes Amazon to prospective employees as “the best place in the world to fail.” In his most recent letter to shareholders, Bezos summarized his thinking toward failure this way:

Failure and invention are inseparable twins. To invent you have to experiment, and if you know in advance that it’s going to work, it’s not an experiment.

Jeff Bezos on technology and innovation

With interests in cloud computing, e-commerce, space exploration, and more, Bezos has a front-row seat to many of the fastest-growing areas of technology. In an entertaining interview from this year’s Code Conference, Bezos seemed particularly fixated on the potential of artificial intelligence. When host Walt Mossberg asked him about the state of AI, Bezos said:

This is probably hard to overstate how big of an impact it’s going to have on society over the next 20 years.

… It has been a dream ever since people started, in the early days of science fiction, to have a computer you can talk to in a natural way and actually have a conversation with and ask it to do things for you, and that is coming true.

… The combination of new and better algorithms, vastly superior computing power, and the ability to harness huge amounts of training data, those three things are coming together to solve some previously unsolvable problems, and they’re going to drive a tremendous amount of utility for customers, and customers are going to adopt those things.

… And there’s so much more to come. It’s just the tip of the iceberg of what you can do for these kinds of technologies. … It’s the first inning. It might even be the first guy’s up at bat. It’s really early, and I think we’re on the edge of a golden era.

Mossberg’s questions also turned to Bezos’ efforts in expanding Blue Origin and his motivation to help develop the budding private space flight industry:

When it comes to space … I’m using my resources to put in place heavy lifting infrastructure so that the next generation of people can have a dynamic, entrepreneurial explosion into space. And I think that’s possible, and I believe I know what you need to do to put that infrastructure in place. … I want thousands of entrepreneurs doing amazing things in space. And to do that, you have to dramatically lower the cost of access to space.

Jeff Bezos on life

Bezos’ unique perspective on life has also garnered plenty of attention over the years. Indeed, his thought process led him to leave his lucrative job at the quantitative hedge fund D.E. Shaw to found Amazon. Here’s what he said in an interview with 60 Minutes:

The way I decided to leave Wall Street and do this … this’ll sound geeky to you — but it was a regret minimization framework. … I wanted to have lived my life in such a way that when I’m 80 years old I have minimized the number of regrets that I have. … I actually think a lot of people do that, even if they don’t call it something as dorky as “regret minimization framework.”

Bezos also made waves when he bought The Washington Post in 2013 and moved his personal efforts into the news media. In light of the controversy surrounding Gawker’s bankruptcy at the hands of another tech billionaire, Peter Thiel, Bezos has fielded a lot of questions on his views of the media. One of his answers, while dealing with Gawker and Thiel specifically, also contains a sizable dollop of worldly wisdom:

As a public figure, the best defense to speech that you don’t like as yourself as a public figure is to develop a thick skin. It’s really the only effective defense. If you’re doing anything interesting in the world, you’re going to have critics. If you absolutely can’t tolerate critics, then don’t do anything new or interesting.

Of course, this list merely scratches the surface of Bezos’ entertaining and insightful quotes. What’s more, with Bezos just 52 years old and Amazon apparently clicking on all cylinders today, it seems likely we’ll continue to enjoy Bezos’ wisdom for many years to come. 

Andrew Tonner has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Amazon.com. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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Lottery-Winning Couple 'Defrauded' By Tax Business – NBC Chicago

A husband and wife who won big off a 2014 lottery scratch off say they don’t want what happened to them to happen to anyone else.

Rafael Borsas says he and his wife, who make less than $80,000 a year, went to a nearby Key Express Tax service to have their taxes prepared for them. Instead of being charged $160 for a “1040 single family house owners” service, they were overcharged nearly $2,000: $300 for income tax and $1,700 for a gambling bonus.

The commissioner of the Department of Businesses Affairs and Consumer protection said the couple’s 2015 refund was about $92,000, which raised red flags for the IRS who claimed the couple underpaid on their taxes.

“There is no such thing as a gambling bonus to a tax preparer,” said Maria Guerralapacek, commissioner of the Department of Consumer Affairs and Business Protection.

“We right away issued citations to the business,” Guerralapacek said. “Because in fact, the business didn’t follow the law set out for tax preparers.”

Guerralapacek said it was obvious the couple was being defrauded and offers a warning to taxpayers. She said having a city license doesn’t mean a tax preparer is qualified or to do so because they are not regulated by the federal government.

Borsas says he’ll never go back to the Key Express Tax, part of an industry Guerralapacek says is “ripe with fraud.”

When the business was reached by phone, NBC5 was told the person in charge was not available. The city is pursuing legal action against it for multiple reasons, including restitution for the victims.

Published at 10:42 PM CDT on Sep 5, 2016

News breaks at inconvenient times.  Download one of the NBCChicago mobile apps and have the news come to you. Watch live streaming newscasts, receive critical push notifications on the go and stay in touch with your city around the clock. 

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Volkswagen Navistar Move Could Make Its Truck Business An Easier Sell Long Term – Forbes

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Forbes

Volkswagen Navistar Move Could Make Its Truck Business An Easier Sell Long Term Forbes Volkswagen’s decision to buy a stake in U.S. truck-maker Navistar International seems to contradict its declared policy of concentrating on core business, but more likely could represent a long-term attempt to beef up its commercial vehicles business … Volkswagen Truck & Bus buying stake in Navistar for $256MFox Business all 68 news articles »

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20 Must Watch YouTube Channels That Will Change Your Business – Forbes

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Forbes

20 Must Watch YouTube Channels That Will Change Your Business Forbes I confess that when I watched my first business video on YouTube, I winced. It was bad. The lighting was terrible, the editing was frightful and the host sounded like yet another corporate drone that has come to define the modern executive. But then, I …

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Trump has vaulted into the lead in a new national poll – Business Insider

Donald Trump speaks to supporters during a campaign stop in Canfield, Ohio. REUTERS/Mike Segar

After weeks of being down in the polls, Donald Trump has vaulted into a narrow lead over Hillary Clinton, according to a new national survey released Tuesday.

The CNN/ORC poll showed the Republican presidential nominee with 45% of the vote from likely voters. His Democratic rival earned 43% in a four-way race that included Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein.

Trump’s 2-point lead was within the poll’s margin of error of 3.5 percentage points, meaning the race is essentially tied. The real-estate mogul led by 1 point in a head-to-head race.

But Trump seems to be doing well with independent voters, a crucial bloc in any election — 49% of those voters in the CNN/ORC poll said they’d vote for Trump, while only 29% said they backed Clinton. Johnson carries a significant proportion of independents, with 16% saying they’d vote for him.

Trump, however, is in trouble with minority voters — 71% of nonwhites in the CNN/ORC poll said they preferred Clinton.

Despite Trump’s recent rise in the polls — a CNN/ORC poll from early August, for comparison, showed Clinton with an 8-point lead — most voters surveyed said they still expect Clinton to win in November.

Clinton has consistently topped Trump since general-election polling began. Trump briefly took the lead over Clinton after the Republican National Convention in July, but Clinton came out on top again after the Democrats’ convention the next week.

Another poll released Tuesday shows Clinton ahead of Trump by 4 points in a four-way race with Johnson and Stein. The NBC News/Survey Monkey poll has Clinton with 48% of the vote and Trump with 42%.

The race has been narrowing in recent weeks, with Clinton seeing her large leads over Trump erased in some polls.

NOW WATCH: Here’s what economists think of Trump’s proposed economic plan

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PRESS DIGEST- British Business – Sept. 6 – Reuters

The following are the top stories on the
business pages of British newspapers. Reuters has not verified
these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.

The Times

Telefónica SA has kicked off plans to float O2, its
British mobile phone business, in what could rank as one of the
biggest IPOs in City history. bit.ly/2c3c4vk

Russian investigators have launched a criminal investigation
into an energy company controlled by Viktor Vekselberg, one of
the country’s richest tycoons. bit.ly/2c3d6rc

The Guardian

Sainsbury plc is to open mini-Habitat shops and
more than double the number of Argos outlets in its supermarkets
by Christmas after finalising its £1.4bn takeover of Home Retail
Group. bit.ly/2c3czFv

U.S. product safety and testing non-profit organisation
Consumer Reports has called for Samsung Electronics Co Ltd
to initiate an official recall of all of its Galaxy
Note 7 smartphones, following a halt in sales caused by some
phablets exploding while charging. bit.ly/2c3d0Q6

The Telegraph

GlaxoSmithKline plc scored a double win today after
announcing positive results from separate studies in two of its
biggest divisions: respiratory and vaccines.

Sky News

North Korea has fired three ballistic missiles into the sea
off its east coast, South Korea has said. bit.ly/2c3cLEJ

Santander UK plc is weighing a takeover bid for
one of the UK’s biggest credit card groups in a move that could
cast doubt on its interest in buying a separate set of assets
from the state-backed Royal Bank of Scotland.

The Independent

Junior doctors’ strikes set to take place for five
consecutive days next week have been called off following
concerns for patient safety. ind.pn/2c3cYI2

Theresa May has said the UK’s relations with China are
“about more than Hinkley” as speculation mounted that the Prime
Minister could pull back from the symbolically important £18 bln
nuclear scheme. ind.pn/2c3dlTc

(Compiled by Abinaya Vijayaraghavan in Bengaluru; Editing by
Sandra Maler)

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Clinton visits US casino hub to attack Trump's business record – Reuters

Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton smiles during a campaign rally, where she received the endorsement of U.S. President Barack Obama, in Charlotte, North Carolina, U.S., July 5, 2016.

Reuters/Jonathan Ernst

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton will journey on Wednesday to the gambling center of Atlantic City, site of some of Donald Trump’s biggest corporate projects, to attack the business record of her Republican rival for the White House.

Clinton is putting a spotlight on Trump’s casino bankruptcies and complaints against him by contractors to argue that the New York businessman cannot be trusted to set economic policy from the White House.

Her attack on Trump’s business dealings comes as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee has blasted her integrity following an FBI report that criticized her use of private email during her tenure as secretary of state.

On Tuesday, FBI Director James Comey said the agency would recommend no criminal charges against Clinton for her use of private email servers. But Comey rebuked her for what he said was “extremely careless” handling of classified material on her email servers, and contradicted her claims that she never transmitted or received classified material on that email system.

Republican lawmakers criticized Comey for what they saw as lax treatment of Clinton, and on Wednesday, committee chairman Jason Chaffetz, a Republican, announced that Comey will testify before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Thursday to explain the bureau’s “surprising and confusing” recommendation.

A Clinton campaign official said that in Atlantic City, the Democratic presidential candidate would highlight Trump’s history of bankruptcies, his dealings with contractors and job losses related to his business activities.

The official said Clinton would emphasize Trump’s promise to “do for the country what I did for my business” to warn that he is unfit to manage economic policy.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Clinton has used criticism of Trump’s business dealings as a way to illustrate one of her principle campaign themes – that the wealthy real estate developer is only interested in boosting his financial bottom line, and is not concerned about the economic struggles of working Americans.

    “He’s written a lot of books about business, they all seem to end at Chapter 11. Go figure,” Clinton said at a rally in Ohio last month, a reference to Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.

    Trump has defended his bankruptcy filings on casinos and other projects as legitimate legal avenues designed to help businesses manage their debts. He tweeted recently that he was “the king of debt.”

It was unclear if Clinton would address the FBI’s announcement regarding its year-long probe into her email practices.

The FBI has been investigating whether Clinton broke the law as result of personal email servers kept in her Chappaqua, New York, home while she was secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, including whether she mishandled classified information on the servers.

Clinton’s campaign welcomed the end of the FBI probe, which had cast a cloud over her run for the White House, but Comey’s criticisms were likely to reinforce what polls show are public concerns about her honesty and trustworthiness.

(Additional reporting by Amanda Becker; Editing by Caren Bohan and Bill Trott)

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Soccer star Leo Messi sentenced to 21 months in prison, but will avoid actual jail time – Business Insider

[unable to retrieve full-text content]

Business Insider

Soccer star Leo Messi sentenced to 21 months in prison, but will avoid actual jail time Business Insider A judge first ruled against Messi and his father in October 2014, saying “in this type of crime, it is not necessary for someone to have complete knowledge of all the accounting and business operations nor the exact quantity, rather it is sufficient to … and more »

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Clinton visits US casino hub to attack Trump's business record – Reuters

Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton smiles during a campaign rally, where she received the endorsement of U.S. President Barack Obama, in Charlotte, North Carolina, U.S., July 5, 2016.

Reuters/Jonathan Ernst

Democratic presidential contender Hillary Clinton will journey on Wednesday to the gambling center of Atlantic City, site of some of Donald Trump’s biggest corporate projects, to attack the business record of her Republican rival for the White House.

Clinton is putting a spotlight on Trump’s casino bankruptcies and complaints against him by contractors to argue that the New York businessman cannot be trusted to set economic policy from the White House.

Her attack on Trump’s business dealings comes as the Republican presidential nominee has blasted her integrity following an FBI report that criticized her use of private email during her tenure as secretary of state.

On Tuesday, FBI Director James Comey said the agency would recommend no criminal charges be filed against Clinton for her use of private email servers. But Comey rebuked Clinton for what he said was “extremely careless” handling of classified material on her email servers, and contradicted her claims that she never transmitted or received classified material on that email system.

A Clinton campaign official said that in Atlantic City, the Democratic presidential candidate would highlight Trump’s history of bankruptcies, his dealings with contractors and job losses related to his business activities.

The official said Clinton would emphasize Trump’s promise to “do for the country what I did for my business” to warn that he is unfit to manage economic policy.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Clinton has used criticism of Trump’s business dealings as a way to illustrate one of her principle campaign themes – that the wealthy real estate developer is only interested in boosting his financial bottom line, and is not concerned about the economic struggles of working Americans.

    “He’s written a lot of books about business, they all seem to end at Chapter 11. Go figure,” Clinton said at a rally in Ohio last month, a reference to Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.

    Trump has defended his bankruptcy filings on casinos and other projects as legitimate legal avenues designed to help businesses manage their debts. He tweeted recently that he was “the king of debt.”

It was unclear if Clinton would address the FBI’s announcement regarding its year-long probe into her email practices.

The FBI has been investigating whether Clinton broke the law as result of personal email servers kept in her Chappaqua, New York, home while she was secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, including whether she mishandled classified information on the servers.

Clinton’s campaign welcomed the end of the FBI probe, which had cast a cloud over her run for the White House, but Comey’s criticisms were likely to reinforce what polls show are public concerns about her honesty and trustworthiness.

(Additional reporting by Amanda Becker; Editing by Caren Bohan and Ralph Boulton)

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