Month: January 2020

FREE NOW taxis become ‘JAM Card’ friendly to help passengers with learning and communication difficulties

FREE NOW taxis are to become JAM Card (‘Just a Minute’) friendly as part of a new partnership that will support the service provided to passengers with learning and communication difficulties.

Created by Belfast-based social enterprise NOW Group, the JAM Card and app has been developed to help people with autism, brain injury or related speech impediments to ask discreetly for a minute of patience when carrying out everyday activities that others take for granted.

Driver Ambassadors using the FREE NOW app will get free, customised training in partnership with NOW Group to help them support JAM Card passengers and to take account of the hidden disabilities that affect many taxi users across Ireland.

Leeann Kelly, Business Development Manager at NOW Group, said: “Mobility and freedom of movement are vital aspects of every-day life for all people, regardless of ability or capacity. We are extremely pleased to have FREE NOW Driver Ambassadors join the growing JAM Card Community. For those with a learning difficulty, autism or any communication barrier, the JAM Card allows users to relay to others that they may need a little extra time in a simple, effective non-verbal manner.  FREE NOW is leading the way in the private hire industry in terms of providing training to its staff to meet the diverse and varied needs of Ireland’s population.” 

Fiona Brady, Head of Operations at FREE NOW said: “Our aim is to make mobility as simple and hassle-free as possible for everyone and we believe supporting JAM Card friendly training for drivers using the FREE NOW app, will improve the service experience for thousands of our customers. 

“The JAM Card is a very powerful initiative that helps thousands of people across the country and we are delighted to support it. We want to provide drivers with the tools to cater for the diverse service needs of all of our passengers in Ireland, so we are delighted to partner with the NOW Group on what is an extremely innovative, worthwhile initiative.”

FREE NOW is the first Irish taxi operator to recognise the JAM Card initiative and is working hard to help taxi drivers cater for all passengers by offering training to those using the app. This development follows its recently announced free Wheelchair Accessible Vehicle training programme, which has seen over 300 drivers already complete the training to improve service levels to passengers that are wheelchair users.

The NOW Group is working with FREE NOW to deliver a training package based on an e-learning platform and face-to-face interaction with drivers to support them to deliver the best JAM Card friendly service possible.  Since being established in 2011, over 35,000 JAM Cards have been issued across the UK and Ireland. In 2017 NOW Group designed a JAM Card app which lets users rate the customer service they receive from participating service providers. In November 2018, NOW Group won the ‘UK: Tech for Good Award’ for the JAM Card App.

JAM Cards are available from the FREE NOW driver office on 11 Mount Street Upper, Dublin 2, or from designated TFI transport hubs.  The public can also request one directly from NOW Group by visiting the JAM Card website and filling out the request form. There is also a JAM Card app available for Android and iOS.

 

Next government must invest in innovation and ensure patient access to medtech – Irish Medtech Association. #MedTech #Health

The Irish Medtech Association, the Ibec group that represents the medtech sector, today launched its “Priorities for the next Government: Investing in Innovation, Investing in People”. Ireland is one of the top five global medtech hubs with 9 of the world’s top 10 medtech companies having a base here. With the right policies, the Association believes the industry can take a greater share of the global medtech market which is forecast to grow to €530 billion by 2024. The Irish Medtech Association’s priorities sets out recommendations under three pillars:

PILLAR 1: Health and patient access

  • Ensure the effective implementation of the new EU Medical Device Regulations
  • Promote regulatory convergence after Brexit and the recognition of CE marks
  • Make sure any Health Technology Assessment regulations are fit-for-purpose

PILLAR 2: Enterprise and Innovation

  • Embrace new technologies with advanced manufacturing
  • Nurture entrepreneurship and support disruptive innovation
  • Advocate for tax policies that align profits with substance
  • Establish Ireland as a leader for gender leadership in manufacturing

PILLAR 3: Education and skills

  • Support lifelong learning for a worldclass knowledge economy
  • Safeguard the sustainability of the new apprenticeships programmes

Chair of the Irish Medtech Association and S3 Connected Health CEO John O’Brien said, “Manufacturing is a vital part of the Irish economy, with major clusters in Galway, Limerick, Cork, Waterford, Sligo and Dublin, but as we plan for the future there is a serious gap in the Irish innovation ecosystem which the next Government must address. We are calling on the next Government to invest ambitiously in an advanced discrete manufacturing centre of scale by adding €30 million to the IDA-led centre, with a well-coordinated governance structure that includes industry, to help companies take new technologies from proof of concept to commercialisation.

For Irish manufacturers to compete they need to embrace new technologies such as AI, data analytics and 3D printing, as well as provide access for professionals to these technologies to ensure that they are equipped to embrace industry 4.0. To help Irish people prepare for the jobs of the future, the next Government must foster lifelong learning by continuing to support the Irish Medtech Skillnet and ensuring the sustainability of the new manufacturing apprenticeships.”

Ireland is one of the top locations for medtech FDI investment in Europe and has per capita the greatest employer of medtech professionals in Europe, but O’Brien warned that changes in EU regulations could jeopardise this; “A high bar is set for manufacturers to demonstrate safety, efficacy and clinical benefit for medtech products to get to market. This is strengthened under the EU Medical Devices Regulation, but over the past two and half years while industry has been preparing for the biggest regulatory change in over two decades policymakers have failed to ensure that the regulatory system is ready for tens of thousands of life transforming technologies to transition under the 26 May deadline.

The EU has historically been a location of choice for the launch of innovative medical technologies with Ireland being chosen by many FDI multinationals as a gateway to it the EU’s €115 billion market. Now a lack of predictability under the EU Regulations and increasingly favourable regulatory regimes in other markets such as the United States is undermining this position. The Irish Medtech Association is calling on the next Government to work with the EU to conduct a ‘readiness check’ to identify and prioritise the main implementation challenges. Additionally, policymakers must work with the EU to maintain access to life transforming medical devices certified in the UK and avoid regulatory divergence after Brexit.”

 

Organizations call for sustainable action on Circular Electronics Day. #CircularElectronicsDay

Electronic products come with social and environmental challenges, many of them linked to today’s linear economy. January 24 is Circular Electronics Day, an initiative aiming to encourage organizations and consumers to take a more responsible approach to the electronic goods they use.

In today’s linear economy, we take virgin natural resources to manufacture products, which often have a short lifespan before they are discarded. This leads to a number of serious sustainability issues, affecting human health and the environment. From raw materials extraction to final assembly, working hours, health and safety and forced labor are examples of industry-wide issues. Conflict minerals used in IT products are known to fuel wars and human rights abuses. Hazardous substances present a wide variety of risks. Valuable natural resources are overused and the problem with e-waste is severe. Worldwide, 50 million metric tons of electronic waste are generated every year. It is often handled in unsafe ways, leading to human health problems and environmental degradation.

Even though manufacturers hold the ultimate responsibility for their products, other stakeholders such as policy makers, NGO’s, and purchasers need to work together and contribute to solutions.

“Buyers have the power to influence the industry to move in a more sustainable direction. By making responsible purchasing decisions, they can have a direct effect on human health, lives, and the environment,” says Andreas Rehn, development manager at TCO Development, the organization behind the global sustainability certification for IT products, TCO Certified.

The organizers of Circular Electronics Day encourage both individuals and organizations to use electronics more responsibly and inspire others to take circular action with the hashtag #CircularElectronicsDay. While large organizations have more power to make a difference, everyone can contribute. Decisions made before purchasing a product has the most significant impact.

  • Consider if you really need the product.

  • Can you buy it second hand?

  • Is it possible to rent the product?

  • Can you repair or refurbish an old product?

“Keeping products and materials in use longer is the single most effective thing we can do to lower the negative impact and reduce e-waste. Electronics contain scarce, valuable resources and should never be treated as waste. Instead, materials should be recirculated and used in new products”, says Andreas Rehn.

If repairing, renting or buying the product second hand is not an option and you have decided to purchase a new product, think about the following to extend product life:

  • If you can, purchase a high-performance product. It enables you to keep it for a longer time, through your own use or by a second-hand owner.

  • Choose a durable and robust product that can withstand wear and tear.

  • Make sure that the design of the product you buy allows for repairs and upgrades, that service manuals and spare parts are easily available, and that the battery is replaceable.

  • To make your purchasing decision easier, look for a sustainability certification that includes circular criteria. Select a certification compliant with ISO 14024. Criteria must then be comprehensive, relevant and cover the product’s full life cycle. Compliance with the criteria must be verified by an independent part.

  • Sell your old product, or hand it in to a refurbishing or recycling facility, or another collection point where the materials are taken care of. Many retailers and second-hand shops accept that you leave your old products with them for refurbishing or recycling.

  • Climate compensate the negative impact of your new product by offsetting the e-waste footprint, either by recycling a product with a similar footprint or by purchasing the offsetting as a service.

“When organizations join together, we can drive real change. At Circular Electronics Day, we want to inspire and set examples of how consumers and organizations can have a large impact through small, everyday decisions,” says Hanna Ljungkvist Nordin from IVL Swedish Environmental Institute, one of the initiators of Circular Electronics Day.

Language app @Busuu acquires live video tutoring company Verbling. #Video #Busuu #Language

Busuu, one of the world’s most popular language-learning platforms, today announced that it has acquired the live video tutoring company Verbling. The double-digit million dollar acquisition sees Busuu expand into the live video tutoring space for its consumer users and corporate clients.

Busuu recently surpassed 100 million users globally, acquiring one new user every three seconds. This makes Busuu one of the world’s fastest-growing EdTech companies, disrupting the growing, $60 billion language learning industry. The company, which reached cash flow break-even last year, plans to generate over $40 million in revenues in 2020, eyeing to go public in the future.

Verbling was founded in San Francisco in 2011 by the Swedish co-founders Mikael Bernstein (CEO) and Gustav Rydstedt (CTO) who met while studying at Stanford University. After attending the prestigious Y-Combinator program, Verbling raised over 4.4m USD from renowned investors such as Learn Capital, DFJ and Bullpen Capital. The platform has over 10,000 pre-vetted live teachers and offers interactive 1-1 lessons in nearly 60 different languages.

“No matter how smart technology becomes, language will always be about human interaction – which is exactly why Busuu was built around a learning community,” commented Bernhard Niesner, Co-Founder and CEO, Busuu. “Offering live video tutoring through our acquisition of Verbling is a natural progression for our business, and gives us the potential to expand beyond just language learning in the future.”

“We are very excited to be joining forces with Busuu’s talented and experienced team,” commented Mikael Bernstein, Co-Founder and CEO, Verbling. “Combining our world-class tutors with Busuu’s AI-powered platform will enable language learners across the globe to reach proficiency even faster.”

Following the acquisition, Verbling’s team members, including co-founders Mikael Bernstein (CEO) and Gustav Rydstedt (CTO) will join Busuu. In addition to its expanded team, Busuu will also open a new office in Madrid, where the company was initially founded in 2008 before moving its headquarters to London in 2012.

Busuu will launch Busuu Live using Verbling’s platform, which will be made available to the company’s 100 million consumer users and 200+ corporate clients in the coming months. With the addition of Busuu Live, Busuu is by far the most comprehensive language-learning product on the market, offering AI-powered grammar and vocabulary training, multimedia lessons designed by experts, and content from world-leading publishers such as The New York Times, The Economist and El Pais.

Giftr launches globally. – An app that changes how you interact with memories. #Gifs #Giftr #AR #Apps

Everyday billions of GIFs are sent across the globe. The use of GIF’s is growing, because GIFs allow users to express their personality beyond simple words or emojis, but what if you could put yourself in a GIF? Giftr is here to give you the freedom to create GIFs from your own memories, which brings you into your GIF’s, adding a personal dimension to the format.

Launching today, Giftr will be equipped with support for 34 languages, 7 million filters and 27 editing tools with more to come. The foundation for creating Giftr was to rediscover, explore and browse your old memories in a new way. Utilising new technology, such as GIPHY’s SDK so users can layer GIPHY Stickers onto their own GIFs, Giftr will be seamlessly fast and offers a completely new experience for editing your memories.

Giftr comes from Philippe Levieux, the same person who brought you Infltr. Infltr is the global hit application that gave you an infinite amount of filters and has become the most powerful editor for all media types. With 800k monthly active users and at least 200k stories sent to Snapchat daily. Snapchat has allowed integration for Giftr and here is what they had to say,

“Creative Kit allows Snapchatters to bring their favorite parts of other apps into the conversation with their best friends on Snapchat. When the Infltr team integrated Creative Kit to allow sharing of their creations on Snapchat, we were thrilled to see their community really embrace the feature, using it 200,000 times a day on average and to-date totaling over 40M Snapchat shares,” said Alston Cheek, Director, Platform Partnerships at Snap Inc. “We’re excited to bring Creative Kit to their new app, Giftr, and can’t wait to see how the community uses it to talk about their favorite GIFs with their friends on Snapchat.”

Giftr is an app that keeps surprising. Using a special AR feature that lets you interact with a globe. All your memories are positioned where you took them, making the connection between the memory and the place so much stronger. GIFs are perfect for sharing and Giftr is working with GIPHY to help you share your creativity.

“Whether you’re sending a GIF of your favorite TV show or layering a GIPHY Sticker onto your photo, GIFs in any form have the capacity to make everyday conversations more entertaining,” said Lydia Getachew, Business Development Manager at GIPHY. “This is why we’re encouraged to see how our SDK partners, like Giftr, are leveraging GIPHY’s technology to bring more creativity and — in Giftr’s case — personalization to people’s lives and favorite memories.” – GIPHY

Your privacy is important to Giftr and it does everything locally on your phone, making it perfect for offline use as well. Once you’re back online you can share your memories through your favorite platforms. Starting the decade off with a powerful tool that lets you recapture your memories and provides a new way to create them.

“We designed the algorithm to bring back memories in the most joyful way. There is something therapeutic about opening Giftr and discovering golden moments that are animated on your screen.” – Phillippe Levieux, Giftr creator.

Giftr is available to download on the App Store.

Avaya Appoints Steve Joyner as Managing Director for UK and Ireland. #Avaya

Avaya Holdings Corp, a global leader in enterprise & business solutions to enhance and simplify communications and collaboration, today announced the appointment of Steve Joyner as Managing Director of the UK and Ireland (UK&I). Reporting to Ronald Rubens, Vice President, Europe, Joyner will champion Avaya’s customer-first culture and lead his team to help build experiences that matter for their customers in their digital transformation journey. 

Joyner will also lead the company’s evolution into a cloud-centric communications provider and help to drive excellence in executing Avaya’s global cloud strategy in the UK&I region.  

Joyner began at Avaya following the acquisition of Nortel in 2009 and has held multiple engineering, sales and channel roles in the UK and the Middle East over his successful, 30-year career. Prior to being appointed UK&I Managing Director, Joyner was the company’s European channel lead. In this role, he led a team of regional channel managers to drive significant growth through an extensive, diversified network of business partners and resellers across Europe. He played a critical role in improving the company’s various channel programs globally and expanding its channel business.  

 

“Steve’s appointment comes at an exciting time for Avaya with our transition to cloud and the strategic partnership with RingCentral & introduction of Avaya Cloud Office. The company is poised to offer a real competitive advantage by providing our customers with a seamless journey to cloud communications. With his extensive industry experience, Steve will be instrumental in delivering our global cloud-first strategy in the region.” – Ronald Rubens, Vice President, Europe, Avaya 

“I am very excited to be taking on this role at such an important time in the Avaya story. The company has continued to lead the market in customer and employee experience in recent years and we’re ready to go even further in 2020. I look forward to working with the team here to drive growth and bring even more value to our partners and customers in the UK and Ireland with our full suite of cloud-first solutions.” – Steve Joyner, Managing Director, UK&I, Avaya

First look at the Zhiyun Smooth Q2 Mobile Gimbal. #ZHIYUN #Gimbal #Tech

Looking to improve your creativity or filming skills? Well this could be the tech for you. A first for me and something I have been looking into in a while now is a gimbal for videos and so on. Of course there is a variety of these out there to buy today but this one got going off a kickstarter campaign which was very successful and is now available to purchase.

As mentioned this is my first such gimbal so I will be testing this out in the coming week or two and share my findings then and in the interim if you have any questions feel to ask.

Key features include

Quickly switches to vertical mode for a portrait-style look
The powerful torque motor eliminates the need for counterweights with larger loads such as the iPhone 11 Pro Max or when using accessories
USB Type-C port for charging the smartphone while shooting
Object-tracking, motion-lapse, vortex, and time-lapse modes
Charge your smartphone using the USB Type-C port while mounted
Removable 4500mAh 21700 battery with 16-hour battery life and 3-hour charge time with a separately available charger
Bluetooth 5.0 connectivity allows you to control the photo and video record functions of your smartphone camera without an app
Uses the Zhiyun-Tech ZY Play app to transfer and edit video, change modes and settings, and upgrade the firmware

First look at the PaMu slide True Wireless earbuds. #TrueWireless #Tech #Padmate

The PaMu slide True Wireless is a new pair on earbuds on the market and offer great specs for the money which in this case will set you back around €120. Now some might say that is hefty but its not if you want to get something decent for you money and these have some really good specs on offer but at the end of the day it is how they perform which most people prefer.

Well presented to begin with and that for me is a good sign and comes packed with features you would expect at higher priced earbuds we will be checking these out over the next week or two and will be reporting back on how these sound and an overall performance so if you have any questions in the meantime feel free to ask, Check out the video below and the specs listed.

  • Stable Bluetooth 5.0 connection thanks to Qualcomm QCC3020
  • Qualcomm AptX Classic
  • 2000mAh+85mAh*2 battery
  • 10h playback time
  • 60-hour battery time with charging case
  • Call audio in both ears
  • Auto pairing
  • Touch control
  • IPX6 certified water-resistance & sweat-resistance
  • USB Type-C fast charge
  • Acts as wireless mobile phone charger
  • Low-power dissipation
  • 6 sizes of silicon secure-fit eartips
  • 3 colours available: Black, White & Green

BUY HERE 

 

Review – XIAOMI Mijia IMILAB H.265 1080P 360° Night Version Smart AI IP Camera Home Baby Monitor Pan-tilt Webcam

This camera is a first with some of the capabilities on board and for the price those capabilities are something we need to see in more home security cameras of its type and those features are the 360 rotation and AI built in which enables the camera to follow its subject anywhere in the room depending on where you place it of course but having said that it tracks you from any angle and as soon as you walk into the room you will be followed which is really cool.

There is some cameras out there today that indeed do this but with limitations and this camera beats them in some with its pan and tilt option and again you can track things from your smartphone too using the feature in the app. For the price you pay for this is its really good to see and I feel we will see more,there is others out there I have not tried yet personally but I like what I see here at this price.

 

Set up is simple you just need to download the app and connect to your Wi-Fi and what was nice here the camera will speak to you on the set up process which makes life easier for those who are no tech savvy In short once both connected you will point a QR code on your device at the camera and then you are good to go.

 

The camera can be placed anywhere in the home but this is a wired indoor camera but does not require a hub and the app is simple to use which you will see in its full in the video below and placement of the camera can be anywhere once you are near a power socket, You will require and SD card for file storage and you can access files and the camera on the go from you mobile phone and control the camera itself if you just want to check on things should you wish.

 

Quality itself is good this will depend to on your Wi-Fi connection like any other security camera when it comes to lag and so on which I  suffer from time to time due to the amount of connected devices I have here at home at any given time. Build quality is solid and given this is a rotating ball so to speak its not in any way loose or any rattles and it is also quite when its doing its thing moving around.

For the money you pay here this one is certainly one I would suggest looking given its features however everyone is different but the ability here with the tilt and zoom options and this also ideal for those with kids perhaps and want to keep an eye on pets too and more,Head on down to the video for a detailed look at what you can do.

Features..

 Remote Viewing Automatic Alarm 
The Mijia APP can not only view real-time video remotely, but also make two-way voice calls. When the watching home mode is turned on, the camera detects an abnormal situation and automatically records the alarm video and pushes it to the mobile phone.

– AI Humanoid Detection

After the Mijia APP has turned on the housekeeping mode, the camera detects an abnormal situation, automatically records the alarm video, and pushes the message to the phone. Combined with AI technology, the algorithm is optimized for the target, effectively reducing the invalid alarm and making the alarm more accurate.
– HD Panoramic Night Vision Enhancement
With dual motor drive, the control unit 360° horizontal rotation adjusts the angle of view, high-definition picture quality allows the picture to retain more details, noise reduction infrared night vision, even at night, can present a clear picture
– Watch Smooth And Save Space
Adopting H.265 video coding technology, the viewing is smoother under the same network conditions, and the video takes up less space.
– Smart Linkage, Security Upgrade 

With Mijia APP, you can mix with other Mijia smart products, you can customize your own personalized scene to better protect the privacy of individuals and family.

– Support Multi-person Terminal Remote Viewing 
Support mobile phone/tablet remote viewing, and share real-time pictures to family and friends at the same time. For historical video recording stored in Micro SD Card, support 1x/4x/6x double speed playback, which can be quickly searched, saving time and effort