YCLOAK

Nevada Lab: Quake-resistant Bridge Design Tests Well

By Ytech on Thursday, September 21, 2017

Scientists at a Nevada earthquake lab Wednesday tested new bridge designs with connectors they say are innovative and created to better withstand violent temblors and speed reconstruction efforts after major quake damage.

University of Nevada, Reno engineers performed the experiments on a giant “shake table” to simulate violent motions of an earthquake to rattle a 100-ton (91-metric ton), 70 foot (21-meter) bridge model to determine how well it would hold up.

The tests, conducted a day after a big quake struck Mexico, shook large concrete columns and beams back and forth for about 30 seconds at a time, displacing some nearly a foot before returning largely to their original spot.

Graduate students measured and marked indications of tiny fractures but no major structural damage was observed in the initial review of the experiments.

“The bridge has done better than we expected,” said Saiid Saiidi, a professor of civil and environmental engineering who served as the project leader. He’s done related research for more than 30 years.

Bridges are already designed not to collapse in earthquakes but often are unsafe for travel after big quakes. He said the designs that were tested employed special types of connectors to link prefabricated bridge parts, including ultra-high performance concrete.

“Earthquakes by themselves don’t kill people, it’s the structures,” Saiidi said.

The elements have been tested on their own but never before combined in a bridge model subjected to realistic earthquake motions, like the 1994 Northridge, California quake. Wednesday’s test inside the University of Nevada’s Earthquake Engineering Laboratory simulated activity of a quake as large as magnitude 7.5.

Some design work by the engineers has been incorporated into a highway off-ramp under construction in Seattle. It’s the first bridge in the world that uses flexible columns and reinforcement bars made out of a metal alloy with titanium that bends and then springs back into shape when quakes hit.

Among other things, the innovative connectors allow for prefabricated concrete and other materials to be attached to an existing bridge foundation so as to speed repair and reconstruction.

Part of the research centers on a so-called “pipe pin” connection developed by the California Department of Transportation’s bridge designers for use in connecting certain beam interfaces in bridge construction.

The pin consists of a steel pipe that is anchored in the column and extended into a steel can embedded in the beam. A gap between the steel pipe and the can enables the extended segment to freely rotate inside the steel can and prevents bending of the protruded segment inside the can.

The University of Nevada’s Earthquake Engineering Lab is the largest of its kind in the United States.

The latest project is funded by the California Department of Transportation, which currently is developing plans for 10 pilot projects based on the developing bridge connector technology.

“This study today is going to allow them to make observations of those designs,” Saiidi said.
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Science

Scientists Remove Gene in Human Embryos to See What It Does

By Yscien on Thursday, September 21, 2017

British scientists have used a genome editing tool known as CRISPR/Cas9 to knock out a gene in embryos just a few days old, testing the technique’s ability to decipher key gene functions in early human development.

The researchers said their experiments, using a technology that is the subject of fierce international debate because of fears that it could be used to create babies to order, will deepen understanding of the biology of early human development.

CRISPR/Cas9 can enable scientists to find and modify or replace genetic defects. Many describe it as game changing.

Role of key gene

“One way to find out what a gene does in the developing embryo is to see what happens when it isn’t working,” said Kathy Niakan, a stem cell scientists who led the research at Britain’s Francis Crick Institute. “Now we have demonstrated an efficient way of doing this, we hope that other scientists will use it to find out the roles of other genes.”

She said her hope was for scientists to decipher the roles of all the key genes embryos need to develop successfully. This could then improve IVF treatments for infertile couples and also help doctors understand why so many pregnancies fail.

“It may take many years to achieve such an understanding, our study is just the first step,” Niakan said.

No gene, no protein

Niakan’s team decided to use it to stop a key gene from producing a protein called OCT4, which normally becomes active in the first few days of human embryo development.

They spent more than a year optimizing their various techniques using mouse embryos and human embryonic stem cells in lab dishes, before starting work on human embryos.

To inactivate OCT4, they used CRISPR/Cas9 to change the DNA of 41 human embryos. After seven days, embryo development was stopped and the embryos were analyzed.

After an egg is fertilized, it divides for about seven days when it forms a ball of around 200 cells called a blastocyst, Niakan explained in a briefing about her work.

Her results, published in the journal Nature on Wednesday, found that human embryos need OCT4 to form a blastocyst. Without it, the blastocyst cannot form or develop normally.

US research

The British team’s work comes on the heels of milestone science in the United States, where scientists said in July they had succeeded in altering the genes of a human embryo to correct a disease-causing mutation.

Rob Buckle, chief science officer at Britain’s Medical Research Council, praised Niakan’s research and findings: “Genome editing technologies — particularly CRISPR-Cas9 used in this study — are having a game-changing effect on our ability to understand the function of critical human genes,” he said.

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Science

Study Finds Stereotypes About Boys, Girls Begin at Early Age

By Yscien on Thursday, September 21, 2017

Whether children live in Baltimore, Beijing, Nairobi or New Delhi, by the time they are 15, boys are told to go outside and have adventures, while girls are told to stay indoors and do housework. Furthermore, most girls are told that if they are raped or have sex, they are the ones at fault.

A new study by adolescent-health specialists interviewed 450 poor children and their parents about gender expectations in a total of 15 high-, low- and middle-income countries. The children included in the study, the first of its kind, were between the ages of 10 and 14.

“When we started this work, there was no research at all, no understanding at all of young adolescents,” said Robert Blum, director of the Global Early Adolescent Study at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. “There was an assumption that these were young children, and they aren’t cued into gender-based violence, gender messages, rape and things of that nature.

“What we see is that around the world, young people have keen awareness, and they’re very cued in to what’s going on.”

The key finding was that rigidly held and enforced gender expectations are linked to increased lifelong health risks — everything from HIV and depression to violence and suicide.

Messages internalized

“We found children at a very early age, from the most conservative to the most liberal societies, quickly internalize this myth that girls are vulnerable and boys are strong and independent,” Blum told VOA. “And this message is being constantly reinforced at almost every turn, by siblings, classmates, teachers, parents, guardians, relatives, clergy and coaches.”

The researchers found that in most cultures, by the time girls are 10 years old, they have been taught that their key asset is their physical appearance.

Lead researcher Kristin Mmari said no matter where they are, girls are concerned about their bodies, and others’ attitudes to them. “In New Delhi, the girls talked about their bodies as a big risk that needs to be covered up, while in Baltimore, girls told us their primary asset was their bodies and they need to look appealing, but not too appealing.”

Venkatraman Chandra-Mouli of the World Health Organization said violence against women is so pervasive that one in three women experience violence from their husbands or other sexual partners. “Social norms accept that a woman has to be beaten,” Chandra-Mouli said.

He and other researchers involved in the study of adolescents’ gender norms discussed their findings at the National Press Club in Washington.

Pressure on boys

The researchers found that boys do not emerge unscathed from gender expectations. They found that the pressure boys face to become physically strong and independent make them more likely to be victims of physical violence and homicide, and more likely to take up unhealthy habits like tobacco, drug and alcohol use.

The study was a collaboration between the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the World Health Organization. The Journal of Adolescent Health has published a supplement to its October issue incorporating a number of articles on the subject, along with commentaries by Blum, Chandra-Mouli and others.

Adolescents are torn between opposing expectations, the study showed, especially girls.

In Shanghai, for example, girls are told they should be economically independent, and that they should not rely on men for financial support. At the same time, girls are told their husbands will divorce them if they don’t do housework.

The goal was to understand the factors in early adolescence that predispose young people to subsequent sexual health risks and promote healthy sexuality.

The conclusion was that societies wishing to have healthier adolescents and young adults, free of gender stereotypes, must intervene, where necessary, before children reach age 10. Chandra-Mouli said WHO hopes to use the data from the study to shape programs to change misunderstandings about gender norms.

Blum said the researchers will measure changes in their subjects three times over five years to see how perceptions of gender affect individuals’ lives and how programs change the outcome.
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Science

California Condors Return to the Skies After Near Extinction

By Yscien on Thursday, September 21, 2017

In a remote, rugged valley overlooking the Pacific Ocean, researchers closely monitor an endangered icon: the California condor.

The giant vultures flap their wings and circle the sky before perching on branches and observing their observers.

Wildlife biologist Amy List uses a handheld antenna to track the birds, which wear radio transmitters and numbered tags.

“If we don’t know what they’re doing, we don’t know what’s going wrong,” said List, who works for the Ventana Wildlife Society, which manages the condor sanctuary in Big Sur.

Three decades after being pushed to the brink of extinction, the California condor is making a comeback in the wild, but constant vigilance is needed to ensure the endangered bird doesn’t reverse course.

One of the world’s largest birds with a wingspan up to 10 feet, the condor once patrolled the sky from Mexico to British Columbia. But its population plummeted in the 20th century due to lead poisoning, hunting and habitat destruction.

In 1987, wildlife officials captured the last remaining 22 condors and took them to the San Diego and Los Angeles zoos to be protected and bred in captivity.

Those efforts have led to a slow but steady recovery for a species that reproduces slowly compared with other birds. There are now roughly 450 condors, including about 270 in the wild in California, Arizona, Utah and northeastern Mexico.

Plans also are underway to release some captive-bred condors in Redwood National Park in 2019 to establish a population near the California-Oregon border.

Federal officials said in August that for the first time in nearly 40 years, condors were roosting in the Blue Ridge National Wildlife Refuge, expanding to their historical range in the southern Sierra Nevada.

Another milestone was reached this summer: the first “third generation” condor was born in the wild in California since the 1980s.

“We’re seeing very encouraging results that the condors can become self-sustaining again,” said Kelly Sorenson, who heads the conservation group.

While condors still face threats from exposure to mercury and the pesticide DDT, biologists say the biggest danger is lead ammunition, which can poison the scavengers when they eat dead animals shot with lead bullets. California banned the use of lead ammunition near condor feeding grounds in 2008 and will be the first state to ban lead bullets in all hunting in 2019.

“We’re already starting to see fewer lead deaths. The condors are surviving longer. Their blood-lead levels are coming down,” Sorenson said.

Some gun owners complain that copper bullets are more expensive and less effective than lead and point to other possible sources of lead, such as paint and metal garbage.

“Condors are getting lead poisoning. The question is, are they getting it from lead ammunition?” said Chuck Michel, president of the California Pistol and Rifle Association.

Meanwhile, the San Diego Zoo celebrated the birth of its 200th condor this year.

“While we were caring for the birds, trying to protect them and provide sanctuary, we were literally writing the book how you propagate a species, how you genetically manage it and prepare it for release back in the wild,” Michael Mace, the zoo’s birds curator.

After up to a year at the zoo, chicks are taken to a release site such as the Big Sur sanctuary, where a flock has grown to about 90 condors that travel between Big Sur and Pinnacles National Park. They scavenge, breed and raise chicks on their own, under the close watch of List, the wildlife biologist, and her colleagues.

“I hope that I’m out of a job soon because condors don’t need to be managed in the future,” she said. “I hope that they’re self-sustaining and wild and free, and nobody needs to trap or tag or monitor them at all.”
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Technology

Internet Firms Say Removing Extremist Content Within Hours Is Huge Challenge

By Ytech on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

Removing extremist content from the internet within a few hours of it appearing poses “an enormous technological and scientific challenge,” Google’s general counsel will say later Wednesday to European leaders who want it taken down quicker.

Kent Walker, general counsel for Alphabet’s Google, will speak on behalf of technology companies Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube at an event on the sidelines of the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations.

The leaders of France, Britain and Italy want to push social media companies to remove “terrorist content” from the internet within one to two hours of it appearing because they say that is the period when most material is spread.

“We are making significant progress, but removing all of this content within a few hours — or, indeed, stopping it from appearing on the internet in the first place — poses an enormous technological and scientific challenge,” Walker will say in a speech on behalf of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism, a working group formed by the four companies to combine their efforts to remove extremist content.

Tech firms have come under increasing pressure from governments in the United States and Europe to do more to keep extremist content off their platforms after a spate of militant attacks, and the European Union is mulling legislation on the issue.

“There is no silver bullet when it comes to finding and removing this content, but we’re getting much better,” Walker will say.

“Of course, finding problematic material in the first place often requires not just thousands of human hours but, more fundamentally, continuing advances in engineering and computer science research. The haystacks are unimaginably large and the needles are both very small and constantly changing.”

Walker will say the companies need human reviewers to help distinguish legitimate material such as news coverage from the problematic material and train machine-learning tools against “ever-changing examples.”

The companies last year decided to set up a joint database to share unique digital fingerprints they automatically assign to videos or photos of extremist content, known as “hashes,” to help each other detect and remove similar content.

Facebook used a hash that contained a link to bomb-making instructions to find and remove almost 100 copies of that content.

Twitter said Tuesday that it had removed 299,649 accounts in the first half of this year for the “promotion of terrorism,” while Facebook has ramped up its use of artificial intelligence to map out pages and posts with terrorist material.
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Technology

Review: Apple Watch Goes Solo, But Don’t Dump Your Phone Yet

By Ytech on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

A chief gripe with Apple Watch is that it requires you to keep an iPhone with you for most tasks. The inclusion of GPS last year helped on runs and bike rides, but you’re still missing calls and messages without the phone nearby.

A new model with its own cellular-network connection is Apple’s next step toward an untethered world. Now you can make and receive calls and messages on the watch while leaving your phone at home.

But the watch still needs regular contact with an iPhone, and for most tasks, the phone needs to be on and connected, even if it’s nowhere nearby. So, you can’t get away with ditching the iPhone altogether. (Android users have their own wristwear options, including Samsung Gear and Android Wear watches, some of which can already manage their own network connections.)

The new Apple Watch Series 3, distinguished by a red crown, comes out Friday starting at about $400. You can forgo cellular, and the red crown, for $70 less. Or get a first-generation model, without GPS, for about $250.

Where it helps

You might not want to bring your phone on a short jog; the watch can still keep you in touch. Or you can leave the phone home while walking the dog or performing a quick errand.

You need a data add-on from the same wireless provider as your phone. It typically costs $5 or $10 a month and uses the phone’s data allotment.

While the watch technically has its own phone number, the major carriers have worked out number syncing. Calls to your phone will go to the watch, and calls from the watch will appear on caller ID with your regular number. Same goes for texts and iMessage chats.

Calls use the watch’s speaker and microphone, or wireless earphones. Colleagues say call quality was fine. It came in handy for sneaking in runs during conference calls (though if you’re my boss, just kidding! Now, about that raise …).

Phone calls and iMessage chats work on the watch even if your phone is off, as do turn-by-turn maps and queries to the Siri voice assistant. For texts, the phone needs to be on — somewhere. With the phone on, you can perform a variety of other tasks, including checking weather apps, Yelp recommendations and notifications that go to the phone.

Coming soon: the ability to stream Apple Music, even with the phone off. Unfortunately, this doesn’t apply to rival music services or Apple’s podcast app.

Limitations

Because the watch screen is small, many apps offer only a sliver of information and refer you back to the phone to view more. That was little more than an annoyance when the phone was in the same room. If you’ve left the phone behind, though, you’ll be left hanging.

You can also run into trouble while roaming, particularly internationally. For one thing, engineers weren’t able to squeeze in support for cellular frequencies around the world. And outside the U.S., only a handful of carriers are supporting the cellular watch. In any case, don’t forget to switch to airplane mode on flights.

Cellular data also drains the battery quicker. Apple’s promised 18 hours of battery life includes about four hours of such use. An hour of phone calls over LTE will drain the battery completely.

I got dropped from two conference calls because the battery was low to begin with. Plan ahead. A spare watch charger at your desk helps for those days you’re dumb enough to leave your phone on the kitchen counter.

Embracing the tether

It can be handy to untether the watch at times, but it’s not always necessary. Even when tied to the phone, Series 3 offers improvement such as tracking elevation, so you get credit for climbing stairs or jogging up a hill. And you can now hear Siri responses on the watch speaker, something enabled by the new version’s faster processor.

Software update

For owners of past models, a software update out this week, watchOS 4, will bring easier access to music playback controls when exercising — just swipe left. There are more prompts when reaching or nearing daily goals, and options for multiple sports in a single workout.

A new heart rate app now shows heart rate at rest and averages when walking or recovering from exercise. These can help you gauge your overall fitness.

And if your heart rate is high without any signs of exercise, you’ll get an alert. You enable this when you first open the heart rate app. It can signal health problems, though Apple is stopping short of telling you to see a doctor or visit the emergency room, as the watch isn’t marketed — or certified — as a medical device.
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Technology

Security Firm Links Iranian Hackers to Malware Attacks

By Ytech on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

A private U.S.-based security firm is linking an Iranian government-sponsored hacking group to cyber-attacks targeted at organizations across the world.

The security firm FireEye said Wednesday the Iranian hackers used malware to attack aerospace and petrochemical firms in the United States, Saudi Arabia and South Korea.

The hacking group, dubbed APT33 (advanced persistent threat) by the FireEye researchers, used phishing emails and fake domain names to gain access to computer systems of the targeted companies.

The report suggests the hackers target the companies in an effort to “enhance Iran’s domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran’s military and strategic decision making vis-a-vis Saudi Arabia.”

“We believe the targeting of the Saudi organization may have been an attempt to gain insight into regional rivals, while the targeting of South Korean companies may be due to South Korea’s recent partnerships with Iran’s petrochemical industry as well as South Korea’s relationships with Saudi petrochemical companies,” the report reads.

The FireEye report says the hackers retained access to the companies’ computers for between four and six months at a time, during which the hackers were able to steal data and drop off malware that could potentially be used to destroy the infected computers.

It is difficult to accurately attribute cyber-attacks, but FireEye says it linked the hackers to Iran in part by tracking an online handle, “xman_1365_x,” that was accidentally left in the malware coding.

The report also notes references to the Farsi language in the malware code and that the hackers’ workdays appear to correspond with the Iranian time zone, and the Saturday to Wednesday workweek used in the country.
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Economy

Epidemic at Work?: Businesses Forced to Deal With Drug Abuse

By Yeco on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

After a troubled youth himself, Phillip Cohen made it a practice to hire people at his woodworking business who have also struggled with addiction and mental health issues. But when an employee died from a drug overdose, he adopted a zero-tolerance policy.

“I think I have saved lives,” says the owner of Cohen Architectural Woodworking in St. James, Missouri — an area hit very hard by the nation’s growing opioid epidemic. Opioids range from prescription pain medicine like oxycodone to illegal drugs like heroin.

Cohen still hires former drug addicts, felons and people who have been traumatized in life. One person, now a top employee, was hired right after he finished drug rehabilitation. Another used to sell illegal drugs. Still, Cohen says, if a worker fails a periodic random drug or alcohol test, “we’ll fire them on the spot.”

The epidemic of drug use — a report from the surgeon general last year said that 20 million Americans have a substance use disorder — is forcing many small business owners to think about what they would do if they suspect an employee is abusing drugs or alcohol.

Between 1999 and 2015 the number of overdose deaths from opioids and heroin quadrupled, the National Institute on Drug Abuse says. The government also reported more than 15 million adults with what’s called alcohol use disorder in 2015.

Over 70 percent of employers with 50 or more workers have been affected by prescription drugs, according to a survey released this year by the National Safety Council. But more than 80 percent don’t have a comprehensive drug-free workplace policy.

Although Cohen understood the dangers of drugs and knew that some staffers had a history of substance abuse, he wasn’t prepared when a worker overdosed in 2010, three days after the staffer attended a leadership conference.

“I didn’t care what people did at first,” says Cohen, whose workers use saws and other potentially dangerous machinery to create reception desks, cabinets and furniture for businesses, schools and health care facilities. But the devastating death of an employee prompted him to hire an attorney to write a tough drug policy that workers must read and sign.

“You have to draw the line somewhere,” says Cohen, who also brings in counselors and people who run support groups to help staffers who are struggling with personal problems.

Many small business owners don’t think ahead and create a written policy on alcohol and substance abuse, says employment law attorney Shira Forman. That forces them to be reactive, trying to figure out what to do when presented with an employee who shows up drunk, high or hung over, whose work is suffering or who causes an accident.

“It’s often not something that an employer knows how to deal with until they’re confronted with a scenario,” says Forman, who works at Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton in New York.

Having a policy in place doesn’t make it easier for a boss to confront a staffer they believe to have a drug or alcohol problem. It’s hard on an emotional level, especially if the employee denies there’s an issue and gets angry. But there can also be legal questions that must be considered before an owner broaches the topic.

While a staffer’s behavior might seem to point to a substance abuse problem, it’s often not a clear-cut situation, says Michael Schmidt, an employment law attorney with Cozen O’Connor in New York. An employee may have a prescription for opioids, and therefore be protected by federal, state or local laws. A staffer might have shaking hands, a sign of possible alcohol withdrawal but also a symptom of anxiety or a condition like Parkinson’s disease.

Even when it’s clear that the problem is due to drugs or alcohol, many owners seek help from a lawyer or HR professional. David Grant was taken by surprise when an employee at his public relations company told him that a co-worker had gotten drunk at a lunch with a client.

Grant turned to his human resources provider and a consultant on dealing with alcoholics.

“It was a world I don’t know anything about,” says Grant, whose eponymous company is based in New York. “I was aware of how litigious everyone is, so I did it by the book.”

Grant’s HR provider had created a substance abuse policy that he followed. He told the staffer she had a choice: go into rehabilitation treatment for a month or be fired. She chose treatment, which Grant paid for. He also warned she’d be dismissed if it happened again. And it did; a few weeks after she returned to work she was again drunk at a client lunch.

“I fired her instantly,” Grant says. He had to follow some painful advice from his consultants: “You can’t back off. You can’t be a nice guy.”

At Abbey Research, a market research firm based in Philadelphia, the substance abuse policy calls for employees to be suspended if they fail a random drug test or tell management they have a drug problem.

Their jobs will be held until they pass a drug test, since the company wants to give people a second chance, says Kristen Donnelly, who is in charge of human resources. But if they fail a second time, they’ll be fired.

The company, which seeks to help people who are struggling economically and personally, is located in a neighborhood where drug use has taken a toll. Two staffers have been suspended and then fired for drug use in the 18 months since Donnelly has headed HR.

But even afterward, the company has helped them find resources aimed at getting them back on their feet. “First and foremost they’re human beings, and they’re human beings with a disease,” Donnelly says.
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Technology

Alexa, What Do You See? Amazon Said to Be Working on Glasses

By Ytech on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

Amazon is attempting to develop glasses that pair with Alexa and would allow users to access the voice-activated assistant outside the home, according to a newspaper report.

The Financial Times, citing anonymous sources, says the glasses could be released before the end of the year.

Amazon.com Inc., based in Seattle, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Wearable technology, glasses specifically, is already in limited use. Snapchat sells $130 glasses that take a short video and post it on the social media app. And Alphabet Inc. sells Google Glass to employers, so that doctors or factory workers can search information or talk to co-workers hands free.
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Economy

China Announces Trade Secrets Crackdown to Assure Investors

By Yeco on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

China has announced a crackdown on violations of patents and trade secrets in an effort to mollify foreign companies ahead of a visit to Beijing by U.S. President Donald Trump.

The crackdown might give Beijing diplomatic ammunition to respond to mounting U.S. and European trade complaints. But it fails to address what foreign companies say are bigger problems with intellectual property protection.

The four-month campaign will attack theft of foreign trade secrets and violations of patents, copyrights and trademarks, according to a Ministry of Commerce announcement this month. It says the goal is to “increase foreign investment.”

Investment into China fell in the first half of 2017 following two decades of regular double-digit annual increases. That reflects what business groups say is growing frustration with difficult operating conditions and regulatory and other hurdles.

Companies complained for years that China was the global center for unlicensed copying of goods ranging from Hollywood movies and designer clothes to drugs and computer software. More recently, companies complain that Chinese entities try to steal technology and other trade secrets, sometimes with government encouragement.

Beijing has increased some penalties, but business groups say the Communist government needs to go much further in developing its enforcement and court system to protect intellectual property rights on which its economy increasingly depends.

“As welcome as further public commitments to protecting IPR are, this cannot be achieved through a campaign-style approach,” said Lance Noble, policy director for the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China.

“It requires a sustained commitment to enforcing existing laws and applying protections equally to foreign and domestic companies,” Noble said in an email. “Doing so is in China’s own interest.”

In a survey this year, the American Chamber of Commerce in China said the share of its member companies that cited China as a global priority dropped to 56 percent from a peak of 78 percent in 2012.

The chamber said American companies were reconsidering investment plans in China due to “unfavorable regulations” and “uncertainty about intellectual property protection.” It said 72 percent considered positive U.S.-Chinese relations important to their business but 83 percent expected them to remain the same or deteriorate.

The two governments say Trump is likely to visit China this year, though no date has been announced.

The American president agreed in April to temporarily set aside trade disputes while Washington and Beijing cooperate over North Korea. But U.S. officials have criticized Chinese policy with increasing force in recent weeks.

On Monday, the U.S. trade representative, Robert Lighthizer, complained in a speech in Washington that Chinese efforts to create industrial champions and induce foreign companies to hand over technology threaten the world trading system.
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Economy

Moody’s: Egypt Economy Still Recovering From 2011 Uprising

By Yeco on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

Egypt’s economy has started to improve but has yet to recover from the country’s 2011 uprising and the years of unrest that followed, an international credit rating agency said.

Moody’s hailed recent economic and fiscal reforms in its annual report released Tuesday, saying they point to “improved government effectiveness and policy predictability.” Weak finances, however, remain a “key challenge” for the government, it added.

Egypt embarked on an ambitious economic reform plan shortly after President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi took office in 2014. The government has slashed subsidies, imposed a value-added tax and allowed currency devaluation in order to qualify for a $12 billion bailout loan from the International Monetary Fund.

The austerity measures have hit the public hard, however, with inflation hovering around 30 percent for months, many import products unavailable, and soaring electricity and fuel costs.

Moody’s said reforms and financial support provided by international lenders have helped in restoring Egypt’s foreign reserves, which are currently above $36 billion, their highest level since December 2010.

“We also expect that Egypt’s high fiscal deficits and government debt levels will gradually reduce,” said Steffen Dyck, a Moody’s vice president.

Egypt’s Finance Minister Amr el-Garhy announced earlier this week that the country will face a $10-$12 billion budget deficit for the current fiscal year 2017-18, which started in July. He also said the government plans to plug the gap by increasing foreign debt issuance, and will announce future bond offerings in the coming weeks.

Egypt’s sovereign rating by Moody’s remains unchanged at B3, far below investment grade and subject to high credit risk, but the outlook remains stable.
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Economy

Workers in India’s Brick Kiln Industry Trapped in Perpetual Poverty

By Yeco on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

A human rights organization says millions of workers in India’s brick kiln industry are trapped in a perpetual cycle of imposed debt and low wages, which forces them to bring their children to work alongside them in the hot, dusty kilns.

An estimated 23 million workers are employed in at least 100,000 brick kilns operating across the northern state of Punjab, according to a study released Wednesday by Anti-Slavery International. Nearly all the workers are provided loans from the kiln owners before the brick making season begins, immediately putting them into debt. The owners withhold their wages during the entire season, which lasts up to 10 months, and keep no records, allowing them to pay their workers far less than what is due.

Up to 80 percent of children under 14 years old working an average of nine hours a day during the hot weather months. Because workers are paid for each piece of brick they make, families are forced to put their children to work to increase their output.

The report also says living conditions at the kilns are dire, with the air filled with dust and other chemicals and no access to running water, and entire families living in cramped rooms of just under eight meters.

Volunteers for Social Justice, which partnered with Anti-Slavery International in the report, is urging India’s government to enact a minimum wage for the brick kiln workers, along with child labor laws to ensure that children get a proper education. “It is time that the government takes that responsibility and ends this exploitation that shouldn’t be taking place in the 21st century,” says Jai Singh, the director of Volunteers for Social Justice.
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Technology

Drones May Soon Deliver Life Saving Defibrillators to Rural Areas

By Ytech on Wednesday, September 20, 2017

A cardiac arrest happens when the heart stops beating regularly, due to mixed up electrical signals. According to the American Heart Association, when cardiac arrest occurs, every minute that passes before help arrives lowers a person’s chance of surviving by seven to 10 percent. However, as we hear from VOA’s Kevin Enochs, in a crisis when every minute counts, drones may be able to quickly get help to people who live in rural areas.
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Science

Giant Antennas in New Mexico Search for Cosmic Discoveries

By Yscien on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Employing an array of giant telescopes positioned in the New Mexico desert, astronomers have started a massive surveying project aimed at producing the most detailed view ever made of such a large portion of space using radio waves emitted from throughout the Milky Way and beyond.

The National Radio Astronomy Observatory announced the project this week, saying the Very Large Array will make three scans of the sky that’s visible from the scrubland of the San Augustin Plains. It is one of the best spots on the planet to scan space, with 80 percent of the Earth’s sky visible from the location.

The array works like a camera. But instead of collecting light waves to make images, the telescopes that look like big satellite dishes receive radio waves emitted by cosmic explosions and other interstellar phenomenon.

Astronomers expect the images gathered by the array will allow them to detect in finer detail gamma ray bursts, supernovas and other cosmic events that visible-light telescopes cannot see due to dust present throughout the universe. For example, the array can peer through the thick clouds of dust and gas where stars are born.

Scientists involved in the project say the results will provide valuable information for astrophysics researchers.

“In addition to what we think [the survey] will discover, we undoubtedly will be surprised by discoveries we aren’t anticipating now,” project director Claire Chandler said in a statement. “That is the lesson of scientific history and perhaps the most exciting part of a project like this.”

The survey is possible because of a major technological upgrade at the Very Large Array, which was initially conceived in the 1960s and built in the 1970s. The antennas relied on their original electronics and processing systems for years until a recent overhaul made the system capable of producing much higher resolution images.

The work done at the Very Large Array is similar to that of the Hubble Space Telescope — making high-quality images so scientists can better study objects in the universe and the physics of how they work.

Research efforts elsewhere search the galaxy for signals or evidence of extraterrestrials, but the New Mexico operation would almost certainly get involved if signals are received, said Very Large Array spokesman Dave Finley.

“I do think when the time comes that they find a signal that they think is the real thing, the first phone call they will make will be to us. They’ll want an image of that region,” Finley said.

Astronomers using the array also expect to see more examples of powerful jets of superfast particles propelled by the energy of massive black holes at the center of galaxies. This could help in understanding how galaxies grow over time.

The National Radio Astronomy Observatory in 2013 invited astronomers from around the world to submit ideas and suggestions for the survey. Based on the recommendations, scientists and engineers designed the survey and ran a test in 2016. Approval for the full survey was granted this year.

The survey will involve about 5,500 hours of observing time. Data from the three separate scans will be combined to produce the radio images.

The scanning began Sept. 7 and the raw data will be available to researchers as quickly as the observations are made.

The seven-year project will not come at an additional financial cost because the array already has a $15 million annual budget for making observations 24 hours a day for various scientific requests. More of that time will now be dedicated to the project.
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Technology

Mobile App Aims to Help End Child Marriage in India’s Bihar

By Ytech on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

A mobile phone app is the latest tool for campaigners seeking to end child marriage in India’s Bihar state, where nearly two-thirds of girls in some of its rural areas are married before the legal age of 18.

The app, Bandhan Tod, was developed by Gender Alliance — a collective of more than 270 charities in Bihar focused on gender rights — and launched this week by Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi. It is backed by the U.N. Population Fund.

India ranks among countries with the highest rates of child marriage in the world, accounting for a third of the global total of more than 700 million women, according to UNICEF, the United Nations children’s agency.

Bandhan Tod — meaning “break the binds” — includes classes on child marriage and dowries and their ill effects. It also has an SOS button that notifies the team when activated.

“The app is a big part of our efforts to end child marriage in the state,” said Prashanti Tiwary, head of Gender Alliance.

“Education is good, but when a young girl wants help because she is being forced to marry before the legal age, the app can be her way out,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Despite a law banning girls from marrying before they turn 18, the practice is deeply rooted in tradition and widely accepted in Indian society. It is rarely reported as a crime and officials are often reluctant to prosecute offenders.

While boys also marry before the legal age of 21, girls are disproportionately affected.

Risks of abuse, death rise

Early marriage makes it more likely that girls will drop out of school, and campaigners say it also increases risks of sexual violence, domestic abuse and death in childbirth.

Legal efforts have failed to break the stranglehold of tradition and culture that continues to support child marriage, charity ActionAid India said in a report this year.

When the SOS on Bandhan Tod is activated, the nearest small NGO will attempt to resolve the issue. If the family resists, then the police will be notified, said Tiwary.

A similar app in West Bengal state to report child marriage and trafficking of women and children has helped prevent several such instances, according to Child in Need Institute, which launched the app in 2015.

Other efforts include a cash incentive, where the state transfers a sum of money to the girl’s bank account if she remains in school and unwed at age 18.

Suppliers of wedding tents in Rajasthan state have stopped dozens of child marriages by alerting officials.

“It will take a change in mindset and behavior to end child marriage,” said Tiwary, who is lobbying the government to raise the marriage age for women to 21, so they have the same opportunities as men.

“But technology provides a practical and accessible way to help prevent it on the ground,” she said.
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Technology

Twitter Reports Progress on Weeding Out Users Advocating Violence

By Ytech on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Twitter said that its internal controls were allowing it to weed out accounts being used for “promotion of terrorism” earlier rather than responding to government requests to close them down.

U.S. and European governments have been pressuring social media companies including Twitter, Facebook and Alphabet’s Google to fight harder against online radicalization, particularly by violent Islamist groups.

Twitter said it had removed 299,649 accounts in the first half of this year for the “promotion of terrorism,” a 20 percent decline from the previous six months. Three-quarters of those accounts were suspended before posting their first tweet.

Less than 1 percent of account suspensions were due to government requests, the company said, while 95 percent were thanks to Twitter’s internal efforts to combat extremist content with “proprietary tools,” up from 74 percent in the last transparency report.

Twitter defines “promotion of terrorism” as actively inciting or promoting violence “associated with internationally recognized terrorist organizations.”

The vast majority of notices from governments concerned “abusive behavior,” which includes violent threats, harassment, hateful conduct and impersonation.
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Technology

Review: Glitzy iPhone X Aside, iPhone 8 is Fine for Most

By Ytech on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

The difference between Apple’s new iPhone models is a bit like flying first class compared with coach. We envy first class, but coach gets us there without breaking the budget.

The iPhone 8 will do just fine for $300 less than the glitzy iPhone X , even though it won’t make your friends and colleagues jealous. It’s also available much sooner – this Friday – starting at almost $700. The X (read as the numeral 10) won’t be out until November.

Still, the iPhone 8 remains a fairly straightforward update of the iPhone 7 , which itself was a fairly straightforward update of the iPhone 6S. Then again, no one expects much different from a coach seat.

What you’re not getting

It’s hard to talk about the iPhone 8 without comparing it to my 15 minutes with the iPhone X last Tuesday.

The X wowed with a fancy new display that flows to the edges of the phone. The phone is compact, yet features a screen slightly larger than the one on the supersized iPhone 8 Plus. The X also features facial recognition that lets you unlock the phone with a glance; you can also create animated emojis that match your facial expressions.

The 8 has none of that, although it does share other new goodies the X is getting, including wireless charging. The 8 and the X both have faster processors and sensors to enhance graphics in augmented reality, a blending of the virtual and physical worlds, though older iPhones will also run AR apps with a software update Tuesday.

Wireless charging

Apple is embraces wireless-charging technology that Android phones have had for years. It’s a rare case in which Apple isn’t going its own way; instead, it’s adopting an existing standard called Qi (pronounced chee). That means the iPhone gets all the technical advancements from the consortium behind Qi _ and can take immediate advantage of a slew of public wireless-charging stations.

It worked perfectly for me while waiting for a connecting flight in Los Angeles – no need to rummage through my backpack for a charging cord.

Apple says the wireless system should charge as quickly as the wall adapter included with iPhones. But I found wireless slower in testing, using a Belkin charger with the same power output as the iPhone charger.

Wireless charging is largely about convenience; it’s terrific if you can just drop your phone on a charging pad overnight or during the day at your desk. Apple says it will boost wireless-charging power by 50 percent in coming months, which will speed things up further. But those in a rush should consider a wall charger that comes with the iPad, which will still be even faster.

In a way, wireless charging makes up for Apple’s earlier decision to ditch the headphone jack in the iPhone 7, which made people share the Lightning port with both charging cords and wired headphones. You can now charge and use wired headphones at the same time.

Display

Colors on the 8’s screen adapt to lighting in the room. It’s noticeable in my apartment at night, as artificial lighting tends to be warmer and more yellowish. The screen adapts by making whites more like beige and yellow even yellower. It’s softer on the eyes and mimics how light glows on white paper, though it can make images appear less natural. You can turn this feature off.

Resolution isn’t as sharp as what the X and many rival Android phones offer. The Plus offers enough pixels for high-definition video at the highest quality, 1080p, while the regular model is comparable to the lesser 720p.

Camera

New color filters produce truer and richer colors without looking fake, while a new flash technique tries to light the foreground and background more evenly. You have to know to look, as the iPhone 7 already had a great camera. Differences in test shots taken while sightseeing in Poland were subtle, but noticeable – more so on the iPhone 8 screen than on last year’s Mac.

The iPhone 8 also offers additional video options, including recording of ultra-high definition, or 4K, at 60 frames per second, twice the previous rate. (The phone’s display, though, isn’t sharp enough for 4K.)

A second lens in the 7 Plus and 8 Plus models lets the camera gauge depth and blur backgrounds in portrait shots, something once limited to full-featured SLR cameras. Samsung adopted that feature in this year’s Note 8 .

Coming to the 8 Plus are filters to mimic studio and other lighting conditions. My favorite, stage light, highlights the subject’s face and darkens the background. Some of these filters make images look fake – Apple has slapped a “beta” test tag to signal it’s not flawless. You can try them out and undo any changes you don’t like.

Design

To make wireless charging work, the 8 features a glass back, something last seen in the iPhone 4S in 2011. Aesthetic considerations aside, this gives you another sheet of glass to break.

Apple says custom glass from Corning makes the phone stronger. Even so, consider a service plan and get a case. Wireless charging works with most cases, as long as there’s no metal or magnets. I found the phone charged just as fast with the case on.

About the price tag

The iPhone 8 is about $50 more than what the iPhone 7 cost at launch. Samsung has similarly increased the prices of its flagship Galaxy phones, and the S8 still outsold last year’s S7. Consumers seem willing to pay.

You do get double the storage – 64 gigabytes – at that price, a value considering that iPhone storage boosts typically cost $100. You’ll need that extra storage for video, apps and fancy features such as AR and animated photos.

Nonetheless, I would have preferred the option of a cheaper, lower-storage version. For that, you need an older model , such as the $549 iPhone 7 and the $449 6S. There’s also the smaller iPhone SE for $349.
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Economy

US Current Account Deficit Hits $123.1 Billion

By Yeco on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

The deficit in the broadest measure of U.S. trade rose to the highest level in more than eight years this spring, reflecting in part a drop in fines and penalties paid by foreign companies.

The deficit in the current account increased to $123.1 billion, up 8.5 percent from an imbalance of $113.5 billion in the first quarter, the Commerce Department reported Tuesday. It was the biggest deficit since a gap of $150 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008.

The current account is the most complete measure of trade because it includes not only goods and services but investment flows and other payments between the United States and the world.

President Donald Trump has promised to reduce America’s trade deficit, contending it costs U.S. factory jobs.

One of the biggest contributing factors to the larger deficit in the April-June quarter was a decline in receipts from foreigners after they had risen sharply in the first quarter. The government attributed the $5.2 billion decrease in receipts of secondary income from foreigners to a decline in fines and penalties paid by foreign companies. That category had risen sharply in the first quarter.

Exports of goods and services increased $2.2 billion in the second quarter. Exports are getting a lift from a pickup in global growth and a drop in the value of the U.S. dollar against other currencies. A weaker dollar makes American products more competitive on foreign markets.

Imports of goods and services were also up in the second quarter, rising $11.8 billion, reflecting rising domestic demand from stronger U.S. growth.

The rise in the current account deficit put the imbalance in the second quarter at a level equivalent to 2.6 percent of the total economy, as measured by the gross domestic product, up from 2.4 percent in the first quarter. By comparison, the largest current account deficit in relation to GDP was in the fourth quarter of 2005 when the deficit totaled 6.3 percent of GDP.

Trump says America’s trade deficits have been caused by bad trade deals and abusive practices by China and other U.S. trading partners. He has pledged changes that he says will reduce the deficit and bring back American factory jobs.

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Economy

Popular US Toy Store Files for Bankruptcy

By Yeco on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Toys ‘R’ Us, an iconic United States toy store, has filed for bankruptcy after struggling to compete with online retailers and racking up about $5 billion worth of debt.

In a statement Monday, the company said it is voluntarily seeking relief through the U.S. bankruptcy process, but that its international holdings would not be affected.

“The company’s approximately 1,600 Toys ‘R’ Us and Babies ‘R’ Us stores around the world, the vast majority of which are profitable, are continuing to operate as usual,” the statement reads. “Customers can also continue to shop for the toy and baby products they are looking for online.”

The company said it has begun the process of working with creditors to restructure the debt that its stores will remain open as the bankruptcy plays itself out.

The bankruptcy filing, CEO Dave Brandon said in a statement, “will provide us with greater financial flexibility to invest in our business … and strengthen our competitive position in an increasingly challenging and rapidly changing retail marketplace worldwide.”

The company said it is “well-stocked” for the upcoming holiday season, which has historically been a time when retailers can pad their bottom-line at the end of the year.

Toys ‘R’ Us has seen its popularity fall since the 1980s and ‘90s, when it began losing customers to big-box stores like Wal-Mart and Target, and more recently with the advent of online shopping giants like Amazon.
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Economy

Jet Fuel Shortage Disrupts Travel To-From New Zealand’s Main Airport

By Yeco on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

As many as three dozen domestic and international flights at New Zealand’s Auckland Airport have been canceled Tuesday as it struggles to deal with a weeklong fuel shortage.

New Zealand’s main airport has lost 70 percent of its jet fuel supplies since a digger ruptured the main pipeline that carries fuel to the facility, forcing many air carriers to refuel at other airports in the Pacific region. The accident has also cut off supplies of high-grade gasoline at Auckland gas stations, although fuel supplier Z Energy says stocks of regular gasoline are still plentiful.

The pipeline’s owner says the repairs will not be completed until sometime next week.

Prime Minister Bill English says a naval tanker and military trucks have been assigned to transport fuel to ease the shortage, and has ordered all lawmakers and public employees to avoid any unnecessary air travel until the situation is resolved.

The fuel disruption has placed enormous pressure on English with Saturday’s national elections on the horizon. Jacinda Ardern, the leader of the main opposition Labour Party, accused English of ignoring warnings about the pipeline’s vulnerability.

“One pipeline, one digger, and New Zealand grinds to a halt,” Ardern told reporters Tuesday. The 37-year-old politician has led the Labour Party from a certain electoral defeat to a tight race with English’s ruling National Party.
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Economy

Probe into State Firms Reveals Nagging Corruption Problem in Vietnam

By Yeco on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

A multi-million-dollar banking flap being investigated in Vietnam this month casts light on a tough corruption problem that nips at the Southeast Asian country’s explosive economic growth.

The Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security last week began investigating three companies under state-owned gas and oil giant PetroVietnam on suspicion of trying to divert $5.2 million from OceanBank, a domestic financial institution.

Widespread corruption

The case, analysts say, points to widespread corruption Vietnam. They point to construction, land use contracts and government procurement as particular sore spots. People are also asked for side payments to process official paperwork or get out of traffic violations.

“In terms of corruption in Vietnam, I do think it’s a serious problem here and I think the government recognizes that,” said Frederick Burke, partner with the international law firm Baker McKenzie in Ho Chi Minh City.

Corruption, known to cause waste in business, could hobble economic growth.

Growth driven by export manufacturing makes Vietnam a darling in Asia among foreign investors. The economy grew between 5.2 percent and 6.68 percent each year from 2012 to 2016.

The nonprofit advocacy group Transparency International placed Vietnam at 113th out of 176 countries and regions that it evaluated in 2016 for perceptions of corruption.

“It doesn’t constrain growth. It’s just an added cost of business,” said Song Seng Wun, Southeast Asia-specialized economist with the private banking unit of CIMB in Singapore. “When it’s corrupt, that’s just wastage without any addition to capacity or contribution to productive economic activities.”

New York-based business compliance consultancy Gan Integrity calls corruption “pervasive” in Vietnam. It says companies are likely to face bribery, political interference and “facilitation payments” across industries. Land development and construction fall especially to corruption, the consultancy says.

Reasons for the corruption

Inadequate salaries for government workers, some of whom need extra money to provide for their families, causes a lot of the corruption, said Trung Nguyen, international relations dean at Ho Chih Minh University of Social Sciences and Humanities.

Complex regulations have also pushed companies to seek permitting shortcuts, another source of corruption.

People with capital sometimes hold back expansion to avoid getting enmeshed in graft, adding to a large underground economy, Nguyen said.

He added Vietnamese also face graft when they ask government offices for documents and if police stop them in traffic, eroding overall public confidence in government services.

“I think it’s very bad,” he said. “I have so many friends and they don’t want to open big businesses in Vietnam because they think that they will have to deal with the government and they have to bribe them, and it violates their ethics and their principles.”

PetroVietnam probe

The PetroVietnam probe, as described in Vietnam’s English-language media, fits into a bigger issue at OceanBank.

Reports say more than 50,000 people and 400 organizations benefited from what prosecutors call illegal interest payments worth $70.4 million.

From 2010 to 2014, bank executives offered loans and set deposit rates, above state-approved limits to key customers, including PetroVietnam, local media have reported.

The Vietnamese news website VnExpress calls this case one of the biggest bank fraud flaps ever brought to court in Vietnam.

Some legal cases start with allegations brought by unhappy company employees, Burke said. Only “squeaky clean” firms can build reputations strong enough to eliminate solicitations for graft, he said.

“We do see from time to time perfectly good businesses get disrupted completely by some allegation of corruption,” he said. “Often our employment disputes turn into compliance cases and they trigger full investigations. People lose their jobs. It’s quite traumatic.”

Multinationals get used to graft as a cost of business in emerging economies, Song said, but countries that try to stop corruption grab more sympathy.

Around Asia, investors face similar barriers in Indonesia, the Philippines and China.

Most countries around the Asia Pacific ranked in the lower half of the 2016 corruption perceptions index.

Anti-corruption efforts

Government attention to the issue has surfaced in Vietnam with the roll-out of the Anti-Corruption Law in 2005, a 2009 law on government procurement and the National Strategy on Anti-Corruption, which is due to run through 2020. Domestic media may be widely reporting the OceanBank case to discourage others from graft, Burke said.

In October 2016, the government gave an unusually candid report to the legislature, saying numerous officials had been “neglecting their duties and failing to uphold moral standards and political virtues,” VnExpress reported.

Gan Integrity says sentences for graft in Vietnam range from fines to capital punishment, but that enforcement is lacking.

Vietnam’s anti-graft work, Song believes, is a “work in progress.”

But Transparency International says it sees little public information about the outcomes of anti-corruption work.

“Vietnam’s “top leaders…are not united in stopping the problem,” Nguyen said. “I don’t think they have political will to end corruption.”
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Technology

Self-driving Boats Could Launch Before Self-driving Cars

By Ytech on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

While car manufacturers are racing to get self-driving cars on the road, researchers are well ahead in developing self-driving vessels that could soon start ferrying passengers and cargo in busy ports. VOA’s George Putic has more.
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Technology

Virtual Reality Therapy to Treat the World’s Most Common Vision Problem

By Ytech on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Amblyopia or Lazy Eye, as it is called, is a vision problem in which the brain doesn’t receive or process signals from the affected eye. It can be caused by any number of physical issues, but the real problem is that it can’t be fixed with glasses. But it can be fixed, through therapy, and that therapy is now getting a high tech makeover using VR technology. Kevin Enochs reports
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Economy

Coffee Rivals Square Off in Italy Ahead of Starbucks Invasion

By Yeco on Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Two of Italy’s biggest coffee houses are reinforcing their brands with flagship cafes in Milan near the spot where U.S. rival Starbucks is set to begin operations next year.

Lavazza opens its first flagship cafe in the coffee-obsessed city on Tuesday, not far from the renovated 19th century palazzo where Starbucks will open its first Italian store, a ‘Reserve Roasteries’ outlet offering specialty blends and fine food.

Another top Italian brand, illycaffe, opened its own luxury cafe close to the Starbucks site in May, in a cozy courtyard in Milan’s most fashionable street.

Lavazza, which is opening near the city’s famous La Scala opera house, and illycaffe both deny their moves are a response to a global rival’s impending arrival, a first step in what may become a 200-store expansion.

Industry experts suspect it is no coincidence.

“Lavazza and illycaffe are the purists of coffee, they want to show they are there when Starbucks arrives,” says Jean-Paul Gaillard, who ran Nespresso for 10 years before founding the Ethical Coffee Company, a Swiss firm selling coffee pods.

Milan’s battle of the coffee palaces reflects global competition among major brands to capture a growing market for people who are prepared to pay a premium for quality espresso coffees in upmarket boutique cafes.

Nestle last week bought California-based Blue Bottle Coffee, one of the top boutique U.S. chains whose single-origin and cold-brewed coffees have proven popular with hipsters and have made inroads into the Starbucks franchise.

JAB Holdings, the investment vehicle of Germany’s Reimann family, has also been buying up independent start-ups selling premium brews around the world, from Europe to the Americas.

Starbucks Chief Executive Howard Schultz hopes his company’s arrival in Milan, which he calls the home of the “perfect espresso”, and the inspiration for his Starbucks vision, will show discerning Italian coffee-lovers that “we got it right.”

“We are happy to hear about Lavazza’s growth,” said a Starbucks spokesman when asked to comment on Lavazza’s opening.

The U.S. chain will open its 2,400-square-meter cafe in late 2018, seeking to attract tourists, young Italians and the business crowd. If the Milan experiment succeeds, Starbucks and its local partner, Antonio Percassi, could open more than 200 stores in Italy over six years, according to Percassi.

Some analysts are skeptical that Starbucks can crack a market where espresso typically sells for just one euro ($1.20), a fraction of the price of a Starbucks coffee.

But the local brands are also gambling Italians will spend much more than one euro for a restaurant-style experience: illycaffe charges around three times that for coffee brought to the table.

Nestle, JAB Holdings and Starbucks are the three largest players in the global coffee market, followed by several mid-tier players including Lavazza and illycaffe.

“As the biggest get bigger, mid-tier companies are in a position where they must either expand or risk being left behind or swallowed up by their massive rivals,” said Matthew Barry, an analyst at market research firm Euromonitor International.

Lavazza’s chief executive and some of its family owners will cut a ribbon to launch their cafe, where customers can sip a blend of coffee specifically crafted for the store, taste gourmet food and buy single-origin coffees.

“The opening of the new flagship store has nothing to do with Starbucks,” a Lavazza spokeswoman said, adding that it was solely aimed at giving people an exclusive Lavazza experience.

The group is primarily a roaster and supplier to independent cafes and restaurants rather than a retailer and its new store is a way of boosting brand visibility on the high street.

Lavazza went on an acquisition spree three years ago, buying up three coffee suppliers in Europe and Canada, boosting sales to nearly 2 billion euros last year. It has overtaken Starbucks in supermarket sales, Euromonitor International says.

Illycaffe sells its coffee both through independent cafes and 230 mono-brand stores, some of them directly owned, in 43 countries, and says it wants to develop the network further, though not via major acquisitions.

“The new store wants to be a landmark for the global nomad in search for the real Italian lifestyle experience,” illycaffe said, without commenting on the arrival of Starbucks.

Milanese coffee society is divided on whether Starbucks can make its name at the high-end of Italian market, the world’s fourth-largest coffee consumer.

“I am curious about Starbucks, I will give it a try when it arrives in Milan,” office worker Giuseppe Gaggiano, 55, said at a small, upmarket independent cafe close to the Starbucks site.

However, another customer there, Alberto Paparusso, 31, said he wouldn’t abandon his usual cafe: “I don’t like Starbucks coffee. It’s not worth going there.”

($1 = 0.8371 euros)
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