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Facebook pulls the plug on Snapchat clone Lifestage
 Facebook has pulled the plug on its teen-focused Lifestage app – that was intended to work as a direct rival to Snapchat – almost a year after its launch.

The app was created to help teens connect with other classmates at their school through the use of selfies and videos, as opposed to direct messaging. It also blocked anybody who listed their age as over 21 from accessing anything more than their own profile – though there were no age verification tools or checks, so you could enter any age. This, as you’d expect, led the app to receive a lot of criticism surrounding privacy – one person even dubbing it as “sorta creepy” shortly after the app’s release.

Though the app never really took off, as Facebook would’ve hoped. The app paved the way for the Snapchat-like features we now see in the main Facebook app and Instagram.

“We originally launched Lifestage to make it easier for teens in the US to connect with others at their school by creating a video profile with content for all of things that make up their identity,” a Facebook spokesperson told Business Insider. “Teens continue to make up an important part of the global community on Facebook, and we've learned a lot from Lifestage. We will continue to incorporate these learnings into features in the main Facebook app.”

On top of killing off Lifestage, Facebook has also discontinued the Facebook Groups app for Android and iOS, instead fully shifting its focus to groups in the main Facebook app and on Facebook.com.

Don’t forget to enter the Effective Mobile Marketing Awards. We've extended the final deadline to 18 August, but time's running out. More details here.

Output: Facebook has closed down its controversial teen-focused Lifestage app after a year of operation. Aimed squarely at Snapchat's user base, Lifestage enabled teens to use pictures and videos to connect with schoolmates. However, the lack of age controls led to concern around the feature. A spokesperson for the social media giant said: "Teens continue to make up an important part of the global community on Facebook, and we've learned a lot from Lifestage".


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Save Your Monkey claims south Asian first with insurance chatbot
 Save Your Monkey predicts rapid digitalisation of the insurance industry

in near future

Saveyourmonkey.com, Sri Lanka’s pioneering Insurtech startup which began operations earlier this year, announced their official launch following the trilingual launch of Sri Lanka’s first Digital Insurance Agent, ‘Amaya’. The startup aims to change the traditional perception of procuring an insurance policy as being a tedious legal obligation via digitalisation, and tested its platform and new ideas such as ‘Amaya’ in the market following the soft launch in February this year.

Amaya, the innovative brainchild of the Save Your Monkey team, was initially developed in English and is the first of its kind insurance chatbot in the South Asian Region. ‘Amaya’ is a fun and easy way for customers to choose their insurance policy online and became immensely popular among users over the last few months while still at its testing stage. Following this wide spread interest, the saveyourmonkey.com team jumped to action and worked to launch the ‘Amaya’ in all three languages to make it relevant and accessible to all Sri Lankans.

Speaking on the official launch of saveyourmonkey.com and the latest development with Amaya, Chathura Jayatissa, Founder and CEO of saveyourmonkey.com said, “As we launch officially, we have made it our mission to change the public perception that procuring an insurance is a tedious task. Amaya was designed using AI (Artificial Intelligence) components to respond to customer inquiries effectively and provide them with the best advice for their requirements. We named the chatbot ‘Amaya’ in order to make our customers feel at ease and to make them feel like they are chatting to a friend. With the AI components at work, Amaya interacts with customers as an actual person and thus quickly became popular among our customers.’’

Amaya is a first of its kind not only in Sri Lanka but also in the region. While the rest of the world has experienced rapid technological advancements in the insurance industry, things have been slow to progress in this part of the world. “That’s why we wanted to introduce the digital revolution to the insurance industry in Sri Lanka. Because of the tedious process of procuring and the confusion that always surrounds insurance, many tend to overlook the value and purpose of an insurance policy. As ‘Amaya’ has already borne testimony, we are confident that our tech based solutions will introduce a more customer-centric and cost effective approach to the conventional insurance business. We are happy to be at the forefront of this change,” added Jayatissa.

Saveyoumonkey.com is the creation of three young entrepreneurs driven by a genuine passion to make an impact. With the clear vision of transforming Sri Lanka’s insurance industry into a more technologically advanced and progressive industry, they have already introduced a number of new innovations and reveal that much more is in the pipeline. Their Road Side Assistance App which is another first in the industry is one such product that is soon to be launched.

Progressing fast towards making their dream a reality, Save Your Monkey has successfully laid the foundation for their mission within the last few months. As a result they have collaborated with a number of insurance companies such as HNB General, Sri Lanka Insurance, Janashakthi, LOLC Insurance, Amana Takaful Insurance, Fairfirst, Ceylinco VIP and Continental Insurance. Additionally, the company has also partnered with top-tier automobile servicing, transport, technology and communication firms like Exide, Smart Wheels, Laugfs Car Care, Autodrome Plc and Uber to provide value added services to its clientele.

Output: Insurance customers in Sri Lanka can now take advantage of the south Asian region's first artificial intelligence-driven digital insurance agent, Amaya. The trilingual service launched by insurtech start-up Saveyourmonkey.com is described as a "fun and easy way for customers to choose their insurance policy online". The service will interact with customers as if Amaya was a "friend", said founder and CEO Chathura Jayatissa. The company has collaborated with insurers including HNB General, Amana Takaful Insurance and Fairfirst as well as car servicing, transport technology and communications firms to provide value-added services.


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Facebook raises game against dishonest, unacceptable ads
 Facebook is taking aim at scammers who use bait-and-switch tricks to sneak sketchy ads past its inspectors.

Hackers have long been able to bypass the social network's rules against ads for things like diet pills, pornography, and gambling through a practice called "cloaking." Cloaked ads are made to link to a different page when clicked by the company's vetting team.

No longer, Facebook says. The company has built new artificial intelligence software to detect cloaking attempts and added more people to its review staff to identify them manually.

"We don't want these bad actors and these negative experiences on the platform whatsoever," says Facebook product director Rob Leathern, who's in charge of policing the site for nefarious activity. "The effects it has on people--it's jarring, it's a bad experience--so we're committed to addressing it."

How 'cloaking' works, according to Facebook. Credit: Facebook

The company has been working to choke off these sorts of schemes for years by bulking up its vetting capabilities. But it's been much more public about its misinformation battles in general in recent months because of public scrutiny on its role in spreading fake news and pressure from advertisers who are skeptical of its black-box metrics.

While cloaking clearly remains a headache for Facebook's enforcers, it's gotten much harder to pull off, according to various hacker forums. Doing so now requires a list of all the various IP addresses and traffic fingerprints of Facebook's review teams and third-party partners as well as knowledge of how its automated systems work.

Still, it's easy to find websites that purport to offer such services. Many of them come with a disclaimer about their risky nature.

"Cloaking isn't magic, and it isn't some get-rich-quick thing," one of these warnings reads. "It’s a war between the marketer and the ad networks [and] search engines—a constant back and forth."

It’s a war between the marketer and the ad networks [and] search engines—a constant back and forth.

Facebook hopes that its latest crackdown will finally up this risk to the point where it no longer makes economic sense for marketers to even try.

"We want to increase the costs for these scammers so they have less incentive," Leathern said. "We want to make it clear to the bad actors out there that we're ramping up enforcement--we'll take down ad accounts, we'll take down pages."

The push is part of a broader effort to drum out misleading content of any kind from the platform that Facebook's been publicizing heavily since last year's presidential election. Other moves have included shutting down vast bot networks used to defraud advertisers, suppressing links from websites with bad ad experiences, and adding warning labels to links from sites that tend to get low ratings from reputable fact-checkers.

Output: Facebook is taking on the bad actors who get past its rules against ads it deems unsuitable by launching artificial intelligence software that detects the use of "cloaking". "We want to increase the costs for these scammers so they have less incentive," said Facebook product director Rob Leathern, who added sites that breached the rules would be taken down. The move is part of a broader campaign to eliminate misleading content, following criticism of the amount of fake news on the social network. "Cloaking" is a technique scammers use to trick Facebook's vetting process into thinking their ads are legitimate.


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US in danger of debt-ceiling crisis in October
 Sometime in October, the United States is likely to default on its obligation to pay its bills as they come due, having failed to raise the federal debt ceiling. This will cost the Treasury tens of billions of dollars every year for decades to come in higher interest charges and probably trigger a severe recession.

The debt ceiling is politically imposed, and the decision not to raise it, and therefore to choose to default, is also political. It’s something America has avoided in the past. This time, though, will be different.

This country has hit the debt ceiling once, in 1979, and then largely by accident and only to a minor extent. But even that foot fault was estimated to cost the United States about 0.6 percent in higher interest costs for an indefinite period. More recently, congressional debt ceiling brinkmanship in 2011 led Standard & Poor’s to downgrade the credit rating of the United States.

An increase in Treasury interest rates of just 0.2 percent a year would cost the government about $400 billion over the next 10 years. It also would lead to higher borrowing costs for American businesses, because borrowing rates are set by reference to Treasury rates. Moreover, each month holders of tens of billions of dollars in valid claims against the United States would go unpaid, triggering a major recession.

Output: The US is at risk of defaulting on its obligation to pay its bills this October, revealing that a debt-ceiling crisis is a genuine danger, according to an op-ed piece by Edward D. Kleinbard in the New York Times. A default would cost the US Treasury tens of billions every year in higher interest charges for years to come and could ignite a severe recession.


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Insurers see opportunity in India's growing sales of art
 Art and valuable insurance

Numerous high networth individuals buy and hold art as connoisseurs. There are also a number of investor-collectors who view art as a good financial investment. While they were earlier wary of insuring their collection for fear of disclosing details to a stranger, times are well and truly changing. Art and other valuables are highly vulnerable to perils like fire, burglary, theft, flood, malicious defacing, and accidents even when they are either stored, displayed, exhibited or in transit. This has unveiled a huge market for insurance companies, who are vying for a slice of this top-dollar space. The target customers include business promoters, corporate honchos, sport personalities, movie actors and their families.

"Given that art and other valuables are increasingly considered as an asset class, demand for art insurance is poised to grow in the future. The estimated value of art that can be insured in India is about Rs 6,000 crore," Mukesh Kumar, executive director, HDFC Ergo General Insurance, told DNA Money. Only a small segment is covered with art insurance policies since there is lot of undisclosed art/valuables in the Indian market, he said.

The items insured under 'art and valuable insurance' usually include fine arts, paintings, expensive carpets, watches, clocks, expensive furniture, chandeliers, statutes, sculptures, books, expensive and antique jewellery (gold / silver/ diamond), Kumar said.

"The sum insured for each and every art and other valuables need to be fixed at the time of inception of the policy which would be the value to be agreed by insured and insurer based on the valuation certificate from a professional valuer," Rakesh Jain, CEO, Reliance General Insurance, said. There is no standard premium rate, but it depends primarily upon coverage to be offered, type of assets to be insured, security and protection measures available at the premises, sum insured per article or per location, whether it is kept at one place or moved to different places for exhibition.

Sanjay Datta, chief-underwriting, claims & reinsurance, ICICI Lombard said the claim experience has not been adverse on this line of business where HNIs, corporates ,and gallery owners are the company's main customers. "The premium is calculated on a certain percentage basis applied on a total painting cost and the premium rate depends on the risk," he said.

Narrating an instance of how art insurance plays out, Jain said a Rs 3-lakh value sculpture of a client accidentally fell down while shifting within the office premises. Surveyors observed that the sculpture got broken in to three pieces and lost its identity, beyond possibility of rectification. In view of the same, the surveyor's report was obtained and the claim was processed for Rs 2.9 lakh.

Some insurers like TATA AIG have exclusive policies to cover highly valuable items. Parag Ved, executive vice president - consumer lines, Tata AIG General Insurance said, "As part of the Private Client Group policy which deals with insuring personal assets & valuables, we at TATA AIG provide insurance cover for jewellery & collectibles like artwork, watches, antiques, wine, pens, rare stamp & coin collection." There are comprehensive 'all risk' coverages to insure virtually any fine collectible or valuable –from a diamond necklace to Raja Ravi Verma painting, Ved said.

Private Client Group, built on experience, both globally and locally, tries to curate a thorough protection plan suited to an individual or family's requirement to safeguard their prized possessions. "India, till recently had a lot of undeclared wealth and ultra HNIs were sceptical of insuring their private collection for fear of disclosing such details to an outsider. But as customer awareness is building, we are seeing a significant more number of inquiries and demand for such customized covers," Ved said.

Interestingly, standard property insurance policies like fire policy do not cover such items for their market value as these values are notional and subjective. If at all the coverage is taken under fire policy, it would be limited to the intrinsic cost of material used and would exclude the sentimental value part, experts said.

Output: With an estimated $940m worth of declared art in India, insurance firms are beginning to tap the nation's growing high net worth market. "Given that art and other valuables are increasingly considered as an asset class, demand for art insurance is poised to grow in the future", said Mukesh Kumar, executive director at HDFC Ergo General Insurance. The true value of the Indian art market is thought to be significantly larger than $940m, with many works of art and valuables undeclared.


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Facebook, Amazon continue to squash start-ups, monopolise markets
 In just 10 years, the world’s five largest companies by market capitalization have all changed, save for one: Microsoft. Exxon Mobil, General Electric, Citigroup and Shell Oil are out and Apple, Alphabet (the parent company of Google), Amazon and Facebook have taken their place.

They’re all tech companies, and each dominates its corner of the industry: Google has an 88 percent market share in search advertising, Facebook (and its subsidiaries Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger) owns 77 percent of mobile social traffic and Amazon has a 74 percent share in the e-book market. In classic economic terms, all three are monopolies.

We have been transported back to the early 20th century, when arguments about “the curse of bigness” were advanced by President Woodrow Wilson’s counselor, Louis Brandeis, before Wilson appointed him to the Supreme Court. Brandeis wanted to eliminate monopolies, because (in the words of his biographer Melvin Urofsky) “in a democratic society the existence of large centers of private power is dangerous to the continuing vitality of a free people.” We need look no further than the conduct of the largest banks in the 2008 financial crisis or the role that Facebook and Google play in the “fake news” business to know that Brandeis was right.

While Brandeis generally opposed regulation — which, he worried, inevitably led to the corruption of the regulator — and instead advocated breaking up “bigness,” he made an exception for “natural” monopolies, like telephone, water and power companies and railroads, where it made sense to have one or a few companies in control of an industry.

Output: Start-ups such as Snap, Blue Apron and Houseparty are struggling in the face of fierce competition from Facebook and Amazon. Both Snap and Blue Apron are to report earnings imminently, with investors said to be bracing themselves, as both stocks have declined since their IPOs. It is suggested that the aggressive stance of Facebook and Amazon is making it increasingly difficult for start-ups to grow fast enough to avoid being squashed or acquired. This has led to an increasing number of calls to break up or regulate companies like Facebook, Amazon and Google to stop them monopolising markets.


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WannaCry raised awareness of cyber risk: CFC Underwriting
 CFC Underwriting’s Graeme Newman considers how public cyber attacks such as the WannaCry hack are helping brokers have the right conversations about digital crime with their clients.

Last year the National Crime Agency revealed that cyber crime had officially overtaken traditional crime in the UK. Where once it was masked bandits holding up bank tellers, we’re now seeing teenagers stealing cash from businesses from the comfort of their bedroom.

CFC’s own claims experience backs this up. We saw a 78% rise in cyber claims in 2016 with just over a third caused by simple phishing scams rather than sophisticated cyber crime.

Perhaps more importantly 90% of our claims by volume

Output: Cyber attacks such as the recent WannaCry hack are raising awareness of cyber risk, enabling brokers to have more discussions about digital crime with clients, according to CFC Underwriting. The National Crime Agency said that cyber crime overtook traditional crime in the UK last year, which is confirmed by CFC's experience. CFC noted that enquiries rose 50% in the month following the WannaCry attack and it saw a 78% rise in cyber claims last year. Cyber insurance policies are reflecting the alterations in threat, now covering both the immediate financial costs and the specialist help that may also be necessary.


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Energy, chemicals companies highly vulnerable to cyber attack
 The recent WannaCry ransomware attack, which affected hundreds of thousands of computers and caused disruption to major infrastructure including the UK’s National Health Service, has highlighted the vulnerability of outdated industrial control systems used in energy production and chemical manufacturing.

Experts have warned in the past that the computers controlling chemical plants, factories and power stations all have the potential to be compromised. And now there is some indication that cyber criminals are increasingly viewing them as a target. James Scott from the Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology in the US says over 350 incidents targeting energy company critical infrastructure were reported to the US Department of Homeland Security between 2011 and 2015. Furthermore, in 2016, 108 cyber-espionage attacks were reported against manufacturing facilities.

‘As the antiquated legacy technology supporting chemical and petrochemical systems ages, the networks become exponentially more vulnerable to the hyper-evolving cyber-threat landscape,’ he tells Chemistry World.

Alan Woodward from the University of Surrey, UK, who advises the government on cybersecurity, says the risks, or at least awareness of the risks, have increased in recent months. ‘What WannaCry showed was that ransomware does not just hit a computer on which some unsuspecting person opens a booby-trapped attachment, but is able to “worm” its way around an internal network to affect any vulnerable, attached device.’

Even in plants and factories whose control systems are separated from the internet, Woodward says, this ‘air gap’ can easily be inadvertently bridged by plugging in an infected USB stick, for example.

As the antiquated legacy technology ages, the networks become exponentially more vulnerable

‘The networks rely on outdated technology that is “Frankensteined” with modern Internet of Things devices,’ says Scott. This can provide a route for hackers to exploit vulnerabilities in the system. In June, for example, ransomware infected a European petrochemical plant’s network via a coffee machine connected to the internet.

Potential catastrophe

The consequences of such attacks could range from ‘minor disruption of a process to a major catastrophe’, says Raheem Beyah, a computer scientist at the Georgia Institute of Technology, US. Recent examples of cyberwarfare have shown that malware can be used to target energy infrastructure and damage equipment. The infamous Stuxnet worm – developed by the US military in the early 2000s to attack an Iranian nuclear power plant – disrupted uranium enrichment by tampering with centrifuges.

And a recent attack on Ukraine’s power grid at the end of 2016 is believed to have used a sophisticated piece of software called Industroyer/Crash Override that Beyah explains is ‘designed in a modular fashion and has the ability to send legitimate industrial control system commands’.

There’s no reason why similar approaches couldn’t be used to target other types of control systems. For example, Beyah’s research group recently used simulations to show how malware could theoretically be used to poison water supplies with chlorine by hijacking a water treatment plant. Although this was just a proof of concept, it highlights the potential consequences if cyber defences fall short.

Updating defences

One issue the WannaCry attack drew attention to is the danger of using outdated operating systems, as the ransomware was designed to attack vulnerabilities in historic versions of Windows. The use of outdated systems is rife in industrial control systems, Scott says. ‘Many chemical and petrochemical facilities still rely on Windows XP or earlier versions, which have publically known vulnerabilities and are no longer supported by Microsoft or security applications. These companies lack the technology and skilled Information security personnel to secure systems, detect incidents, or mitigate or remediate breaches.’

Woodward explains that industrial control systems have a particular problem in that they are sometimes not set up to be upgraded. ‘Some manufacturers do not enable embedded systems (even those running standard operating systems like Windows) to be upgraded by end users, [and] the company that built the control systems can take some time to respond,’ he says. To address this, and ensure they are protected against attacks, companies need to invest in modernised systems and make sure they have a strategy to keep them updated.

These companies lack the technology and skilled Information security personnel to secure systems

Close monitoring of their network is also crucial, Beyah says, so that any hint of an attack can be stopped in its tracks. ‘If the networks are monitored, then malicious activity can be detected before a system is compromised or before a catastrophic even is imminent.’

Output: Out-of-date technology is leaving facilities in the energy and petrochemical sector at risk of ransomware attack, said James Scott from the Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology in the US. These facilities are becoming growing targets for cyber-espionage attacks, even if the computer systems are separate from the internet, as other methods such as infected USB sticks could be used. By updating the system and its network, facilities can prevent catastrophic events that could be harmful to human life.


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Stonehenge Growth Capital invests in solar company PosiGen
 BRIDGEPORT, Conn, Aug. 10, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Stonehenge Growth Capital today announced a new investment in PosiGen that will enable the solar company to expand operations in Connecticut and provide clean energy technology to hundreds of low- to moderate-income Connecticut households.

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/dc457ca6-ecf1-434b-8ab7-eea9a399e29f

Stonehenge Growth Capital, a subsidiary of Stonehenge Capital Company, made the $5 million investment through the Invest CT program. Solar panels installed by PosiGen have already reduced the energy cost burden faced by over 10,000 families across four states, including Connecticut, New York, Louisiana and Florida. Stonehenge’s investment will allow PosiGen to provide an additional 750 rooftop solar panel systems to further reduce Connecticut households’ energy costs. The electricity generated from these panels is used to heat, cool and illuminate homes in an eco-friendly and affordable way.

“We are thrilled to partner with Stonehenge Growth Capital to further expand our footprint across the state of Connecticut while sustainably lowering utility costs for a large and underserved community,” PosiGen CEO Thomas Neyhart said.

With a focus on impact investing, Stonehenge is pleased to support a project that offers financial benefits for local households along with broader benefits for the environment.

“The team at PosiGen is poised to transform the way families think about solar energy to an easy, affordable and environmentally conscious alternative for their homes,” said Stonehenge Growth Capital Managing Director Charles Haberkorn. “PosiGen’s ability to reach low-income households, traditionally unable to access the solar panel market, makes the company a leader in the clean energy space.”

The Invest CT program mandates that 25 percent of all capital associated with the program is invested in green technology. Connecticut has committed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent below 2001 levels by 2050, and the addition of 750 solar panel systems will help the state to continue to meet its goals. Construction of the new solar systems is now underway.

About Stonehenge Growth Capital

Stonehenge Growth Capital is a subsidiary of Stonehenge Capital Company LLC and has the capacity to provide venture capital, private equity and mezzanine debt to companies led by experienced management teams with a passion for innovation and the pursuit of high-growth opportunities. With a flexible and creative financing approach, the Growth Capital team seeks to develop customized financing solutions based on a company’s unique strategic and financial plan. Stonehenge Growth capital offers institutional resources to a variety of businesses from small entrepreneurial companies to multistate corporations. The Growth Capital team been investing in small businesses since 1993 with over $1.0 billion invested across venture capital, private equity and debt funds. To learn more about Stonehenge Growth Capital, please visit www.stonehengecapital.com.

About PosiGen

Headquartered in Jefferson, Louisiana, PosiGen is one of the nation’s leading residential solar, energy efficiency and energy education providers for low- to moderate-income families. PosiGen has more than 10,000 residential customers, over 150 direct employees and supports more than 120 employees through its contractors in Louisiana, Connecticut, New York and Florida. PosiGen's unique services and products make solar energy affordable to homeowners of all income levels, and offer individuals, families and businesses the opportunity to achieve greater fiscal autonomy and energy independence by lowering their utility bills. To learn more about PosiGen, please visit www.posigen.com.

Output: Louisiana-based solar provider PosiGen has received a $5m investment from Stonehenge Growth Capital. The funding will allow PosiGen to install 750 rooftop solar panel systems to homes in Connecticut, reducing household energy costs in and greenhouse gas emissions. The company already provides solar panels to over 10,000 households across the US. Connecticut has agreed to reduce emissions by 80% from 2001 levels by 2050, and hopes the construction of the new panels will contribute to meeting that target. The investment was made through the State's Invest CT programme.


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Distributed solar power fund raises $350m
 WESTPORT, Conn., Aug. 10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- True Green Capital Management LLC ("TGC"), an institutional asset manager specializing in distributed power generation, with a current focus on commercial photovoltaic solar, announced it has closed its latest discretionary fund, True Green Capital Fund III, L.P. (the "Fund", "Fund III"). The Fund reached its hard cap of $350 million and was oversubscribed. The Fund's Limited Partners include a diversified institutional investor base of leading endowments, foundations, investment advisors' clients, fund-of-funds, family offices, and insurance companies.

"We are pleased to announce the closing of Fund III following the success of our predecessor Fund II which closed in 2015 and is fully invested. Our proven investment strategy offers institutional investors the opportunity to participate in the fast growing commercial and industrial distributed solar power generation markets, providing a reliable income stream and combining strong upside potential with prudent downside protection," said Dr. Panos Ninios, Managing Partner of TGC.

"Solar technology has improved to the point where it is price competitive with traditional power generation infrastructure and provides energy consumers with power price certainty for decades to come. We are pleased that our institutional investor base has shown confidence in TGC and in an asset class that is both good for the environment and their investment portfolios," said Bo Wiegand, Partner at TGC.

TGC seeks to deliver superior risk-adjusted returns and has developed a scalable, proprietary organizational and portfolio construction process that aims to combine the certainty of long-term fixed-price contracts with highly rated creditworthy partners augmented by the upside offered by power sales, environmental credits and real asset optionality. As part of this process, TGC has developed a privately negotiated pipeline of approximately $1.5 billion in projects.

To date, TGC has deployed approximately 30% of its Fund III capital in a portfolio of pre-identified projects, continuing its innovative investment strategy of self-originating, building and financing renewable energy electric power infrastructure projects. The existing investment portfolio consists of commercial and sub-utility scale solar power plants, including one of the largest roof-top installations in the world. The projects have contracted offtake agreements providing municipal utilities, military bases, universities, and corporate clients with clean, renewable energy at a fixed price. True Green Capital expects to deploy Fund III over the next 1-2 years across similar investment opportunities in the U.S.

About True Green Capital Management LLC

True Green Capital Management LLC is a specialized energy infrastructure asset management firm based in Westport, Connecticut with over $500 million in private equity capital under management. TGC has an operating portfolio of approximately 150MWs of distributed solar power generation assets across nine states including New Jersey, California, Massachusetts, Idaho, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Tennessee, and Vermont. The firm was founded in 2011 and is led by a team of investment professionals with a proven investment track record and a demonstrated capacity to originate, finance, construct and operate infrastructure investments.

True Green Capital is currently focused on the approximately $2 trillion distributed power generation market with an emphasis on the sub utility scale solar power segment. Thanks to rapid advancements in technology, the cost of distributed power generation, including solar, is now on par with traditional electricity generation sources and in many U.S. states it represents one of the few sources of new power generation infrastructure that can be added to the power network quickly, reliably and cost efficiently. TGC believes the continued increase of power prices and decreasing entry costs of distributed power generation technology will continue to lead to compelling investment opportunities which provide a stable cash flow stream with little to no correlation to the broader markets. To learn more, visit www.truegreencapital.com.

CONTACT:

Panos Ninios, Managing Partner

Telephone: 203-557-6224

media@truegreencapital.com

View original content with multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/true-green-capital-management-successfully-closes-latest-fund-reaching-hard-cap-of-350-million-300502768.html

SOURCE True Green Capital Management LLC

Output: True Green Capital Management, a Connecticut-based specialised energy infrastructure asset management firm, has raised $350m for its discretionary fund True Green Capital Fund III. The oversubscribed fund reached its hard cap, with endowments, foundations, fund-of-funds, family offices and insurance companies among the investors. Just under a third of the fund has been deployed for renewable energy infrastructure projects, while the company's existing portfolio includes one of the largest roof-top installations in the world.


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$10bn flood, storm losses reveal Asia's coverage shortfall: Aon
 Billions of dollars of catastrophe and severe weather losses in Asia in July 2017 have highlighted the size of the insurance and reinsurance protection gap in the region. Flooding and storms in Asia caused well over $10 billion of economic losses during the month, while storms in Turkey and the United States drove the insurance industry loss for the month.

Reinsurance broker Aon Benfield’s catastrophe modelling unit Impact Forecasting reveals a story of “relentless seasonal flooding” across the month of July, resulting in many fatalities and widespread damage across parts of Asia.

China felt the effects of the funding most acutely, with around 200 people reported dead or missing while hundreds of thousands of properties were damaged or destroyed.

China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs reported the combined economic flood damage at more than US $10 billion during a six-week stretch through late June and July 2017, with much of the impact in the Yangtze River Basin.

As ever insurance and reinsurance penetration in China remains low and the industries expectation is that the insured loss will be very low, likely well below US $1 billion.

Japan also experienced heavy flooding after Tropical Storm Nanmadol made landfall, with over 2,600 homes and other buildings damaged or destroyed due to extensive flooding and landslides in the regions of Fukuoka, Oita, Shimane, Kumamoto, and Hiroshima prefectures. Economic losses in Japan from this flooding is expected to near US $1 billion.

While insurance penetration is higher in Japan this flooding alone is not anticipated to have much, if any, impact on the reinsurance arrangements of Japanese domestic insurers. This weeks Typhoon Noru could exacerbate the flooding losses though, however it’s too early to know the extent of the economic impact of that event.

Additionally in Asia, hundreds of millions of dollars of economic damages were reported due to monsoon rains in India, Bangladesh and Pakistan, where hundreds were said killed and major damage caused to structures, agriculture and infrastructure.

Finally, season rainfall in Thailand also killed at least 23 people and caused economic damage in excess of US $300 million, while a European flooding event in northern Switzerland resulted in insurance claims payouts of nearly US $90 million.

As we’ve written previously, Turkish insurers are expecting combined insurance claims payouts of US $440 million due to the two severe storm outbreaks, with the resulting hail and flooding.

Meanwhile adding to the insurance and perhaps reinsurance toll from the month of July, severe thunderstorms and related flooding struck areas of the U.S. Midwest, Plains, Southeast, Mid-Atlantic and the Desert Southwest. Tornadoes, hail, torrential rain, floods and strong winds all caused a combined economic and insured losses that Impact Forecasting expects will reach into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

As ever, the events in Asia demonstrate the fact that insurance penetration remains woefully low in many areas.

Claire Darbinyan, Impact Forecasting Associate Director and Meteorologist, commented on July’s global catastrophe activity; “There was no shortage of global natural disasters during July, though the vast majority were reported in Asia where enhanced seasonal monsoon rainfall over China and throughout South Asia led to significant flooding that caused considerable loss of life, and billions of dollars of damage to property and agriculture.

“In addition, three tropical cyclones in the region enhanced the monsoonal flow to trigger further flooding in multiple countries. Given low levels of insurance penetration in the region, the majority of these losses are expected to be uninsured, highlighting the considerable protection gap and the potential for re/insurers to further offer their specialist risk management skills.”

Other natural hazard events to have occurred elsewhere during July include:

Major severe weather events were noted in Canada, China, and Europe.

Officials in Italy reported that prolonged drought conditions has cost the economy some EUR2.0 billion (USD2.3 billion) in economic losses. Production of vegetables, fruits, cereals, vines, and olives were all impacted by the abnormally dry conditions which prevailed across the country during the first half of 2017.

Extreme heat and drought conditions led to wildfire damage across parts of the United States, Canada, Portugal, France, and the Balkans.

Tropical Storm Talas made landfall in Vietnam, causing USD44 million in economic damage.

Strong earthquakes were recorded in the Philippines, Greece, Turkey, and China.

A winter storm brought high winds and flooding to New Zealand; damage estimated in the millions (USD).

The full July catastrophe report can be downloaded here.

Output: Catastrophic flood and storm losses of more than $10bn in Asia have demonstrated a significant gap in insurance and reinsurance protection coverage, according to reinsurance broker Aon Benfield. Insurance and reinsurance in Asia has not seen widespread adoption, with insured loss expected to fall far below the $1bn expected in the US. "The majority of losses are likely to be uninsured", said meteorologist Claire Darbinyan, offering an opportunity for "re/insurers to further offer their specialist risk management skills".


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Input:
EIV Capital ploughs $47m into gas from cow manure facility
 Thank you for supporting our journalism. This article is available exclusively for our subscribers, who help fund our work at the Chicago Tribune.

AMP started as a company that turned the animal waste from 15,000 cows at Fair Oaks Farms in 2011 into a usable, renewable energy source. (Fair Oaks Farms)

AMP Americas, a Chicago company that makes commercial trucking fuel from cow manure, announced Thursday a $47 million private equity investment from Houston-based EIV Capital.

Launched in 2011 out of Fair Oaks Farms in northwest Indiana, AMP started as a company that turned waste from 15,000 cows into a usable, renewable energy source. Since then, AMP has expanded its sourcing to include other waste products as it markets and sells compressed natural gas, or CNG, an often cheaper and cleaner fuel than diesel.

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AMP CEO Grant Zimmerman said the company will use the new capital to launch a second renewable natural gas production operation at another Midwest dairy site that it won't yet name. It also plans to add to its existing network of CNG stations across eight states operated under its ampCNG segment, Zimmerman said.

"We are using (the $47 million) to primarily invest in new renewable natural gas projects at dairy farms," he said. "We will also use it to fund an expansion of our CNG business with a particular focus in California."

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AMP has 19 ampCNG stations with plans to open a 20th this fall, Zimmerman said. Its stations are located along interstates including I-10, I-65, I-75, I-55 and I-30, with its closest station to Chicago located in Fair Oaks, Indiana.

The Energy Information Administration estimates that CNG produces, on average, about 28 percent less carbon-dioxide emissions than diesel or gasoline. A gallon of CNG from one of AMP's Indiana stations currently costs less than $2.30. In comparison, the national average of a gallon of diesel fuel is about $2.50, according to AAA's most recent figures.

"Growth in our early years was fueled by $4 diesel prices," Zimmerman said. "Even with diesel prices now much, much lower, compressed natural gas is still less expensive than diesel on a per-gallon basis or per-mile basis in almost the entire country."

While CNG may be cheaper than diesel for commercial trucking in terms of fuel, it can still be costly for the commercial trucking industry, at least initially. A CNG-compatible tractor-trailer can cost between $30,000 and $50,000 more than a diesel one, Zimmerman said. But tax benefits can reduce that cost, he said.

Additionally, trucking companies can eventually save thousands of dollars from reduced fuel prices over the lifetime of a single truck, Zimmerman said.

Besides its ampCNG and its Renewable Dairy Fuels segments, AMP also operates a sourcing, marketing and risk-management businesses called ampRenew.

AMP has 16 employees, Zimmerman said. He would not comment on revenue. Since launching, AMP has raised $57 million in total funding, according to the company.

EIV Capital is a private-equity firm that focuses on the energy industry.

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Robert Holly is a freelance writer.

Twitter @robertwadeholly

Output: Houston-based private-equity firm EIV Capital has invested $47m into AMP Americas, which turns cow manure and other waste products into compressed natural gas (CNG), a cleaner alternative to diesel. The new funds will be used to set up a renewable natural gas production operation at an as-yet-unnamed Midwest dairy site, AMP said.


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Input:
Investors settle ownership of world's largest offshore wind farm
 Norway’s oil major Statoil has signed a swap agreement with UK’s energy firm SSE and with German company Innogy to revise the ownership of the four offshore wind projects off the east coast of Yorkshire in the UK that comprise the world’s largest offshore wind development, Dogger Bank.

Under the deal, Statoil gets half of the equity interest in three out of the four individual projects. The Norwegian company will hold 50 percent in Creyke Beck A and B, as well as 50 percent Teesside A, while Innogy will own 100 percent of Teesside B. The other 50 percent in the Statoil-held projects will be owned by SSE.

Each of the four projects has an agreed target installed capacity of 1.2 GW, for a total of 4.8 GW of the Dogger Bank development, which is expected to be able to provide renewable energy to up to 5 million homes in the UK.

According to Forewind, the Statoil-SSE-Innogy consortium that had pursued the project so far, the new ownership agreements mean that the projects will now be progressed towards Financial Investment Decisions by their respective owners.

“Dogger Bank represents a unique opportunity for the UK to develop secure, sustainable and cost-competitive energy from its world-class wind resource and the asset constitutes a very important element in Statoil’s strategy to gradually complement our oil and gas portfolio with profitable renewable energy solutions,” Irene Rummelhoff, Statoil’s executive vice president for New Energy Solutions, said in the company statement.

Related: How Much Fuel Does It Take To Get To The Moon?

Statoil has a strategic ambition to allocate 15-20 percent of its annual investments towards new energy solutions in 2030, the Norwegian group said in its Energy Perspectives 2017 report.

“Statoil supports the Paris agreement. We believe that being able to produce oil and gas with lower emissions, while also growing in profitable renewables, will give competitive advantages and provide attractive business opportunities in the transition to a low carbon economy,” CEO Eldar Sætre said.

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By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:

Output: Statoil, SSE and Innogy have agreed the ownership structure of the 4.8 GW Dogger Bank offshore wind development off the east coast of the UK. Statoil and SSE will own 50% each of Creyke Beck A and B, and Teesside A, while Innogy will own 100% of Teesside B. Each of the 1.2 GW projects are more than twice the size of the next largest offshore wind farm, according to Forewind, the consortium made up of the three investors in Dogger Bank.


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Input:
Solutions emerging to deal with spent EV batteries
 The drive to replace polluting petrol and diesel cars with a new breed of electric vehicles has gathered momentum in recent weeks. But there is an unanswered environmental question at the heart of the electric car movement: what on earth to do with their half-tonne lithium-ion batteries when they wear out?

British and French governments last month committed to outlaw the sale of petrol- and diesel-powered cars by 2040, and carmaker Volvo pledged to only sell electric or hybrid vehicles from 2019.

The number of electric cars in the world passed the 2m mark last year and the International Energy Agency estimates there will be 140m electric cars globally by 2030 if countries meet Paris climate agreement targets. This electric vehicle boom could leave 11m tonnes of spent lithium-ion batteries in need of recycling between now and 2030, according to Ajay Kochhar, CEO of Canadian battery recycling startup Li-Cycle.

Recycling gap

However, in the EU as few as 5% (pdf) of lithium-ion batteries are recycled. This has an environmental cost. Not only do the batteries carry a risk of giving off toxic gases if damaged, but core ingredients such as lithium and cobalt are finite and extraction can lead to water pollution and depletion among other environmental consequences.

There are, however, grounds for optimism. Thus far, the poor rates of lithium-ion battery recycling can be explained by the fact that most are contained within consumer electronics, which commonly end up neglected in a drawer or chucked into landfill.

This won’t happen with electric vehicles, predicts Marc Grynberg, chief executive of Belgian battery and recycling giant Umicore. “Car producers will be accountable for the collection and recycling of spent lithium-ion batteries,” he says. “Given their sheer size, batteries cannot be stored at home and landfilling is not an option.”

EU Regulations, which require the makers of batteries to finance the costs of collecting, treating and recycling all collected batteries, are already encouraging tie-ups between carmakers and recyclers.

Umicore, which has invested €25m (£22.6m) into an industrial pilot plant in Antwerp to recycle lithium-ion batteries, has deals in Europe with both Tesla and Toyota to use smelting to recover precious metals such as cobalt and nickel. Grynberg says: “We have proven capabilities to recycle spent batteries from electric vehicles and are prepared to scale them up when needed.”

Problem solved? Not exactly. While commercial smelting processes such as Umicore’s can easily recover many metals, they can’t directly recover the vital lithium, which ends up in a mixed byproduct. Umicore says it can reclaim lithium from the byproduct, but each extra process adds cost.

This means that while electric vehicle batteries might be taken to recycling facilities, there’s no guarantee the lithium itself will be recovered if it doesn’t pay to do so.

Investment bank Morgan Stanley in June said it forecast no recycling of lithium at all over the decade ahead, and that there risked being insufficient recycling infrastructure in place when the current wave of batteries die. “There still needs to be more development to get to closed loop recycling where all materials are reclaimed,” says Jessica Alsford, head of the bank’s global sustainable research team. “There’s a difference between being able to do something and it making economic sense.”

Second life for batteries

Francisco Carranza, energy services MD at Nissan, says the fundamental problem is that while the cost of fully recycling a battery is falling toward €1 per kilo, the value of the raw materials that can be reclaimed is only a third of that.

Nissan has partnered with power management firm Eaton for its car batteries to be re-used for home energy storage, rather than be recycled, and this economic problem is a big reason why. “Cost of recycling is the barrier,” says Carranza. “It has to be lower than the value of the recovered materials for this to work.”

The lack of recycling capacity is “a tragedy”, says Amrit Chandan, a chemical engineer leading business development at Aceleron, a hi-tech British startup looking to transform end of life batteries. “It takes so much energy to extract these materials from the ground. If we don’t re-use them we could be making our environmental problems worse,” he says.

Aceleron, like Nissan, thinks the answer lies in re-using rather than recycling car batteries – for which the company has patented a process. Chandan says car batteries can still have up to 70% of their capacity when they stop being good enough to power electric vehicles, making them perfect – when broken down, tested and re-packaged – for functions such as home energy storage.

Fresh from recognition by Forbes as one of the 30 most exciting hi-tech startups in Europe, Aceleron is looking for investors to help it roll out pilot projects. “There’s going to be a storm of electric vehicle batteries that will reach the end of their life in a few years, and we’re positioning ourselves to be ready for it,” says Chandan.

This is not the only alternative. Li-Cycle is pioneering a new recycling technology using a chemical process to retrieve all of the important metals from batteries. Kochhar says he is looking to build a first commercial plant to put 5,000 tonnes of batteries a year through this this “wet chemistry” process. However, it is early days for the commercial exploitation of this technology.

Linda Gaines, transportation system analyst and electric vehicle battery expert at the Argonne National Laboratory in the US says: “The bottom line is there’s time to build plants”. “But”, she adds, “we don’t know what kinds of batteries they’ll be yet. It would help if the batteries were standardised and designed for recycling, but they’re not.”

Output: The growth in popularity of electric vehicles will cause a rise in the number of discarded lithium-ion batteries, with as few as 5% of such batteries currently being recycled in the EU. EU regulations make car manufacturers responsible for collecting, treating and recycling the batteries, which can weigh up to half a tonne. In response, recycling giant Umicore has partnered with Tesla and Toyota to recover metals such as cobalt and nickel, and Nissan has collaborated with power management firm Eaton to repurpose batteries for home energy storage. CEO of recycle start-up LiCycle, Ajay Kochhar, predicts there could be 11 million tonnes of spent batteries by 2030.


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Agricultural insurtech Crop Pro raises $8m in series A round
 Crop Pro Insurance, a Des Moines, Iowa-based agriculture-focused insurance provider, raised $8m in Series A funding.

The round was led by Finistere Ventures and Seed 2 Growth Ventures with participation from GuideOne Insurance. In conjunction with the funding, Sanjeev Krishnan, CIO and managing director, at S2G Ventures, and Arama Kukutai, managing director and co-founder at Finistere Ventures, will both join the Crop Pro Board.

The company will use the funds to expand its team and speed the development of products and services.

Led by Chairman Billy Rose and President Joe Young, Crop Pro Insurance is a technology company that serves the traditional crop insurance market while developing and providing risk management solutions that address emerging markets, preparing agents and growers for future changes in agriculture.

Crop Pro, a Managing General Agent (MGA) platform specializing in Federal and private crop insurance, currently operates in the Mid-West states through a network of independent agents.

FinSMEs

08/08/2017

Output: Crop Pro Insurance, an agricultural insurtech firm, has raised $8m in a series A funding round. Led by Seed 2 Growth Ventures and Finistere Ventures, the funding will be used to enlarge its team and develop its products and services. As part of the deal, the CIO and managing director of S2G Ventures, Sanjeev Krishnan, and the managing director and co-founder of Finistere Ventures, Arama Kukutai, will join the board of the Des Moines-based company. Crop Pro Insurance offers risk management solutions for both the traditional market and emerging markets.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Income protection companies move into employee wellness market
 Employee health benefits must be used to cut insurance costs and reduce the risk of ill health at work, argues Paul White, senior consultant at Punter Southall Health & Protection.

Wellbeing services often come as standard added-value employee health benefits provided alongside group risk and healthcare insurance products.

This includes services such as employee assistance programmes (EAPs), second medical opinions, virtual GPs, carer support, workplace health screening, and support from experts in musculoskeletal problems, cancer and cardiovascular health. These benefits are sometimes seen as non-essential add-ons or “bells and whistles”.

Although HR health professionals are familiar with these services, they are still, arguably, much under-used and there is untapped potential for their use across other departments such as risk and OH.

Added-value employee health benefits used to be the preserve of group income protection (GIP) and, to a certain extent, group life providers. Now the individual income protection (IP) market is beginning to turn its attention to such services, recognising the potential value to the employee and not just the employer.

British Friendly, for example, launched its Mutual Benefits programme in February 2017, providing its income protection members – many of whom are self-employed – with access to a range of GP, physiotherapy, counselling, diet and lifestyle-related services provided by its support partner Square Health.

In the group insurance market, some corporate cash plan providers are now providing wellbeing services. HealthShield recently announced the launch of a suite of health and wellbeing initiatives on its corporate cash plans for both existing members and new. Aimed at reducing absenteeism and presenteeism, these initiatives include physiotherapy triage, cancer screening, workplace health screening and support for care in the home following a hospital stay.

Linking employee health benefits to insurance premiums

These are all valuable services for employers as early intervention and rehabilitation applications. But there is also now a school of thought that these services should be linked to general insurance, integrating efforts to reduce sickness absence management and claims reduction across HR and risk managers, plus OH professionals. In effect, linking employee benefits with employers’ liability.

The rationale is that if all these departments worked more closely together, added-value benefits could not only be used much more to help ensure early intervention and rehabilitation, but they could also be used in the battle to stem the rising tide of employers’ liability (EL) claims within some companies.

Currently, about one in four EL claims is for stress-related illness, according to a report by the Chartered Insurance Institute’s (CII’s) New Generation Underwriting Group entitled “Is stress the elephant in the boardroom?”

There is little data on EL claims aside from that in the CII report, but what is available shows that overall average costs have increased from £10,000 in 2010 to £60,000 in 2012, the most recent figures available. Subsequent anecdotal evidence suggests that this rate of increase has continued. Although the average cost of claims has remained fairly stable, the volume is rising.

According to some industry experts, this growth might correspond with the decline in the number of employer liability claims for whiplash injuries. Past government reforms restrained the activities of solicitors specialising in whiplash, leading them to consider other potentially lucrative areas such as mental health because, like whiplash, it is difficult to diagnose.

Another factor is that it has become more difficult in recent years to achieve successful stress claims in employment tribunals, putting a potential burden on EL insurance as an alternative.

An ongoing increase in claims would bring with it an inevitable knock-on effect on British businesses in terms of costs, not to mention the reputational impact and loss of productivity that comes with failing to get to grips with workplace stress.

So where do added-value employee health benefits fit in? As the recording and analysis of absence hot spots becomes more sophisticated across companies, HR, OH and risk specialists have an opportunity to collaborate on information sharing and putting in place targeted interventions.

Role of employers in improving wellbeing

Given that industry experts have extolled the virtues of added-value benefits for many years, why are employers failing to realise the benefits? One factor is the assumption in the UK that the state will provide.

Attitudes are changing in this regard, but it will take further support from the Government to get the message across to British business and employees that there is little available in terms of state welfare benefits. Employers will be increasingly expected to provide such benefits and the Government needs to make this explicit.

It is for this reason that Group Risk Development (GRiD), an industry group that aims to improve the uptake of group protection benefits in the UK, has called for added-value benefits to be used much more by employers to help tackle some of the biggest causes of employee absence, such as workplace-related stress.

GRiD made several key recommendations to help encourage more employers to provide GIP in its response to the joint Department of Work and Pensions and Department of Health’s “Work, health and disability Green Paper: improving lives” published in November 2016.

Top of the recommendations was that the Government should campaign to raise awareness among employers and employees that sickness benefits provided by the state are only a safety net and there is a definite need to make extra provision.

The submission stated: “The Government has played a significant role in raising awareness of the need to save for retirement and a similar approach is needed for sickness absence. Group income protection provides great support to employers and employees, and raising awareness is key in contributing to greater take-up.

“As it offers valuable access to cover for people with long-term health conditions and disabled people, group income protection is a great support for recruitment and retention, with policy features specifically designed to support the retention of people with health conditions.”

The submission highlighted to Government what GRiD believes are important features of GIP, which could help keep employees in the workplace after illness or accident, and reduce the overall burden on the state benefits system. These include personalised and tailored early intervention and rehabilitation via added-value benefits.

HR and occupational health should work together

There is much that HR and OH can do now to ensure employers use group risk and healthcare benefits already in place.

The simplest and quickest action is to train line managers to identify any potential employee health and wellbeing hot spots and keep HR informed at an early stage.

Equally, when an employee phones in sick, there should be a system in place to record this, together with the reason, and a process to inform HR from day one if possible. Too often, HR only gets to know about sickness absence a few days or even weeks down the line.

If deemed appropriate, interventions could be put in place from the start. Risk managers can also be alerted to potential problem areas, working with HR to help nip issues in the bud.

More sophisticated employee health benefits

Gone are the days when added-value benefits simply meant putting an EAP in place for all employees to help tick the duty of care box and then promptly forget about it. The services available via GIP providers are becoming more sophisticated.

In addition to the obligatory EAP, added-value services can include: medical second opinions; eldercare support services; and access to independent experts in mental health, cancer, musculoskeletal problems, chronic fatigue and pain.

To improve engagement with all of these services, some providers also offer communications help and expertise.

Generali-UK, for example, recently designed and built a communications hub, which allows HR to produce various types of employer-branded employee communications material.

The hub also includes free access to seminars on healthy diets and lifestyles via online platform WebEx, staff newsletters and online meetings. Plus, employers can get management consultations as part of healthcare management technology Optum.

The provider has also launched wellbeing investment matching. Where employers have identified a specific new initiative for their workforce – virtual GPs, for example – and want to finance it, the insurer will consider contributing to the initiative based on the likely short and medium term outcomes for the GIP population. The new feature helps minimise outlay for the employer while ensuring that their wellbeing needs are being met.

Providers can often introduce companies and their GIP members to a range of additional services, available at preferential rates, such as interactive health kiosks and on-site workshops.

None of these services should be considered non-essential “bells and whistles”. The next step is to look at ways to ensure information gathering and sharing across HR, risk and OH.

This involves breaking down of long-held barriers between these professions. But the market is slowly moving towards this and employers would be well advised to start considering how it can be achieved.

Paul White is senior consultant at Punter Southall Health & Protection.

Output: Individual income protection providers are now looking to move into the employee health benefit market, with British Friendly launching its Mutual Benefits earlier this year. It offers members, many of whom are self-employed, services such as access to GPs, physiotherapy, counselling, diet and lifestyle-related services. Corporate cash plan providers are also now providing wellbeing services, with HealthShield recently announcing a range of initiatives. According to consulting firm Punter Southall Health and Protection, employee health benefits can be used to lower insurance costs and reduce the risk of staff members developing illnesses at work, and it believes wellbeing insurance services are underused, despite providing added-value.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Battery storage, smart grids, energy efficiency investment jumps 25%
 This year is proving to be the year of investing in innovative energy technology. Mercom Capital Group reports that in the first half of 2017, over $1 billion in venture capital and private equity funding has been invested in battery storage, smart grid and energy efficiency companies worldwide, exceeding the first-half funding benchmarks in 2014, 2015, and 2016.

Mercom Capital Group, a global clean energy communications and consulting firm, surveyed the combined venture capital funding (including private equity and corporate venture capital) and mergers & acquisitions across 89 companies in three separate sectors – Battery Storage, Smart Grid, and Energy Efficiency. Total investments in these areas amounted to $1.03 billion across the first half of 2017, a marked 25% jump from $807 million in the first half of 2016.

Where are the largest investments being made?

China’s Microvast Power came out on top across all sectors, bringing in $400 million for its battery storage growth plan. Rounding out the top five venture capital-funded companies were View Dynamic Glass (efficiency) with $100 million, ChargePoint (smart grid) with $82 million, Actility (smart grid) with $75 million and Kinestral (efficiency) with $65 million.

Overall, the battery storage sector collected the largest amount of funding of the deals reported at $480 million over 18 deals, whereas the highest number deals took place among smart grid companies – 22 total over the first half of this year, amounting to $304 million. The energy efficiency sector brought in $242 million through 20 deals that were reported.

Breakdown by sector

Within the battery storage sector, Microvast’s deal was followed by Massachusetts-based Vionx Energy with investors supporting its long- duration energy storage solution, as well as British battery maker Moixa Technology. The sector is seeing a notable upward trend compared to this time last year, at $179 million across 20 deals. Top investors included CITIC Securities, CDH Investment, and National Venture Capital.

The smart grid sector saw a minor dip in investment from $331 million over 29 deals in 2016 to $304 million over 22 deals this year. However, there was a big jump to 13 M&A transactions, up from 5 at the same time last year. In Q2 alone, 17 investors contributed to smart grid venture capital funding rounds, with Actility securing funding from Creadev, Bosch, Inmarsat, Idinvest, Bpifrance, Ginko Ventures, KPN, Orange Digital Ventures, Swisscom, and Foxconn, and ChargePoint raising funds from Siemens.

Energy efficiency also saw a slight drop, from $297 million in 23 deals last year to $242 million in 20 deals in 2017. While France-based Kinestral saw the largest overall investment, CIMCON Lighting secured the top venture capital deal in the sector, raising $15 million from Energy Impact Partners. In Q2, six investors contributed to venture capital funding of energy efficiency overall.

All in all, it’s been an exciting six months for some of the most groundbreaking actors in battery storage, smart grids and energy efficiency. We’ll be keeping a close watch to see what the year-end brings for companies in these sectors and in the sustainable energy industry as a whole.

[View source.]

Output: More than $1bn was invested in global battery storage, smart grids and energy efficiency by venture capital and private equity during H1 2017, up 25% from the same period last year, according to a report by Mercom Capital Group. China’s Microvast Power came out on top of all three sectors, attracting $400m to its battery storage products. View Dynamic Glass (efficiency) drew $100m, ChargePoint (smart grid) took in $82m, Actility (smart grid) raised $75m and Kinestral (efficiency) attracted $65m.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Toyota to trial hydrogen-fuelled trucks with 7-Eleven
 Specific Themes for Studies on Energy Conservation and CO 2 Emissions Reduction

Distribution

Fuel cell trucks, in which the refrigeration/freezer unit, and the truck itself, are powered by fuel cells, will be introduced as refrigerator/freezer trucks for stores with the goal of reducing CO2 emissions.

Store Operation

An energy management system, combining already-installed solar power generators and the items listed below, will be introduced to enable greater energy conservation and CO2 emissions reduction.

Introduction of stationary hydrogen generator utilizing an automotive fuel cell unit

Under consideration is the utilization of a fuel cell power generator as a power source at stores with hydrogen stations.

Introduction of stationary rechargeable batteries utilizing rechargeable batteries for automobiles

A stationary rechargeable battery system which uses rechargeable automobile batteries will be introduced to stores and may be used as an emergency power source during disasters, in addition to possible applications for energy conservation and CO2 emissions reduction.

Output: Toyota and 7-Eleven are teaming up in Japan for a trial of refrigerated delivery trucks powered by hydrogen fuel cells. Some 7-Eleven stores may also get stationary hydrogen generators for refuelling hydrogen fuel cell vehicles as well as stationary rechargeable battery systems to that may be used as emergency power sources. As of July 31, 7-Eleven has 19,638 stores in Japan, including 2,528 in Tokyo.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Massachusetts developers create sarcasm-detecting bot
 Living

Call Me, Beep Me: A Case For The Burner Phone At The Club

For too long, the image of burner phones has been associated with cheating husbands and Walter White in Breaking Bad. After all, burner phones are traditio

Output: Researchers from MIT have created an automated bot that can detect sarcasm. The scientists happened upon the technology while developing a way to automatically filter out racism online. The bot uses deep learning to recognise patterns in emoji. During training, the bot scanned 55 billion tweets, and was able to identify sarcasm with 82% accuracy, where humans achieved only 76%. The discovery could be the first step on the road to the identification of human emotion by AIs and digital devices.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Buzzfeed Germany strengthens news coverage for upcoming election
 With Germany’s federal election coming up Sept. 24, BuzzFeed Germany is pushing further into news and politics coverage, following the playbook of its U.S. and U.K. news teams that have debunked fake-news stories spreading on social media.

In April, BuzzFeed hired Daniel Drepper as editor-in-chief. Drepper co-founded Correctiv, the not-for-profit organization Facebook partnered with to fact-check stories. He’s tasked with building BuzzFeed Germany’s news team, which will have five people once another position is filled, roughly the same number as BuzzFeed Germany’s entertainment team.

“BuzzFeed understands the internet,” Drepper said. “I want to combine serious news reporting and the lessons BuzzFeed has learned in the last few years.”

Drepper pointed to three articles from his team in the last few months that he said have performed well: One uncovered a fabricated story about the Germanwings plane crash in 2015; another reported the number of police injuries was exaggerated during protests at the G-20 summit, which other national news sites picked up and published; and the third revealed that seven out of the 10 most viral stories on Facebook about German Chancellor Angela Merkel are fake.

The increased focus on hard news comes as 3-year-old BuzzFeed Germany has struggled to gain viewers and advertisers in Germany with its focus on quiz-like content and irreverent humor.

So far, with more focus on listicles and entertainment coverage, BuzzFeed hasn’t pulled big audiences in Germany. In June, it had 3.5 million monthly unique visitors, out of an internet population of about 57 million, according to comScore. BuzzFeed does distribute across 30 platforms. At BuzzFeed Germany’s launch, then-editor-in-chief Juliane Leopold said she hoped to grow its social media following beyond 1 million users before introducing more news coverage. As of Aug. 9, BuzzFeed Deutschland has less than 500,000 Facebook fans. Twitter, which has also struggled to take hold in Germany, only brings BuzzFeed Germany about 9,000 followers.

But BuzzFeed Germany has to compete with long-established local publishers like Gruner + Jahr, plus local digital competitors like Heftig, with more than 2 million Facebook followers, and homegrown social platforms.

Although BuzzFeed Germany’s follower count and the number of articles it publishes to Facebook is less than local competitors, data from NewsWhip shows Facebook engagement on each of its posts is greater. It’s not uncommon for smaller audiences to be more engaged.

Still, without much reach, BuzzFeed Germany has struggled to gain relevance with some advertisers.

“The offering from BuzzFeed is just too narrow. You need a holistic role for the brand to play rather than single campaigns, but you can’t cover that with a small team,” said Norman Wagner, managing director of MediaCom Beyond Advertising.

“The requests for native advertising on BuzzFeed in our agency are still quite limited,” said Kristin Seidler, content manager at Havas Media, adding that she expects the demand for native advertising in general to grow in the next two years as audiences become harder to reach.

Partly this is because BuzzFeed’s London-based business team handles sales and monetization across Europe, which can be a barrier in gaining traction among local agencies. It has run ad campaigns in Germany for the last year with brands like Volkswagen, Diageo and Universal Pictures. However, Wagner said BuzzFeed recognizes cultural nuances, pointing to BuzzFeed spinoff Einfach Tasty (which translates to “Easy Tasty”), which is focused on healthy eating rather than the cheese-stuffed foods its U.S. counterpart features — and its 2.4 million Facebook followers.

Historically, Germany has been a tricky market for international companies, including those in classified, display and social media, to establish themselves, said Alex DeGroote, media analyst at Cenkos Securities, adding that the threshold for listicle content in Germany is lower than in BuzzFeed’s other markets.

More in-depth journalism could improve BuzzFeed Germany’s image, said Wagner. “BuzzFeed’s site doesn’t have the quality touch,” he said. “It looks like, ‘I know the mechanics of how to get traffic.’ It doesn’t look like, ‘I can do good journalism,’ yet.”

Still, the early signs of BuzzFeed’s foray into more political journalism are encouraging, partly because readers can see the novelty in BuzzFeed’s coverage compared to its three years of entertainment content, according to Drepper. “People don’t expect us to do news. Seeing it come from BuzzFeed means they are giving us more credit than they would a traditional newspaper,” he said. “We’re on a quest to convince people to keep us in mind; we’re trying to enforce it through our deeper analysis.”

Output: Buzzfeed Germany is focusing on its political coverage in advance of the federal election on 24 September. The company's priority is debunking fake news stories, which have been implicated in interference with recent political events. Buzzfeed has struggled to gain traction in Germany with its regular content, and is seeking to expand its readership with more traditional journalism in a bid to compete with well-established local publishers.


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Tesla secrecy has analysts estimating Model 3 battery costs
 There has been a lot of speculation, more recently through documents released by the EPA, about Tesla Model 3 battery pack options since the company first refused to confirm their energy capacities in an attempt to dissociate them from the vehicle’s options.

But now CEO Elon Musk added to the debate and says that the pack options are “just over 50 kWh” for the standard version, which is expected to enable 220 miles of range, and about 75 kWh for the “long range” version, which Tesla claims can enable 310 miles of range.

Musk made the comment during a conference call hosted by Goldman Sachs for bondholders following Tesla’s new bond issuance yesterday, according to sources who were at the event.

The information is especially important to investors who are attempting to estimate the cost of the Model 3 in an attempt to model ways that Tesla can achieve its targeted 25% gross margin on the vehicle.

For example, at $150 per kWh, the Model 3 battery packs would cost between $7,500 and $11,250 per vehicle. A few dollar difference per kWh or a few kWh difference per battery capacity can make a significant overall impact on the cost of the electric car.

As we reported earlier today, Musk refused to disclose Tesla’s battery cost but he insists it is ahead of the competition.

Tesla had previously disclosed that its battery pack cost was “below 190$ per kWh” and they aim for Gigafactory production to reduce the cost by 35%. Musk also said that he would be disappointed if they don’t bring the cost below $100 per kWh by the end of the decade.

During the call, Musk also expressed concerns over battery cell supply potentially creating a bottleneck for Model 3 production and even suggested that Tesla could push customers toward the smaller battery pack option, which require significantly fewer cells.

They are sort of already doing this with the $9,000 premium for the ~75 kWh long range battery pack over the standard option, which starts at $35,000.

At this point, Tesla is not entirely sure of the demand for each version because only the long range is available and the fact that the standard version has been pushed a few months can have an impact on the demand, which could shift once both versions are in full production.

The company started taking the preferences of reservation holders in an attempt to model demand for each version, as well as the upcoming dual motor powertrain, which is due next year on the Model 3.

Output: Tesla CEO Elon Musk told analysts on a call with Goldman Sachs this week that the two pack options on the Model 3 are “just over 50 kWh” for the standard version, which is expected to enable 220 miles of range, and about 75 kWh for the “long range” version, which Tesla claims can enable 310 miles of range. However, he refused to disclose the cost of the batteries while insisting it is ahead of the competition.


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English Premier League opens door to Amazon, Facebook and Twitter
 The executive chairman of the English Premier League has opened the door for the likes of Amazon, Facebook and Twitter to pick up the broadcast rights to the league from BT and Sky.

Between them, BT and Sky paid £5.14bn for three seasons of rights in 2015, and with the rights due to come to an end at the close of the 2018/2019 season, the Premier League is expected to start taking offers for 2019 onwards later this year.

“We envisage anybody, really, being able to come along and bid for those rights,” Richard Scudamore told The Times. “We would need some distribution criteria and to make sure it was readily available across platforms and everything else, but as long as it was widely available and distributed properly, we wouldn’t rule those out.”

The news will leave a bitter taste in the mouths of traditional sports broadcasters that were already hit just days ago when Amazon won the rights to ATP World Tour tennis for the next five years from Sky.

If one of the online giants do pick up the rights to the Premier League, it’s likely it will be at the expense of either Sky or BT, rather than both of them. With an ambition to show at least half of the 380 Premier League games in the future, it is logical that the Premier League will maintain having at least two broadcast partners – and you can expect at least one to still be TV-based.

Don’t forget to enter the Effective Mobile Marketing Awards. We've extended the final deadline to 18 August, but time's running out. More details here.

Output: The executive chairman of the English Premier League has released broadcasting rights for league games from 2019 onwards, as BT and Sky’s monopolies come to an end after the 2018/19 season. Amazon, Twitter, Facebook and more will have the option of bidding for the rights to broadcast, unwelcome news to traditional sports broadcasters who have already lost the ATP World Tour to Amazon for the next five years.


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Adding 3D objects to articles increases view time for The Outline
 The Outline is making the most of having its own proprietary content-management system.

Along with comics, video games and Snapchat-like “card” stories, The Outline is venturing into other flashy areas like 3-D and choose-your-own-adventure-style content to get people to spend more time on-site.

Over a month, developers built a 3-D tool for The Outline’s CMS. Two weeks ago, the publisher embedded a 3-D object into one of its articles for the first time. The top of a story about drug-related deaths at music festivals featured a 3-D pill that users could spin around using their mouse, as seen in the video below.

The Outline’s average user session is about three minutes, but for this article, users stayed on page about 30 percent longer than usual, said Josh Topolsky, CEO and founder of The Outline. Users spent a disproportionate amount of their time at the top of the article where the pill was located, which led him to conclude the 3-D object drove the increased engagement.

Because The Outline controls its publishing software from soup to nuts, it can experiment with new media formats that are difficult to integrate into an off-the-shelf CMS, Topolsky said.

Since embedding a 3-D object led to more time spent on page, The Outline expects to use 3-D more frequently. In its CMS, the 3-D tool works similarly to how photo or video embeds work. An editor uploads a file for the 3-D object, and the CMS integrates it within the article.

“It isn’t like, ‘Holy shit, I can’t believe someone built this,’” said Topolsky, while downplaying the difficulty of embedding 3-D objects into stories. “It is more of a cool asset that has been underutilized on the internet, and it is part of the process of figuring out how to tell stories in a new way.”

For now, The Outline’s developers will create the 3-D files that get loaded into its CMS. But as it begins to use 3-D objects more frequently, it will experiment with getting files for 3-D models from third-party firms like TurboSquid.

Having the option for 3-D allows the publisher to tell stories in an interactive way. For example, if it did a story on chair design, it could embed 3-D files of various types of chairs for users to click on rather than listing the information in a block of text, Topolsky said.

The Outline is also working on a choose-your-own-adventure feature. The idea is that users will receive a question and several answers they can click. Each answer the user clicks on will serve a different piece of content. After the content is served, the user will get another prompt, which surfaces another set of answers, each of which elicits its own piece of content.

“We aren’t just re-creating a magazine on the internet,” Topolsky said. “We’re at the next step of trying to use data to see how [new media formats] impact an audience.”

Output: Digital media company The Outline has added a 3D tool in its proprietary content management system, giving the publisher the ability to embed 3D objects in its articles. The new feature has led to a 30% longer page view time for the first article with the image, with viewers spending a disproportionate time at the top of the page where the 3D image was inserted. The Outline intends to use 3D images more frequently as a result.


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America’s Dental Crisis: Thousands Cross into One Mexican City for Treatment
 Millions of Americans don’t have dental insurance and those who do say it doesn’t cover enough. The town of Los Algodones, Mexico —better known as “Molar City” — has become a destination for those seeking treatment, at a fraction of the cost.Aug. 6, 2017

Output: Of the 5,000 residents of Los Algodones in Mexico, 600 are dentists working at over 300 practices, offering dental care to Americans unable to afford the USA’s high prices. With 114 million Americans lacking dental insurance, “Molar City” is the last resort for treating dental issues. In the winter, over 7,000 Americans per day make the trip to Los Algodones for treatment, using deals found online to get cheaper procedures.


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Most of Snapchat's shows fall within unscripted, reality TV or news
 Snapchat Discover has quickly become the newest home for reality TV and other nonfiction video series.

Of the 22 Snapchat shows that have premiered since last fall — when Snap ramped up its shows initiative in earnest — almost all of them have fallen within the unscripted, reality TV or news genres. This includes Snapchat’s newest show, “Artist Pass,” a documentary series from Billboard that goes behind the scenes with musicians as they prepare for a big performance; E!’s “Ask Kylie,” which stars Kylie Jenner; and “Stay Tuned,” a twice-daily news show from NBC News.

Shows remains a huge commitment for Snap, which plans to have as many as three shows airing per day on Snapchat Discover by year-end, according to the company.

Snap hasn’t explicitly said it’s only looking for nonfiction programming, but news, documentary and reality TV genres seem to be a focus.

“They’re leaning more toward a reality, unscripted and documentary focus for series,” said Nick Cicero, CEO of Delmondo, which has pitched Snap show concepts. “We’ve also received interest from record labels and celebrities who are reaching out to say they’re interested in creating a show concept for Snap.”

Snap has a few narrative shows in the works, including an animated comedy series with Conan O’Brien’s “Team Coco.” These are expected to roll out later this year as the company expands the lineup of shows to include animation, scripted dramas and comedies, said a Snap source.

But it makes sense that Snap would pursue nonfiction genres and show formats for its initial foray into TV-like programming — it’s what users are accustomed to. It’s also a fast way to build an audience.

“Reality breeds reality,” said Peter Csathy, founder of media advisory firm Creatv Media. “Snapchat users already showcase their own lives, so it makes sense that Snapchat would showcase the lives of celebrities — that interest is embedded in Snapchat’s DNA.”

There appears to be an audience for this type of programming. A+E Networks’ “Second Chance,” where former couples revisit their breakups, averaged 8 million viewers per episode by the end of the first season, a 100 percent growth from the first episode.

“In creating ‘Second Chance,’ we focused closely on Snap’s unique audience makeup and the kind of content that really resonates with them,” said Paul Greenberg, evp and gm of 45th & Dean and FYI at A+E Networks.

Vertical Networks’ “Phone Swap,” which is Snapchat’s most popular show so far, averaged more than 11 million viewers per episode. On the news front, “Good Luck America,” a Snap-produced political series, averaged 5.2 million viewers in its second season, according to Snapchat. E! News’ entertainment news show “The Rundown,” meanwhile, averages 8 million viewers per episode, with some episodes clearing 10 million viewers, E! News said. (Snapchat counts a view as soon as the episode is clicked on and starts playing, whereas Facebook counts a view at 3 seconds — and why online video and linear TV are not comparable.)

Advertisers are also experimenting with reality TV-style programming on Snapchat. Earlier this year, The Recording Academy aired a four-episode, man-on-the-street-style game show to promote the Grammys to Snapchat users. The show came close to being distributed on Snapchat Discover, but ultimately aired on The Recording Academy’s personal Snapchat account.

More recently, Marriott released “Six Days, Seven Nights,” a travel show that follows different influencers as they travel around cities. Unlike The Recording Academy, Marriott has released episodes of the show, which run for three minutes apiece, as ads inside Snapchat Discover.

Even here, the focus is on celebrities and influencers within a nonfiction setting.

“If you’re thinking about original scripted and narrative character development, unless you have a recognizable person attached to the show and are promoting the show outside of Snapchat, the ability to successfully launch such a show is difficult,” said Cicero. (Delmondo produced branded shows for The Recording Academy and Marriott.) “Snap’s looking at celebrities, athletes, influencers and other prominent individuals who can immediately deliver viewership from the first episode.”

Output: Snapchat Discover has seen nearly all of its 22 new shows fall with the unscripted reality TV genres, with shows such as Artist Pass, Ask Kyle and Stay Tuned all fitting the bill. Companies are looking to showcase celebrities and music, and are targeting the responsive audience for Snapchat Discover that has shown interest in this type of programming. The most popular shows average between 8 million and 11 million viewers.


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Nasdaq joins SIX to develop OTC blockchain concept
 Nasdaq and SIX Swiss Exchange have teamed up to provide blockchain technology for SIX’s OTC structured products business.

The project will be integrated with several systems currently managed by SIX using Nasdaq’s blockchain architecture stack.

SIX said the partnership will be an opportunity to gain first-hand experience regarding the implementation of the technology and its uses in the post-trade world.

Chris Landis, division CEO SIX Swiss Exchange, added the exchange operator is keen to explore innovative technologies like blockchain.

“Working together with Nasdaq reinforces our commitment towards being an exchange at the technology forefront,” he said.

SIX extended its technology contract with Nasdaq in October last year marking the tenth year of collaboration between the two companies.

As part of this, SIX extended the X-stream INET trading technology across equities, ETFs, structured products, fixed income markets, as well as NASDAQ’s SMARTS surveillance and pre-trade risk management tools.

Nasdaq’s head of market technology, Lars Ottersgård, added the latest project with SIX is a “prime opportunity to explore and implement blockchain technology in a controlled, highly collaborative environment”.

Output: SIX Swiss Exchange and Nasdaq will develop blockchain technology for SIX’s OTC structured products business, in the latest project shared between the long-term collaborators. The initiative, which will integrate with several existing systems, was an "opportunity to gain first-hand experience regarding the implementation of the technology and its uses in the post-trade world", according to SIX.


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Toxic 'sea sawdust' found near Canary Island beaches
 Tourists have been warned to avoid blooms of toxic microalgae that have been propagating in the hot weather off Spain's Canary Islands.

Beachgoers have emerged from the warm sea waters scratching themselves after brushing against the tiny algae, also known as sea sawdust.

"Since the end of June, we have seen episodes of massive efflorescence (or bloom) of microalgae, sometimes reaching as far as bathing beaches," said Juan Aleman, director of public health for the Canaries.

He said its proliferation was a "natural, temporary phenomenon" which would eventually disappear.

But he warned it contained a toxin which can lead to skin irritation and dermatitis.

"Hence one must avoid coming into contact with it in the water and on the sand," said Mr Aleman.

Image: The algae, also known as sea sawdust, can lead to skin irritation and dermatitis

He added no beaches had been closed because of the algae.

However, AFP reported that it had found several have been closed to swimmers in recent weeks, including the popular Teresitas beach at Santa Cruz de Tenerife.

Marta Sanson, professor of plant biology at the University of La Laguna in Tenerife, said ideal conditions, including an increase in water temperature, were allowing proliferation of the microalgae.

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This includes a dust cloud sweeping in off the Sahara which is rich in iron, a nutrient which micro-organisms like, she said.

Earlier this week, an Australian teenager was bitten by flesh-eating bugs during a night-time dip in the ocean at Brighton Beach in Melbourne.

He emerged with blood streaming from his feet and ankles after being attacked by what are believed to have been sea lice.

Output: The waters around Spain's Canary Islands have seen blooms of a toxic microalgae, which has thrived on warmer sea temperatures and iron-rich dust clouds from the Sahara. While the phenomenon has been described as natural and temporary, tourists have been warned the algae contains a toxin which can lead to skin irritation and dermatitis. The Juan Aleman, director of public health for the Canaries, urged people to avoid contact with the algae.


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Useless Ethereum Token has a market cap of $105,000
 Useless Ethereum Token (UET) is a cryptocurrency and operates on the Ethereum platform. Useless Ethereum Token has a current supply of 3,965,716.09795 with 0 in circulation. The last known price of Useless Ethereum Token is 0.01342498 USD and is up 0.00 over the last 24 hours. More information can be found at https://uetoken.com/

Output: A token created using the ethereum ERC20 smart contract called Useless Ethereum Token is trading at $0.03 and has a market cap of $105,000 at the time of writing. The token is a response to the valuations that Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) have generated in recent months, with its own ICO raising $40,000 in three days in June. The website questions why investors would put money into the token, reminding people that it "does absolutely nothing of value".


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Tesla to use Samsung batteries in Australian storage project
 Back in July, Elon Musk secured Tesla a contract for the world's largest lithium-ion battery thanks in no small part to a guarantee it would be running within 100 days of the contract being signed, or it would be free.

The battery will help ensure South Australia no longer has to suffer repeated blackouts when major storms hit, but in order to do that, Tesla needs to build a 100-megawatt battery quickly.

Gigafactory 1 in Nevada is still in the process of coming online for battery cell production and only began producing them in the first quarter of 2017. Panasonic is Tesla's main battery supplier, but those batteries almost all end up inside Model S and Model X vehicles. We also can't forget Tesla needs to ensure a supply of battery cells is available for its Powerwalls and Powerpacks.

With Tesla already the largest consumer of rechargeable batteries, it should come as no surprise the company had to look elsewhere for battery cells for the South Australian project. According to Electrek, it's Samsung who won out and the South Korean company's battery cells will be used for the world's largest rechargeable battery. Tesla will provide everything else that's required.

To put the scale of this order with Samsung into context, during the last quarter Tesla required 97MWh of energy storage to fulfill all commercial Powerpack orders. For the 100 megawatt South Australia battery, 129 MWh of energy storage is needed. All of that capacity will be provided by battery cells produced at Samsung SDI.

Samsung will be pleased with securing such a large order, but also for having the foresight to develop its own '2170' battery cell announced back in January. 2170 is the latest battery cell format used by Tesla and Panasonic, so by producing a compatible alternative Samsung made itself an obvious choice for future projects where supply is tight.

Output: Tesla is set to use Samsung lithium-ion batteries in the world's largest battery energy storage project in South Australia that was commissioned to helped the region deal with regular blackouts.