Moving and Storage Business News

The News Review:

- Moving is stressful, but good planning can help
- How I made it: It’s waste to you, but another business opportunity…
- RedHerring.com — The Business of Technology
- Workers Struggles: Asia, Australia and the Pacific
- Merchants deal with mayhem

Moving is stressful, but good planning can help
nwsource.com – Jul 29, 2006
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Cazalet and Holmes are proving that moving doesn’t have to be as stressful as death or divorce, whether you do it yourself or hire a moving company. They’ll tell you the key is planning, and so will the professionals. “The biggest mistake people make is they don’t plan far enough ahead,” says David Sparkman, spokesman for the American Moving and Storage Association. Although Holmes is having a painless move, he’s had to scramble at the last minute. “I had a moving company lined up,” he says. “But the closing on our new house got pushed back, and we lost the movers. They were booked and couldn’t adjust their schedule… “The biggest mistake people make is they don’t plan far enough ahead,” says David Sparkman, spokesman for the American Moving and Storage Association. Although Holmes is having a painless move, he’s had to scramble at the last minute. “I had a moving company lined up,” he says. “But the closing on our new house got pushed back, and we lost the movers. They were booked and couldn’t adjust their schedule. I’m lucky I have the guys to help me. ”
Holmes is paying his crew the same as if they were painting.

How I made it: It’s waste to you, but another business opportunity…
Times Online – Jul 30, 2006
Ann, his fiancée, was getting worried. It was 1988 and Flynn was involved in constructing a crude oil storage lagoon at Port Harcourt. Home was a camp of prefabricated huts watched over by armed guards, and there was no phone. So she called the company in Germany that was co-ordinating the contract and was assured “the job was going fine”. It took a few more questions to divine Flynn was well. “It was one of my first self-employed contracts,” he said… It was 1988 and Flynn was involved in constructing a crude oil storage lagoon at Port Harcourt. Home was a camp of prefabricated huts watched over by armed guards, and there was no phone. So she called the company in Germany that was co-ordinating the contract and was assured “the job was going fine”. It took a few more questions to divine Flynn was well. “It was one of my first self-employed contracts,” he said. “It helped to toughen both of us up in terms of events to come in the future on the long road to establishing the business on a steady footing. ” They married that year and two days after the honeymoon ended he went to Italy for eight weeks.

RedHerring.com — The Business of Technology
Red Herring – Jul 29, 2006
While standards are debated, digital home players race to roll out products, hoping to set standards others will adopt. Menlo Park, California-based Zensys, for example, makes remote controls that use radio technology dubbed Z-Wave, and sells starter kits to control several devices for as little as ?a few hundred dollars,? according to CEO Tony Shakibi. With partners like Panasonic and Intermatic, a lighting company, Mr. Shakibi claims enough devices are embedded with Z-Wave now to ?fully trick out a house? for $2,000. ?We want to make Z-Wave the de facto standard for home control. ??Too Many Standards?He?s in for a fight. ?There are too many standards,? complained Peter Lee, Walt Disney?s vice president of business development, at Parks Associates? digital home connection convention in Santa Clara last spring… 12 billion in 2005, says iSuppli analyst Jadish Rebello, who notes that home and home office users make up 65 percent of the Wi-Fi market. The home market is what Ruckus focuses on and it?s already overcome problems plaguing today?s off-the-shelf Wi-Fi technology?such as inconsistent signals?according to President and CEO Selina Lo. Fluctuation may be irritating for those moving around with laptops, but it?s fatal for video. Ruckus makes signals solid enough for downloading or streaming high-definition video, she says. The company recently partnered with Aruba, just down the road in Sunnyvale, California. Aruba makes Wi-Fi networking equipment for large business environments, but with Ruckus, it plans to tackle the home. ?More and more companies are encouraging telecommuters,? Aruba founder and Marketing Vice President Keerti Melkote explains, ?so they need to make the home office part of the enterprise network.

Workers Struggles: Asia, Australia and the Pacific
World Socialist Web Site – Jul 29, 2006
Workers contend that privatisation of the program will lead to an inferior service. Sri Lankan petroleum workers on strike Hundreds of employees from Ceylon Petroleum Corporation petroleum storage facilities in Sri Lanka went on strike on July 24 against privatisation. The workers demonstrated outside company storage complexes in Kolonnawa and Muthurajawela. The CPC was initially divided into three separate companies in 2002. Workers believe that new moves to place the units under a newly appointed chairman of the Ceylon Petroleum Storage Terminal Ltd (CPSTL) are in preparation for privatisation. The government has already sold one-third of fuel-pumping facilities to Indian Oil Corporation and allows it to determine fuel prices. Bangladeshi teachers? strike passes third week On July 23, thousands of striking non-government teachers demonstrated in Dhaka, the Bangladesh capital and held sit-down protests across the country, as the strike entered its 19th day.

Merchants deal with mayhem
Denver Post – Jul 29, 2006
” The war has taken its toll on Israel’s tourism industry. It has shuttered entire cities in the north, most notably Haifa. American companies with operations near Haifa – including Intel and IBM – are moving operations south or abroad. The Manufacturers Association of Israel said about 35 percent of the 1,800 factories and small manufacturers in the northern region were closed. Another 35 percent were partially operating. So far, most of the economic damage has been contained to the north, though on Friday, Hezbollah fired a longer-range missile deeper, into southern Israel. The Bank of Israel last week said the growth of the nation’s $130 billion gross domestic product could take a 1 percentage-point hit if fighting continues.