FourKites Acquires European Supply Chain Visibility Leader NIC-place

The acquisition creates the largest multimodal carrier network in Europe and accelerates adoption of software solutions specifically designed for carriers and logistics service providers

FourKites Acquires European Supply Chain Visibility Leader NIC-place

The acquisition creates the largest multimodal carrier network in Europe and accelerates adoption of software solutions specifically designed for carriers and logistics service providers

CHICAGO, Jan. 18, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — FourKites, provider of the world’s #1 real-time supply chain visibility platform, announced that it has acquired leading European supply chain visibility provider NIC GmbH (NIC-place). The combined over-the-road, rail and ocean carrier networks of FourKites and NIC-place will create the largest multimodal carrier network in Europe, ready to serve global shippers with the most comprehensive end-to-end global supply chain visibility platform. The acquisition will also accelerate the adoption of secure real-time visibility solutions specifically designed for carriers, while shortening the time to value for shippers with complex, multimodal carrier networks.

NIC-place is the market leader in supply chain visibility software solutions specifically designed for transport companies, carriers and logistics service providers. With its proprietary Data Control Center (DCC), NIC-place provides a flexible and secure way for carriers to share supply chain data with customers, while giving them complete control of their business, their network and their data. Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Germany, thousands of companies such as Kuehne+Nagel, H.Essers, Unterer, Quehenberger and Frigotrans rely on NIC-place to track and monitor millions of shipments every year.

“We are thrilled to join forces with FourKites, the pioneer and market leader in real-time supply chain transport visibility, and the pace-setter for innovation and end-to-end multimodal coverage,” said Pete Jendras, Founder and Managing Director of NIC-place. “FourKites shares our vision for prioritizing data security and integrity, and empowering carriers to collaborate easily with their supply chain partners. We look forward to extending the combined benefit of NIC-place’s leading carrier solutions with the largest global real-time visibility network in the world.”

As a FourKites company, NIC-place will remain focused on carrier-specific solutions, while leveraging FourKites’ leading shipper network, global scale and R&D engine to accelerate the pace of innovation. The companies will maintain the NIC-place name and will maintain the NIC-place offices in Germany from which to expand its team and operations.

“NIC-place boasts the only carrier-focused visibility solution on the market; the most advanced rail tracking features in Europe; and unmatched expertise in high-value and temperature-controlled shipments,” said FourKites founder and CEO Mathew Elenjickal. “This acquisition creates a powerhouse of carrier- and shipper-focused expertise that accelerates end-to-end visibility and the delivery of new solutions tailor-made for our customers’ unique requirements.”

The acquisition will help accelerate much-needed supply chain visibility across Europe. According to a recent research report on the state of European supply chains by Reuters and FourKites, 78% of European companies indicated that end-to-end freight traceability was their biggest supply chain pain point.

NIC-place’s advanced capabilities:

  • Data privacy and security. NIC-place’s Data Control Center (DCC) is subject to some of the most stringent data privacy regulations regarding GDPR. These laws allow carriers to have complete control over their data and with whom they share it.
  • Easy integration with any real-time visibility provider. NIC-place’s DCC is the only solution with standardized interfaces to all open real-time visibility platforms, unifying all data types from multiple telematics systems across different manufacturers and transport modes. Carriers who onboard with DCC have a simple, single hub for all of their visibility data.
  • Temperature-controlled and high-value shipments. NIC-place is the market-leader for tracking temperature-controlled and high-value transports such as pharmaceuticals, fresh and frozen products, and electronic equipment. The largest group of European refrigerated logistics companies leverage the NIC-place platform to better serve customers and ensure that critical goods are delivered with the highest quality.
  • Comprehensive and optimized rail coverage. NIC-place tracks the largest European rail network — an increasingly critical capability as many companies shift more shipments to rail in the face of ongoing ocean challenges. The company’s advanced monitoring tracks wagons, train compositions, points of interest and transports for effective use, smooth processes and better planning.

“We are excited to see these two market leaders joining forces,” said European Carrier Rainer Linke, Unterer Logistics. “With their shared commitment to secure, carrier-controlled data sharing, collaboration and ongoing innovation, we are excited about the value this union will bring to the broader European logistics community.”

FourKites’ acquisition of NIC-place comes on the heels of record growth for both companies as they address the challenges fueled by the ongoing global supply chain crisis. In 2021, FourKites saw 148% growth in European shipment volume, doubled the number of new European customers, grew its carrier network 35% and saw 110% growth in European carriers on FourKites’ Premier Carrier List.

FourKites will be showcasing the NIC-place solution and the value it brings to both carriers and shippers in a live webinar taking place on Wednesday, February 16. Register here.

About FourKites
FourKites® is the #1 supply chain visibility platform in the world, extending visibility beyond transportation into yards, warehouses, stores and beyond. Tracking more than 2.5 million shipments daily across road, rail, ocean, air, parcel and courier, and reaching 176 countries, FourKites combines real-time data and powerful machine learning to help companies digitize their end-to-end supply chains. More than 1,000 of the world’s most recognized brands — including 9 of the top-10 CPG and 18 of the top-20 food and beverage companies — trust FourKites to transform their business and create more agile, efficient and sustainable supply chains. To learn more, visit https://www.fourkites.com/.

Media Contact:
Marianna Vyridi
Big Valley Marketing for FourKites
(650) 468-3263
mvyridi@bigvalley.co

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/a4419401-4eba-4337-84ff-9b407f30a20f

OKX overtakes global crypto exchanges as 2nd largest, rebrands as cross-platform services provider

Formerly OKEx, OKX’s new brand highlights the platform’s robust suite of crypto, NFT and DeFi investing products

VICTORIA, Seychelles, Jan. 18, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — OKX, which recently became the second largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world by spot trading volume, today announced a company-wide rebrand that reflects the dynamism and accelerating adoption of cryptocurrency. Founded in 2017 as a cryptocurrency trading service, OKX has since amassed over 20 million users and expanded its suite of digital asset investing products to include OKX Earn, a tool for earning passive crypto income; an NFT marketplace and decentralized application discovery hub; and most recently, MetaX, OKX’s new decentralized mode that features a cross-chain dashboard and self-custody Web 3.0 wallet for storing digital assets, including NFTs.

This shift, as highlighted by the company’s name change from OKEx to OKX, reflects the platform’s growing number of wealth creation opportunities beyond the exchange, which investors use to trade hundreds of digital assets on spot, margin and derivatives markets.

As part of the move, OKX has declared its mission to be “to remove barriers to wealth creation by giving you access to everything our decentralized future holds.” This underscores the platform’s ongoing evolution towards decentralization, which includes giving investors the option to self-custody their digital assets. Distinct from other centralized cryptocurrency exchanges, OKX is committed to gradually decreasing the company’s level of involvement in user activity, with the ultimate goal of shedding intermediation entirely.

“OKX is moving beyond the standard centralized exchange model to give our customers an end-to-end cryptocurrency experience,” said Jay Hao, CEO of OKX. “Most importantly, we’re doing this while upholding the core principles of crypto — decentralization and autonomy. Our goal is to give customers the tools they need to easily and securely earn, transfer, and spend their wealth as they see fit, without intermediation from us. We’ve dropped the ‘E’ from our name because we’re so much more than an exchange, just like crypto is so much more than a speculative asset.”

OKX, which lists over 250 digital assets and has long held the #1 rank for cryptocurrency futures trading volumes, recently became the second largest cryptocurrency spot trading platform in the world. In 2021, total trading volume on the platform, including spot and derivatives instruments, grew over 700%, while the number of trades executed on the platform increased over 480%. Staking, savings and DeFi offerings via OKX Earn saw over $5.1 billion deposited by users, and paid out over $314 million in passive income this past year.

To learn more, please visit OKX.com and follow @OKX on Twitter.

About OKX

Founded in 2017, OKX is a world leading cryptocurrency exchange and ecosystem. OKX has innovatively adopted blockchain technology to reshape the financial ecosystem and offers some of the most diverse and sophisticated products, solutions and trading tools on the market. Trusted by more than 20 million people in 180 regions across the globe, OKX’s mission is to remove barriers to wealth creation by offering access to everything the decentralized future holds. With its unwavering commitment to innovation, OKX envisions a world of financial inclusion for all through the power of crypto and decentralized finance.

Contact us

Email: media@okx.com
Olivia Capozzalo:
olivia.capozzalo@okx.com
@oliviacap (Telegram)

Vuzix and AMA Strengthen Strategic Partnership to Address the Future of the Deskless Workforce

Vuzix and AMA Strengthen Strategic Partnership to Address the Future of the Deskless Workforce

  • Vuzix M400 smart glasses now supports the entire XpertEye assisted reality product range
  • Adoption of the embedded Vivoka multilingual automatic speech recognition

RENNES, France, January 18, 2022Vuzix® Corporation (NASDAQ: VUZI), (“Vuzix” or, the “Company”), a leading supplier of Smart Glasses and Augmented Reality (AR) technology and products, and AMA (EURONEXT GROWTH: ALAMA), a pioneer of assisted reality and workflow management software solutions, today announced the reinforcement of their partnership to grow and strengthen both organization’s ability to deliver world-class remote collaboration for the deskless workforce.

Vuzix and AMA have been closely working together for over five years and are now widening the scope of their partnership agreement to accelerate the digital transformation of their joint industrial and healthcare customer base. By proposing the lightweight and ergonomically versatile Vuzix M400 smart glasses on the entire XpertEye remote assistance product range, customers will be able to boost productivity and successfully complete remote support tasks safely and efficiently. Customers will now benefit from hands-free collaboration with voice control on XpertEye Essential as well as from seamless remote assistance with the Vuzix M400 wearable display connected to a dedicated smartphone on XpertEye Advanced.

As a strategic partner, AMA has been the first to successfully test and leverage Vivoka’s embedded multilingual automatic speech recognition, now standard on Vuzix full line of smart glasses. With 18 languages available, the XpertEye assisted reality solution embraces the unparalleled and secured voice AI capabilities of this embedded speech technology.

“Our growing relationship with AMA increasingly leverages the strong combination of a leading hardware platform and a leading software solution,” said Paul Travers, President and CEO of Vuzix. “The proven productivity improvements of our combined offering will remain a strong demand driver as industry adoption continues to accelerate this year and beyond.”

“Our partnership is taking a new step forward. We are convinced that our combined, forward looking vision of remote assistance is key to accompany the rapid digital transformation of our customers,“ said Guillaume Campion, VP Product & Partnerships at AMA.

About Vuzix Corporation

Vuzix is a leading supplier of Smart Glasses and Augmented Reality (AR) technologies and products for the consumer and enterprise markets. The Company’s products include personal display and wearable computing devices that offer users a portable high-quality viewing experience, provide solutions for mobility, wearable displays, and augmented reality. Vuzix holds 243 patents and patents pending and numerous IP licenses in the Video Eyewear field. The Company has won Consumer Electronics Show (or CES) awards for innovation for the years 2005 to 2022 and several wireless technology innovation awards among others. Founded in 1997, Vuzix is a public company (NASDAQ: VUZI) with offices in Rochester, NY, Oxford, UK, and Tokyo, Japan. For more information, visit the Vuzix website,   Twitter, and Facebook pages.

Forward-Looking Statements Disclaimer
Certain statements contained in this news release are “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and applicable Canadian securities laws. Forward-looking statements contained in this release relate to Vuzix Smart Glasses, our business relationship and future opportunities with and orders from AMA and its customers, and among other things the Company’s leadership in the Smart Glasses and AR display industry. They are generally identified by words such as “believes,” “may,” “expects,” “anticipates,” “should” and similar expressions. Readers should not place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements, which are based upon the Company’s beliefs and assumptions as of the date of this release. The Company’s actual results could differ materially due to risk factors and other items described in more detail in the “Risk Factors” section of the Company’s Annual Reports and MD&A filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission and applicable Canadian securities regulators (copies of which may be obtained at www.sedar.com or www.sec.gov). Subsequent events and developments may cause these forward-looking statements to change. The Company specifically disclaims any obligation or intention to update or revise these forward-looking statements as a result of changed events or circumstances that occur after the date of this release, except as required by applicable law.

Vuzix Media and Investor Relations Contact:

Ed McGregor, Director of Investor Relations,
Vuzix Corporation
ed_mcgregor@vuzix.com
Tel: (585) 359-5985

Vuzix Corporation, 25 Hendrix Road, West Henrietta, NY 14586 USA,
Investor Information – IR@vuzix.com www.vuzix.com

About AMA
While most video conferencing tools quickly prove their limits outside the office, AMA’s smart workplace allows experts and frontline workers to collaborate remotely on any device via a secure software platform, perfectly tailored to each business.

With seven years of proven experience in remote assistance solutions, AMA is helping medical institutions and industrial organizations of all sizes accelerate their digital transformation. Our market-leading XpertEye Assisted Reality platform has been deployed in more than 100 countries, addressing a wide range of applications like remote diagnostics, inspection, scheduling, and workflow management. These unequaled remote interactive collaboration solutions empower our customers to improve productivity, speed up resolution time, and maximize uptime.

AMA is a fast-growing company with offices in Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Japan, Romania, Spain, UK, and the USA – allows us to work in every time zone and reach our customers wherever they are. AMA is listed on Euronext Growth Paris (GB00BNKGZC51 – ALAMA).

More information on www.amaxperteye.com

AMA Media Relations Contact:

Esther Duval
Marketing Director AMA
+33 689 182 343

Attachment

White House Launches Website to Order Free At-Home COVID-19 Tests

The White House on Tuesday launched a website for U.S. citizens to order free at-home COVID-19 tests one day earlier than the launch was set to go online.

Americans can now go to COVIDTests.gov and request four at-home tests per household that will be delivered by the U.S. Postal Service.

White House spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters the website was in “beta testing” and functioning at a “limited capacity” before it officially launches Wednesday morning.

The preliminary launch is part of a Biden administration effort to tackle inventory problems and long lines for testing as the omicron variant pushes coronavirus infections in the U.S. to record high levels.

After saying in December the federal government would buy 500 million at-home tests for the online program, President Joe Biden announced Thursday he was increasing the order to 1 billion tests.

The tests will typically be shipped within 7-12 days of ordering through the USPS. Shipping times could be between 1-3 days within the continental U.S.

The Biden administration has also ordered private insurance companies to cover the cost of eight at-home rapid tests per month, starting January 15, enabling Americans to be reimbursed for tests they bought from retailers.

Source: Voice of America

Malaysia Reports 2,342 New COVID-19 Infections, 16 More Deaths

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia reported another 2,342 COVID-19 infections as of midnight, bringing the national total to 2,810,689, according to the Health Ministry.

There are another 180 imported cases, with 2,162 being local transmissions, data released on the ministry’s website showed.

Another 16 deaths have been reported, bringing the death toll to 31,809.

The ministry reported 2,907 new recoveries, bringing the total number of cured and discharged to 2,738,262.

There are 40,618 active cases, 184 are being held in intensive care and 87 of those are in need of assisted breathing.

The country reported 242,705 vaccine doses administered yesterday alone, and 79.7 percent of the population have received at least one dose, 78.6 percent are fully vaccinated and 29.4 percent have received boosters.

Source: Nam News Network

Indonesian President Chooses Nusantara As New Capital Name: Minister

JAKARTA, Indonesian President, Joko Widodo, has chosen Nusantara, or archipelago in English, as the name of the new national capital, to be built on the country’s Kalimantan island, a senior government official said yesterday.

“I just received a direct confirmation from the president on Friday and he said, the new capital is named Nusantara,” the country’s National Development Planning Minister, Suharso Monoarfa, said, during a meeting with the special committee for the new capital city’s establishment, at the House of Representatives in Central Jakarta.

The minister explained the reason for selecting Nusantara was because the name has been well known since a long time ago.

“It is iconic internationally, easy and it describes the archipelago of the Republic of Indonesia,” Monoarfa said, adding, “And I think we all agree with the name Nusantara.”

The plan to relocate the capital from the country’s most populated island of Java was first announced by the government in Apr, 2019.

Months later, Widodo announced two districts in East Kalimantan province, which are North Penajam Paser and Kutai Kertanegara, to be the site of the new capital city.

With an area of about 127,000 square km, East Kalimantan is home to more than 3.7 million people.

The ground-breaking of the multibillion U.S. dollar construction project was initially expected to be conducted in Aug, 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic forced the government to put it on hold.

The new capital will serve as the centre of government, while Jakarta, the current capital city, which is home to more than 10 million people, would remain the business and economic centre of Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s biggest economy.

Source: Nam News Network