Business

According to statistics from the Small Business Administration, seven out of ten new companies survive at least two years and 51 percent survive at least five years. This dispels the long-held view that 50 percent of businesses fail in the first year and 95 percent fail within five years. Now is a good time to start a new business. StartupInfo.com helps first-time and serial entrepreneurs develop winning strategies for building, financing and …

Idea World Co. was established in 1991 and specializes in the development of product ideas. It is a venture company headquartered in Korea that invests in R&D for the development of practical, convenient products. For instance, the UV Sun Visor shown below provides 99 percent UV protection through the use of poly-carbonate film. This product is fashionable while offering protection from harmful ultraviolet rays. Idea World has a company philosophy …

Earlier this week, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued a final report specifying a framework of “best practices” for businesses to use in protecting American consumers’ privacy. This framework is designed to give consumers greater control over the collection and use of their personal data, and calls for industry self-regulation along with legislation. It also calls for continued work and implementation of the Do Not Track initiative. The report, “Protecting …

Last week, The White House released a report, Consumer Data Privacy in a Networked World, described as a “framework for protecting privacy and promoting innovation in the global digital economy.” One purpose of the consumer “bill of rights” is to create guidelines for providing web users with a do-not-track option for opting out of personal data collection by marketers, akin to the do-not-call list. There continues to be a lot …

As announced last week on TopTenWholesale News, ChinaMart® Los Angeles and TopTenWholesale, along with key sponsors, will be hosting China’s Vice President Xi Jinping and his business delegation in a supplier matching seminar to enhance trade between China and the USA. Two sessions will be held February 16 at ChinaMart LAX and Pepperdine University’s Business School. You can register on TopTenWholesale for the Supplier Matching event starting at 7:30 a.m. …

ChinaMart® Los Angeles and TopTenWholesale will host China’s Vice President Xi Jinping and his business delegation in supplier matching seminar events to enhance investment in and exports from the US to China, creating more balanced trade between the two countries. The events will be held February 16 at ChinaMart LAX and Pepperdine University’s Business School. You can register for the supplier matching events on TopTenWholesale. Key sponsors for the seminar …

As you know, the America Invents Act became law last fall. This legislation involved an extensive overhaul of the U.S. patent system in order to weed out unnecessary patents and put our patent procedure more in line with international patent procedures. The legislation is particularly important to the technology industry, which has had many patent disputes in the past. The passage of the current law has even played a role …

In the last couple of days, I have had three first time CEO entrepreneurs present me with their initial draft of an executive summary that they planned to give to potential investors. I know the companies, and that they have compelling value propositions, but in each case, they failed a address some of the critical elements that one would expect to see covered. And in each case, those missing elements …

The Year of the Dragon, the Last Year of the Mayan Calendar, the Year of Aquarius, the Year of Order, the Year of the Personal Brand… 2012 has been given more tags as a year than any other. In my mind, this is the year of the “E.” Many of the business challenges and opportunities that face retailers this year seem to start with the letter “E.”

Retailers may have heard about the increasing popularity of catalog apps for tablets, especially the iPad. For instance, Google Catalogs is a shopping app for tablet computers. It is currently available for the iPad and Android tablets, delivering virtual catalogs to shoppers from merchants such as Nordstrom, L.L. Bean, Macy’s, Pottery Barn and more. Catalog shopping apps allow consumers to browse, shop and share their favorite brands while tracking items and sharing with friends on social networking sites.

Over the past month or so, SOPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act known as H.R. 3261, has been a hot potato in the news. The proposed legislation requires the removal of infringed content by ISPs, search engines and webmasters. Due to the vociferous online protests on social media sites, SOPA has been put on the back burner. The outburst of anti-SOPA sentiments online has been tremendous, and perhaps have influenced the White House’s decision not to support this legislation in its current form.

ComScore reported that Internet retailers made over $1 billion in online sales on four of the five workdays last week. That means ecommerce is almost 15 percent ahead of last year for this holiday season, although growth is slowing a bit compared to the frenzy around the Thanksgiving weekend.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and his delegation left for China, Japan and South Korea Sunday, December 4 to boost investment, trade and tourism in Los Angeles. The OnGreen Chinese Roadshow joined the Mayor’s delegation in China, as did Jason Prescott, CEO of TopTenWholesale/Manufacturer.com, who left Saturday to meet with Jiaozhou City leaders for executing a Memorandum of Understanding between Jiaozhou, Manufacturer.com and China Mart Los Angeles that will create jobs and foreign investment in Los Angeles.

What should merchants do in case of cyber attack? According to security experts, they should disable their site as soon as they realize they are undergoing a hacking attack. It’s better to shut down an ecommerce site right away and put protections in place than to deny the problem and keep the site going since you can risk further damage.

Both B2B and B2C merchants have a lot to gain by making their sites user friendly for tablet customers. Did you know 26 million adults in the U.S. are using tablet computers? Forrester Research estimates that number will go up to 50.7 million in 2012 and reach 82.1 million by 2015. Forrester also reported at least 20 million of the 24.1 million new tablets sold this year will be iPads.