Beta testing is generally defined as external pilot-testing of a product before commercial quantity production. At the beta test stage, the product has already passed through first-level, internal pilot-testing (alpha testing) and glaring defects have been addressed. Beta testing puts a new product through “real world” testing by selected customers under normal, everyday conditions. Investors … Continued
Matt Krantz, in an article recently published in the Investor’s Business Daily, pointed out that six companies that commanded market values of more than $1 billion at the start of the decade (12/31/2009), were now penny stocks. Without attempting to analyze the underlying fundamentals of each of the companies in question, (J.C. Penney, Frontier Communications, … Continued
One of the few things that investors can absolutely count on is that there will be a next recession. Currently, recession talk has completely taken over the discussion on Wall Street and CNBC. Economists and other prognosticators seem to be constantly competing with each other to be the first to predict the next downturn in … Continued
Near record unemployment rates and an increase in help wanted signs would suggest that there is a labor shortage. If this is the case, we should be seeing the signs of a tight labor market, with wage growth and inflationary pressures. Surprisingly, wage growth has been modest and inflation has been relatively benign. What is … Continued
According to Wikipedia, survival of the fittest is a phrase that originated from Darwin’s evolutionary theory as a way of describing the mechanism of natural selection. In the corporate world, perhaps an appropriate corollary would be, survival of the lowest costs, and the probable fate of high cost producers as an industry develops excess capacity. … Continued
Reuters recently reported that India’s coal-fired power generation capacity is expected to rise by 22.4% in three years, based on comments by India’s federal power ministry’s chief engineer. India, the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases, saw annual coal demand increase 9.1%, to nearly 1 billion tonnes, in the year ended March 2019. Coal demand … Continued
Purely on the basis of anecdotal, personal experience, it appears that English is increasingly becoming the world’s second language. As of 2019, there are 55 sovereign states and 27 non-sovereign entities where English is the official language. More important to business and leisure travelers, even in countries where English has no official status, there seems … Continued
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