International Business and Technology Blog

September is a time of change, and so it has been for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) program. The increasingly drawn out negotiations (started in July 2013) are now in their 7th week-long round, 29^th September to the 3^rd October 2014. This time hosted by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) in Chevy Chase, Maryland, USA , they steadily accrue interested party criticism, while losing the more broad political support on both sides of the economically challenged Atlantic.

On Friday the 19th September 2014, as a warming sun rose on the coastline of bonnie eastern Scotland, the overwhelming “Nay” to Independence was clear. Those Scottish National Party (SNP) Braveheart Mel Gibson lookalike warriors wrapped in their Saltires, drifted despondently home. The “Better Together” campaign to keep Scotland within the United Kingdom had resoundingly won the night. Of the 4.3 million Scots who were eligible to vote (population 5.4 million), a drum thumping 85% did so. However, the hitherto silent 2 million (55%) demanded No to Independence, while the Independence cries of the very vocal proved thin at the ballot box with just 45%.

In our previous blog we introduced two different types of videos that can boost your business: demonstration and explainer videos. Today we will have a closer look at how to get return on investment in these videos by making them visible to a broader audience.

Maybe you’ve heard of website localization already, maybe this is the first time. But don’t worry, in this blog we’ll explain what it is and why it matters to your exports!

If you want to grow your European exports and business, firstly you need to ensure people will be able to find your business on the internet. Secondly, once you’ve got your visitors on the website, you need to present them with both text and visual elements that are native to their home country. That will help you generate local demand for your products or services in Europe. Website localization is the process that will help you achieve that. So what is it exactly?

"The Single Market is the European Unions’ grown jewel, and online is its natural new home. So let’s bring down those barriers”, announced Neelie Kroes (Vice President of the European Commission responsible for the Digital Agenda for Europe) in June 2014, preceding the Global Ecommerce Summit in Barcelona, Spain.

Scotland: No or Yes to "Independence", the big issue currently exercising the directly concerned 65 million minds in Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland (United Kingdom). Will or won't, the 3 million Scots (95% of the UK population is effectively disenfranchised) who are eligible to vote, decide No (= stay) or Yes (= leave) to the Union of 1703. Their decision will have a huge direct impact on the whole of the UK and beyond as the fallout, directly impacts the European Unions' 28 nations and 350 million citizens. If Yes, Scotland will be out of the UK and the EU, avowedly seeking to be admitted in, as #29. A huge topic on its own.

In 07.2014 we saw the 6th round of TTIP negotiations completed in Brussels. The EU's Chief TTIP Negotiator, Ignacio Garcia Bercero, highlighted in his closing statement the achievements as well as the work to be done before the 7th round convenes. He flagged up i) classic market access issues ii) the ongoing regulatory agenda iii) other negotiation areas and iv) importantly the stakeholders.

Italy has been on my watch list for many, many years. I never: i) lose a chance to go there for both business (and leisure) and ii) did not understand (nor do most of my Italian friends) how someone like Berlusconi (apart from the fact that his fortune estimated at >$9Bn, owns much of it in Italy’s media and communication assets) became their Prime Minister (3 times since 1994) for >9 years.

European economic ills are back in the financial headlines, as GDP numbers disappoint. I was enjoying not being gloomy, a little bit upbeat, reporting on steady economic upticks. This was supposed to be the turnaround year. How quickly that can change. We now know that the Eurozone economies (18 of them) collectively failed to grow in Q2.2014. You might like to know who and why.

Both the EU and the USA are very online-oriented economies, with 375 million European and 254 million American internet users, and an ecommerce spend of $379Bn and $225.5Bn respectively (2012). If you’re selling your products via distributors and think that you can avoid being involved in the online world then you are mistaken; you’re making your brand less competitive and missing out on business. Moreover, these trends are not going to slow down; expected 2014-2015 ecommerce growth rates are at 18% for the EU and 13% for the USA. Learn why and how you should use online presence and marketing to support your distributors!