Michelin creates fuel efficiency service with Accenture

Tyre maker Michelin has partnered with Accenture on a major project to create a business division focused on providing IT solutions for logistics.

Through its Michelin solutions business, the company has introduced a service called EffiFuel, which is designed to help logistics companies improve fuel efficiency.

The service offers eco-driving training courses and monitors drivers’ on-road behaviour using telematic units. Michelin analysts then study the gathered data to identify what influences fuel consumption. The analysis will then be used by Michelin's logistics customers to help them improve fuel efficiency.

Michelin, which is among a growing number of companies creating digital businesses, will act as a systems integrator.

It has partnered with Accenture, which will provide a platform for cloud hosting and monitoring. The platform will be charged on a per use basis. Accenture will also provide the call centre for Michelin solutions on an outsourced basis, along with contract creation, collecting and processing data relating to the use of a service, pricing, accounting and billing.

“Accenture used a combination of consulting and technology services to collaborate, launch and monetise Michelin solutions’ offerings in a very short time-to-market," said Jean Cabanes, managing director for the automotive and industrial equipment industries in France and Benelux at Accenture.


"Working side by side with Michelin solutions, we are being paid based on the future performance of Michelin solutions – which gives us a vested interest to create a successful project.”

GreatCall Jitterbug Dial Phone and Service

Smartphones here, smartphones there—how about a dumb phone? This week I tested the Jitterbug, a phone designed for the parents of baby boomers, a nice way of saying the only people who may not yet have cell phones. It?s the opposite of a so-called smartphone—far from push e-mail servers and multimedia text messages, this phone comes pre-loaded all the contacts you?ll ever need, and voicemail is optional. I said ?dumb? but in truth, this simple phone may be one of the smartest designs on the market.
This Jitterbug has excellent pedigree: built by mighty Samsung, it was co-designed by Martin Cooper, the man who made the first cell-phone call in 1973, and his wife, Arlene Harris, herself a telecom pioneer. During the late 1990s, the couple created the SOS Phone for people who just wanted something around in case of emergencies. The SOS Phone evolved into the Jitterbug, the star of Cooper and Harris? new mobile operator, GreatCall. The strategy is simple: give elderly people a phone that they can use, with larger buttons, fewer screen options and a padded, amplified earpiece that doesn?t interfere with hearing aids. Even the manual comes in large print, with excessive explanation (?Battery?Delivers power to make your phone function?). I looked at the Jitterbug Dial, so called because it has a numeric keypad. The other phone (also $147) is the Jitterbug OneTouch, which keeps the options simple with just three main dialing buttons. While ordering, you type in online or dictate to a salesperson the 10 preset names and numbers you?d like to have on the phone. When you open the phone, you hear the quaintly familiar dial tone, purely for effect. The screen says ?Voice Dial?? Tap the ?Yes? button, say the name of a person in your phone book, and the call goes through. It?s painless, and reliable thanks to voice recognition from the brainiacs at VoiceSignal. If you don?t want to voice dial, you can press the ?No? button, which leads you to the next option, a list of phone numbers. Press ?No? again, and you get a call history, followed by a prompt to listen to voicemail. A final ?No? takes you to a screen of quick stats: battery life, signal strength and approximate used minutes. Voicemail is organized in a similarly linear fashion. Your first option is to hear new messages. Pass that and you?re on to your saved messages. After that, you can edit your answering options (name only or a full greeting). Best of all, you can navigate voicemail by simply answering ?yes? or ?no? to everything—you don?t have to push a single button. GreatCall?s final ace is its operator assistance. If a frustrated user calls, the operator will see his or her personal phone list in order to help. Operators will dial other numbers, too, or look people up like other types of directory assistance. Operator assistance is never free: this one takes five minutes out of your allowance, even if the call was super quick. Plans range from $10 per month for ?simple SOS?—no regular minutes, just emergency service—up to 300 minutes per month for $40. Voicemail will cost an extra $3; the usual taxes and other surcharges also appear on the bill. GreatCall offers annual versions of all of their plans, but the math didn?t add up for me. The 300-minute plan costs $569 if you pay for the year up front. Even with voicemail included, that?s over $50 more expensive than paying monthly. The annual plan includes a 20% discount on the phones, but I hardly think that?s worth it. More importantly, even though the phone physically uses the Sprint network, GreatCall is the operator. If you buy your mother this phone, you won?t get free in-network calling from your carrier, not just Verizon, T-Mobile and Cingular, but even Sprint. The clear message here is that these phones aren?t for gabbers?they?re for people who are worried that their parents don?t have any means to communicate, in case of emergency or just in case. I just don?t know how many people would entrust their elderly parents? safety to a cell-phone carrier that isn?t their own. My desire is to see this phone somehow become a major-carrier offering, and not just the hardware. Let?s see the big boys sell the whole package, including full-service set-up, simplified voicemail, and barebones billing options.
As the Earth's population booms and cities grow ever larger, the spotlight on energy innovation becomes greater. TIME looks into the new energy sources powering our world and sustaining our future.


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St. Michael’s plans outdoor service

BRIGHAM CITY — On Sunday, the service of Holy Eucharist will be celebrated at 11:30 a.m. at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church, 589 S. 200 East, by the Rev. Claudia Seiter. She will be assisted by Deacon Deanna Sue Adams and lay ministers.

Adams will preach at this service.

Weather permitting, this service will be held at the outdoor sanctuary. A nursery is available for young children during the service.

There will not be an Adult Forum during the summer.

St. Michael’s is looking for a webmaster to keep the church’s website up to date. This will be a paid position. Those interested can call Seiter at 801-391-2185.

No Wednesday services will be held in July.

 

GreatCall Jitterbug Dial Phone and Service

COURTESY OF GREATCALL

Smartphones here, smartphones there—how about a dumb phone? This week I tested the Jitterbug, a phone designed for the parents of baby boomers, a nice way of saying the only people who may not yet have cell phones. It?s the opposite of a so-called smartphone—far from push e-mail servers and multimedia text messages, this phone comes pre-loaded all the contacts you?ll ever need, and voicemail is optional. I said ?dumb? but in truth, this simple phone may be one of the smartest designs on the market.
This Jitterbug has excellent pedigree: built by mighty Samsung, it was co-designed by Martin Cooper, the man who made the first cell-phone call in 1973, and his wife, Arlene Harris, herself a telecom pioneer. During the late 1990s, the couple created the SOS Phone for people who just wanted something around in case of emergencies. The SOS Phone evolved into the Jitterbug, the star of Cooper and Harris? new mobile operator, GreatCall.The strategy is simple: give elderly people a phone that they can use, with larger buttons, fewer screen options and a padded, amplified earpiece that doesn?t interfere with hearing aids. Even the manual comes in large print, with excessive explanation (?Battery?Delivers power to make your phone function?). I looked at the Jitterbug Dial, so called because it has a numeric keypad. The other phone (also $147) is the Jitterbug OneTouch, which keeps the options simple with just three main dialing buttons. While ordering, you type in online or dictate to a salesperson the 10 preset names and numbers you?d like to have on the phone.

When you open the phone, you hear the quaintly familiar dial tone, purely for effect. The screen says ?Voice Dial?? Tap the ?Yes? button, say the name of a person in your phone book, and the call goes through. It?s painless, and reliable thanks to voice recognition from the brainiacs at VoiceSignal. If you don?t want to voice dial, you can press the ?No? button, which leads you to the next option, a list of phone numbers. Press ?No? again, and you get a call history, followed by a prompt to listen to voicemail. A final ?No? takes you to a screen of quick stats: battery life, signal strength and approximate used minutes.

Voicemail is organized in a similarly linear fashion. Your first option is to hear new messages. Pass that and you?re on to your saved messages. After that, you can edit your answering options (name only or a full greeting). Best of all, you can navigate voicemail by simply answering ?yes? or ?no? to everything—you don?t have to push a single button.

GreatCall?s final ace is its operator assistance. If a frustrated user calls, the operator will see his or her personal phone list in order to help. Operators will dial other numbers, too, or look people up like other types of directory assistance. Operator assistance is never free: this one takes five minutes out of your allowance, even if the call was super quick.

Plans range from $10 per month for ?simple SOS?—no regular minutes, just emergency service—up to 300 minutes per month for $40. Voicemail will cost an extra $3; the usual taxes and other surcharges also appear on the bill. GreatCall offers annual versions of all of their plans, but the math didn?t add up for me. The 300-minute plan costs $569 if you pay for the year up front. Even with voicemail included, that?s over $50 more expensive than paying monthly. The annual plan includes a 20% discount on the phones, but I hardly think that?s worth it.

More importantly, even though the phone physically uses the Sprint network, GreatCall is the operator. If you buy your mother this phone, you won?t get free in-network calling from your carrier, not just Verizon, T-Mobile and Cingular, but even Sprint. The clear message here is that these phones aren?t for gabbers?they?re for people who are worried that their parents don?t have any means to communicate, in case of emergency or just in case. I just don?t know how many people would entrust their elderly parents? safety to a cell-phone carrier that isn?t their own. My desire is to see this phone somehow become a major-carrier offering, and not just the hardware. Let?s see the big boys sell the whole package, including full-service set-up, simplified voicemail, and barebones billing options.

As the Earth's population booms and cities grow ever larger, the spotlight on energy innovation becomes greater. TIME looks into the new energy sources powering our world and sustaining our future.

Rackspace supercharges MongoDB service

Rackspace is now offering hosted versions of the MongoDB data store, using MongoDB management technologies it acquired from its purchase of ObjectRocket in February. It also has contracted with 10gen, the company shepherding the open source MongoDB, to provide advanced support for the service.

ObjectRocket created a platform specifically for running MongoDB in hosted, or cloud, services, said Matt Asay, 10gen’s vice president of corporate strategy. The new service will be “one really good way to pave the path to a successful MongoDB experience,” he said.

Although both Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure provide directions for installing and running MongoDB on their clouds, Rackspace is hoping that the ObjectRocket’s technologies will provide a more streamlined process of deploying and managing the data store.

The ObjectRocket platform takes care of a lot of configuration and tuning issues that could flummox an administrator trying to run MongoDB in the cloud for the first time, such as choosing the optimum amount of RAM to allocate, Asay said. It also provides controls for automatically scaling a single server copy to a multi-node cluster deployment, and has tuned the underlying software stack to work specifically with MongoDB.

Before being purchased by Rackspace, ObjectRocket offered MongoDB as a hosted service from its own data centers, tweaking its servers for maximum responsiveness. Rackspace will now offer ObjectRocket-based MongoDB on its own larger, more robust, infrastructure.

On the support side, Rackspace will offer first and second line support, and has contracted 10gen to take on third-tier support, to help resolve particularly thorny customer issues. Also, 10gen will train Rackspace support personnel on MongoDB, Asay said.

MongoDB is one of a one of a number of NoSQL data stores that have appeared in recent years as alternatives to SQL database management systems. MongoDB provides a way to access data through the developer-friendly JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) protocol. It offers a dynamic schema, which makes it easy to add or remove new columns, and comes with auto-sharding for easy scalability.

Rackspace is not alone in offering customized hosted instances of MongoDB. Hosting provider SoftLayer, recently purchased by IBM, also worked with 10gen to offer the data store. 10gen itself also offers to store backup copies of the data store online.