Fraud is big business. Well-funded, well-orchestrated, sophisticated fraud rings aggressively change tactics and invent new technologies to cash in on the unprotected assets awaiting plunder. 25 Mar 2008
The increases in the prices of food and petroleum are important drivers of inflation. According to the South African Reserve Bank's (SARB) quarterly bulletin released on Wednesday, 19 March, food prices recorded double digit rates of increase, with the price of petrol also stocking inflation. 20 Mar 2008
Higher interest rates are still hampering retail sales; January's figures have shown only a modest growth over the same month last year. 20 Mar 2008
Johannesburg is the only African city to feature in the MasterCard ‘Worldwide Centres of Commerce Index'. 20 Mar 2008
Hostex, South Africa's Hospitality and Catering Exhibition, will be hitting Durban shores for the first time this year. The 2008 show will be taking place from 28 - 30 May at the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC) and at the Durban Exhibition Centre from 8 - 10 September. 20 Mar 2008
Think combating fraud is not of paramount concern to online merchants? The topic was front and centre at the Merchant Risk Council's annual conference held in early March. Online merchants gathered there were eager to get a deeper level of understanding of how better to combat fraud - fraudulent chargebacks chief among their worries. 20 Mar 2008
The Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) has given the Northern Cape goat farming industry a R15 million financial injection to transform herders into commercial farmers. 20 Mar 2008
A recent BurstMedia survey of more than 13,000 web users 18 years and older found that online content providers are not meeting the needs of all age segments. A majority of Internet users 45 years and older believe online content is focused on younger age segments. 20 Mar 2008
Statistics SA, the official statistical body of South Africa, is expanding its SAS 9 Enterprise Intelligence Platform (EIP) initiatives across the entire organisation following the successful implementation and migration to SAS 9 from SAS 8 last year. 20 Mar 2008
Craig Leathwhite has been appointed managing director of the South African operation of General Mills, the world's sixth-largest food company – but he's not giving up his bike! 20 Mar 2008
Cashbuild is reaping the rewards of staying away from risky credit offerings and selling to lower-income South Africans who are unaffected by rising interest rates. 20 Mar 2008
The retail sector is in trouble, with consumer confidence at its lowest in years and consumers facing higher living costs on almost every front. 19 Mar 2008
In a bid to cut out the middleman and drive its own Web traffic, eBay said Monday, 17 March, it would launch a partner network that will replace affiliate relationships the auction site has long relied on to get users to its site. 19 Mar 2008
Virtual printer technology is driving an electronic invoicing rebirth within many industries. It's a new, innovative approach to on-boarding vendors. Vendors simply download the virtual printer off the Web. This takes about 30 minutes. Unlike electronic data interchange, there is no upfront cost or IT resource requirement. 19 Mar 2008
The economically active commuter market living in Etwatwa/Daveyton, situated on Johannesburg's East Rand, sometimes travel as far as Sandton or Cresta to spend their disposable income at their favourite shopping centre, even though many of these residents have to travel by taxi to get there. 19 Mar 2008
The agro-processing industry in the country received a major boost with the announcement of an R1.5 billion bio-fuels processing plant, making it the largest soybean processing facility in Africa. 19 Mar 2008
In 2006, the Chief Marketing Officer Council found over 26% of executives pointed to a lack of data and systems integration that prevented their organisation from achieving the optimal level of customer insight and intimacy. The current CMO Council's 2008 Marketing Outlook study still finds that only two of the top five solution investments for the year are CRM tools and customer analytics. 19 Mar 2008
After a successful partnership three years in the making, leading cosmetic brand, Clinique has renewed its contract for another year with in-mall advertisers Primall Media. 19 Mar 2008
German group Metro is set for a big shake-up after its plans to sell its Kaufhof department stores and restructure the Real supermarket chain. 19 Mar 2008
Controlled approach governs plans to open eight to 10 new stores between January and June this year. 18 Mar 2008
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