General

Netflix is planning an expansion into video games and has hired a former Electronic Arts and Facebook executive to lead the effort.

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Up to 60% of food and beverage operators in the country could be forced to shut permanently within the next two months should the dine-in ban continue, say F&B associations.

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Companies have constantly relied on market research to understand their target audience. However, the pandemic has seen a huge change habits, such as people taking less showers to supporting more local businesses and shopping sustainability. A report by Vase.ai, a company that deals with market research and industry insights, found that with the new normal came a whole new generation of consumers with newfound habits, concerns and needs. This has caused all past data before the pandemic to become useless.

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yellow.ai offers enterprise-grade chat and voice bots, weaving in the best of AI and Human intelligence to deliver highly differentiated elevated customer experience at a fraction of the current operational cost. The human-like voice AI bots can understand sentiments, intent, and past behavior, and also modify pitch, tone, excitement, and more.

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Business travel in 2020 came to a grinding halt as a result of worldwide Covid-19 travel restrictions. While video calls have kept companies connected virtually, we have now worked remotely long enough to fully appreciate its benefits as well as its limitations. There is still real value in business travel for companies with 60% of business travellers saying that major deals and decisions cannot be made virtually. However, the travel landscape has changed and along with it, so has business traveller demands.

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Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL), easy credit to help with cash flow or a debt trap in waiting?

Roshan Kanesan speaks to Idham Idris, Licensed Financial Planner with Wealth Vantage Advisory, and Suraya Zainudin, founder and writer at ringgitohringgit.com, to find out.

Other episodes to check out:

> Emergency Cash: How Much and How To Keep it

> Loan Moratorium: Should You Opt-In?

> Wedding Planning: Critical Advice, Common Mistakes, And Taking On Debt

> Bankruptcy: Basics, Impacts, And Way Out

2021 has been a dismal year for the Malaysian equity market with the FBMKLCI the worst-performing major Asian market so far. Datuk Teng Chee Wai, the Managing Director of Affin Hwang Asset Management, and Anand Pathmakanthan, the Regional Head of Research at Maybank Kim Eng tells us why but more importantly what themes could still outperform despite the weak domestic outlook.

With a weakening economy and the accumulation of government debt to provide more assistance to the most in need, we speak to P Gunasegaran from the Vibes about what can be done to strike the right balance between maintaining fiscal discipline and providing more aid to the rakyat as the government contemplates to increase its GDP to debt ceiling to 65%.

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Fire season is starting up once again in parts of North America, just two weeks after a heatwave which killed hundred across the Pacific Northwest and western Canada. Some of the hottest temperatures on earth have been recorded over the weekend. So for some insight into the climate effects and what governments have to do to manage the consequences of extreme climate change, we speak to Zeke Hausfather, Director of Climate and Energy of the Berkeley Earth.

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Following up from Jerome Powell Fed chairman reports on his monetary policy outlook, we spoke to Vishnu Varathan, Head of Economics & Strategy at Mizuho Bank if we should be spooked by US’ recent high CPI numbers, would the Fed taper than sooner, the US dollar momentum, and closer to home, if Singapore's GDP forecast is too bullish.