November 5, 2021

Melissa Hammerle Appointed President of Intelex Technologies

Hammerle will be responsible for the formation and execution of Intelex’s strategy as it delivers safer, cleaner and more efficient operations for our customers.

Toronto, Canada, Nov. 05, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Intelex Technologies, ULC, a leading global provider of cloud-based Environmental, Health, Safety and Quality (EHSQ) management software, today announced the appointment of Melissa Hammerle to the role of president of the organization.

“I’m excited to bring Melissa’s deep continuous improvement experience and leadership to the Intelex team. Melissa will be a key driver as we work to help customers drive EHS and ESG performance to levels previously unimaginable,” said Justin McElhattan, Group President of EHS businesses for Intelex parent company Fortive.

Hammerle brings experience driving growth, customer retention and innovation through leadership roles in general management, product, marketing, sales, customer success and the Fortive Business System (FBS). She has led teams to co-create cultures with high engagement, ownership and customer centricity across a range of businesses, from startups to large scale enterprises.

“I’m thrilled to join the Intelex team,” said Hammerle. “We have a profoundly impactful mission and a once-in-a-lifetime growth opportunity as investors, business leaders and customers raise the bar on the practices of EHSQ and help our customers achieve their Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) goals.”

Hammerle joins Intelex from Accruent, where, as the Commercial President, she and her team built new sales and marketing growth engines to sustainably deliver software bookings. Previously, she led the team that created Fluke’s first Internet of Things business to serve customer maintenance workflows, accelerated strategic initiatives across Fortive as the FBS Director of Growth, and delivered strong revenue and employee engagement as the VP & GM of Fluke Calibration.

Prior to joining Fortive, Hammerle served as a Captain in the U.S. Army, where she led a company in Iraq.

She earned an MBA from Harvard University and an BA in Economics from Dartmouth College.

About Intelex Technologies, ULC
Intelex Technologies, ULC is a global leader in environmental, health, safety and quality (EHSQ) management software. Since 1992, Intelex employees across the globe have been committed to innovating and enabling organizations to send their employees home safely every day, leaving behind a more sustainable world to the generations that follow, and manage quality so that only the safest and highest quality products make it to market. Intelex’s scalable, web-based platform and applications have helped clients across all industries improve business performance, mitigate organization-wide risk, and ensure sustained compliance with internationally accepted standards (e.g. ISO 9001, ISO 14001, ISO 45001, and OSHAS 18001) and regulatory requirements. Almost 1,400 customers in 195 countries trust Intelex to power their EHSQ initiatives. Headquartered in Toronto with regional offices and employees around the world, Intelex became an Industrial Scientific company in 2019. In 2020, Intelex acquired ehsAI, provider of a SaaS-based next-wave compliance automation solution that leverages artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms. For more information about Intelex, visit www.intelex.com.

Attachment

Melissa Hammerle\

Sandy Smith, Head of Global Content Marketing
Intelex Technologies, ULC
+1 216-375-0484
Sandy.Smith@intelex.com

November 5, 2021

LONGi issues its first White Paper on Climate Action at COP26 summit

XI’AN, China, Nov. 5, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — LONGi founder and president Li Zhenguo has participated in a special company activity at COP26 in Glasgow via online video, outlining LONGi’s “Commitment and Action to Address Climate Change” and releasing the company’s first White Paper on Climate Action at the China Corporate Pavilion.

LONGi founder and president Li Zhenguo has participated in a special company activity at COP26 in Glasgow via online video, outlining LONGi’s “Commitment and Action to Address Climate Change” and releasing the company’s first White Paper on Climate Action at the China Corporate Pavilion.

In 2020, LONGi joined the RE100, EV100 and EP100 in succession, becoming the first Chinese company to join all three initiatives of the Climate Group at the same time. LONGi also joined the Science Based Target initiative (SBTi) in the same year in response to a CDP climate change questionnaire, which opened the way for the company’s involvement in Climate Action.

According to its white paper, LONGi is actively fulfilling its commitments and promoting the implementation of the four international initiatives. The company has completed the accounting and verification of greenhouse gas emissions across its entire value chain for the first time, with the proportion of renewable electricity used in 2020 reaching 41.83%, the equivalent of reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 1.35 million tons.

LONGi’s five manufacturing plants in Yunnan Province have in the meantime achieved 100% use of renewable electricity. In accordance with SBTi standards, the company has also submitted its own emission reduction targets for the first time – based on 2020 figures, greenhouse gas emissions within the scope of operation in 2030 will be reduced by 60% and carbon emission intensity per ton of silicon material, per watt of cell and per ton of glass will be reduced by 20%.

“LONGi’s philosophy on Climate Action corresponds to the four initiatives, which every company must follow, and the advanced presentation of this can be a demonstration and example for the entire renewable energy industry. In the future, the overall thinking behind LONGi’s Climate Action will be to refer to the SBTi in order to set emission reduction targets and integrate the promotion of the RE100, EP100 and EV100 initiatives.” Li believes that the road to “Net-zero LONGi” will be long and difficult, but the company hopes to use its own actions to show the outside world a successful demonstration of “manufacturing clean energy products using 100% clean energy”. The company also looks forward to working with more partners and stakeholders, especially upstream and downstream organisations in the supply chain, to promote global energy transformation, also working with customers from all walks of life to jointly realize the vision of harmonious coexistence between mankind and nature.

The COP26 summit is the first meeting of the parties since the Paris agreement entered the implementation stage.

“In the face of an imminent climate crisis, the Paris agreement pointed out the actions necessary for a global green and low-carbon transition, and these are still our guidelines for protecting the earth,” Li added.

Over the past 10 years, China’s photovoltaic industry has made significant progress, enabling people to use renewable energy at a cheaper price, with the “Photovoltaic + Energy Storage + Green Hydrogen” model gradually becoming a powerful weapon against climate change.

Glasgow is the third consecutive COP at which LONGi has participated. At COP24 in 2018, LONGi released its “Solar for Solar” sustainable development concept of manufacturing photovoltaic products driven by photovoltaic power generation, with COP25 in 2019 seeing the release of the company’s “China PV Outlook 2050” report.

LONGi’s ‘special activity’ at COP26 saw guests invited from the Climate Department of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of China, the British Energy Transition Commission (ETC), the British Embassy in China, the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, Vanke Foundation and the Tencent Company, for in-depth discussion on the actions required of corporate entities to actively respond to climate change.

Find out more about the white paper: https://en.longi.com/uploadfile/3/2021/Climate-Actions-of-LONGi-2021.pdf

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Logo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/781516/LONGi_Solar_Logo.jpg

November 5, 2021

Synchronoss Personal Cloud Solution Selected by Telkomsel to Bolster Digital Services Offering

New partnership will allow Indonesian mobile operator to bring personal cloud services to a market of more than 170 million subscribers

BRIDGEWATER, N.J., Nov. 04, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Synchronoss Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: SNCR), a global leader and innovator of cloud, messaging and digital solutions, today announced it would supply its personal cloud solution to Telkomsel, Indonesia’s largest mobile operator. The addition of the Synchronoss Personal Cloud solution will give Telkomsel’s subscribers the ability to back up and manage their valuable digital content, including photos and videos, from any device.

The white-label Synchronoss Personal Cloud solution—branded “Floudrive” and managed by Telkomsigma—will be made available to Telkomsel’s 170 million subscribers as a premium feature. Subscribers will be able to choose between two different storage tiers and enjoy an initial free 30-day period. The solution gives subscribers a reliable and intuitive cloud storage experience, with the ability to backup and sync digital content, while also introducing advanced tagging and search capabilities.

“We are excited to be partnering with Synchronoss to integrate its personal cloud solutions into our consumer channel,” said Tanto Suratno, Director of Business and Sales, Telkomsigma. “Having outgrown our existing personal cloud offering, now is the perfect time to embrace this opportunity and provide our subscribers with an advanced solution that meets their evolving needs. We look forward to enabling our customers to optimize and manage their precious digital content, and to protect and store it safely and securely. As well as benefiting our customers, this partnership also represents the next step as we move towards offering more digital services.”

The solution will be delivered through Synchronoss’ agreement with Telkomsigma, the IT Services and Data Center arm of Telkomsel and Telkomsigma’s parent company, Telkom Indonesia. Unlike other cloud solutions on the market, the Synchronoss-powered personal cloud allows subscriber data to be stored in-country, a critical requirement for Telkomsel to adhere to Indonesian law.

Anthony Socci, President and General Manager, APAC for Synchronoss, said he is delighted to be working with Telkomsel on its new cloud offering. “As a private cloud solution provider, we are always looking for ways to support telecom partners in their mission to deliver more varied and advanced digital services to their subscribers. This cloud solution will be instrumental to Telkomsel as it facilitates a more integrated experience and promotes a safer handling of personal assets,” he said. “This deal builds on the success we have already experienced with Telkomsigma that impressed and inspired Telkomsel to deliver similar offerings to their mobile subscribers. It will also create greater synergies between the two organizations within the group.”

To learn more about Synchronoss cloud solutions, visit synchronoss.com/solutions/cloud.

About Synchronoss
Synchronoss Technologies (NASDAQ: SNCR) builds software that empowers companies around the world to connect with their subscribers in trusted and meaningful ways. The company’s collection of products helps streamline networks, simplify onboarding, and engage subscribers to unleash new revenue streams, reduce costs and increase speed to market. Hundreds of millions of subscribers trust Synchronoss products to stay in sync with the people, services and content they love. That’s why more than 1,500 talented Synchronoss employees worldwide strive each day to reimagine a world in sync. Learn more at www.synchronoss.com.

Media Contacts

For Synchronoss:
Anais Merlin,
CCgroup,
E: synchronoss@ccgrouppr.com

Investor Contact
For Synchronoss: Todd Kehrli/Joo-Hun Kim, MKR Investor Relations, Inc., E: investor@synchronoss.com

November 5, 2021

South Korea Showed How to Contain COVID, Now It Will Try to Live With It

Seats are once again packed at professional baseball games in South Korea. Just as in pre-pandemic times, fans can drink beer and eat fried chicken. They can clap their hands, stomp their feet, and wave inflatable noisemakers to support their team.

What they are not allowed to do, though, at least not yet, is shout or sing fight songs, a key feature of Korean baseball crowds.

“If you shout a lot, the virus will leak through your mask,” Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum pleaded with fans on a radio show this week, after crowds were seen as being too vocally supportive of their teams during tense playoff games.

It is a microcosm of how life is going in South Korea: basically, things are returning to normal, but they are not quite there yet.

Although South Korea never locked down during the coronavirus pandemic, it was never fully open either, especially as the country has battled a fourth wave of infections since July.

However, starting this week, the government rolled out the first step of its “living with COVID-19” plan. Bigger crowds can now gather in Seoul. Restaurants and cafes, including those that serve alcohol, are no longer subject to a nighttime curfew. Sports fans have returned to stadiums and arenas.

Barring setbacks, South Korea will phase out all social distancing rules by the end of February, two years after the country experienced one of the world’s first COVID-19 outbreaks.

South Korea’s COVID-19 approach has unquestionably been a success so far. It is one of very few countries to avoid both mass lockdowns and mass deaths.

Now, after outperforming its global peers at nearly every stage of the pandemic, South Korea hopes it can demonstrate how to live with COVID-19.

A cautious opening

For starters, few in South Korea are declaring victory. That is in contrast to countries such as the United States and Britain, where leaders announced independence from the virus and quickly eased social distancing, only to see the delta variant sweep through their populations, killing tens of thousands more in each country.

“The goal here is to set up a system where the government can relax the restrictions, but at the same time has criteria for moving back,” said Jerome Kim, director-general of the International Vaccine Institute in Seoul.

There are good reasons for caution. Although over 75% of South Koreans are vaccinated, the number of daily confirmed COVID-19 cases has not fallen since the fourth wave began.

“We do, I think at this point, have a realization that the vaccines are doing what they’re supposed to do, which is preventing severe disease, hospitalization, and death. But they don’t necessarily prevent infection,” Kim said.

Officials have repeatedly warned the opening up could be reversed. And they say some precautions, such as mandatory facemasks, may be around for the foreseeable future.

South Koreans seem receptive. According to a recent poll by Seoul National University, about 49% of South Koreans have mixed feelings about the loosened restrictions. Twenty-seven percent think it will be impossible to ever stop wearing masks, according to a survey by Gallup Korea.

Getting public support

Unlike many countries, South Korea has seen almost no domestic backlash to its pandemic approach.

Businesses largely complied with mandatory curfews. There has been no successful anti-vaccine movement. Virtually everyone wears masks, even when running alone outside on empty paths.

That public buy-in has been at the heart of South Korea’s COVID-19 success, according to public health experts. Not only has it given authorities more anti-pandemic tools, those tools are less coercive and more precise.

For instance, no vaccine mandates have been necessary; about 90% of adults have received the COVID-19 vaccine. Mass lockdowns, too, are unheard of; during the pandemic it has always been possible to go shopping or eat at a restaurant.

Perhaps the most invasive tool is South Korea’s system of contact tracing.

Using cellphone, credit card, and other personal data, authorities can quickly determine where those infected with COVID-19 have gone and who they may have contacted.

The contact tracing only became possible after South Korea’s National Assembly loosened privacy laws following a public outcry over the government’s handling of a deadly 2015 outbreak of Middle East respiratory syndrome, or MERS.

“I think there are a number of choices that people here have made in order to have freedom, which is really what it is,” Kim said.

Moving ahead

As South Korea makes the transition toward living with the virus, it will continue to use many of those same tools, which have become a part of daily life.

Customers at every restaurant in Seoul are required to check in either via their phones or on a sign-up sheet at the counter. Temperature checks remain at the entrance of almost every business. Soon, electronic vaccine passes will be required to enter sporting events, concerts, and other large venues.

Some health experts caution that new standards may be necessary for defining COVID-19 success, though.

While many news outlets continue to focus on the number of confirmed daily cases, it will soon be important to pay attention to more meaningful measurements, such as the number of intensive care unit beds available or the number of serious illnesses.

“Even if there are 10,000 confirmed cases, it will still be more important to know the number of serious cases or what the fatality rate is,” said Chun Eun-mi, a respiratory disease specialist at Ewha Womans University Medical Center in Seoul.

Experts also warn inconsistencies may need to be addressed as authorities figure out the best path to follow.

During a previous round of social distancing, many South Korean newspapers mocked the strangely specific guidelines for Seoul fitness centers, which were prohibited from playing music with a tempo higher than 120 beats per minute. Joggers were also prevented from running faster than 6 kph on the treadmill.

More recently, Korean baseball fans are the ones questioning the rules against cheering. Why are they allowed to attend baseball games, they ask, but remain forbidden to vocally support their team?

South Korean officials insist that cheering may be allowed during future rounds of opening up.

For now, South Korea’s prime minister asked fans, “please reduce your shouts by just a little.”

Source: Voice of America

November 5, 2021

Pfizer: COVID-19 Pill Cuts Risk of Severe Disease by 89%

U.S. pharmaceutical company Pfizer announced Friday its new COVID-19 pill showed an 89% reduction in risk of COVID-19-related hospitalization or death in clinical trials and they plan to submit the drug to U.S. regulators for emergency use approval.

In a release Friday, Pfizer said the latest clinical trials of its pill, Paxlovid, featured a randomized, double-blind study of non-hospitalized adult patients with COVID-19 who are at high risk of progressing to severe illness.

The company said interim analysis of the oral antiviral showed an 89% reduction in risk compared to a placebo in patients treated within three days of symptom onset.

Pfizer said it has received an independent data monitoring committee recommendation to pause enrollment in the Phase 3 trial due to the overwhelming efficacy demonstrated in the latest results.

The company plans to submit the data as part of its ongoing application to the FDA for Emergency Use Authorization as soon as possible.

Pfizer is now the second drug manufacturer to develop an oral treatment for COVID-19. U.S. company Merck last month introduced its COVID-19 pill, which clinical studies showed to provide a 50% reduction in hospitalizations and deaths due to COVID-19. It has been submitted to the FDA, and the federal agency is scheduled to rule on it late this month.

Currently, all COVID-19 treatments approved in the United States require injection or intravenous drip. Pills have the advantage of being distributed by pharmacies and taken at home.

Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency approved Merck’s pill, known as Molnupiravir, Thursday. The European Union’s drug regulator, the European Medicines Agency (EMA), said it would speed up its review of the Merck pill, and is prepared to give advice to individual EU member states so they can make the pill available for emergency use ahead of the EMA authorization.

When Merck’s pill was submitted for approval last month, White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Jeff Zients said the U.S. government had already arranged to buy 1.7 million doses of the pill, with an option to acquire more if needed.

Source: Voice of America

November 5, 2021

‘It’s Our Lives on the Line’, Young Marchers Tell UN Climate Talks

Thousands of young campaigners marched through the streets of Glasgow on Friday, chanting their demand that world leaders at the U.N. climate conference safeguard their future against catastrophic climate change.

Inside the COP26 conference venue in the Scottish city, civil society leaders took over discussions at the end of a week of government speeches and pledges that included promises to phase out coal, slash emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane and reduce deforestation.

“We must not declare victory here,” said former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, who shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his work informing the world about climate change. “We know that we have made progress, but we are far from the goals that we need to reach.”

Campaigners and pressure groups have been underwhelmed by the commitments made so far, many of which are voluntary, exclude the biggest polluters, or set deadlines decades away.

Swedish teenage activist Greta Thunberg joined the marchers on the streets, who held placards and banners with messages that reflected frustration with what she described as “blah-blah-blah” coming from years of global climate negotiations.

“You don’t care, but I do!” read one sign, carried by a girl sitting on her father’s shoulders.

Sixteen-year-old protester Hannah McInnes called climate change “the most universally devastating problem in the world,” adding: “It’s our lives and our futures that are on the line.”

Promises

The talks aim to secure enough national promises to cut greenhouse gas emissions – mainly from fossil fuels – to keep the rise in the average global temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Scientists say this is the point at which the already intense storms, heatwaves, droughts and floods that the Earth is experiencing could become catastrophic and irreversible.

To that end, the United Nations wants countries to halve their emissions from 1990 levels by 2030, on their way to net-zero emissions by 2050. That would mean the world would release no more climate-warming gases than the amount it is simultaneously recapturing from the atmosphere.

The summit on Thursday saw 23 additional countries pledge to try to phase out coal – albeit over the next three decades, and without the world’s biggest consumer, China.

A pledge to reduce deforestation brought a hasty about-turn from Indonesia, home to vast and endangered tropical forests.

But a plan to curb emissions of methane by 30% did appear to strike a blow against greenhouse gases that should produce rapid results.

And city mayors have been working out what they can do to advance climate action more quickly and nimbly than governments.

The Glasgow talks also have showcased a jumble of financial pledges, buoying hopes that national commitments to bring down emissions can actually be implemented.

But time was running short. “It is not possible for a large number of unresolved issues to continue into week 2,” COP26 President Alok Sharma said in a note to negotiators published by the United Nations.

Efforts to set a global pricing framework for carbon, as a way to make polluters pay fairly for their emissions and ideally finance efforts to offset them, are likely to continue to the very end of the two-week conference.

The new normal

U.S. climate envoy John Kerry said on Friday it was possible to reach a deal at the summit settling the final details of the rulebook for how to interpret the 2015 Paris Agreement.

He said the United States was in favor of “the most frequent possible” assessments of whether countries were meeting their goals to reduce emissions.

In Washington, President Joe Biden’s mammoth “Build Back Better” package, including $555 billion of measures aimed at hitting the 2030 target and adapting to climate change, looks set to pass eventually. It hit snags on Friday, however, as the House of Representatives was due to vote on it.

Gore, a veteran of such battles, offered conference-goers a scientific video and photo presentation filled with images of climate-fueled natural disasters, from flooding to wildfires.

“We cannot allow this to become the new normal,” Gore said.

One schoolchild’s placard put it just as well.

“The Earth’s climate is changing!” it read, under a hand-painted picture of a globe on fire. “Why aren’t we?”

Source: Voice of America