Ikea Just Made a Tiny Bed for your Smartphone

Even your smartphone will want a good sleep! 

In the United Arab Emirates, IKEA have announced the IKEA Phone Sleep Collection, a range of mini IKEA-style beds that come with a built-in NFC tag, meaning you can keep track of the sleep you're getting. 

The bed is currently only available there and is free with a purchase of 750 UAE dirhams, which is equivalent to about $200. Of course, the app-driven bed is meant to encourage better sleep by discouraging phone use. 

After seven nights of uninterrupted sleep for seven hours each, the user will earn a Dhs100 (roughly five Dollars) IKEA voucher ‒ but the real reward is the sleep itself.

The tiny bed sadly does not seem to have an equally adorable Swedish name, but it does not require an Allen wrench for assembly, so there is that. 

Hearts showed they might just be title contenders as they stunned Celtic 3-1 on Sunday to move eight points clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership. 

Dane Murray ‒ one of three youngsters in the Celtic XI ‒ slashed into his own net in the eighth minute to put Hearts ahead. The Glasgow side made amends when Callum McGregor's classy first goal of the season quickly cancelled out Hearts' opener four minutes later. 

Still, the irrepressible Edinburgh side seized control again and scored two goals (52, 55 penalty) to consign Celtic to successive league defeats for the first time since 2023. 

The Scottish champions are back at home on Wednesday against promoted side Falkirk.

The Crawl Back to Russia

Foreign businesses that left Russia three years ago are crawling back to the country, Kirill Dmitriev, who is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s investment envoy, has said. 

These companies pulled out of Russia, either due to supply problems caused by unprecedented sanctions imposed on Moscow by the West after the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, or the risk of facing secondary sanctions or even public relations pressures. 

"The trend is there, we see that some firms are already returning. It’s just that there is no publicity around it. The process, however, is certainly underway", Dmitriev told journalists on Thursday. 

According to the investment envoy, American businesses alone lost over $300 billion from leaving the Russian market. 

When asked about conditions for the return of Western businesses to Russia, the president’s economic aide noted that the government are actively engaged in “setting the rules” for the process. According to Dmitriev (right), it's not about putting up barriers, but giving priority to protecting domestic businesses. 

In recent months foreign companies that had left Russia have begun to register new trademarks in the country, signaling their potential return. Among them are McDonald's, Hyundai, Intel, Microsoft, LG, IKEA, Chanel, Rolex, and Louis Vuitton, according to data from the Russian patent office, Rospatent.

Yesterday, Arsenal fought back from 2-0 down to salvage a 2-2 draw against Premier League champions Liverpool at Anfield. 

Andy Robertson had floated in a cross and an unmarked Cody Gakpo six yards out was there at the near post to power a header into the net in the twentieth minute. Then, Mohamed Salah's wonderful pass found Dominik Szoboszlai, who squared for Luis Diaz to tap into an empty net just 87 seconds later.

After half-time, Arsenal came roaring back. On forty-six minutes, they glanced a header into the far corner. And in the seventieth minute, the Gunners scored again to level the score.

But with a trip to Brighton & Hove Albion and a home game against Crystal Palace with a trophy presentation to come, Arne Slot's side have two opportunities to make more memories before the season is through.

Invisible Furniture by IKEA

Furniture brand IKEA has introduced a playful collection for April Fool's Day. 😁😁

Named the INVSBÅL collection, a witty play on the word "invisible", this new range from IKEA includes transparent and colorless items that blend seamlessly into any home environment. 

The INVSBÅL collection features a see-through laundry basket, a transparent picture frame, colorless storage boxes, and clear shoe racks. Developed in collaboration with The Secret Little Agency, IKEA Singapore launched the INVSBÅL collection on popular social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The marketing campaign featured images of the fake collection in real homes, showcasing relatable and messy situations that many households experience daily. Each visual hinted at an INVSBÅL product that promised to "solve" the mess for a comically low price of $1.04. 

Noticeably, the products featured in the visual campaign allude to the fact that there is no real line. While the products may not be authentic, the campaign is a lighthearted reminder of IKEA's commitment to practical and inventive home solutions.

2019-nCoV: Unnecessary Panic

The World Health Organisation cautioned yesterday that closing borders would be pretty much ineffective in stopping the transmission of China's deadly novel coronavirus 2019-nCoV and could even accelerate its spread. 

If you close official border crossings, you can “lose track of people and cannot monitor (their movement) anymore”, WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier told reporters in Geneva, Switzerland. 

The UN health agency had declared the outbreak a global health emergency, but emphasized they were not recommending any international trade or travel restrictions and urged the countries already taking such measures to reconsider. 

But with the disease fanning out in 27 territories and countries – todate, it has already infected 11,921 and killed 259 people – governments and even businesses have taken matters into their own hands. 

China's neighbors have closed their borders. As well as some other territories and countries elsewhere. 

Italy's government has stopped all air traffic with China, for example. Israel suspends all direct flights to the country. It also bars entry through sea and land crossings to anyone who has visited China in the last two weeks and is not a citizen or resident of Israel. Singapore halts entry to visitors with a recent history of travel to China and suspends visas for Chinese passport holders. The ban also applies to those transiting Singapore, a major travel hub. 

Even Sarawak and Sabah have banned all incoming flights from China. In fact, the Sarawak government has disallowed China students, who are studying in the state, from re-entering after their Lunar New Year holidays in their home country. 

And businesses such as Ikea, McDonald's, Starbucks, Yum China-owned KFC and Pizza Hut have closed their stores across China. 

However, Lindmeier warned that countries’ efforts to halt the virus by closing their borders and banning arrivals from China could be counterproductive. 

“It might be a logical step to... say, look we see a danger from outside, so let’s lock ourselves up”, he said. 

“But as we know from other scenarios, be it Ebola or other cases whenever people want to travel... if the official paths are not open, they will find unofficial paths”. He continued: “…the only way to control, to check fever for example, to identify travel history, to try to monitor who’s coming across the border, and to see whether they have any signs of infection is through official border crossing points”. 

He is right. There is no need for unnecessary panic. When we overreact, we are only making matters worse. 

For sure, my Toastmasters' days are numbered:

Ikea Wolf Sells Like Hot Cakes

 



Image credit: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-25314580

Ikea Hong Kong on Tuesday announced that a plush toy wolf – based on the Red Riding Hood fairytale – that is called Lufsig in Hong Kong as it is elsewhere in the world and stocked by the Swedish furniture giant has sold out in Hong Kong, after it became an unlikely symbol of protest. Its spokesperson told the BBC that customers arrived at Ikea stores on Monday to queue for the toy at 07:00 local time and that by 11:10 the wolf had sold out.

An anti-government protester is said to have thrown the toy at Hong Kong's unloved chief executive CY Leung over the weekend. [The latter was appointed in July 2012 and has suffered from extremely poor popularity ratings]. 

Critics have long nicknamed Leung "the wolf" because his name resembles the Chinese word for wolf as they accuse him of being cunning and untrustworthy. It is equally interesting to note that the Ikea website for mainland China features the same toy but with a Chinese name that sounds similar to a profanity in the Cantonese dialect. 

Lufsig even has its own Facebook page featuring spoof pictures of the wolf in different locations, including one with an image of the chief executive's face superimposed on top! It collected more than 35,000 likes since it was created on Saturday. 

Of course, Ikea did not comment on any political message being read into the small stuffed animal, but it did say that none of its products in Hong Kong, including its soft toy range, had Chinese names. 

Meanwhile Ikea says that new stock of Lufsig is expected in early January 2014. While the delay in restocking shelves for the next few weeks may not come as bad news for Leung, an education fund for Unicef and Save the Children receives $10HKD for every soft toy sold in Ikea. 

Does Ikea Malaysia have plans to sell a plush cow or a submarine toy? I am sure these too will sell like hot cakes! 

On Tuesday, I dropped in at Chiyoda Malaysia, an affiliated company of Chiyoda Corporation, Japan and one of the leading global engineering companies in the LNG, petroleum and petrochemical industries located in Menara Maxisegar, Jalan Pandan Indah 4/2, Pandan Indah, KL. 

It wasn’t a casual visit but it was the Chiyoda Toastmasters meeting that brought me there. In fact, there were six project speakers in total that day and they were evaluated by a distinguished team of external Toastmasters. When you have Toastmasters Lenny Pang (Satu Hati), Chris Chen (MAS Cempaka), Benny Chia (ITC Bintang), Andrew Tan, Geoff Andrew and Moses Wong (all three are members of Premier Advanced) assembled in one location, you know the meeting is going to be top-notch! What more with Victor Ong as the General Evaluator. 

It was a good meeting – there’s no doubt about it – and so my score is a 7 over 10.

An Ikea Lesson

A good retailing tip:

MKT2074/DMK2033 Marketing research students at SUBS preparing for their Poster Exhibition, to commence at 2:30 PM today :

This is also an excellent platform for big boys to show off their toys!