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NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Nokia said Thursday it will cut up to 10,000 jobs worldwide by the end of next year, part of an accelerated cost reduction program at the Finnish cellphone maker.

The company also warned that increased competition in the smartphone sector would hit its financial results in the second and third quarters, causing its operating loss margin to be bigger than previously forecast.

U.S. shares of Nokia (NOK) fell 8% in premarket trading. even before that latest plunge, shares had fallen 42% so far this year.

"these planned reductions are a difficult consequence of the intended actions we believe we must take to ensure Nokia’s long-term competitive strength," said Nokia CEO Stephen Elop, in a statement.

As part of its cost reduction efforts, Nokia plans to close research and development facilities in Germany and Canada.

Nokia said it plans to focus more on the development of its Lumia phone. The Lumia, which uses a Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) operating system, is Nokia’s attempt to take on Google (GOOG, Fortune 500) and Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) in the cellphone market.

Besides the challenge of going up against Apple, the world’s most valuable company, Nokia faces greater challenge from the deep pockets of Google, which last month closed a $12.5 billion purchase of Motorola Mobility

In the first quarter of this year, Nokia lost the title of world’s largest cell phone company to Korean rival Samsung, ending a 14-year reign on top of the industry. It also had credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s and Fitch downgrade its debt rating to "junk" in April.

But Nokia has been losing ground steadily for years, with shipments down nearly 30% since their peak just after Apple’s iPhone first went on sale in 2007. Nokia was the smartphone leader as recently as a year ago, but it has since fallen to a distant third place. And the smartphone category is forecast to be the only part of the cell phone market to grow this year.

Nokia is not the only cell phone company struggling with the new competition. Blackberry maker Research in Motion (RIMM) has hired Wall Street firms to consider its strategic options, which generally means it is considering a sale of the company, and it is plans deep cost cuts that could eliminate jobs.

– Staff writer David Goldman contributed to this report 

First Published: June 14, 2012: 6:49 AM ET

Tuesday, 12 June 2012, 3:28 pm Press Release: Hilton Hotels Corporation

Hilton Worldwide Launches NewWebsite for Meetings, Incentives, Conferences andExhibitions in Australasia and Offers SpecialPromotion

Hilton Worldwide has launched an onlinetool designed to make searching, planning and booking ameeting or event with Hilton properties across Australasiaeven easier.

In conjunction with the launch of thewebsite, a special promotion, called ‘Flexible Meetings,Flexible Offer’ will be available to any event plannerbooking at any one of the 15 Hilton properties acrossAustralia, New Zealand, Fiji and French Polynesia.

www.hiltonevents.co.nz and www.hiltonevents.com.au will be used asa central information source for all event planners lookingto book an event with Hilton. The website is available foruse by both consumer and business event planners searchingfor information or looking to book conferences, meetings,training days, weddings, birthday parties and more.

TheHilton Meeting and Events website offersan easy to use search function allowing users to find theirperfect venue and plan their event. It provides informationsuch as wedding packages, special offers, menus, floor plansand a capacity chart for each venue as well as destinationinformation for those not local to the area.

The‘Flexible Meetings, Flexible Offer’ promotion allows anyevent planner to choose two complimentary add-ons shouldthey confirm their event within 21 days of enquiring. Theseadd-ons include:

• 15 percent discount off the dailydelegate rate which includes tea and coffee upon arrival,morning tea and a buffet lunch. • Double HiltonHHonors event bonus points equal to the base points earnedfor the event, which will be received by the eventplanner.• Complimentary room offered to the eventplanner for the duration of the event.• Welcome drinksreception which includes one glass of house wine, beer orsoft drink.• Themed coffee breaks – each theme isdependent on what each individual hoteloffers.• For more information please visit www.hiltonevents.co.nz or www.hiltonevents.com.au###

© Scoop Media

ole announced today that it had signed an exclusive worldwide music publishing administration deal with Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler, covering all of his co-writes on the forthcoming Aerosmith album Music From another Dimension — due out August 28 — as well as other recent songwriting credits. the other tracks covered under the agreement include Tyler’s 2011 single “(It) Feels So Good,” released in conjunction with his autobiography “Does the Noise in My Head Bother You?” and “Love Lives” from the 2010 film Space Battleship Yamato. “As one of the few people to have heard the upcoming Aerosmith record, Music from another Dimension, I can enthusiastically say that it’s an amazing piece of work and that Steven and the band sound better than ever,” said ole L.a. creative director Chad Richardson in a statement. Aerosmith’s summer Global Warming Tour begins June 16 in Minneapolis. In January 2008, Tyler signed a deal with Primary Wave Music Publishing which included a share in the copyrights of such songs as “Walk This Way,” “Dream on,” and “Sweet Emotion.”

Primary Wave Inks Aerosmith Frontman

“Chad is a songwriter and lover of music, who heard what I heard and it was a perfect fit into another dimension for all of us,” said Tyler in the release. “I look forward to working with Chad and ole.”

BBC Worldwide is understood to be planning changes to its senior management team, in a reorganisation expected to result in the departure of former BBC director of vision Jana Bennett.

John Smith, the BBC Worldwide chief executive, is said to be working on plans for the restructure of the 13-strong executive committee that runs the corporation’s commercial arm. Bennett, BBC Worldwide’s president of global networks and the global iPlayer, is a member of the executive committee.

Smith is in discussions about the proposals with the BBC Trust, the corporation’s governance and regulatory body, with an announcement expected in the coming weeks, according to sources familiar with the management reorganisation plan.

BBC Worldwide declined to comment on the reorganisation or Bennett’s position. Bennett had not responded to a request for comment at the time of publication.

A BBC Worldwide spokeswoman said: “We’ve been looking at a number of options to increase our penetration of high growth markets around the world, and sustain our record of successful growth. This work remains underway and we are not going to comment on speculation about it.”

A BBC Trust spokeswoman said: “As you would expect, the trust has regular and ongoing discussions with the BBC executive about Worldwide’s future strategy and business planning.”

Bennett joined BBC Worldwide in her current job in February 2011, with responsibility for the global rollout of the iPlayer.

She also oversees BBC Worldwide’s wholly-owned channels outside the US, including BBC Entertainment, BBC Knowledge, CBeebies and BBC HD and the corporation’s 50% stake in the UKTV joint venture with Virgin Media, which operates 10 networks including Dave, Gold and Watch.

Bennett moved to BBC Worldwide after eight years as BBC Vision director and director of television, responsible for the corporation’s portfolio of TV channels.

A BBC veteran who has spent all her career at the corporation aside from a two-and-a-half-year stint running Discovery’s TLC cable channel in the US, Bennett joined the BBC as a news trainee in 1979. She went on to work for Newsnight, The Money Programme and Nationwide before producing Panorama, editing Horizon, and running the BBC science department in the late 1990s when it made Walking with Dinosaurs and The Human Body.

BBC Worldwide reported annual revenues of £1.16bn and underlying profits of £160m in the year to the end of March 2011 – up 10% on the previous year.

Whether Smith will reach his target of a £200m annual profit for 2011/12 will be revealed in July when Worldwide publishes its accounts for the last financial year on the same day as the BBC annual report.

• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. if you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”.

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It began when shocked investigators found video on a computer of a 2-year-old-boy being sexually abused.  A forensic investigation of that computer in Milford, Mass., lead to a man related to the child in Arizona, and to a day-care worker in the Netherlands who posted the video on an international child porn website.

Two years later, tracking down the picture of that exploited little boy has resulted in 33 arrests worldwide, the rescue of 138 children, and the takedown of an international network of men bent on sexually exploiting children, according to federal officials.

The sprawling, complex investigation was capped off today, when Robert Diduca, the Milford man who had the image of the 2-year old boy on his computer, was sentenced to 18 years in prison.  the Dutch day-care worker, Robert Mikelsons, was sentenced to 18 years in prison on May 21.  the Arizona man, Brandon Keith Jones, was sentenced to 35 years in prison in March, after confessing to repeatedly sexually abusing his nephew, and two other children under the age of 6.  the other suspects in the case, eight from the U.S., have either been sentenced, or are awaiting sentencing.

“Thanks to international cooperation and first class forensic analysis by Homeland Security Special agents here in Boston, along with our Massachusetts State Police partners, an individual arrest in Milford has led to a network of child pornographers that has spanned the globe,” said Bruce M. Foucart, special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations, Boston. “an individual photo discovered on mr. Diduca’s computer has led to 33 arrests and 138 children being saved worldwide. Eight of those arrested live in the United States.”

The way investigators from HSI busted the international ring reads like a detective thriller.

Investigators found the picture of the 2-year old boy, and thousands of child exploitation files on Diduca’s computer.  One file showed he had engaged in an online chat with Brandon Keith Jones in Mesa, Ariz.   the subject of that chat was depraved and shocking, with Diduca trying to persuade Jones to sexually abuse a 4-year-old and take sexually explicit videos of the abuse.  Diduca even provided the individual with a camera and suggested how the child should be posed.  Investigators immediately called the Mesa police, who took Jones into custody, and removed his nephew, and other children, from a dangerous situation.

In addition, investigators found an astonishing 27,000 more child porn pictures on Diduca’s computer.  many of those pictures did not appear to originate in the U.S.  Working with Interpol and various national police agencies, investigators were able to determine the pictures came from the Netherlands.

Dutch media and police released edited versions of some of the photos and asked the public to help identify the children.  A 2-year-old was identified, and that broke the case wide open.  the child attended a day care center where Robert Mikelsons worked.  Mickelson subsequently confessed to sexually abusing the child, and dozens of sex crimes, Dutch prosecutors say.  He also was the webmaster for the child exploitation web site.

Dutch prosecutors said Mikelsons provided thousands of leads, resulting in 13 arrests in the Netherlands, eight in the U.S., six in Canada, four in Britain, and one each in Germany and Sweden. the child porn website that Mikelson ran has been taken down.

Officials say the investigation was part of Operation Predator, a nationwide HSI initiative to protect children from sexual predators, including those who travel overseas for sex with minors, Internet child pornographers, criminal alien sex offenders and child sex traffickers.  HSI encourages the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity through its toll-free hotline at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE or by completing its online tip form.

External disk storage systems saw big year-over-year growth in the first quarter of 2012, with revenues rising 7.1% or $6 billion, according to IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Disk Storage Systems Tracker. More than six petabytes of capacity shipped during the quarter.

EMC continued to lead in external disk storage system sales with 29% of the overall revenue share in the first quarter, followed by NetApp with 14.1% of the market. IBM followed with 11.4%, and Hewlett-Packard and Hitachi Data Systems ended the quarter with 10.2% and 9.4% market shares, respectively.

The NAS market declined 1.9% year over year. EMC led in NAS sales with 42.6% revenue share, followed by NetApp with 36.4%. The iSCSI SAN market continued to show strong sales with 17.6% revenue growth compared to the same quarter in 2011. Dell led the iSCSI SAN market with 33% revenue share, followed by EMC and NetApp with 18.9% and 13.7% market shares, respectively.

Even though monsoonal flooding in Thailand shut down manufacturing facilities last year and caused hard disk drive shortages, the external storage systems market remains strong, said IDC analyst Liz Conner. Hardest hit were entry-level systems that have an average selling price of less than $25,000. Those system sales suffered most because they typically use serial ATA (SATA) or lower-priced near-line serial SCSI (SAS) drives, which experienced the highest price increases due to the flooding.

“However, strong overall growth in emerging regions and the slowdown in price-per-gigabyte erosion helped the market post year-over-year growth,” Conner said.

IHS iSuppli released a report earlier this week that predicted hard drive prices will remain high and are unlikely to fall to pre-flood levels until 2014.

In the wake of the flooding, hard drive prices rose to an average of $66 in the fourth quarter of 2011, a 28% jump from the $51 average price in the previous quarter, according to IHS iSuppli. The average price held steady at $66 in the first quarter of 2012 and is expected to decline only marginally, to about $65, in the second quarter, IHS iSuppli said.

IDC analyst Amita Potnis said the high-end storage segment, which is represented by systems with price tags north of $250,000, remained flat year over year and declined 13% sequentially in the first quarter of 2012.

“The high-end segment grew significantly in 2010 and 2011 owing to the loosened storage budgets after the economic crisis of 2009. IDC believes that the softened growth in the high-end segment this quarter is reflective of what will be a long-term trend,” Potnis said.

Open Networked Disk Storage Systems

The open networked disk storage market, which includes Open SANs, iSCSI SANs and NAS systems, grew 8.5% year over year in the first quarter with $5.1 billion in revenues, according to IDC. EMC maintained its lead there with 32.2% revenue share, followed by NetApp with a 16.4%.

The Open SAN market, which includes Fibre Channel, iSCSI, Fibre Channel over Ethernet, InfiniBand and switched SAS, showed 13% year-over-year growth in the first quarter. EMC also lead that market with 28.3% revenue share, followed by IBM and HP with 13.8% and 12.3% market shares, respectively.

Lucas Mearian covers storage, disaster recovery and business continuity, financial services infrastructure and health care IT for Computerworld. Follow Lucas on Twitter at @lucasmearian or subscribe to Lucas’s RSS feed. his e-mail address is lmearian@computerworld.com.

See more by Lucas Mearian on Computerworld.com.

Read more about storage in Computerworld’s Storage Topic Center.

Hilton Worldwide today launched an online tool designed to make searching, planning and booking a meeting or event with Hilton properties across Australasia even easier.

In conjunction with the launch of the website, a special promotion, called ‘Flexible Meetings, Flexible Offer’ will be available to any event planner booking at any one of the 15 Hilton properties across Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and French Polynesia.

www.HiltonEvents.com.au will be used as a central information source for all event planners looking to book an event with Hilton. the website is available for use by both consumer and business event planners searching for information or looking to book conferences, meetings, training days, weddings, birthday parties and more. the Hilton Meeting and Events website offers an easy to use search function allowing users to find their perfect venue and plan their event. It provides information such as wedding packages, special offers, menus, floor plans and a capacity chart for each venue as well as destination information for those not local to the area.

The ‘Flexible Meetings, Flexible Offer’ promotion allows any event planner to choose two complimentary add-ons should they confirm their event within 21 days of enquiring. These add-ons include: 15 percent discount off the daily delegate rate which includes tea and coffee upon arrival, morning tea and a buffet lunch. Double Hilton HHonors event bonus points equal to the base points earned for the event, which will be received by the event planner.

Complimentary room offered to the event planner for the duration of the event.

Welcome drinks reception which includes one glass of house wine, beer or soft drink.

Themed coffee breaks – each theme is dependent on what each individual hotel offers.

For more information please visit www.hiltonevents.com.au

By John Mylant – June 4, 2012 | Tickers: CHRW, YRCW | 0 Comments

John is a member of The Motley Fool Blog Network — entries represent the personal opinions of our bloggers and are not formally edited.

C.H. Robinson Worldwide (NASDAQ: CHRW) generates profit by moving goods, buying and selling produce, and providing information services to the trucking industry.  Customers vary from family-owned stores to large Fortune 100 companies. No customer accounts for more than 7% of total revenue. C.H. Robinson will charge customers higher rates (which depend on volume and weight) than it negotiates with its network of third-party transportation companies – this is the source of its operating margin. But with the supply and demand fairly equal right now, it is hard for the company to make a good profit.

US trucking industry shipments have declined for a few months now. because more than two-thirds of all manufactured and retail goods in the U.S.are carried by truck, the industry is considered an important economic bellwether. for this reason, a couple analysts have lowered the company’s price targets. Recently, Wunderlich Securities initiated a Hold rating and a $68 price target. The company looks solid on paper with good liquidity and a debt free balance sheet but the market is just soft right now and the Security Company envisions subpar earnings and growth at the moment.

J.P. Morgan has also lowered C.H. Robinson’s price target from $72 to $70. with an expectatation of weak revenue growth (significantly weaker than expected), JP Morgan stated that the company’s growth potential remains limited for the near future. until there are signs of an economic turn, stronger net revenue and EPS will be very restricted.

This is not the only transport company struggling right now. One of its main competitors is TCR Worldwide (NASDAQ: YRCW). Its 1Q report of an EPS loss of ($12.40) was $1.98 worse than analyst’s predictions of ($10.42). The American Trucking Association recently stated that the industry is expected to haul more freight than last year, but the pace of growth would most likely be slower than in 2010 and 2011.

The freight trucking industry is finding heavy competition with rail. In fact, with road freight conversion to rail intermodal posing as a negative impact on the trucking business, C.H. Robinson will still suffer for the near future. according to market reports, North American Class I railroads registered growth of approximately 29% in their first quarter earnings. This is a surprise considering uncertainties surrounding the demand for U.S. coal and the fact that coal is a big railway mover. Yet—railroads continue to benefit from the ongoing highway conversion due to the significant rise in fuel costs of truckers. currently, rail intermodal services are considered one of the most fuel-efficient modes of fright transportation. So for companies like C.H. Robinson Worldwide and TCR Worldwide, revenue streams will be a challenge for the near future. 

It will be a couple quarters before these firms outperform asset based carriers again. Markets cycle between the two and it will be a couple quarters before the cycle swings back in favor of C.H. Robinson and other tricking brokerage companies. This is why taking a look at the company at year’s end would be a good time to consider it for a long term investment.

LYON, France, June 1 (UPI) — the incidence of cancer will grow by 75 percent by the year 2030 worldwide — nearly doubling in some developing countries, a French research group said.

Lead author Dr. Freddie Bray of the International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon, France, said in medium- and high-Human Development Index settings, the observed declines in cervix and stomach cancer linked to infections appear to be offset by increasing rates of female breast, prostate and colorectal cancers, linked to lifestyle issues.

This may be attributed to a “Westernization” effect in countries in rapid economic transition.

Almost 40 percent of cancers worldwide occur in countries with the highest standard of living, even though those countries have only 15 percent of the world’s population. As standards of living increase, so does the risk of cancer, the report said.

“This study should serve as a catalyst for further work on human inequality and cancer from a global perspective, in order to better determine how and why macroeconomic determinants influence cancer incidence, mortality and survival,” Bray said in a statement. “It is imperative that public health clinicians and cancer control specialists are alerted to the increasing magnitude of cancer incidence and mortality worldwide; this analysis serves as an important reference point in highlighting the need for global action to reduce the increasing burden of cancer.”

The findings were published in the Lancet Oncology.

Courtesy of Ritu Sharma

Ritu Sharma (right), shown during a visit to Honduras, makes one trip a year to live with underprivileged women, one week at a time, living as the women there live.

May is Asian-American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. All month, tell me More is talking to people who trace their heritage to that part of the world, and have changed the game in various fields.

Nonprofit “game changer” Ritu Sharma knew from a young age that she wanted to make a difference. now, as the president and co-founder of Women Thrive Worldwide, she is hoping to lift women and children around the world out of poverty by influencing U.S policy.

Sharma is a first-generation American. her family’s roots are in Punjab, India, so it’s easy to understand where she gets her taste for international affairs. The challenge sometimes is convincing people crafting U.S policy that keeping women and girls out of poverty should be an issue of national concern. in an interview with tell me More host Michel Martin, Sharma says there’s a correlation between countries with less-than-stellar women’s rights records, and countries where governments are unstable and where terrorism might take root.

In order to advance her work, Sharma tries to make a trip once a year to live with underprivileged women for a week at a time. she does this while living as the women there live, and using what they live on.

Sharma says the experiences are critical to being able to better understand the women for whom she advocates.

“You really don’t know what it’s like until you at least try to walk in their shoes,” she says. “Standing there next to an African farmer and trying to weed with a little hoe that’s about 5 inches long, you know, my back hurts after five minutes! She’s out there for five or six hours a day.”

But Sharma insists that women around the world aren’t lamenting their situations, and they’re not asking for a handout.

“They are tenacious,” she says. “They just want equal access. they want a little bit of a hand so that they can get ahead; they can do the rest themselves.”

A do-it-yourself approach has been critical to Sharma’s own success. she co-founded Women Thrive Worldwide in 1998, before she had turned 30 years old. her decision to go into the nonprofit world wasn’t at the top of her parents’ wish list.

“I think my parents really hoped I would become a Wall Street banker or an engineer,” she says, noting that her parents thought that was where she could put her international economics degree to work. But, she adds, “my parents are also people who supported me — unlike many, many Indian parents — as a girl to follow my dreams.” It’s a lesson that she says defined her work, and inspired her to do the same for women around the world.

Cooperation and cultural understanding are central to Sharma’s approach. Rather than impose a Western way of thinking on some societies, Sharma chooses to rely on forward-thinking men and women in all cultures to achieve success organically. That, says Sharma, is how change happens.