ReleaseWire

The Shareholders Foundation announces that a deadline is coming up on March 21, 2017 in the settlement reached in the securities class action lawsuit filed on behalf of investors who purchased shares of Barrett Business Services Inc (NASDAQ:BBSI) between February 12, 2013 and March 9, 2016.

The report "Polyurethane Additives Market by Type, Application (Flexible Foam, Rigid Foam, Adhesive & Sealant, Coating, Elastomer, Binders), End-Use Industry (Automotive, Building & Construction, and Bedding & Furniture), and Region - Global Forecast to 2021", The market for polyurethane additives is expected to reach USD 2.75 Billion by 2021, at a CAGR of 6.3% from 2016 to 2021.

Layla Sleep, an American mattress company who specializes in copper infused dual firmness memory foam mattresses have announced discounts on their highly sought after products. In welcoming spring, they have offered all their customers $60 off their mattress purchase. This means that if one buys a twin size mattress, they are saving nearly a fifth of the original price. Similarly, purchase of the King size mattress, saves nearly a tenth of the total price.

The smart battery market is poised for considerable growth in the coming years, riding on the rising demand and usage of smart electronics such as smartphones, tablets, laptops, and cameras. Technological advancements aimed at improving the efficiency of batteries used in various end uses have played a significant role in the development of this market.

The identification and security systems deployed across organizations have evolved a great deal in the past few years. Many recent advances introduced in these systems have considerably benefited businesses worldwide in fortifying their security. Next generation biometrics is one such technology that has been witnessing rising demand around the world.

Smart home appliances are the class of next-generation connected equipment that are designed to be controlled with the help of commands from a central system or communicate with other appliances in a network and make certain decisions for the owner. The concept of connected devices, which allow the user to manage everyday home appliances, such as ovens, refrigerators, stoves, air conditioners, vacuum cleaners, washing machines, etc. from any corner of the house, with the use of a mobile computing device, a simple app, and some kind of network that connects the user with the devices, is highly fascinating.

Smart electricity meters are an electric device that is used to calculate the amount of energy consumed. Smart electricity meters come with monitors so that energy usage can be easily measured. The monitoring is used to measure the quality of power so that it can lower the energy cost and extend the machine's life.

Distributed temperature sensing (DTS) helps in making continuous measurements for the full length of the optical fiber. Previously measurements were made at pre-determined and discrete points which were not helpful in getting the right information. DTS uses the light pulses which are reflected by the optical fiber to measure the temperature and pressure changes more efficiently. Using DTS it is now possible to detect temperature changes which are smaller than 0.01°C. Also, DTS is a real-time temperature measurement technique which provides continuous monitoring for the whole length of the cable covering all the critical measurement points.

Increasing safety systems, not only passive safety e.g. seat belts, but mainly by electronic such as air bags, anti-lock braking systems (ABS), electronic stability control (ECS), blind spot detection (BSD), adaptive cruise control (ACC) and lane change assist (LCA) among others. These all intelligent functions mentioned above require a semiconductor device to perform their function. The main function of a semiconductor is to conduct electricity easily in one direction among other more specific functions.

An act of producing the electronic systems or components resistant to malfunction or damage done by ionizing radiation (electromagnetic radiation and particle radiation of high energy) is called as radiation hardening. These radiations are encountered in high-altitude flight and outer space, around particle accelerators and nuclear reactors, or during nuclear wars and nuclear accidents. Most of the electronic components are prone to damage by these radiations. However radiation hardened electronic components are placed on the non-hardened components with some manufacturing and design variations reducing the vulnerability to radiation damage. Extensive testing and development is required in producing a microelectronic chip which is radiation tolerant, radiation hardened electronic chips lag behind in new developments. TID (Total Ionizing Dose), EDLRS (Enhanced Low Dose Rate Effects), single event effects (SEE, SEB, SET, & SEL), and proton & neutron displacement charge are some of the tests used typically for radiation-hardened products testing. Cosmic rays, solar particle events, Van Allen radiation belts, secondary particles, particle accelerators, chip packaging materials are some of the major radiation damage sources. There are two types of radiation hardening techniques logical hardening and physical hardening. Techniques included under physical hardening are production of electronic components by insulating substrates like silicon on sapphire and silicon on insulator. Bipolar ICs (Integrated Circuits), magneto resistive RAM (Radom Access Memory), capacitor based dynamic RAM (Random Access Memory) and shielding packages are radiation hardened. Logical radiation hardening techniques are redundant elements, hardened latches, parity checking, and watchdog timer for reducing radiation impact on electronic components.

Earphones are a pair of small hearing devices that are designed to be fitted in a user's ears, facing the ear canal. They are electroacoustic transducers through which the electrical signal is converted into a corresponding sound. They are typically designed to enable a single user to listen to an audio privately, unlike the loudspeakers, which produces sound in open air, for anyone to hear nearby. Earphones are portable device and are convenient, however some people consider them uncomfortable and prone to falling out. The earphones consist of separate units that are plugged into the ear canal of the users. In the terms of telecommunication, a headset is a combination of earphone/headphone and microphone. They either connect directly to an audio amplifier, CD player, radio, portable media player, mobile phone, electronic musical instrument, video game consoles or use wireless bluetooth technology. Earphone consists of different audio imitation quality capabilities. The headsets used for telephone cannot reproduce sound with highly reliable expensive units that are designed for listening music.

A battery management system (BMS) is an electronic framework that deals with a rechargeable battery. The most vital function that a battery management system does is cell defense and thus it ensures long life of a battery. To guarantee that a battery's charge does not go beyond or under its limit, it has a defending unit called as lithium-ion protector, which protects the cell from getting damaged. If lithium ion battery cells get overcharged they may possibly get damaged due to excessive heating. Thus, it is important to have a battery management system in order to provide overvoltage protection.

In common parlance, thin film battery can be defined as any battery which is comparatively thinner as compared to other typical batteries. In thin film batteries, instead of liquid based Li-ion batteries, solid-state electrolyte is used. These electrolytes greatly improve the performance of a battery and its ability to function over a wide temperature range makes its appropriate for use for various applications. The various advantages associated with the use of thin film battery in electronics include lower cost potentially, smaller footprint, less weight and higher energy density. Moreover, thin film batteries have a flat shape and thus enabling the developers to have an option of fitting in a battery according to their plans.

Fog computing is a computing technology which decentralizes application and computing resources in the most efficient and effective point. Fog computing technology is also known as fog networking. Fog computing enhances efficiency and helps in reducing the size of the data which would be uploaded to the cloud for the purpose of analysis, data processing and storage. Fog computing also helps in enhancing compliance and security for the end users. In fog computing atmosphere, most of the data processing is done over smart mobile devices and data hubs. Moreover, other devices like gateway and smart router are also used in fog computing. Due to this distributed approach fog computing is gaining popularity. The demand for fog computing is driven by the requirement for managing enormous amount of data which is generated by the sensors. Further fog computing enable portability, the fog enables the cloud to be more conveniently positioned to act and produce on Internet of things (IoT) data.

Hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) is a software based information technology (IT) infrastructure in which various elements of storage and compute components are optimized for working collectively on a single commodity appliance supported by one single vendor. A hyper-converged infrastructure system curtails the necessity of making individual purchase of various servers, virtualization software that is running on those servers and different management tools. Moreover, the HCI system also reduces the requirements for installation of a separate network-attached storage (NAS) or storage-area network (SAN). Thus, a hyper-converged infrastructure system reduces the overall operating cost of an infrastructural system. The market of hyper-converged infrastructural system is at the nascent stage at present and is anticipated to grow at an exponential rate in the coming years owing to the adoption of virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) across various application sectors.

Soil is important natural resource which has been disregarded in the past leading to adverse results. To help efficiently manage irrigation systems, it is imperative for farmers to measure soil moisture. This helps farmers to use lesser water for growing a crop, hence increasing the quality and yield of the crop by improving the management of soil moisture during plant growth. Soil moisture sensors are the device used by gardeners to measure the water content (volumetric) in soil. Direct gravimetric measure of the moisture in soil requires drying, removing and weighting of soil sample. However soil moisture sensors measure the volumetric moisture content in soil using properties of the soil like electrical resistance, interaction with neutrons and dielectric constant. Soil moisture and measured property relation must be calibrated. The relation may vary due to environmental factors like soil type, electric conductivity or temperature. Soil moisture sensors are easy to use. The rainfall pattern, crop evapotranspiration rate, and soil type determine the amount and type of irrigation needed in the region to produce high yield. Due to unpredictable weather conditions it is difficult to maintain consistent crop irrigation. Excess irrigation leads to increase in cost of production which further leads to runoff, waterlogging and soil nutrients leaching which reduces yield. Hence measuring moisture content helps growers reduce negatives effects on environment.

Motion Controllers control the velocity and position of machines. These controllers can be implemented with the help of both analog and digital computers. A motion controller comprises of load, prime mover, sensors and controlling machine for proper functioning of prime mover and load. Moreover, it is used to accomplish speed accuracy, increased position, fast reaction time, smooth movements, cost reduction, integrated automation, improved efficiency and consistency, elimination of hazards and better diagnosis and troubleshooting among others. These devices incorporate high force magnet materials, precise dimensional tolerance and innovative design machines. Motion controllers are widely used in printing, packaging, textile, assembly industries, semiconductor production and many other automation systems.

Growing concerns related to decreasing oil and gas resources and degrading environmental conditions are having positive impact on the demand for electric powered vehicles. Moreover, subsidies and incentives on usage of such vehicles is another factor driving the market for electric powered vehicles. These vehicles depend on electric batteries to provide the primary or the secondary power. Thus any impact on the demand for electric powered vehicles will affect the electric vehicle battery market. An electric powered vehicle or battery electric vehicle use chemical energy stored in rechargeable battery packs for power. As all the power is derived from batteries therefore, it does not require any combustion engine for propulsion. Battery Electric vehicles include scooters, rail cars, bicycle, forklifts, buses and cars. The advantages in battery storage technology have also positively affected the electric vehicle battery market.

Recordable optical discs are commonly used for data storage and retrieval purposes. These discs came up with a breakthrough technology to store data on magnetic discs and provided efficient results in comparison to the traditional magnetic tape and floppy disks. Recordable optical discs are laser based optical recording discs. The laser light is used to change the reflectivity of the optical disc and eliminate data duplicity.

Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) is the technology in which the electric current generated by the TENS device is used to stimulate the nerves and minimize pains associated with those nerves. TENS technology covers the entire frequencies of transcutaneously utilized currents that are useful in nerve excitation.

Resistive RAM (Random Access Memory) is a form of non-volatile RAM that functions by changing the resistance of a solid dielectric material called memristor. A memristor is an electrical device whose resistance depends on the flux of electric charge through the device whereas a resistive RAM is a device that exhibits memristive behavior and is a special type of memristor. Scalability, high capacity, operation on low voltage, high performance and reliable memory are some of the unique characteristics of a resistive RAM that enables its use in embedded and SSD applications. Also, it requires low programming currents than PCM (Phase Change Memory) with a comparable performance with respect to retention and endurance. Computers that use DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) to run programs temporarily store data that is required by the system. The contents of DRAM are immediately lost once the power supply goes off, but with resistive RAM, it is possible to resume a computing session without loss of any data. A typical resistive RAM cell possesses a switching material with different resistance characteristics. This switching material is sandwiched by two metallic electrodes. The switching effect is based on the motion of ions under the influence of an electric field and the ability of switching material to store the ion distribution that causes a notable change in the resistance of device.

The global rise in demand for Internet of Things (IoT) has resulted into the development of smart appliances which are capable of storing essential data in cloud servers. However, the data needs to be stored securely for future access. Backup and disaster recovery appliances are used to store important data in case of disaster of hardware of software failure. These appliances are based upon network attached storage and works by replicating the files and the operating systems. The replicated data is then stored on dedicated appliances which are available instantly in case of a system failure. The market is expected to grow due to increasing demand for these appliances in small and medium businesses.

An electrically charged surface replicating the looks of ink on paper is called Electronic Paper Display (EPD). Electronic Paper Display is extremely thin and require power only when a new page is requested. The main use of the electronic paper technology is to ease and develop the comfort of e-book reading. During the recent years this market has grown with efficient advancements in the Electronic paper display devices.

Research conducted by CollabTalk LLC and a team of graduate students within the Marriott School of Management at Brigham Young University is providing strong data that shows hybrid SharePoint solutions as a strategic alternative to moving legacy on-premises SharePoint environments directly to the cloud. The initiative is sponsored by Microsoft, PixelMill, B&R Business Solutions, and several other leading Microsoft partners, with results available in mid-April 2017.

It was almost early February 2017, when Retainly announced it's waitlist. Since then, half of the marketing gurus of this world are waiting patiently for the Beta Release of Retainly's Marketing Automation Software. Since it was pre-released in BetaList last month, more than 500 of the experts have joined the waiting list. Inside sources have given a tip that there are high chances of releasing the software publicly by 21st March 2017.