Hello from Decatur, Alabama!
We enjoyed a nice quiet Thanksgiving yesterday and today we're continuing with the theme of quietness. No "Black Friday" shopping for us. I have to admit, I'm not a big fan of shopping anyway and I tend to do most of my shopping online. However, I'm looking forward to seeing the results of this shopping frenzy and will hopefully write on the topic for the wednesday Ti e-newlsetter.
This past week I wrote on Brazil's privatizing its airports as well as Oman investing in a few infrastructure projects of their own. For the APAC e-newsletter, I wrote on the Chinese government's new directive concerning ecommerce. They want to increase ecommerce to 10% of total retail sales. They are on their way, I believe it now represents about 6.5% of total sales.
For the blog, I wrote on Mexico's plan to tax maquiladoras. Thanks to Mark Szakonyi at Journal of Commerce for suggesting the topic. Mark's done a good bit of work on the topic so check out his article on the topic here. Also, check out Eye For Transport's website, they posted the blog post. Thank you!
I'm finishing up on our annual Agility Emerging Markets white paper. This has been a fascinating project to work on. I'm looking forward to hearing the feedback from folks.
While today is a quiet one for us, it is also one in which I'm packing and preparing for a trip to Asia for next week. The trip involves a project I'm working on as well as a way to gather additional information/analysis for our reports.
For next week, I will be writing Ti briefs on Ecommerce in the Middle East and hopefully one on Black Friday/Cyber Monday. I'm not sure what I'll do for the APAC e-newsletter right now. Sign up on our website to receive all the e-newsletters for free.
Blog posts and Tweets may be scarce next week but be patient with me - I'll make up for it when I get home!
So, while I'm away, do me a favor and pull hard for my college football team: University of South Carolina who is playing their rival and one I also dearly love, Clemson. I alternate each year who to pull for so this year it's Carolina! Also, think happy thoughts for Auburn as they take on Alabama. Alabama is still undefeated and I think it would be great if their in-state rival upsets them!
Have a great week and thanks for reading!
Cathy
