VoIP Logic Hits Financial and Corporate Milestones
VoIP Logic, (www.voiplogic.com), a leading provider of voice-over-IP (VoIP) Managed Services and solutions, today announced several noteworthy corporate and financial milestones from the ITEXPO East 2009 in Miami. VoIP Logic provides a comprehensive set of VoIP Managed Services, Engineering and Integration Professional Services. In addition, the company's proprietary Cortex® OSS helps carriers and service providers to easily deploy and manage customized, scalable VoIP systems and solutions.
For 2008, VoIP Logic reported:
An increase in headcount to 35;
An 82% increase in annual revenue from 2007 – 2008;
An expanded customer footprint into Central and Latin America;
An increase of 40 carrier Managed Services customers; and
An additional 8 new retail VoIP service providers using Cortex OSS CEO
Micah Singer noted that, "Now, more than ever, outsourcing telecom deployment, integration and ongoing support for VoIP technology has proven to be a cost-effective and a results-driven decision for carriers and service providers who have become more sensitive to ROI." In addition to a few dozen publicly referenced customers, VoIP Logic now provides infrastructure, integration and technology assistance to more than 160 carriers and service providers worldwide.
About VoIP Logic VoIP Logic is a leading global provider of VoIP managed services and solutions. The company enables telecommunications service providers worldwide to build and manage customized, flexible and scalable IP telephony rollouts. With the addition of its award-winning Cortex® OSS, VoIP Logic provides a comprehensive, and fully neutral, set of on-demand solutions for service providers looking to use VoIP technology. Founded in 2003, the company is headquartered in Williamstown, MA, with hosting hubs in North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific.
The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees does little to check whether its staff or clients are terrorists, its former chief attorney, James Lindsay, says in a newly published report.
A Palestinian man carries a sack of flour as residents receive their monthly food supplies from the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) at a warehouse in the Shati refugee camp in Gaza City. Photo: AP [file]
Allegations linking terrorists to UNRWA are not new. Israel has said many times its troops were fired on by gunmen using UNRWA facilities, that UNRWA vehicles transported weapons and that some of its staff members were terrorists.
UNRWA has denied those charges and Israel has often retracted them or found them hard to prove.
This latest claim against UNRWA, contained in a 67-page critique of the organization published at the end of January by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, has more authority behind it, because Lindsay was a senior lawyer for UNRWA from 2000 to 2007.
The issue, Lindsay wrote, is not intention but oversight.
"UNRWA has taken very few steps to detect and eliminate terrorists from the ranks of its staff or its beneficiaries, and no steps at all to prevent members of terrorist organizations such as Hamas from joining its staff," he wrote.
"These failings have occurred not because UNRWA consciously supports terrorism but rather because it is not particularly concerned about the issue. Its main focus [is] the provision of services and protection of Palestinian refugees," he wrote.
UNRWA's Jerusalem spokesman Chris Gunness said in response that his organization had "a rigorous approach to ensuring that its staff are not involved in militant or political activity" and that it took the matter very seriously.
Lindsay wrote that UNRWA did not have the means to ensure there was no terrorism in its midst.
"Even if terrorism constituted a greater concern, the agency is not equipped to undertake the extensive security investigations that a thoroughgoing anti-terrorism effort would require," he said.
Lindsay cited examples of past charges against UNRWA staff, including a 2002 UNRWA driver who was accused - but never charged - with carrying weapons in an ambulance and a Gaza headmaster employed by UNRWA who was also an explosives experts for Islamic Jihad. The headmaster was killed by Israel last year.
UNRWA has no preemployment security checks and does not monitor off-time behavior to ensure compliance with the organization's anti-terrorist rules, Lindsay wrote.
"Evidence of area staff members who have had second jobs with Hamas or with other terrorist groups does occasionally come to light," he wrote.
Even so, Lindsay noted, of the 5,000 UNRWA staff who worked in the West Bank and the 10,000 in the Gaza Strip, most of whom were Palestinians, few had been convicted of terrorism-related charges.
Staff members, however, had been involved in political activity, wrote Lindsay. In particular he quoted the organization's past commissioner-general Peter Hansen, who in 2004 said, "I am sure there are Hamas members on the UNRWA payroll and I don't see that as a crime. Hamas as a political organization does not mean that every member is a militant and we do not do political vetting and exclude people from one persuasion as against another."
UNRWA has said in response that its staff were prohibited from any political involvement.
The bulk of Lindsay's report, however, focused on operational suggestions to de-politicize and change the organization's mission and to cut down on its list of 4.5 million refugees.
UNRWA was created in 1949 by General Assembly Resolution 302 and began operation in May 1950 to service what at the time was 957,000 refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon, many of whom been rendered homeless or jobless by the 1948-49 war with Israel, according to Lindsay.
That number was higher than the initial UN list of 726,000 refugees recorded in the immediate aftermath of the war, he wrote.
Initially, UNRWA provided immediate relief with an aim to integrate the refugees into their host countries.
Both the refugees and the Arab states opposed the idea of integration. By the late 1950s it had been disregarded in favor of servicing the refugees, including offering developmental services in areas such as education, health, welfare, microfinance and urban planning.
UNRWA also expanded its definition of a refugee to include those patrilineal descendants of the original refugees.
Since the 1970s, more than half of the organization's budget has gone to education. In 2007, for example, $282 million of UNRWA's $545m. budget went to educate 480,000 children, according to Lindsay.
Similarly, 21,962 of its 29,000 staff members work in UNRWA schools. Fifteen percent to 20% of its budget goes to health services, for which $106m. was earmarked in the 2007 budget.
But not all those serviced by UNRWA need the organization, Lindsay wrote in his study, particularly given that a majority of them have been resettled.
In Jordan, where 2 million Palestinian refugees live, all but 167,000 have citizenship, and are fully eligible for government services including education and health care.
To continue to call citizens of recognized states refugees is suspect and suggests "that the agency's continued existence is due at least in part to political purposes" even though UNRWA was not designed as a political organization, Lindsay said.
Eliminating UNRWA services in Jordan to all but the 167,000 noncitizens could reduce its refugee list by 40%, Lindsay said.
In deciding to whom UNRWA provides services, it assesses "refugee status," not need, he wrote.
Some recipients of aid could afford to pay for the services they now received for free, he wrote.
The decision to allow for a growing refugee population had become a political statement that fostered and supported the Palestinian demand to return to Israel, he wrote.
UNRWA, he said, did this even though the United States, its largest single donor, did not support the right of Palestinian return to within Israel's pre-1967 border.
While some critics have demanded that the organization be disbanded, Lindsay called for it to be reformed. UNRWA's programs, he said, had insured that the population it serviced did not suffer from lack of basic needs.
2008-11-13 15:46:48 - BPC provides simple, fully-automated turnkey biological solutions. Now it's easy to clean bilge water on-site, allowing all marine vessels to discharge bilge water to the port
Houston, Texas - November 13th, 2008 - For the first time, marine ports have a bilge purification-system solution that delivers a totally reliable operation while reducing costs dramatically. BioPetroClean's new ACT technology for marine ports is fully-automated for hassle-free, non-technical operations, and fits perfectly into the pace and resources of a busy marine port.
Before international regulations were introduced to prevent
oil pollution from ships, the standard practice for marine vessels was to wash out the contents of their tanks and release directly into the sea. The responsibility of cleaning this water has now fallen to the marine ports and port administrators. 'Bilge water is both a financial strain and an operational hassle. Problematic disposal of waste storage complicates a port administrator's tasks and can become an uninvited financial burden.' said David Amir, CEO of BPC. By acquiring a total BPC turnkey solution, marine ports have an in-house solution for on-going treatment.
With only a one-time investment ports gain full control without the requirement of additional work force. With this skid-mounted, easy to integrate system installation is hassle free and fits even into the most limited spaces. The automated system provides port administrators and operators with automatic and upon-request reports at any desired time. It effectively monitors and balances the system to ensure clean water discharge is occurring.
What was once impossible is now in performance: BPC's ACT system treats all categories, quantities, and levels of contaminates. It produces an output that can be directly returned to the sea - making it the ultimate green solution. ACT system has been explicitly designed to perform at optimal levels when treating salt water, in direct contrast to other solutions whose performance degrades in the same conditions. BPC offers plug & play systems which handle 5-50 cubic meters an hour of water with an in-residence time of only 10 hours. BPC's ACT can also treat much higher capacities with custom-made solutions.
One-time service option: There is a range of incidents in a marine port's routine that can cause a one-time crisis or large accumulation of bilge water to be treated. To get started BPC recommends its unique one-time ad hoc ACT service. With this simple option BPC analyzes the problem, treats with the appropriate custom engineering and bacterial solution, and discharges the water.
What is inside? The key to ACT is assimilating the appropriate bacteria cocktail for each individual type of polluted water. By using the principle of chemostat, the process maintains a homeostatic state of bacterial growth and organic compound degradation. As a result the output can be deposited directly into the sea, meeting even the strictest environmental standards. BPC's patented technology delivers a beginning-to-end solution.
Water processed by gravitational separation is put into the bioreactor, where it is quickly and efficiently purified. When a change in parameters (organic levels, pH, etc.) occurs, the bioreactor's sensors communicate to the controller, automatically stabilizing the flow so that the balanced state is continuously maintained. The controller also issues on-line alerts to any chosen control center and/or designated supervisor. An extensive range of reports support a clear picture of operations at all times. This data, from technical performance to risk management, is automatically distributed on a 'need to know' basis only.
About BPC BPC directly addresses the challenges facing various industries and installations today: waste water treatment. Led by a world-respected scientist in biological treatments, BPC has developed a breakthrough balanced bio-process (ACT) that, for the first time, results in a virtually pure output that can be directly returned to nature. With several of its key technologies and elements patented, the BPC process transforms water treatment into a significantly more efficient, economical and ecologically friendly process. It can be applied across a wide range of sites: from oil refineries and oil storage farms to drilling sites, marine ports, side streams water, reservoirs and similar locations. For further information please visit our website at www.biopetroclean.com
Press Contacts: Ms. Yael Barash Director of Business Development BPC - Bio Petro Clean Email: yael@biopetroclean.com Ofer Segali MarkeTouch, Marketing Communications Solutions Tel: +972 9 950 9500 Mobile: +972 54 5402067 Email: ofer@marketouch.co.il
Hi, I am David Anthony. I am the Manager of 21Ventures (www.21venture.net) - I invest in 3 main areas, Physical Security, Mobile Computing and Clean Technology. I also have some interests in PIPE (private investment in public equity - check out on wikipedia)
