Materials Science & Development | Bed Liner Business

Brad F Nov 20, 2013 #744907 Dallas, Texas

I know some of the issues my dad had with starting a bed liner business involved franchise and equipment primarily. The biggest issue seemed to be how to compete with Ultimate, Line-X, and RHino Lining polyurea hybrid materials. THe equipment is really expensive and the return on investment was over 2 years. The contracts the Line-X wanted us to sign pretty much had us giving up all of our rights to free enterprise once in a franchise. If he left the franchise we would not be able to compete locally. We had restrictions on material minimums without penalties. This kind of *** got my dad thinking this was all a scam. So, we just went with a high end polyurethane and a hopper gun system. Yeah, we had some complaints about set time and vertical running in the beginning, but once we tweaked everything, the complaints stopped. So, now we are happy that we are NOT in a franchise scenario with anyone. And if you think the RHino Linings does not hold you back because of no franchise agreement, you are incorrect. Always read the fine print. Don't get scammed.

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Apple Has a Good Reason to Want to Block Bitcoin Apps

Around 100 million people own an iPhone or iPad, and the fast-growing mobile payments industry is estimated to be worth $90 billion within three years. So when Apple blocks every app that enables Bitcoin transactions, that's a big blow for the cryptocurrency.

Today Apple removed the Bitcoin transaction app Blockchain from its app store, the only Bitcoin-related app that hadn't already been given the boot. The notoriously tight-lipped company didn't elaborate on why it removed the app beyondciting "unresolved issues." But it's looking more and more likely that Apple's giving Bitcoin the cold shoulder because it's gearing up to launch its own digital payment system, and sees virtual currencies as unwelcome competition.

Apple's run on Bitcoin-related apps is a bold move, even given the company's monopolistic bent and history of blocking competitor apps. Isn’t Apple supposed to worship at the altar of innovation and out-of-the-box thinking? You’d think it would be patting Bitcoiners on the back for yet another industry disrupted. Thing is, that particular industry, mobile payments, is one that Apple stands to make a killing on. At the end of the day, Apple's a business—and a big one.

Apple’s uniquely positioned to cash in on mobile payment technology, with some600 million user credit cards on file, versus PayPal's 110 million active accounts and Bitcoin's still small and niche user base. The hardware giant has been laying the groundwork for its nascent payments business for years, waiting for the right time to make a move. Now might be that time.

Last month the Wall Street Journal reported that Apple top brass was talking to retail and commerce execs about launching a wide-reaching payments system. A lot of the pieces are already in place. You can currently buy music, movies, apps in the iTunes store with your saved credit card info, and some small items in physical Apple stores by swiping your phone. Now, with its in-store shopping app iBeacon, Apple's gearing up to expand beyond its own walled ecosystem and into brick-and-mortar stores, which still make up 85 percent of commercial purchases.

"Apple is absolutely the sleeping giant in the payments world," Forrester Research analyst Denee Carrington told the Journal. "They have the capability; they just haven't tied it all together."

So is Apple snubbing Bitcoin as a defensive strategy? Blockchain CEO Nicholas Cary said it's clear Apple plans to take on mobile payments and that its actions are anti-competitive. But Cary also pointed out that Apple's technology just makes traditional payments more convenient; it’s still subject to transaction fees, which presumably Apple could take a cut of. "This isn't innovative at all," he told me.

And this is where cryptocurrencies could pose a threat. "Bitcoin won't dent their mobile payments revenue. It will completely circumvent it," Cary said. "Bitcoin is a completely frictionless payment protocol. Instant, irreversible transactions, nearly for free and no risk of fraud or identity theft."

Per Forbes: 

Bitcoin poses a more specific threat because, as its own independent, nonpolitical currency, the third-party legacy players (i.e., VISA, Mastercard, banks) can be bypassed which would disrupt Apple’s partnerships with dongle players like Square and iZettle. Bitcoin payment apps have already demonstrated the effectiveness of QR codes and scanning at the point of sale which is obviously Apple’s bridge strategy prior to full Near Field Communication (NFC) deployment.

The lack of transaction fees give virtual currencies a leg up, and could be one reason Apple blocked Bitcoin apps but not other digital payment apps, like Google Wallet, Square, Stripe, Amazon One-Click, and PayPal. PayPal, for its part, is in an interesting position in all this. Now that the word’s out that Apple is talking to industry execs, the e-commerce company is shaking in its boots. It pitched Apple last week to partner up on the in-store payments plan, but Apple's shown no sign it wants to make this a team effort. Meanwhile, PayPal is hedging on whether to embrace Bitcoin or try to stop the crypto-trend from rendering the service irrelevant.

The other possible reason Apple's targeting virtual currency is that it’s simply easier to prevent a new spate of cryptocurrency apps than kick out longstanding services that consumers are accustomed to and enjoy. Without Apple's support, virtual currency will have a much harder time breaking out of crypto-nerd circles and entering the mainstream economy. The rumblings in those circles this week suggest that if Apple doesn't warm to Bitcoin and altcoins, the community will flock to Android. Google would be waiting with open arms.

TOPICS: future money, bitcoin, apple, mobile payments, business, power

If Your Athletic, This Is A Fun Job For You

Mailboat tryouts held Wednesday in Lake Geneva 

A true sign of summer in Lake Geneva on Wednesday -- mail boat tryouts.

Lessons from the List of Most Valuable Companies

By Allan Roth | CBS MoneyWatch – 23 hours ago

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RELATED QUOTES

Symbol	Price	Change
AAPL	423.48	-2.73
XOM	88.91	0.31

You've probably heard that two corporate heavyweights,
Apple (AAPL) and ExxonMobil (XOM), are fighting for
the distinction of being the most valuable company on
the planet. That made me curious about who the top
ten are, and what lessons could be learned.

To determine the top ten, I used market capitalization
 to measure the value of the companies. That's simply
a matter of multiplying the number of shares they
have outstanding by the price of their stock, and here they are:

Courtesy CBS MoneyWatch

It turns out that the top ten produced some interesting statistics:

• Their combined value is over $2.1 trillion, or about 12 percent of the U.S. 
• national debt. 
• 
  
• Nine are based in the United States while one is based in China.
• Apple and ExxonMobil have large leads on the others.
• Four are tech, three energy, and one each are retail, diversified, and a 
• holding company.

Will Apple or ExxonMobil still be number one at the end of the decade?
Will one of the next eight take over? Perhaps the new champ won't even
be a top ten today.

I went back to the beginning of 2000, when Microsoft and GE were
fighting for the top slot and Apple wasn't a contender. Hard as it is to
imagine now, you may not have even heard of Google at that time.
In fact, half of today's top ten weren't in the top ten back then. 
Further, Intel was number seven on the charts in 1999 --
today, it barely breaks the top 50 at #48.

The lesson here is that the future is very uncertain. For those who might
want to put all their eggs in one of these corporate heavy hitter's' basket,
it's important to consider that some of these top ten will fall from grace
by the end of the decade, and other companies we've barely heard of today
 will become household names.

Which ones do I bet on? All of them. By owning a total U.S. and total
international index fund, I know I'm going to own tomorrow's top ten.


More from CBS MoneyWatch: 

• 3 financial predictions for 2013

• 10 cheapest places to live in the U.S.

• 10 most expensive places to live in the U.S.

@yahoofinance on Twitter, become a fan on Facebook 

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