EnerDry holds numerous patents based on inventions by its founder and CEO Arne Sloth Jensen, including European Patent EP 1 070 223 B1. This patent relates to steam dryers with a specific type of cyclone, which substantially improves the capacity and efficiency of steam dryers ...
The current Presidential Administration has not exempted work visas from its immigration initiatives and focus. On April 18, 2017, President Trump signed an Executive Order designed to protect American jobs (“Hire American”) and products and goods manufactured in the United States (“Buy American”) ...
Dispute is heating up over IRS’s attempts to get personal information about users of Bitcoin and other virtual currencies. Last November, the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) filed a petition in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. It sought the court’s permission to serve a “John Doe” summons on Coinbase, Inc., a virtual currency exchanger in San Francisco ...
The South African Labour Court was recently called on to answer the question whether a trade union, acting on behalf of its members who are employees of the employer, may compel the employer to take disciplinary steps against certain of its employees in order to ensure the safety of the rest of its employees in the workplace. An employer has the duty to provide employees with safe working conditions, as far as is reasonably practicable ...
South African law treats sexual harassment as a serious form of misconduct that infringes upon a person’s dignity and other fundamental rights. The seriousness with which it is viewed by the courts is illustrated by the Labour Appeal Court (“LAC”) decision in MEC for Education (North West Provincial Government) v Makubalo ...
Cybersecurity is one of the most critical challenges facing our nation and our economy. U.S. regulators on both the state and federal level are working to keep pace with the challenges and risks posed by cybercrime. On March 1, 2017, the New York State Department of Financial Services (DFS) issued a new cybersecurity regulation designed to protect financial institutions, their information technology systems, and their customers from cybercrime1 ...
A recent article from Business Insider featuring Haynes and Boone, LLP Labor and Employment Partner Jason Habinsky addresses key takeaways from the recently passed New York City bill that restricts employers from asking candidates about their salary history. Useful context includes: Employers should “promptly audit and review their documentation regarding the hiring process” to make sure hiring documentation does not request prohibited information ...
This article looks at the rise of online advertising amongst brand owners and the impact on Google AdWords. Expenditure on internet advertising in the UK rose by over 15% in the second half of 2016 and is set to increase further this year. With the appetite for online and mobile advertising growing amongst brand owners, the role of Google AdWords appears to be increasing in significance ...
Can computers learn and reason? If so, what are the limitations of the tasks that they can be given? These questions have been the subject of countless debate as far back as 1937, when Alan Turing published his work on computable numbers1. Many researchers have devoted themselves to developing methods that would allow computers to interact more easily with human beings and integrate processes used to learn from the situations encountered ...
In addition to registering their trade marks with the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (“CIPC”), brand owners should ensure that their trade marks are protected online. One way of doing this is by registering a domain name. What is a Domain Name?A domain name allows a party to establish its identity on the internet. It assists internet users to easily identify brand owners on the internet and to access their sites on the web ...
On 8 February 2017, the Luxembourg Parliament voted a new law on immigration (hereafter the “Law”) which aims at increasing Luxembourg’s attractiveness as a host country for foreign talents. The main innovation of the Law is to implement a new category of residence permit in Luxembourg for investors. Immigration represents a major pillar of Luxembourg’s economy which has always relied on foreign labour and investments ...
Upon reconsideration in Gerard v. Orange Coast Memorial Medical Center, Case No. G048039 (March 21, 2017) (Gerard II), the Fourth Appellate District decided that IWC Wage Order 5 is valid and that healthcare employees may waive one of their two required meal periods on shifts longer than 8 hours ...
All non-exempt employees are required to be paid separately for rest breaks and other non-productive work time. This may come as a surprise to businesses that employ commissioned or piece rate employees, who may have assumed (incorrectly) that the commission or piece rate compensation earned by their employees – often very high amounts – is sufficient to cover the pay to which those employees are entitled for rest breaks or other non-productive work hours ...
Following a Phase II investigation, the Serbian Competition Commission granted conditional clearance to SBB''s takeover of IKOM. This consolidation of leading cable operators in Belgrade represents a landmark case for the Serbian authority and is related to global trends in consolidation of cable network operators, which fosters the investments necessary for improvements to network infrastructure and competition with IPTV, OTT and satellite content providers ...
In February 2017, Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly issued two memoranda providing guidance on the recent Executive Order entitled "Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements." This Executive Order established new policies regarding effective border security and immigration enforcement ...
On February 23, 2017, the IRS issued a memorandum to its employee plan auditors to provide guidelines for substantiating 401(k) plan safe harbor hardship distributions. Although directed to employee plan auditors for audit purposes, the memorandum provides guidance on the steps that plan administrators should take to substantiate safe harbor hardship distributions ...
On Wednesday, March 1, 2017, the Department of Labor ("DOL") proposed a 60-day extension of the applicability date of the ERISA Fiduciary Rule. President Trump's administration has openly criticized the Fiduciary Rule, and on February 3, 2017, directed the DOL to further analyze the legal and economic impact of the rule before its implementation ...
On January 1, 2017, AB 1661 went into effect, requiring local agency officials, including board members, to receive sexual harassment prevention training and education. This training requirement is similar to the sexual harassment and prevention training already required for supervisory employees every two (2) years under AB 1825. Local agencies should expand their sexual harassment prevention training programs to include agency officials who are covered under the new law ...
As of March 14, 2017, the recently enacted Consumer Review Fairness Act (the “Act”)1 will prohibit “gag clauses” – contract provisions that prohibit or restrict a consumer's ability to write negative reviews of products and services. While enforcement by the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) and state attorneys general is set to begin on December 14, 2017, businesses should act now to ensure compliance ...
Recognizing that our country -- our “team,” if you will -- is stronger when all our players are on the field and playing to their full potential, our federal and some state governments have developed programs to help disadvantaged entrepreneurs get started on the path of business ownership. In the last issue of The Construct we talked about the Historically Underutilized Business (“HUBZone”) Program ...
Since 1965, the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals has consistently held that defective workmanship that caused bodily injury or property damage did not constitute an “occurrence” under a policy of commercial general liability insurance, and therefore the insurer was not obligated to pay for the damage or tender a defense. See McGann v. Hobbs Lumber Co., 150 W. Va. 364, 145 S.E.2d 476 (1965) ...
It is undeniable that technology and globalization are changing the way lawyers practice law. Technology has not just made people, places, and things much more accessible to us – it has impacted the way we store information and documents, the way we communicate with and advise clients, how we conduct investigations, and how we participate in discovery ...
The H-1B visa filing frenzy is upon us once again! Because of the chronic shortage of nonimmigrant visas for foreign workers in the specialty occupation category (H-1B visas), employers seeking to hire new H-1B workers must file their petitions on April 1, 2014 for work beginning October 1, 2014 ...
With everything from alpacas, pigs and turkeys, to even a snake being claimed as service animals, it is not surprising that many business owners are asking what truly qualifies as a “service animal” under the law. Just last fall, a Wisconsin McDonald’s encountered a situation where a patron wanted to dine with her service kangaroo ...
