MONEY MAY 2016 ISSUE 36

BUSINESS | LIFESTYLE | DESIGN

THE NEW BEGINNINGS ISSUE ISSUE 36

START-UPS THE BREXIT EFFECT INTERVIEW:

MARLENE FARRUGIA

INTERVIEW:

DAVID DARMANIN REDUCING ADMINISTRATIVE BURDENS

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CONTENTS

WELCOME Every new year snaps with the tension of new beginnings. Sluggish from the indulgence of the festive period, we crawl – heavy with the extra paunch – to the gym to polish up a new version of us: better, fitter and more productive. We get a new wardrobe, make fresh proposals and plans, and commit to being more assertive.

However, it’s not just January that heralds new beginnings. Every day brings with it fresh challenges and opportunities.

In the corporate world, new start-ups launch every day, while established businesses commit resources to find that fine balance between keeping themselves rooted to their core, traditional values while exploring and expanding into new sectors in order to strengthen their market share and profitability.

In this issue of Money, we focus on new beginnings.

The local political scenario has traditionally supported two main parties, with a third party, in the present landscape, the Green Party, getting the votes of those disenchanted by the Nationalist and Labour parties. This year, however, a new political party may become a reality. In this issue of Money, we interview independent MP Marlene Farrugia, who last year resigned from the Labour Party and parliamentary group.

Malta is increasingly becoming an attractive hub for launching start-ups.

Hotjar and Discountif are just two of the many start-ups which are making a name for themselves. Jamie Iain Genovese interviews David Darmanin from Hotjar and Lewis Holland from DiscountIf on their rise and rise.

Theo Dix and Chris Meilak also focus on local start-ups, arguing how the shifting economic landscape is creating new employment opportunities while upskilling the local economy.

However, while the market forces may be favourable, starting a new company and leading it to success is not as straightforward as it seems.

Dr Doran Magri Demajo outlines the legal considerations of launching a start-up or new business, including choosing the appropriate legal form to operate, maintaining employment documentation, and protecting intellectual property.

In this issue of Money, we also travel to Tanzania, showcase this year’s edition of the Salone del Mobile in Milan and strengthen our fashion credentials with a great shoot.

Read on and enjoy.

Editor Anthony P. Bernard anthony@moneymag.me Consulting Editor Stanley Borg stanley@moneymag.me Design Roderick Peresso Design Studio m. 99258825 Printing Print It Distribution Mailbox Direct Marketing Group

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THE NEW BEGINNINGS ISSUE

MAY 2016

10 THE BIRTH OF A NEW PARTY

When Marlene Farrugia resigned from the Labour Party, she cited its lack of transparency as the main reason.

She tells Veronica Stivala that the new party’s main goals are to restore trust in a Maltese government by establishing clean, transparent and accountable governance.

14 US AND THEM

How will a potential Brexit affect Malta, Patrick O’Brien asks.

16 IN THE BEGINNING

Jamie Iain Genovese joins Lewis Holland of DiscountIF and David Darmanin of Hotjar on their start-up journeys.

20 THE RULES OF ATTRACTION

What are the elements that could transform Malta into a start-up hub, Theo Dix and Chris Meilak ask.

25 START OFF ON THE RIGHT FOOT

Dr Doran Magri Demajo outlines the legal considerations when launching a business in Malta

35 FUELLING CHANGE

Low oil prices provide a good opportunity for change, Alexander Mangion says. However, that change could be painful.

36 THE COUNTRY OF TWO CONTINENTS

Instability and upheavals are dampening Turkey’s potential.

38 CAPITAL OF DESIGN

The Salone del Mobile.Milano 2016 confirmed itself as a hub of creativity.

52 MR AND MRS COOL

Summer is heating up. Stay cool with Money’s choice of gifts.

55 BEHIND THE PIXEL

No, travelling is not as easy as the click of a button, Mona Farrugia says.

58 NOT TO SERVE AND PROTECT

The lack of consequences towards police abuse is perpetuating a violent cycle, the Bluesman says.

31 BE PREPARED

Malta needs to rethink its strategy in order to reduce the administrative burden on its business community, Reuben Buttigieg says.

David Darmanin

Money is published by BE Communications Ltd, No. 81, Howard Street, Sliema, Malta SLM 1754 All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part is strictly prohibited without written permission. Opinions expressed in Money are not necessarily those of the editor or publisher. All reasonable care is taken to ensure truth and accuracy, but the editor and publishers cannot be held responsible for errors or omissions in articles, advertising, photographs or illustrations. Unsolicited manuscripts are welcome but cannot be returned without a stamped, self-addressed envelope. The editor is not responsible for material submitted for consideration.

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POLITICS

THE BIRTH OF

A NEW PARTY

When Marlene Farrugia resigned from the Labour Party, she cited its lack of transparency as the main reason. She tells Veronica Stivala that the new party’s main goals are to restore trust in a Maltese government by establishing clean, transparent and accountable governance.

Photo: Nicky Scicluna

L

ast November, Marlene Farrugia resigned from the Labour Party on the grounds that she was after more transparent governance. Dr Farrugia, a dentist by profession, was elected from the fifth district in 2013. She comments how back then, the Maltese elected a government with a strong enough majority to implement its electoral manifesto with ease, noting how “we all expected at least a 10-year stint of Labour”.

She reveals her disappointment in both of Malta’s main political parties, going on to point out that simultaneously, the Nationalist Opposition was dealt a historic blow.

“The electoral result was a sign that the Opposition had to clean up its act, pull itself

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together and prepare to be an alternative government if the need arose in 10 years’ time,” she comments. But things did not work out as planned or expected.

Dr Farrugia’s dissatisfaction with her own former political party is understandably stronger and she is harsh in her criticism of its failure to live up to its promise of retaining a governance of transparency.

Looking back on Labour’s performance in the past three years, she highlights how “it reneged on its promise of good transparent accountable governance”.

In one of her early statements as an independent MP, Dr Farrugia stated how “this is not the government we voted for”.

Referring to the string of scandals that emerged and that continue to emerge with regards to the current government, most notably the Panama Papers in which the Prime Minister’s chief of staff Keith Schembri as well as Energy Minister Konrad Mizzi have been found to own offshore bank accounts in Panama.

“Scandal after scandal exposed the government for what it really was, beyond the impeccable marketed surefootedness it had sought to project while in opposition,” she says uninhibitedly.

Indeed recent political events such as these have shown a government whose members refuse to resign. This tends to be a trend in Malta where no one

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POLITICS

ever resigns, and which irks the people.

What are Dr Farrugia’s views on this?

“The culture of resignations to uphold government standards, all depends on how such issues are handled by the Prime Minister,” she notes, adding that “when a culpable representative or minister fails to bow out of his own accord, then it is the prerogative of the Prime Minister to ensure standards and stability in his government and his country”.

In a heavily politically polarised country such as Malta, and in such a situation, one naturally looks to the opposition as an alternative voice, as an alternative solution finder, but, Dr Farrugia laments, “the opposition is struggling to get its act together”.

This turn of affairs has left the population in understandable doubt and confusion seeing as neither of the two parties can currently offer sound solutions or offers, according to the independent candidate. In Dr Farrugia’s words: “the outcome of this scenario is a perplexed electorate, very uneasy and unsure where to cast their vote in two years’ time”.

Dr Farrugia says that people’s negative reaction cannot be described as a “backlash”, but rather an “inquisitive healthy reaction” and one which is really looking for answers that arise from questions about “the possible materialisation of a new political landscape” – by this she means one where independent MPs garner enough political standing to be elected to government.

Dr Farrugia joined Giovanna Debono to become the second independent MP in this legislature, who resigned from the PN earlier last year when criminal charges were filed against her husband.

Dr Farrugia is in the process of setting up an entirely new political party. Speaking about her plans as an independent MP, Dr Farrugia asserts: “Our main goals would be to restore trust in a Maltese government by establishing clean, transparent and accountable governance that reinvigorates democracy by strengthening the much weakened institutions.”

When asked for some concrete examples of this, Dr Farrugia explains “that will be clearly explained at the appropriate time and in the right fora since much work has still to be covered before we are indeed ready to roll out a studied manifesto to the electorate. She goes on to note that “we are at an early stage of formation, and political upheavals are happening in the country as we speak which will have a bearing on the ultimate outcome of this endeavour”.

Dr Farrugia does not describe herself as the leader of this new party, but rather a “coordinator of a group of likeminded individuals who believe that a new political force can bring about the much needed change to our political landscape”.

One of Dr Farrugia’s chief statements, made clear from the beginning of her independent campaign, was that she

“THE OPPOSITION IS STRUGGLING TO GET ITS ACT TOGETHER” wanted “more transparent governance, especially on environmental issues”.

Dr Farrugia used to chair a Parliamentary Committee for Environmental and Development planning, which saw a first in Parliamentary history for the amalgamation of NGOs and interested individuals together to contribute directly in policy making within Parliament. When asked for further detail about her party’s specific plans related to environmental issues, her ideas mirror her previous committee approach and she explains that she is looking for “long term consensual planning with the participation of political parties, but professionally drawn and studied by experts in the field”.

Dr Farrugia is hopeful that the electorate will rise above “the tribal mentality” and, “as was proven by the results of the last election, more and more people are ready to put their vote in a manifesto that convinces them”.

SPECIAL OFFER ON ONE-YEAR DEPOSITS FIMBank is pleased to announce that its special offer of a two per cent per annum interest rate on Easisave one-year fixed term deposits, originally announced in March to celebrate Easisave’s fifth anniversary, has been extended until the end of May. An online savings platform developed by FIMBank, Easisave offers a range of deposit products in Euro and US Dollars to its customers, giving them a choice between savings or fixed term deposits in different tenors.

Commenting on the extension of the special offer, Chris Trapani, FIMBank’s Head of Cash Management, said that, “We are delighted that our original offer, which was meant to reward our loyal customers, was extremely 12 - Money / Issue 36

well received, so much so that we have decided to extend it throughout the month of May. An advantageous market-leading two per cent per annum interest rate will continue to be applied for existing Easisave customers who choose to open or renew a new one-year fixed term deposit during the next 30 days.”

Mr Trapani also announced that as from June, the Bank will be realigning its Easisave interest rates downwards, so as to conform to current market conditions. Easisave is available exclusively online and is designed to the highest standards, offering a secure environment in which customers can control and manage their savings. For more information, visit www.easisave.com or call the Easisave Helpdesk on 2132 2102.

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Interview BREXIT

US AND THEM How will a potential Brexit affect Malta, Patrick O’Brien asks.

B

ehind the black, forbidding ‘Thatcher Gates’ of Downing Street, last February’s cold and drizzly gloom made the large television lights appear even brighter when British Prime Minister David Cameron announced that he had secured a deal in Brussels allowing him to announce a Euro referendum date for June 23.

The Tory Government, although not all of its members, will put before the voters a platform for staying in, arguing that the reforms just negotiated are good enough for Britain to consider remaining in the EU. The official view is to argue for remaining in the reformed and restructured EU. The line is

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that here is an agreement that gives Britain a special place in Europe and therefore people can vote to stay without worrying about any of the concerns that have been in the air since the 1970s. Britain now has a specific opt-out from the troublesome “ever-closer union” that was at the heart of the EU project. Moreover, it will never join the euro single currency.

London mayor Boris Johnson, Cameron’s biggest opponent. Pictures appeared quickly, showing Johnson at the new Vote Leave offices, the main Brexit campaign grouping.

Prime Minister Cameron had to agree that collective cabinet responsibility had ended, unshackling so far six of his closest colleagues to beg to differ with him. The EU referendum campaign thus begins immediately and at least nine senior members of the governing party will campaign for a ‘Leave’ vote, including

At least two aspects of this development, neither of which have been prominent yet in most media reportage, stood out. One is the lengths the other 27 EU leaders have gone to try to find a deal that would suit Britain and stand at least a chance of appealing to the electorate. Europe’s other

How this will affect the Tory party, regardless of the referendum’s outcome, suddenly becomes one of the more intriguing aspects of this drama.

leaders clearly don’t want Britain to leave the EU. One might cynically point out that the EU barely holds together as it is and that there are incipient exceptionalisms all over Europe. For Britain to vote to leave might encourage similar campaigns elsewhere and give them a greater chance of success.

The second dimension is how little was said about poverty in many parts of Europe, including in Britain. Refugees, whose suffering continues even as they reach Europe, barely got a mention. The French government has just announced plans to evict many of the refugees from the infamous ‘Jungle’ camp near Calais and to demolish its makeshift buildings and shelters.

The UK Prime Minister, claiming an apparent triumph in the matter of eligibility for state benefits for inward migrants, took a little-noticed swipe at the poor by claiming that he’d brought about “an end to something-for-nothing culture,” despite there being little evidence that inward migrants come to Britain only to claim benefits.

Those targeted in this statement were migrants from the poorer eastern part of the EU. However, such words run parallel this Tory Government’s snarling disregard for Europe’s refugees and of their general policy of attacking the poor, scapegoating them for the nation’s woes.

There are over 28,000 mostly EU nationals living in Malta and the government, as a result, may be attempted to scale back the benefits these foreigners are entitled to if the exit goes ahead.

In June 2015 Prime Minister Cameron sounded out his Maltese counterpart Joseph Muscat on the possibility of EU treaty changes. But Dr Muscat made it clear that he would not accept treaty reforms by stealth. It was reported that Dr Muscat also insisted that there should be no changes on taxation and benefits unless there is agreement on treaty amendments.

Malta is extremely sensitive to any expansion of the EU’s powers in the realm of taxation which could somehow jeopardise its tax regime in the flourishing financial services, ship registration and gaming sectors.

The UK and Malta have developed links across the board, particularly in education and health services. British universities are still the most popular among Maltese students seeking further education abroad and a Brexit might well affect them should the reduced tuition fees enjoyed by EU citizens be discontinued.

In the health sector, reciprocal agreements ensure that some categories of patients for whom treatment is unavailable in Malta are sent to the UK while UK citizens in Malta have access to the NHS.

“MALTA HAS A LARGE NUMBER OF NATIONALS RESIDING AND WORKING IN THE UK AND WOULD BEAR THE BRUNT OF THE DISCRIMINATION OF EU NATIONALS BEING PROPOSED” Malta forms part of the Commonwealth, which not only strengthens its links with the UK, but also with countries such as Australia and Canada where there are sizable Maltese migrant communities. But the Commonwealth is not perceived as a substitute for EU membership while, should Brexit materialise, UK influence in Malta is likely to diminish.

According to a report by the European Council of Foreign Relations, Maltese exports to the UK made up 7.8 per cent of the Maltese GDP in 2013, with foreign direct investment stock in the UK making up 11.8 per cent of GDP and UK bank links as a percentage of GDP amounting to 67 per cent in 2014.

What most Maltese will take issue with is the reform on immigration. Malta has a large number of nationals residing and working in the UK and would bear the brunt of the discrimination of EU nationals being proposed.

It is still to be seen what the “emergency brake” will in reality entail and when it can be used but a Maltese living in London will most likely not be happy with it. Alfred Sant, head of the Labour delegation at the European Parliament, told journalist Bryony Bartolo on the TV programme Malta and the European Union that events and decisions in Europe in the next months will continue to effect directly Malta and Gozo. Unfortunately, said Dr Sant, faced by these crises, Europe is losing its unity, and individual member states are taking different stances from that agreed by the EU. What has raised some speculation is whether the referendum might impact Malta’s turn at the helm of the Council of the EU Presidency, which is scheduled for the first half of 2017.

Foreign minister George Vella was reported to have said that while relations between Malta and the UK are expected to continue to prosper, the referendum could have some impact on Malta’s EU presidency.

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START-UPS

In the BEGINNING Origin stories are great to hear. They are, to many, the best part of the now populated superhero movie genre – we like to see stories of apotheosis, of characters rising from normality to the exception. But what about actually being the protagonist of one of these stories, of having to write out the pages yourself, and, worse still, having to sometimes hand the pen over to others? Jamie Iain Genovese joins Lewis Holland of DiscountIF and David Darmanin of Hotjar on their start-up journeys.

Lewis Holland DISCOUNTIF Tell me a little bit about yourself.

I love anything that has to do with travel, sports and start-ups. I’ve travelled to over 60 countries in the world and competed in most sports, at various levels. I’ve done crazy challenges like LifeCycle and survived to tell the tale.

Over the last few years I’ve been enjoying the challenging world of start-ups.

Were you always attracted to business and starting your own company?

Rather than always being attracted to business, I’ve been attracted to the idea of solving problems. I spent a number of years creating new million dollar revenue opportunities for large multi-national companies in gaming. It was particularly determined that we could always do more, optimise more.

In the end that determination led me to starting my own business, DiscountIF. What inspired you to set up your own company?

I had always worked in a large corporate environment. Before making the definitive 16 - Money / Issue 36

move I was constantly questioning myself whether I was making the right choice. Even though I tend to assess things logically, there was a point where I had to just draw a line and just go with my gut feeling. The ideas I was working on felt right, there was a great potential to learn, the start-up world sounded too exciting and I couldn’t resist.

When did your start-up first feel like a real thing that could stand on its own two legs?

The moment of spark for the business and as a team was when we decided to compete in a huge start-up event in the UK. We received loads of support and gathered 3,000 votes to take us all the way to the semifinals of the competition. It was the catalyst that led us to successfully crowdfunding the business in the UK, and also propelling our business into the next phase.

Any stressful, hair pulling times?

A start-up is an intense place where one minute you’re cheering, and the next you’re pulling at your hair. Crowdfunding was a very busy time for the team. We were managing conversations with hundreds of investors, launching a new version of our platform and dealing with the press all at the same time. After a lot of blood

and sweat we pulled it off and became the first Maltese team to successfully crowdfund for equity in the UK. Was it a struggle to attract investment?

Raising investment is all about finding the right match. The timing to take in the investment has to be right for the business.

There is a delicate balance between raising too much (or too little) investment especially at the early stages of a business.

The type of investor is important too. Angel investors are the ones that take higher risks, but usually need to really understand the business or have experience in that field. VCs come later and tend to invest in businesses that have already proved they can scale.

Since launch we’ve raised investment through angel money from the UK first, from exBetfair colleagues who really got the business and trusted the team. After successful competitions we then raised money through crowdfunding – this allowed us to convert the backing of votes into investment.

The scene in Malta for investment is poor at present and there are only a few early stage angel investors.

Lewis Holland

“THE IDEAS I WAS WORKING ON FELT RIGHT, THERE WAS A GREAT POTENTIAL TO LEARN, THE START-UP WORLD SOUNDED TOO EXCITING AND I COULDN’T RESIST” Malta at the University of Malta’s TakeOff incubator. The logistics made sense: we got support by the mentors and it also allowed us to tap into the growing Maltese market of experienced online gurus.

What would you change in work and business culture?

There is a saying that the only people who like change are babies with a dirty diaper.

Some of the toughest innovation to pull off is when you merge two industries together. We’ve found out this first hand with DiscountIF as we’re merging concepts of marketing from the gaming industry and applying them to ecommerce.

Would you launch a start-up in Malta?

Definitely. At present, you’ll find that entrepreneurs based in Malta are incredibly resilient. There isn’t a lot of support offered, especially in comparison to the UK, and the market locally is small.

Even given these adversities Malta is still breeding successful global ventures such as Altaro, HotJar and MightyBox. The one thing I spotted in common is hard grit and determination, a lot of which is needed to make your break.

And why haven’t you launched in Malta?

In Europe, London is still the largest hub for start-ups. There’s a great mix of experienced talent, an evolving large marketplace, supporting schemes by the UK government, and investment capital. We founded the business in London first as we knew the competitive advantages it had for start-ups, but also knowing that the UK is a great market for ecommerce.

Nonetheless shortly after incorporating the business in the UK, we set up shop in

We’ve found that from the general public we have a lot of backing for our awesome idea.

But once you turn to the industry dinosaurs, the general reaction is ‘this has nothing to do with our industry’ or ‘this is not how we work’.

What do you love about the start-up world?

Every now and again you get a break. I was part of Betfair, which merged two industries: the finance industry together with the betting industry. It took them a number of years of the founders challenging the norm. When they finally broke the mould it was pure bliss.

With DiscountIF we’re very close to that breaking point and we’re already starting to hear some ‘dinosaurs’ turn into babies.

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START-UPS

David Darmanin HOTJAR Tell us a little bit about yourself.

I was born in Australia and moved back to Malta when I was seven. On paper I’m a lawyer but at heart I’m a designer and entrepreneur. I worked in design, branding and marketing for several years and then specialised in growth and conversion rate optimisation. I have launched hundreds of tests across dozens of industries over a period of 11 years, generating hundreds of millions of dollars in new revenue. I’m now the CEO and founder of Hotjar – a tool used over 90,000 sites worldwide.

Were you always attracted to business and starting your own company?

Oh yes! In college I participated in Young Enterprise. We won both the national and international events. It was my very first experience running a business and I loved it.

I started my first company – an advertising agency – while studying law. But I was involved in endless projects before that, including the Start-Up Malta Business Plan Competition, back in my university days.

What inspired you to set up your own company?

I saw an opportunity to disrupt a market that had not changed in a long time and decided to bring together the best people I had worked with to do so. I was eager for change – I was doing very well consulting big businesses but I wanted to make a difference and own my own destiny instead of growing other businesses.

David Darmanin

When did your start-up first feel like a real thing that could stand on its own two legs?

It was when we started seeing a lot of people sign up for the Hotjar beta. We then started getting featured on many sites such as producthunt.com. The excitement and activity was amazing.

Any stressful, hair pulling times?

When we got featured on one particular site, our site could not take all the traffic and it died on us. It was a horrible experience. Equally, during the beta, it was very painful to slowly bring more users in – we could not keep up with the amount of users requesting to use Hotjar.

Was it a struggle to attract investment?

We’re lucky to have received a lot of VC interest. However we’ve quickly become profitable so we’ve decided to focus on building our the team instead of bringing on more funds for now. Speaking to VCs can be very time consuming – but you do get very valuable feedback and input.

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19 - Money / Issue 36

START-UPS Interview

THE RULES OF

ATTRACTION What are the elements that could transform Malta into a start-up hub, Theo Dix and Chris Meilak ask.

he world has seen a profound transformation over the last decade.

Technology is disrupting everything, fuelled by the convergence of social, mobile, cloud, big data and the growing demand for anytime, anywhere access to information.

T

Malta. This, in turn, has created vast new employment opportunities in areas such as programming, business intelligence and data analytics, digital marketing and design – upskilling the local economy for the new digital working world in the process.

The face of entrepreneurship is also changing.

Across the world, entrepreneurs are increasingly global, young and in many cases women.

Crucially, many of the new enterprises being set up are digital from inception.

In today’s age, the speed of digital economy demands new processes, business strategy and agility to capitalise on opportunities.

New competitors – unburdened by old thinking and outdated technology – are harnessing the full power of digital to address unmet customer needs.

The shifting economic landscape towards digital has had a profound impact on the Maltese economy. One particular sector, iGaming, has attracted hundreds of young, foreign entrepreneurs to set-up shop in

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Technology and globalisation have helped liberate our country from the fate of our insularity as well as our small size since it

opened new markets and allowed us to overcome the physical geographical barriers.

Nevertheless this is a double-edged sword.

Just as our opportunities in the global market have been widened, the sources of threats to our economy have also increased. Today, digital start-ups are able to choose anywhere in the world to set-up their business – and foreign governments are increasingly competing with innovative, start-up friendly policy measures targeted at building or attracting the next Google, Facebook or Twitter to their country.

The British government established Tech City UK to deliver programmes focused on accelerating the growth of digital businesses across the UK at all stages of their development.

Chris Meilak leads the economic advisory team at EY Malta.

In the Netherlands, the Ministry of Economic Affairs appointed a high profile politician to the role of special envoy for start-ups, charged with establishing the Netherlands as the best country in Europe to start up a business within an 18-month period. Estonia set up the e-residency scheme – facilitating the set-up and running of digital businesses for Estonians and foreign nationals alike.

Governments across the world are utilising a wide range of policy measures to attract start-ups and investors to their economies through initiatives such as funding and coinvestment schemes, mentorship and visa schemes for third country foreign nationals.

The ultimate hope is that of generating the next unicorn, that is, companies founded since 2003 valued at US$1b or more.

However, while many foreign investors in Malta and overseas have been quick to invest in new digital start-ups and other equity types, the vast Maltese investors have favoured property as an investment tool in this ultra-low interest rate climate. This is in part driven by the risk appetite of Maltese investors, who seem to prefer investments with a relatively stable rate of return and little perceived capital risk. This is evident when sovereign and corporate debt issuances end up being oversubscribed at issue, while initial public offerings of equity remain limited.

Many local investors view property as a safe investment, with little risk of devaluation. A booming letting market, driven by strong demand from foreign nationals, is pushing up rental returns to around five per cent and fuelling further demand. But investors also worry about sustainability of such prices, and thus are looking for other investment opportunities to hold as part of a diversified portfolio.

A seed investment programme (announced in the 2015 budget speech and based on the UK system) could drive an upsurge in

Theo Dix is a project finance and infrastructure consultant at EY Malta.

“THE SPEED OF DIGITAL ECONOMY DEMANDS NEW PROCESSES, BUSINESS STRATEGY AND AGILITY TO CAPITALISE ON OPPORTUNITIES” both the number of investors considering investment in start-ups, as well as the value of investments made. While start-up investments can offer high rewards, they are also high risk and highly illiquid, which means they are not so ideal for all types of investors. Moreover, investors often require some form of incentive to channel funds into such investments.

According to the budget speech, this initiative will provide tax credits to persons investing seed capital in start-ups. The tax relief allows investors to partially offset the risk associated with start-up investment, while also having involvement in a potentially successful new venture.

It is also hoped that the seed investment programme will also drive the development of a local business angel network.

Other initiatives are also underway. Venture Capital Malta (VC-MT), an initiative to encourage people to consider Malta as an ideal jurisdiction for a new venture set-up in Europe, was launched in 2015 by the Government through Malta Investment Management Company Limited (MIMCOL) and Malta Enterprise in collaboration with finance and advisory specialists from the private sector. When announcing its launch, the government noted that the next stage in Malta’s economic strategy for improved competitiveness is the creation of a stronger framework for the funding of creative industries and other industries with significant IP VC-MT has been consulting widely with local and international stakeholders to better understand the international start-up landscape prior to the roll out of further schemes.

It is hoped that such schemes would also attract foreign start-ups, and drive Malta’s appeal as a start-up hub. Malta offers a beautiful Mediterranean location and excellent climate, a rich cultural history dating back thousands of years and a skilled English-speaking workforce.

While all are nice to have, Malta’s key advantage over its European counterparts is that companies benefit from quicker access to government services given Malta’s small size and a slower burn-rate (the rate at which a new company spends its initial capital). A company’s seed capital may last three to five times longer in Malta than London or San Francisco, providing companies with more time to test and refine their products, build their customer bases and find investors.

This is immensely important since initial capital is usually extremely tight for early stage start-ups.

At a deeper level, Malta needs to hone its strategy exploring new high-value added, knowledge-based sectors and niches and target sectors with high future potential.

Malta needs to clearly differentiate itself as a front-running FDI destination with a clear roadmap and legislation as an enabler, as it has already done in sectors such as igaming, asset management and insurance.

Fintech could be one such new ‘centre of excellence’, given Malta’s reputation for financial services and igaming skills, and the number of fintech start-ups setting up here. However, the country needs to move quickly to catch-up with competing jurisdictions far ahead in developing flexible legislative frameworks that support such companies to innovate and disrupt.

A GOOD NIGHT’S SLEEP Oxford House Ltd has launched the new Dorelanbed Concept Store in Notabile Road, Mriehel with an official opening on April 29, 2016. The 300m2 designer showroom showcases an array of 100 per cent ‘Made in Italy’ products that range from beds, pillows and mattresses to bed linen.

Dorelanbed will introduce to the local market a range of luxurious products that will help customers create a

complete bedroom setting, ensuring well-being during sleep.

The new Dorelanbed Concept Store in Malta will be the goto store for customers who seek unique bedroom furniture.

The Dorelanbed Concept Store is now open in Notabile Road, Mriehel, close to the Oxford House building. For more information call on 21443872 or visit www.dorelanbed.it.

The local Facebook page ‘Dorelanbed Malta’ offers various updates and further information on the brand’s products.

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TECHNOLOGY

CLICK ON ONLINE SHOPPING Maltese consumers are spending millions every year on online shopping. So why aren’t more local businesses opening their online doors, Dale Schembri asks.

H

ave you ever been bored at home and decided to open up your browser for some online shopping to pass the time, most probably ending up buying something you don’t really need? I know I have.

Online shopping seems to cater to the impulse buyer in all of us, and the Maltese seem to be particularly keen on it. Indeed,

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more than €70 million are currently being spent every year by Maltese consumers through PayPal alone. Moreover, 39 per cent of the total spent by Maltese consumers are cross-border transactions, which is more than double the EU average.

Online shopping’s rising popularity stems from the fact that it’s not only quick,

allowing for spur-of-the-moment purchase decisions while still wearing your pyjamas, but it’s also convenient, as you get everything delivered right to your door.

However, even though Maltese consumers seem to be clamouring for more online shopping websites to spend their hard-earned money on, the majority of Maltese enterprises are still

Money / Issue 35 - 22

Dale Schembri is a product marketing executive at BMIT. He previously worked with various clients such as financial institutions, insurance agencies and medical distributors on their marketing efforts online.

sceptical. In fact, the number of companies selling online decreased by 1.4 per cent in 2015 when compared to the previous year.

The benefits of offering online shopping to consumers are numerous, but what incentives are there for businesses to start selling their goods on the internet while operating in Malta?

The island has a clear roadmap, in the form of Digital Malta: National Digital Strategy 2014-2020. This seeks to provide a strategy for Malta to become a digitally-enabled nation, with some of the goals being aimed specifically at improving e-commerce adoption among local businesses.

As the ICT industry continues to grow, technology companies have started to offer e-commerce implementations, taking the headache out of setting up your online store.

Of course, alternatives such as WordPress plug-ins or e-commerce websites such as Etsy, eBay or Amazon allow businesses to set up shop online with little effort.

Needless to say, a website requires infrastructure for 24/7 hosting and that’s where BMIT come in. Apart from offering web hosting plans with a site builder and a free exchange mailbox included, BMIT also offer cloud servers, a pay-as-you-go service with pricing

“MORE THAN €70 MILLION ARE CURRENTLY BEING SPENT EVERY YEAR BY MALTESE CONSUMERS THROUGH PAYPAL ALONE” varying according to configuration, so you don’t pay for what you don’t use.

Most importantly, the cloud servers are instantly scalable, which means you can add or remove resources whenever you want.

Let’s say you’re a clothes retailer operating online and are anticipating a heavy increase in traffic throughout the January sales. Having the website hosted on your own local server would mean that you’d have to upgrade it permanently – an overkill if you only experience heavy traffic during sales. With a server on the cloud, you can upgrade the resources

just in time for sales, and then downscale right after, not to mention the fact that you wouldn’t have to worry about power cuts affecting your server, as BMIT’s infrastructure is backed up by redundant generators capable of withstanding complete blackouts for days.

So if you’re looking to expand your business, both locally as well as overseas, online shopping is the answer. With a great website and a reliable back-end to support it, online shopping will not only help your business reach a wider audience but also provide added value to the consumer in terms of convenience.

IN SHAPE Vivendo Group has completed work on the newly-equipped gym facilities at Radisson Blu Resort Malta. Guests at the resort can now stay in shape while on holiday, using the latest gym and fitness equipment by Technogym.

The new gym combines the best new technology with the latest equipment, enabling users to improve their workouts and exercise safely both individually and under the guidance of trained instructors. The finished facility comprises different sections dedicated to strength training, cardio, free weights, flexibility and group fitness, as well as recreational areas.

The upgraded gym has an enhanced exercise area, and an annex that can be used by third parties for personal training and functional classes. The gym was designed with the needs of the hotel’s guests in mind, providing a convenient space where they can use the cardio machines or pump iron at the weights sections. The gym also boasts the Kinesis Personal, a state-ofthe-art, full-body strength machine that is exclusively offered by Technogym.

Radisson Blu Resort joins countless luxury hotels and resorts around the world that use Technogym equipment in their gyms, ensuring they deliver a five-star experience to their guests even while working out. The resort also requested custom branding in their new gym, which Technogym provided at no further cost.

Apart from delivery and installation of the new gym equipment, Technogym is offering Radisson Blu an ongoing maintenance package at a fixed annual fee, which guarantees the machines remain in perfect working condition longer and includes 24/7 access to trained technicians in case any repairs are needed.

Technogym is part of the Vivendo Group portfolio of brands, specialising in the design and development of cutting-edge gym equipment for professional and home use. A top wellness brand, Technogym is committed to helping people achieve better physical and mental health in their daily lives through its range exercise equipment.

Technogym products include high-end gym equipment and gym management software, providing an all-in-one solution that can be customised for both consumers and professional operators.

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Dr Doran Magri Demajo is a Partner at Be Legal Advocates and is primarily responsible for the firm’s corporate and commercial law practice.

LAW

START OFF ON THE RIGHT FOOT Dr Doran Magri Demajo outlines the legal considerations when launching a business in Malta CHOOSING THE APPROPRIATE LEGAL FORM TO OPERATE THE BUSINESS

The very first decision that promoters must make relates to the legal form for the operation of their business. The legal form is important since this will have a bearing on the level of taxes imposed and liabilities towards third parties.

The main types of business forms that are available in terms of Maltese law for startups are as a sole trader and partnerships.

Starting a business as a sole trader is the ‘easiest’ and most cost-effective route, since no legal documents need to be filed with a regulatory authority and no registration fees are imposed.

At most, one would need to apply for a VAT number and obtain a trade licence.

However, this type of business form does not come without challenges and potential pitfalls and is, in fact, the one which is least recommended. If the sole trader needs additional capital from another investor, this form would not work and a partnership or company would need to be set up.

The main disadvantage is that this type of business form provides absolutely no protection for the sole trader against creditors of the business, meaning that they can sue the sole trader directly and their personal assets are capable of being seized, as opposed to a limited liability company in terms of which the company and its shareholders are considered to be separate and distinct and consequently (save for a few exceptions) the creditors of the company may not successfully sue its shareholders in their personal capacity.

With regards to partnerships, Maltese law provides for various types of commercial partnerships including general and limited partnerships. The most popular form of business organisation is, however, the private limited liability company which is formed by the filing

of certain documentation with the Registry of Companies and the payment of the appropriate registration fees.

The costs for setting up a limited liability company are often greater than for partnerships and sole traders due to legal,

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LAW

“A BUSINESS PARTNERSHIP MAY TO A CERTAIN EXTENT BE COMPARED TO A MARRIAGE” tax, accounting and audit considerations.

However, this type of business organisation generally offers significant advantages for promoters (and subsequent investors) including the facility to raise capital, liability protection from business creditors and tax savings through deductions.

Aside from the mechanics of registering a company, it would be advisable for promoters to also consider a number of issues before embarking on their business which include (i) the feasibility of the company’s proposed activities; (ii) its proposed financing; (iii) its budget of expenditure and income; (iv) tax and regulatory issues; and (v) recruitment of personnel.

SIGNING A ‘PRE-NUPTIAL’ AGREEMENT

As any entrepreneur will confirm, a business partnership may to a certain extent be compared to a marriage. They both involve the pooling of financial and other resources.

Also, mutual trust and respect is the foundation for success. Moreover, they both require hard work to achieve a common goal.

In order for business partners to sustain a successful relationship and avoid ending up in a complicated ‘divorce’, signing a shareholders’ agreement may go a long way in ensuring that there are no problems five, 10 or 20 years down the line, especially when there are more than just two founders or investors. Failing to set the business parameters between the shareholders at the outset often results in problematic

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legal and commercial issues in the future, which could effectively doom a company.

A few key issues which may be addressed in a shareholders’ agreement are the following: (i) percentage of voting rights required in respect of certain key and day-to-day decisions; (ii) whether the shareholding is based on continued participation in the business; (iii) the roles and responsibilities of the shareholders and/or directors; (iv) mechanism for future share allotments, share transfers, share options and share buybacks; (v) shareholders’ dispute resolution; (vi) company financing; (vii) dividend policy; (viii) sale and/or merger of business.

MAINTAINING EMPLOYMENT DOCUMENTATION

It is essential for business start-ups to maintain adequate employment records and should therefore procure the preparation of certain employment documents to be signed by its employees.

Such documentation would include service agreements or letters of engagement containing certain information pertaining to the period of probation, rates of wages payable, periodicity of wage payments, vacation and sick leave entitlement, duration of contract and the conditions under which disciplinary action may be taken by the employer.

Other documentation which should ideally be prepared at the outset is an employment handbook setting out the company’s internal policies on vacation, behaviour in the workplace, conflicts of interest, internet usage and access to employee e-mails. Also, if appropriate, business start-ups should prepare share option documents, including a share incentive plan, notice of share option grants and share option agreements.

PROTECTING INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

It is essential for business start-ups If you have developed a unique and distinctive product, the appropriate steps to protect your intellectual property would need to be considered. In Malta, formal protection of intellectual property is provided through registration at the Commerce Department.

Measures should be undertaken to protect trademarks, patents, designs and copyright.

Trademark means any sign capable of being represented graphically, and of distinguishing goods and services of one undertaking from those of another. A trademark may consist of words (including personal names), figurative elements, letters, numerals or the shape of

goods or their packaging. A trademark right therefore essentially protects the symbolic value of a word, name, symbol, or device that the trademark owner uses to identify or distinguish its goods from those of others.

A patent gives its inventor the right to prevent others from making, using, or selling the patented subject matter described in words in the patent’s claims.

Patents are therefore the best protection you can get for a new product or idea.

An invention shall be patentable if it is novel, involves an inventive step and is susceptible of industrial application.

A design is protected by a design right if the design in question is new and has individual character. Design refers to the appearance of the whole or a part of a product resulting from the features of, in particular, the lines, contours, colours, shape, texture or materials of the product itself, or its ornamentation. A design is considered to be new if no identical design has been made available to the public before the date of filing of the application for registration.

Copyright, also known as author’s rights, includes artistic creations such as poems, novels, music, cinematographic works and software. A copyright gives the owner the exclusive right to make copies of the work and to prepare derivative works (such as sequels or revisions) based on the work.

While formal protection is provided for industrial property in Malta through registration at the Commerce Department, copyright works, although not formally registered, still receive statutory protection automatically once they are placed in the public domain.

LAWYER UP

To implement all these actions effectively, professional advice should always be sought, particularly in the case of businesses operating in highly specialised sectors, such as in the electronic communications, banking, insurance and investment services industry.

Accordingly, proper preparation and careful selection of professional advisors will be paramount for operators looking to successfully launch their Malta business.

Should you wish to contact the author call on 2713 0150, send an e-mail to info@belegal.com.mt or visit www. belegal.com.mt.

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PROMO

ALWAYS A STEP AHEAD Vodafone Malta has scored the highest result among all local network operators in both voice telephony and data services.

Vodafone Malta has been awarded the ‘Best Network in Test’ certification after it achieved the highest score among local network operators for both voice telephony and data services. Behind this achievement is a 40-strong team of dedicated and skilful engineers who work to maintain the level of service we all take for granted.

It’s a normal Sunday morning on the Maltese islands – people congregate at the beach or go for picnics in the countryside. Others go to Gozo for the day. However, behind the scenes, the Vodafone mobile network is quietly being reconfigured to allow for the movement of a large number of subscribers to specific busy areas. It is thanks to this ongoing network monitoring, dimensioning and optimisation that – from the teenager taking selfies on the beach to the businessman conducting his work outside the office – all can carry on with their business smoothly.

Vodafone Malta was recently awarded the ‘Best Network in Test’ certification following an independent study which confirms that, once again, Vodafone scored the highest result among all local network operators in both voice telephony and data services. The result also placed Vodafone Malta in the top 10 Vodafone mobile network operators across Europe.

The study, conducted by P3 Communications Gmbh, an independent network auditing company, ran tests on the three local

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Mario Cordina, Radio Networks Planning and OPT Team Lead (left) and Alan Caruana, Network Deployment and Enterprise Manager (right)

operators between February 15-29. Running across 23 towns and cities and 16 main roads in Malta and Gozo, the tests covered a wide variety of services ranging from voice telephony to web browsing, file upload and download as well as YouTube streaming.

The excellent results obtained were achieved through the expertise of a 40-strong team of dedicated engineers.

“A lot of work is consistently being carried out in the background. Apart from maintaining a high availability network, Vodafone network engineers work around the clock to ensure the best quality of service to our subscribers,” Alan Caruana, network manager at Vodafone Malta, says.

“Data speeds, service accessibility and reliability are some of our key performance indicators which we thoroughly monitor throughout

the day in order to ensure a high quality network,” Mario Cordina, who heads the radio network team and leads the end-toend optimisation of Vodafone network, says.

His team works to plan, design, monitor and optimise the radio network to meet Vodafone’s stringent quality requirements.

The team is also responsible to identify potential problems in the network and take rapid preventive actions to maintain the high level of service. This is achieved through rigorous tests using a vehicle equipped with network testing equipment carrying out automated tests across Malta and Gozo together with a set of sophisticated analytical tools, some of which were developed in-house by the experts themselves.

“Our aim is to pre-empt customer complaints prior to our subscribers dialling the customer care number.”

It’s this team expertise and customer centric attitude to network design and operation that has helped Vodafone Malta to achieve this prestigious certification.

The design and operation of a mobile network is not an easy task.

“Subscribers demand a high quality service, whenever and wherever they are – whether on the beach, out on a boat or in a basement garage – the mobile phone service is now ubiquitous and it’s taken for granted,” Cordina adds.

This puts additional pressures on his team as expectations keep increasing, particularly in the densely populated areas around the innerharbour region, where most businesses operate.

“Businesses are always on the move and having a high quality mobile network is of paramount importance as they can carry on with their

work without having to go back to the office.

In fact, you can have a better experience when using our network than with a standard wired connection in the office,” Caruana says.

“THE QUALITY OF VODAFONE’S NETWORK IS SUPERIOR TO THAT OF ITS COMPETITORS EVEN IN THE MOST DEMANDING AND DENSELY POPULATED AREAS” This is yet another area where Vodafone excels as the results achieved during the network audit have consistently shown that the quality of Vodafone’s network is superior to that of its competitors even in the mostdemanding and densely populated areas.

As summer is fast approaching, the increase in network traffic continues to challenge Vodafone network engineers to come up with innovative ways to manage the rapidly growing thirst for data.

“A few years back, people used to send SMS messages to keep in touch with their family

and friends – now it’s WhatsApp, Facebook messenger and much more. This has led us to develop sophisticated techniques to handle the increase in network traffic.

“Summer is usually a very busy period for us as we monitor and optimise network performance with particular focus to areas where subscribers usually congregate such as beaches, various clubbing scenes or waiting in the ferry queue to get to Gozo.

With the European Football Championship around the corner coupled with the yearly mass events such as Isle of MTV, Beer Festival and other open-air concerts, this summer will be another challenging and busy period optimising the network to ensure a high quality service,” Cordina says.

Vodafone is the only network operator in Malta to own two high-capacity rapid deployment radio base station sites which are always on standby in order to enhance the network coverage and capacity. These are usually used to cater for mass events – however they can readily be used in case of a major disaster event.

It’s a life with a constant flow of challenges.

“Technology keeps changing – and as a telecoms engineer, this is extremely exciting,” Caruana says.

“There’s always more to come – you’re always planning ahead... our job is never done,” Cordina agrees.

Perhaps it is the excitement of being at the forefront, the constant challenges of a rapidly changing scenario – and the satisfaction of overcoming them – that keeps the team driven, motivated and always a step ahead.

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Reuben Buttigieg is director at Erremme Business Advisors.

Interview FINANCE

BE PREPARED Malta needs to rethink its strategy in order to reduce the administrative burden on its business community, Reuben Buttigieg says.

L

ike other EU member states, Malta is facing a new era where professionals are inundated by legislation in order to combat money laundering and tax evasion.

The EU is certainly giving conflicting messages whereby it is not understanding the administrative burden that it is putting on small and medium enterprises.

In the case of Malta, this is reducing the competitive advantage it had when comparing costs with other jurisdictions. The challenge is not only cost but also unclear administrative challenges that it is faced with.

The major challenge that Malta will have shall be the implementation of the Base Erosion Profit Shifting (BEPS) that is now with us. In this context, the Malta Institute of Management (MIM) has put this as the main discussion point in its Annual International Taxation Conference to be held on April 15, 2016.

BEPS will change the promotional strategy of Malta as it certainly changes the playing field for the practitioners. Added to this Malta will be facing additional challenges such as the pressure for Tax Harmonisation in Europe which Malta has been opposing.

Also, one of the main financial services in the country which has been the fiduciary services is at risk with the proposition of the register of ultimate beneficiary shareholders. While the impact of this is yet to be known, certainly it changes the perspective of existent and future clients

of Malta. The playing rules had already changed with the Exchange of Information Directive and with the added requirements of the Customer Due Diligence imposed by our International Obligations.

In itself this has been beneficial as Malta is seen as a reputable jurisdiction. On the other hand it does have its impacts on business in various ways as the slowing down of business transactions. In certain cases, it is felt that we have returned to the bureaucracy there was in exchange control in the past. Various practitioners in fact are facing issues with banks due to the lack of competition and also due to the added requirements on banks.

Certainly, the political talk in these weeks has not assisted the industry and we will still have to see the impact of this on Malta. The issue of trusts and Panama will leave a bad image on Malta and will be used in international discussions and negotiations when the time is ripe. It is not the first time that persons in prominent positions allegedly had interactions in various ways with this country. However, since there was no political mileage to gain both parties preferred to ignore the matter.

In no way I am saying that this matter should not have been discussed since there are politically exposed persons in the matter.

However, Malta – both Government and the Opposition – handled it in a manner that I feel was inappropriate particularly when

31 - Money / Issue 36

Interview FINANCE

“ON MANY OCCASIONS MALTA WAS NOT PREPARED FOR THE INVESTMENT IT ATTRACTED AND OUR REGULATIONS OR RATHER THE LACK OF THEM INDICATE THIS”

the media started involving professionals, including accountants and lawyers.

From a national perspective certain bureaucracy and slow down in service is not helping. This could be for various reasons from lack of adequate resources to a lack of clear vision. The fact that certain departments that were fundamental in the growth of the financial services sector have slowed down is now a fact that no one likes to speak about. The international tax unit for example is publicly stating a considerable back log which is having repercussions on businesses cash flow but not only.

The requirements of Identity Malta for permits keep changing particularly after the concerns raised by the Media on these. However, this is harming certain sectors that cannot do without foreign human talent either because the Maltese do not wish to do those jobs or because the skills lack in Malta. There

32 - Money / Issue 36

are matters that need immediate address particularly when it comes to clarity and not on the person’s mood at the counter.

As for state aid, Malta is becoming increasingly limited due to the relative aid rules. One of the advantages Malta had is that it incentivised business in this manner through different type of concessions. Not only these have been limited but now the Maltese population seem to limit investment through the constant opposition that certain groups do every time there is a new investment. Not only but some seem to enjoy unduly criticising the existent businesses that have brought a lot to this country. Malta knew the implications of having certain industries in Malta but rightly so it was decided that for the common good it needed such industries. Examples of these were the Freeport privatisation, the dockyards privatisation , the airport privatisation and the incentivising of the pharmaceutical industry.

Time has evolved and technology improved and companies are trying to keep the level of investment in improvements, also in view of the fact that they need to remain competitive.

However, we also need to recognise the fact that on many occasions Malta was not prepared for the investment it attracted and our regulations or rather the lack of them indicate this. In the absence of these we need to rely on international organisations parameters in order to ensure that our industries operate the way they should.

With all this in mind, one cannot but conclude that it is time for a review in our industrialisation strategy and in our business promotion strategy. The political parties on many occasions have agreed on certain elements that do this. Let’s agree on the direction Malta needs to take and then lets argue on the route to go there but Malta needs a common vision as otherwise difficult times will come in the next decade.

33 - Money / Issue 36

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MARKET Interview REPORT

Licensed stockbroker Alexander Mangion is Managing Director at MPM Capital Investments since 2009. The company is authorised by the Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) to provide financial services in Malta and holds a Category 2 licence.

He holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Hons) degree in Banking & Finance (University of Malta) and a Master of Finance & Investments (University of Nottingham).

FUELLING CHANGE Low oil prices provide a good opportunity for change, Alexander Mangion says. However, that change could be painful.

M

ost nations and their citizens have had at least one reason to cheer in the past 12 months: the sharp decline in the price of oil has been translated into lower energy bills and slashed fuel prices at the pump. Major companies, particularly airlines, have seen their balance sheets – and their shareholders – have a sigh of relief with significantly discounted fuel bills.

When prices fall as low and as fast as they have over the past two years – dropping circa 70 per cent, or a staggering $80 a barrel – shockwaves are felt around the world. But this cause for celebration is not shared in most oil producing Arab countries – most evidently in autocratic Saudi Arabia – at least by the ruling regimes.

In Saudi Arabia, at stake is political stability for a royal family, known as the House of Saud, which has kept total control and silencing dissidence. Silence and collaboration are ensured through extensive subsidies on food and fuel and very low energy costs. This has helped keep stability while turmoil has deepened across North Africa and the Middle East.

The ruling family provides its citizens with free education and healthcare as well as access to cheap housing.

So far so good, especially when the country sold oil at over $100 per barrel. In Saudi Arabia, the state relies on oil for no less than 80 per cent of its budget revenue, and its income from oil sales represent a staggering half of its GDP. The Saudi currency – the riyal – is pegged to the strengthening dollar, thereby limiting monetary flexibility.

On the one hand, the Saudis still have more

than €650bn in reserves, available for a rainy day. Yet, in only the past 12 months, the country has eaten away about €120bn of such reserves – a figure which puts the severity of the situation into perspective.

At the same time, the lifting of sanctions on Iran, a major political-religious rival to Saudi Arabia, will bring one million new barrels of oil per day to the marketplace, challenging prices further and shifting global market share, and the Middle East’s balance of power, in Iran’s direction.

Other producers are hurting too. Exporters like Nigeria, Brazil and Mexico are already feeling the pinch. But those economies are better diversified and will sustain much less damage. Saudi Arabia has little in terms of other economic activity that will help it cushion the shocks of increased competition and lower prices.

The government ran a deficit of 367bn riyals (€85m) or 15 per cent of gross domestic product in 2015, officials said.

The 2016 budget plan aims to cut that to 326bn riyals. That figure could quite easily be higher as actual spending generally outpaces the estimated number by, on average, 25 per cent over the past decade.

These worrying figures left no other option to the ruling elite but to resort to some degree of belt tightening. Unprecedented cuts to fuel and energy subsidies are forcing the kind of “austerity” – which although does not come close to the big cuts to pensions, salaries and increases in taxation seen in Europe during the economic and financial crisis – which was never seen during the era of petrodollar-fuelled wealth that quadrupled per-capita income since the late 1980s. Gross domestic product per capita

soared to $52,000 by 2014 from about $12,000 at the time of the first Gulf War in 1990. That means young people below the age of 30 have only known luxury.

Those aged 15 to 34, who make up more than 40 per cent of the 21 million Saudis, are at the forefront of the upheaval. No longer can they take for granted free healthcare, cheap fuel for the guzzling cars and routine pay increases. Some of them are having to find a job for the first time in their life, others are seeking additional sources on income to top up their main jobs – a seemingly unthinkable thing to do barely 12 to 24 months ago.

But it is not all Saudis who have lived through such luxury. The country also comprises an increasing number of poorer Saudis in the country who feel disenfranchised in an environment in which the politics of the country are changing.

Moreover, like almost every predominantly Arab country, Saudi Arabia has a Sunni Muslim majority and it faces ongoing protests from members of its Shiite minority and long-growing dissatisfaction among Muslims who do not subscribe to the strict, very conservative brand of Sunni Wahhabism embraced by the monarchy.

The grounds for discontent are there. The challenge for the royal leadership will be to implement the necessary economic changes in areas that will not trigger social and political repercussions that threaten the royal family’s tacit social compact with the country’s elite.

For some Middle Eastern experts, no degree of caution will halt to desire for change. Therefore, it could be that the price of oil will be the agent of change.

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COUNTRY PROFILE

THE COUNTRY OF TWO CONTINENTS

Instability and upheavals are dampening Turkey’s potential.

N

ews coming out of Turkey has been particularly bad in the past few months.

On March 19, a suicide bomber with links to Isis struck a busy tourist zone – Istiklal Street, in the Taksim Square area – in central Istanbul, killing five people and injuring 36. The street, lined with shops and restaurants and frequently visited by most tourists, was transformed into a scene of crime, with helicopters hovering above, ambulances and security forces on the alert.

On April 24, Dutch journalist Ebru Umar was arrested and prevented from leaving Turkey – she is being accused of writing tweets that are critical of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Her arrest was experienced live by people all around the world, as she tweeted, “Police at the door. No joke,” before being arrested.

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While insulting the president is a crime in Turkey, and is punishable by up to four years in jail, this law had rarely been invoked before Erdogan became president.

However, since 2014, prosecutors have opened more than 1,800 cases against people insulting Erdogan.

On May 6, prominent Turkish journalist Can Dundar survived an attack by a gunman who attempted to shoot him outside a courthouse in Istanbul. Dundar may have escaped with his life – however, shortly after surviving the attack, he was sentenced to five years and 10 months for state secrets offence.

Umar’s case came days after German chancellor Angela Merkel gave Ankara the go ahead to prosecute Jan Bohmermann, a comedian who read out an offensive poem about the Turkish president on a late-night programme screened on the German state broadcaster ZDF.

“In the space of two hours we have experienced two assassination attempts: one was done with a gun, the other was judicial,” Dundar, editor-in-chief of daily newspaper Cumhuriyet, said after the verdict was announced.

On May 1, two police officers were killed and 18 people wounded in a car bomb attack in Gaziantep, in south-east Turkey.

One of the attackers was confirmed to have been an Isis member.

Violence has also taken a seat at the Turkish parliament. On April 28, ruling party and pro-Kurdish MPs brawled in parliament as tensions rose about plans to grant Turkish citizens visa-free travel in the EU, part of a vital migration deal.

“THIS GROWTH IS NOT LIKELY TO HAVE CONTINUED WITH ITS MOMENTUM IN 2016, DUE TO RISING VIOLENCE IN KURDISH-DOMINATED AREAS AND TERRORIST ATTACKS IN ISTANBUL”

Established as a modern secular republic in the 1920s by nationalist leader Kemal Ataturk, modern Turkey has long held the ambition to join the European Union. In fact, membership talks were launched in 2005, yet progress has been slow. The issues are mainly related to politics and human rights. The Kurdish issue is one of the more pressing. Kurds make up about a fifth of the population and have been waging a guerrilla war against Ankara since the 1980s – their claim is that the Turkish state is seeking to destroy their cultural identity.

commentators are seeing Turkish prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu’s resignation as a sign that Erdogan is tightening his grip on the country as its unrivalled political leader.

Another pressing issue is the prosecution of journalists, something which is becoming increasingly frequent, as are bombings and violence. In fact, civilian deaths in Turkey went up by 7,682 per cent in 2015.

At the end of 2015, Turkey was still registering economic growth, also thanks to low oil prices and a weaker lira. However, this growth is not likely to have continued with its momentum in 2016, due to rising violence in Kurdishdominated areas and terrorist attacks in Istanbul, which have affected the country’s tourism industry. This is shown in the falling hotel rates, with five and four-star hotels slashing prices in a bid to attract more tourists. If Turkey is to achieve its 2023 target of attracting 50 million tourist arrivals, it must achieve stability.

All these issues are translating into increased doubts by some EU member states, whether having Turkey as a fellow member state is such a good idea. Commenting about the visa-free travel deal between the EU and Turkey, the deputy head of the commission Frans Timmermans said that, “The distance between us and Turkey is not decreasing, it is increasing, because of human rights, the media and what is happening in civil society.”

There are also concerns that Turkey is turning increasingly authoritarian – some

Such turmoil is having an effect on Turkey’s economy, recently considered one of the strongest in the world. Currently, it is the 17th largest economy in the world with a GDP of $799.54bn, with strong economic ties to the EU – accounting for around 40 per cent of Turkish trade, the EU is Turkey’s largest economic partner.

On paper, Turkey has all the credentials to do so. However, it needs to turn the potential of its large domestic and external market by increasing trust in institutions, accelerating reform, enhancing transparency and regaining investor confidence.

The annual economic growth in 2015 was of

Since 2014, prosecutors have opened more than

4%

1,800

up from 3% in 2014 but in start contrast with the 8.8% growth achieved in 2011.

cases against people insulting Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Turkey’s GDP per capita in 2015 was of

The total population of Turkey stands at more than

$9,221

79m

down from $10,389 in 2014.

Civilian deaths in Turkey went up by

7,682%

in 2015.

Turkey has the second largest army in NATO, after the US. Turkey’s defence budget is more than

$18bn

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Interview DESIGN

CAPITAL OF

DESIGN The Salone del Mobile.Milano 2016 confirmed itself as a hub of creativity.

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T

he 55th edition of the Salone del Mobile.Milano presented a wide range of products, services and events. It was an absolutely unmissable appointment for the sector that turns over almost €25,000 billion, at which more than 300,000 professional attendees from all five continents were present, along with more than 30,000 members of the public on the Saturday and Sunday.

Three collateral events took place alongside the trade show proper, dedicated respectively to living concepts, classical furniture and architectural finishings, along with a short film signed by Matteo Garrone.

The 55th edition of the Salone del Mobile.

Milano once again established the event as the international benchmark showcase for furnishing and design. More than 300,000 professional attendees from over 160 countries seized the opportunity to come to Rho and cast their eyes over the latest products being showcased by more than 2,400 exhibitors this year.

A range of goods that combines quality and technology, shaped by the creativity of the leading sectoral companies, practised at developing their businesses by investing each year in innovative products and home furnishing solutions: 67 per cent of the companies taking part said that they ploughed major investments into innovative machinery, equipment, research and development, and design.

The Salone opened its doors during a historical period in which glimmers of economic market recovery are beginning to be seen. The Italian furnishing system closed 2015 with turnover worth €24,924 billion, 3.4 per cent up on 2014, an increase that, for the first time in the last seven years, has had a positive impact on the domestic market and further consolidated the international markets.

The signs of recovery in the Italian furnishing sector confirm the robustness of the Italian wood-furnishing manufacturing system, which closed 2015 with turnover worth €40,722 billion overall, up 2.7 per cent on the previous year.

The Salone is the international platform for cutting edge products and solutions and a hub of ideas, creativity, innovation and technology, underscoring Milan’s role as the capital of design.

Photos courtesy of Salone del Mobile.Milano

Accompanying the Salone Internazionale del Mobile was the International Furnishing

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Interview DESIGN

Accessories Exhibition, split into two style sections, Classic, Design and xLux. All eyes were on the latter, an all-new sector representing an exclusive living experience, the elegance of timeless luxury reworked in a contemporary key. This is in recognition of a product category already largely established on the American markets, from East to Far East, responding to increasing demand for a dedicated venue for products of this type, which were showcased inside the various pavilions up until the last edition.

A great many manufacturers, who started off producing classical or design products, have embraced this new typology,

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which represents a synthesis of the two categories, making for linear products embellished with details, finishings and warmer, softer materials; there will be a strong presence of leading fashion brands.

In tandem with the two annual exhibitions, the biennial EuroCucina and its collateral event FTK (Technology For the Kitchen) and the International Bathroom Exhibition, responded to the growing demand for quality in both market segments.

This year, both exhibitions featured a wide range of high quality goods, responding to consumer demand for superlative performance, eco-friendly approach and

AN EMBLEM OF ITALIAN DESIGN

A new flagship store highlighting the Calligaris brand identity and its concept of home design was presented at the Salone del Mobile in Milan. The Friuli-based company – which is represented by Vivendo Group in Malta – was founded in Manzano in 1923 as a manufacturer of chairs and tables.

Nowadays, it has become an emblem of Italian design.

Images provided by Vivendo Group. Available at Vivendo, Malta.

CASAVITRA AT THE SALONE DEL MOBILE

CasaVitra is represented by Vivendo Group in Malta. Images provided by Vivendo Group. Available at Vivendo, Malta.

instantly accessible, simple to use and integrated technological solutions. Elegant design, avant- garde looks, technological innovation, energy efficiency and ease of use are what mark out the latest products, whether they be kitchens in laminated plastic, wood, metal, lacquered, brick or natural stone; or induction hobs, extractor hoods or integrated cooking appliances; bathroom furniture, shower cubicles, saunas, tubs, radiators The 19th edition of the SaloneSatellite was devoted to emerging young designers under 35. This year’s theme was New Materials> New Design. The SaloneSatellite Award, now into its seventh edition, focused on the interface between demand and supply, between entrepreneurs and designers, between creativity and production.

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E =man

2

Photography NICKY SCICLUNA Styling LUKE ENGERER

Model MANUEL at Supernova models

The new Mercedes-Benz E-Class is sophisticated, confidently stylish and sporty.

The powerfully extended vehicle body is characterised by short overhangs, a long wheelbase, large wheels and taut, well-defined flanks displaying a fresh, stylish and dynamic interpretation of the feature line. All of which allows the E-Class to deliver the perfect take on the Mercedes-Benz design philosophy: “Sensual Purity”.

// Celio jacket, €19.99 // Hilfiger Denim shirt, €79.90 // Hilfiger Denim shorts - €99.90 // Armani Jeans shoes, €160.00 //

// Armani Jeans hoodie, €165.00 // Hilfiger Denim tank, €34.90 // Armani Jeans shorts, €75.00 //

// Celio shirt, €39.99 // Calvin Klein Jeans shorts, €99.00 // Armani Jeans shoes, €160.00 //

// Armani Jeans jacket, €200.00 // Esprit shirt, €39.99 // Armani Jeans shorts, €115.00 //

// Hilfiger Denim jacket, €159.00 // Celio shirt, €39.99 // Esprit bermudas, €39.99 //

// Esprit t-shirt, €19.99 // Celio shorts, €39.99 //

Interview FASHION

MATERIAL BOY From cotton and linen to lightweight materials, summer is all investing in the right fabrics.

Money showcases a summer wardrobe.

LOAF OF RED These suede loafers by JM Weston have been made in France using the Blake construction method, which involves the outer sole directly stitched to the insole – this allows for maximum flexibility and light weight. The bold red shade is offset by the tan trims.

SMART MAN This double-breasted blazer by Brunello Cucinelli gives you a smart yet dandy look. Tailored from breathable linen in a neutral stone hue, wear this blazer with casual trousers and loafers.

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SWIM ON Etro’s print swim shorts are testament to the Italian label’s penchant for bold patterns and motifs. The mesh lining creates support and breathability – put on for a brisk swim or a lazy lounge-around at the beachside bar.

LOOK COOL Orlebar Brown’s polo shirt is designed to keep you feeling and looking cool during the hot season. Semi-fitted and cut from plush cotton-terry, this striped polo shirt is a summer staple.

VINTAGE LEGS Inspired by sailor tattoos, these printed trousers from Alexander McQueen bring some old-school nautical charm to your personal collection. Crafted from white cotton, the pattern features blue polka dots and maritime motifs.

MAN’S BEST FRIEND The snarling Rottweiler has become a motif synonymous with Riccardo Tisci’s tenure at Givenchy.

This cotton t-shirt features the mighty dog picked out in intricate needle punch embroidery.

SUMMER ON YOUR FEET Gucci’s embroidered striped canvas espadrilles are a lively way to add colour to your weekend. Made in Spain from blue and white striped canvas, these espadrilles are decorated with intricate embroidery.

Finished with rubber-trimmed raffia soles that make them ideal for city streets and sandy paths.

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Interview GIFTS

MR & MRS COOL Summer is heating up. Stay cool with Money’s choice of gifts.

TWO WHEELS GOOD The Electra Bike Amsterdam Royal is a lightweight premium edition Dutch-style bike. Attract plenty of stares while you commute.

LISTEN TO THE MUSIC The Kreafunk headphones pack great sound and a headset speaker function, so you can answer calls from your phone. Available in six cool colours.

TAKE THE CALL

GROOMER Handcrafted from the finest African rosewood, Percy Nobleman’s ultimate grooming box is the perfect gift for the modern gentleman. Limited edition.

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The Classic Telephones collection adds retro style to your interiors.

Features an authentic mechanical bell ringer.

COCKTAILS IN COMFORT The original Bartholomew cocktail chairs were produced in Germany in the 1950s. Galapogos Design has now reupholstered the chairs in fabulous Kirkby’s Underground Bakerloo fabric in three colour options: teal blue, citrus orange and charcoal and orange.

TURN THE TABLES The Crosley portable turntable is vintage-inspired yet packs plenty of modern functions. Lightweight and easily transportable, it comes with integrated speakers for an impromptu party.

THE WRITE STUFF The beautiful Yard-O-Led Viceroy Grand Victorian fountain pen is made of silver and has a delicately ornate design. Three nib sizes to choose from.

HAVE A SEAT Made of 100 per cent natural linen, the Niki Jones Concentric cushion is beautifully embroidered. The design includes linen pompoms and the cushion has a feather pad on the inside.

PACK YOUR BAG The Goring 26-inch suitcase is handcrafted and carries the Goring Hotel brand colours. Lined with damask silk.

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THE DEFINITIVE BOATS AND YACHTING MAGAZINE. Informative, exclusive content and the latest in local and international races, sailing destinations, lifestyle, latest gadgets, fashion and cuisine.

Photo by by Rolex/Kurt Arrigo

MAY 2016 EDITION

Available at all marina’s and pontoons, boating and sailing businesses, sailing clubs, embassies and 5 star hotels.

To advertise call 2134 2155 or skipper@becommunications.com

TRAVEL

Food and travel writer Mona Farrugia runs Angelica in Valletta. www.angelicamalta.com

BEHIND THE PIXEL

No, travelling is not as easy as the click of a button, Mona Farrugia says.

S

omeone needs to call out the massive pink and orange striped elephant in the room: the photos. They are what they promised, but at the same time, they’re not. The imagery as fiction, Mona Lisa was a boy, a story built on a biography. Yet the embellishment is such that all the paupers now look like princes.

It’s like when you interview someone whose profile picture reflected the Maltese equivalent of Gigi Hadid and then she could hardly wobble through the one-metre door. This is exactly what is happening to hotels and their websites.

Who books hotels via agents or people you actually know any more? Playing around with websites is the norm for me. Part of the dream. I hardly ever go into Twit-Advisor because online, people seem to enjoy gratuitous negativity and post pseudoprofessional pictures that are not worth the megabytes they occupy in cyberspace.

Frankly, if you’re like me, it’s a nice relaxing holiday you’re looking for, not sharing in the experience of some frustrated git from Italy (the Italians have taken to Tripadvisor in a massive way – a general reflection of their constantly griping culture).

In 2016, it seems that the more gorgeous the website, the greater the disappointment. Take Fundu Lagoon in Pemba Island off Zanzibar: the website is absolutely beyond terrible, written in something akin to comic sans. But the resort and the staff are stupendous. The slicker the website is, the harsher the reality.

And so, the bigger the challenge for the poor hotel staff who have to face the guests and their transition from online to reality.

Let’s take my booking at the very beautiful – on the website and in reality – Donna Carmela in Riposto, near Etna. First – it

takes you ages to arrive, because, like most resorts in Sicily, nobody actually bothers to put proper real signage in place, which means one moment it seems you’re very near, and the next, you’re in the middle of a field surrounded by soya beans. And Google Maps stops you half a mile away and informs you that you’ve arrived. Then you drive off and you’re instructed to perform a u-turn.

Back to Google though and a lot of other map apps. Someone had actually pointed Donna Carmela to the middle of a main road, and unless the owners get in touch with Google and tell them to repoint, people will keep getting lost out there. Did you not know that that is how it works? Unless you specifically go through a pointing process with Google on behalf of your property, anybody else can place it elsewhere and drive your potential customers insane.

After a few e-mail exchanges with Donna Carmela I thought I had delivered a very, very clear exhortation: please ensure that my room is far away from loud families. Post exhausting Easter holidays, my everyday life dictates that a break means I am as far from offspring of entitled parents who think that running around

tables during dinner is a fun thing for their children to do as humanly possible. Donna Carmela is relatively high-priced: entitled parents is the only kind they attract – there is no humility, only rights. The hotel promises to put me “at the very end”. And herein lies the crunch.

“The end” is the room at the end of a block of the cheapest rooms (almost €250 each).

Booking a Saturday to Monday, I thought I would at least get a family-free day but Monday turns out to be a public holiday and boy do the Italians like to all go on holiday at the same time (think Ferragosto). When I finally do get to my room, it’s like a little one-bedroom dark apartment in a city with a ‘designer finish’.

There are children outside the window. I can hear their happy, shrill voices all the way up.

On the other side, the restaurant, packed, at the moment, with more children than a McDonalds, for a family celebration. I booked heaven online. The reality was different.

The light and colour of the room on the website are fantastic when you are sitting in an office on a grey, windy day. Five minutes into being shown this dull and dark ‘suite’, I understand

55 - Money / Issue 36

TRAVEL

what has happened: I am not surrounded by professional lighting, suffused sofas and details of wonderfully ironed Frette sheets.

Detail, online, is everywhere. In reality, all your senses take in everything at the same time: the sounds, the sun (or lack of it), the placing of the window. I booked an Instagram Kim Kardashian and ended up with the real Kanye West, straight off an eight-hour flight in seat 23B. Which leads to the other ‘real’ bit: dealing with the humans at reception, as the porter, upon seeing my open-mouthed face, literally ran off.

I have been up since 3am and it’s now 7.30pm.

I’m offered an espresso which, bizarrely, it turns out later I have been charged for. Apparently, there are no rooms away from children. I start looking for another hotel – I’m ready to leave.

Humans though, have a way of sorting out issues that the internet creates, and so these amazing staff have managed to find me a room far away from everybody else – a detached suite which looks exactly like the website and it feels like it too.

The detached suite has solace and quiet.

The terrace overlooks the vineyards and estate. It is spacious and the only gripe is the wardrobe – when you hang your clothes, they drape over the desk. It was obviously designed by a man who is not a cross-dresser.

In the evening, the restaurant turns out to be outstanding for two reasons: the food is spectacularly good and with a little restraint on some dishes, the chef is on his way to getting his first Michelin star (they are already in the Red guide). The second is the patience of the front of house staff. Out of 15 tables, two of them 10-tops and there are only three couples.

Every single other table has children, toddlers, teens and babies in prams. If the children are quiet, they are on iPads and iPhones. But most of the time they spend in the sofa area, which they have turned into a jump-around.

There are a few German and French customers but most are northern Italians – and Italians, obviously, know more about food and dining than the chef. Most tables have ordered off menu, making up their dishes: tomato and mozzarella salads, simple tomato-sauce pastas and in one case, potato wedges and pizzas.

I was glad I was not in that chef’s kitchen as the frustration levels must have been high. If this were a French dining room, he would have come out bearing a cleaver and performed a screaming session to applause from his audience: this one just cooked on.

I ate my outstanding hand-made pasta and mouth-watering grass-fed beef and watched aghast as the very chic dining room turned slowly, but surely, into an upmarket McDonalds with children still up at 11pm, crankier and louder than I had been after an exhausting drive.

On Sunday, bizarrely, all the children vanished and I could enjoy my planned day at the pool. This is how the senses are supposed to feel at Donna Carmela – the sound of water, the whoosh of ancient olive trees, the shouting farmers and chirping birds, punctured by the roar of the lawnmower.

This, though, did not last long. On Monday morning at breakfast the parents, louder and brasher than the children, had descended en masse asking for weird combinations of coffee (orzo, decaf and gluten free are now de rigueur all over Italy). The quietest child, as usual, was the French one, busy drowning her

LUMINOUS EXPOSURE A navy blue trench coat that looks sharper than ever, paired with pants cropped above the ankle and slick sneakers: a look for the utterly modern man.

Welcome to a new chapter of unique business style, a new expression of classic elegance. This summer, BOSS presents a benchmark collection of reworked pieces, with multifunctional looks and ultra-precise cuts. In redefining luxury, this collection redefines the BOSS man.

This ultra-modern interpretation of business wear calls for statement colours. Red and green are a fresh, yet complementary addition

56 - Money / Issue 36

to timeless business colours. Dyed silks, cashmere blends, and textiles with a soft sheen finish provide the high-end fabrics expected of BOSS and reinforce the core notion of the collection: luminous exposure.

BOSS is exclusively available at the BOSS Stores Malta in St Julian’s and the Departures Lounge, Luqa Airport. For further information call on 2202 1000 or e-mail BOSS_Store_ Malta@vfgmalta.com.

BOSS Store at St Julian’s opens from Monday to Saturday from 10am till 8pm. BOSS Store at Malta International Airport opens from Monday to Sunday from 6am till 11pm.

“THE SLICKER THE WEBSITE IS, THE HARSHER THE REALITY” Barbie repeatedly into the pool and singing softly to herself like a beautiful cliché.

This ‘children in restaurants and hotels’ situation has become a serious one for the hospitality industry. Ten per cent of children are polite and their parents have taught them how to behave in public. The other 90 per cent belong to entitled gluten-free millennials who have no idea why they had them and who expect, nay demand, that other diners and holidaymakers – including those who have made a huge effort to leave theirs at home, asleep as they should be at 10pm – enjoy their children.

At some point, a sole male diner, reading his book at a corner table, was confronted by one of the children at the next table: a nine year old girl who simply went to him and stared for a whole two minutes. Frustrated, he finally made a shooing gesture, which her father noticed.

“Ah,” the father said “we were all children once” as if that explained the bizarre behaviour and the lack of respect for other people’s space.

I felt so sorry for the defenceless guy on his own until I realised, the next day, why the girl’s father had spent all dinner coming and going from his table, having arguments with the staff. They had given him the room they had tried to give us. But of course he did not like it. He complained. So they moved him into a nicer one. A quieter one right next to ours.

PROMO

REGISTER AND PROTECT YOUR TRADEMARK

In today’s business, a trademark is an essential tool for any business that aims to grow and be successful. A trademark can differentiate one’s product or service from those of competitors giving the business a unique and exclusive right to own, build and potentially commercialise a strong brand.

Registering a trademark is easy and affordable. An application for a Trademark can be submitted online from the comfort of one’s own home or office at www. commerce.gov.mt making it possible for micro-enterprises to register and protect their business names and logos at any time without risking misappropriation from someone else.

Once re-directed to the online Intellectual Property portal of the Commerce Department, one can find an option to apply for either a trademark registration or a design registration (online patents registration is planned to be added this year). The online application can be filed in five easy steps, making the process as smooth as possible.

Before starting the online filing of the trademark application, applicants will need to know the type of mark they want to register. A trademark can be a wordmark, a figurative mark, a slogan or a 3-D image. It will also be necessary that the applicant provides a list of goods and services for which the trademark is intended to be used. The online platform will then provide a report of earlier trademarks that may be similar or identical, and thus may affect the current trademark application.

The final two stages of the online application involve filling in the personal details, and then proceed towards submitting the payment. Upon payment, the applicant will be immediately assigned a Trademark application number and an acknowledgment will be immediately sent to the email provided.

Registered trademarks are valid for a period of 10 years from the filing date of the application for registration, and, may be renewed online for a consecutive period of 10 years.

For further information on how to protect and register your trademark in Malta, visit the

Industrial Property Registrations Directorate (IPRD) section on the Commerce Department website at www.commerce.gov.mt.

Should you be interested in protecting and registering your trademark in the European Union, kindly visit the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) at www.euipo.europa.eu.

The Bluesman is a Maltese sound engineer working in New York.

Interview NEW YORK

Not to

serveand protect

The lack of consequences towards police abuse is perpetuating a violent cycle, the Bluesman says.

F

ollowing the spate of recent terrorist attacks, I watched Michael Ware’s documentary Only The Dead See The End of War. It was a horrifying eye opener watching the beginnings of this cult of death referred to as Daesh, although they prefer the term Isil, founded by al-Zarqawi in 1999.

Torture and death dispensed to whoever crossed their path. An outlet for those with vengeance in their hearts and those whose minds have been filled with Salafi jihadism.

Picking them off is one way of dealing and limiting their activities as is policing work in our cities (how hard would it be to pick up and question anybody returning from a trip to Syria?) but condemnation has to be just as vehement coming from the people they claim to be part of.

But on to pleasanter things. I have been taking trips to Florida every couple of months. I had decided to accompany my younger daughter and share the driving after her visit last August, motivated in part by the fact that traffic stops seem to sometimes veer off into strange territory with cops becoming super sensitive tending to perceive threats and life threatening situations in every citizen who so much as passes through their field of vision. Strange that one is forced to worry about the very people tasked to serve and protect.

So many of these encounters have surfaced accompanied by video over the past couple of years that there seems to be more caution exercised but every now and again arrogance and hubris flare up and another corpse bobs to the surface.

Last February NYPD responded to a call in an apartment building. They knocked on the wrong door and as the tenant was talking to the officers her dog came out, tail wagging, on the landing. Despite her calling that it was friendly one of the brave boys in blue backed away in panic and shot the dog at point blank range in the head. The distraught owner came out, in her underwear as she was getting ready for work, and, while screaming at the

58 - Money / Issue 36

cops, tended to her dog. They calmed her down by slamming her against the stair edges.

The dog died still wagging its tail. All this was caught on camera. An NYPD spokesperson said that the matter is under review.

In March, a mailman (a Federal employee) was delivering mail in Brooklyn and as he was exiting his truck, an unmarked car came screaming by close enough for the mailman to have to jump back onto the truck. In answer to his yell one of the four men (none in uniform) in the car shouted “The law doesn’t apply to us, we’re police” and followed this by getting out of the car and proceeded to rough up, handcuff and take away postal worker Grays in their unmarked car, leaving the USPS truck and the mail in it open and on the street.

There’s more. They rear-ended another vehicle as they drove away and because, contrary to regulations, Grays (who is African American) was not belted in, he was flung forward and required hospitalisation. “I see so many things wrong,” said Commissioner Bratton about the video evidence and promised an internal affairs report on the incident, but stopped short of mentioning any potential punishment.

It is this lack of consequences towards police abuse that perpetuates the cycle. Recently a DA in Minneapolis waffled his way out of charging an officer in a shooting death of a suspect saying “The police have a very difficult job.” Why this difficult job excuses a shooting in the face at point blank range is unclear.

Back to Florida. On last summer’s trip I made sure to get together with a couple of old buddies from the band we had in Orlando a few years back, and did some jamming. A good time was had by all, and

so much easier to throw together than in NYC where coordinating three or four schedules and landing at a rehearsal studio together can be challenging. I decided to make a habit of it and visit every couple of months. It seems like a long way to go to scratch my musical itch but I also get to visit my younger daughter, friends, and catch up with a cousin a few times removed.

There have been changes since the time we lived there. A lot of the roads have been widened, resurfaced and equipped with more traffic lights although the main East-West drag is still undergoing what seems to be an unending refurb. But everything nice and clean and uncluttered and further apart compared to the Big Apple. In the Downtown area where my daughter lives there has been an influx of hipster types accompanied by the not-inexpensive bistros and Asian fusion restaurants. Getting around is aided by the sweeping toll roads where some allow you the luxury of opening up the engine to 70mph-ish but rush hour still turns Interstate 4 into a parking lot through downtown.

Unfortunately the various attempts at securing the two nominations for the presidential election are still ongoing. The media is having a great time as Trump and Cruz trade insults about manhood and wives, but I’m done with it and won’t watch anymore until the important bit. I’m likewise turned off by the same media’s minimising Bernie Sanders’ fast growing support and favouring Clinton. Fox News would prefer Hillary to be the nominee as the GOP feel that they can drum up a lot of negative chatter against her while the liberal side, MSNBC, feel she is the anointed establishment candidate and would love for the first woman president to happen already.

brings cool back to the kitchen with engaging content, edgy design and a lifestyle flair.

2nd ISSUE IN JUNE 2016 Distributed exclusively from Park Towers supermarkets and from selected outlets.

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MALTA INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT

THE MIM

YACHT & SUPERYACHT

SYMPOSIUM

MALTA

9 June 2016 Participation by invitation

For more information contact: Malta Institute of Management

T. +356 2145 6819 E. info@maltamanagement.com

60 - Money / Issue 36

www.maltamanagement.com