Bloomberg Google’s cloud services will be used to test blockchain technologies for banks, an area where IBM, Microsoft and Amazon have been courting clients for the past year. Royal Bank of Scotland Group has employed Google servers in a trial of a new blockchain application for clearing and settlement, the consulting firm GFT said Friday in a statement. The company’s ...

  Bloomberg Apple Inc. is pressing ahead with the development of an Echo-like smart-home device based on the Siri voice assistant, according to people familiar with the matter. Started more than two years ago, the project has exited the research and development lab and is now in prototype testing, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing unannounced ...

  Dubai / Emirates Business The Arab Fashion Council (AFC), a Dubai based non-profit fashion association promoting ‘Ready-Couture’ from around the world has officially announced the venue for the third edition of the highly anticipated Huawei Arab Fashion Week (HAFW). The bi-annual event is taking place from October 6-10 at the iconic Meydan Hotel and will be presented by Huawei. ...

  Milan / AFP Giambattista Valli says his fledgling ready-to-wear line is thriving — thanks to spillover synergy from a haute couture operation that has made him a darling of the celebrity A-list set. The Paris-based Roman designer has made his name with spectacularly beautiful and eye-wateringly expensive made-to-measure creations for the likes of singer Rihanna, George Clooney’s wife Amal ...

AFP Alessandro Michele unveiled his most extravagantly flamboyant Gucci collection yet on Wednesday with a pink-hued spectacular on the opening day of the latest Milan fashion week. The Roman designer credited with reviving the fortunes of what was a flagging brand returned to the themes that have underpinned his turnaround and, it seemed, pushed each envelope a little further. Androgynous ...

  New Delhi / AFP He shot onto the world stage after winning a glittering international fashion prize previously given to design icons Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld. Yet India’s Suket Dhir — hailed by Vogue as a potential “global fashion superstar in the making” — is uneasy about the sudden attention that has come with winning the International ...

  AFP With the help of superstar models Gigi and Bella Hadid, Karl Lagerfeld unveiled his vision of what stylish young women will be wearing next summer: glitter lips and big pants that everyone can see. The veteran German designer’s latest work for Fendi was a playful affair — or “decorative opulence twisted with an athletic elan,” as he put ...

  Favara / DPA Ten years ago, Favara was a sleepy dormitory town of 30,000 in Italy with a crumbling and rapidly depopulating historic centre surrounded by the messy urban sprawl that is common across Italy. It has become an unlikely tourist hotspot, thanks to an enterprising local couple whose buzzing contemporary art centre, Farm Cultural Park, has reawakened civic ...

  Beirut / AFP Lebanese like Hamza al-Sees should have no problem finding a beach to while away the summer in a country stretching along the Mediterranean. But as private developers have gobbled up seafront land and families complain of ever-more polluted waters, many Lebanese say it is cheaper and cleaner to fly abroad than go to the beach at ...

  Fujairah / WAM Fujairah’s quest to develop its energy sector within the UAE’s national energy strategy has catapulted the country to become a world leading bunkering hub, HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Hamad bin Mohammed Al Sharqi, Crown Prince of Fujairah, said on Thursday. “The launch on Wednesday of the first Very Large Crude Carrier Jetty on the Indian Ocean ...