Analysis of payment start-ups in the world: an empirical study of the current players and the anticipated trend

LAUREA MAGISTRALEThe world is an ever-evolving enclosure of life that is always brimming with technological innovations every second. In a setting like this it would only be fair that the payments ecosystems also evolve from the traditional cash and coins system to a more advanced non-physical monetary form. This global modification has been on the rise for the past few years but we experienced its greatest push to be adopted in our daily lives during the high density spread of covid-19 pandemic in 2020. Ever since, there have been tremendous number of innovations. To better understand the whole enclosure and to see if we can study the potential trends that might occur here, we analyse a large database of around 2,296 start-ups that have been founded in past 5 years. The focus of this study is to understand the global payment start-ups in all aspects personal to it. By categorising them according to the area of its operational focus, we arrive at a number of categories and sub-categories, this also helps us use better terms while addressing the start-ups. Later, we look into all the categories for their area of operation, customer target, regional origin and annual trends. Mobile Wallets have the highest contribution of 296 start-ups (27.2%) with an interesting rise in their sub-categories of All-in-one-platform and Digital Banks. Another sub-segment of curiosity is that of Buy-now-pay-later services which have been on the rise since their introduction recently. Globally, we observe that as expected North America (381 start-ups) dominates with the highest contribution of start-ups but a noticeable inclusion is that of Asia-Pacific which has made it to top 3 and is a region that is tremendously growing in the digital payments enclosure.The world is an ever-evolving enclosure of life that is always brimming with technological innovations every second. In a setting like this it would only be fair that the payments ecosystems also evolve from the traditional cash and coins system to a more advanced non-physical monetary form. This global modification has been on the rise for the past few years but we experienced its greatest push to be adopted in our daily lives during the high density spread of covid-19 pandemic in 2020. Ever since, there have been tremendous number of innovations. To better understand the whole enclosure and to see if we can study the potential trends that might occur here, we analyse a large database of around 2,296 start-ups that have been founded in past 5 years. The focus of this study is to understand the global payment start-ups in all aspects personal to it. By categorising them according to the area of its operational focus, we arrive at a number of categories and sub-categories, this also helps us use better terms while addressing the start-ups. Later, we look into all the categories for their area of operation, customer target, regional origin and annual trends. Mobile Wallets have the highest contribution of 296 start-ups (27.2%) with an interesting rise in their sub-categories of All-in-one-platform and Digital Banks. Another sub-segment of curiosity is that of Buy-now-pay-later services which have been on the rise since their introduction recently. Globally, we observe that as expected North America (381 start-ups) dominates with the highest contribution of start-ups but a noticeable inclusion is that of Asia-Pacific which has made it to top 3 and is a region that is tremendously growing in the digital payments enclosure

Mitigating climate change through the income tax legislation : a brief analysis of section 12K of the Income Tax Act no. 58 of 1962 and its implications for South African CDM projects

[This] dissertation is dedicated to this attempt of making South Africa a more environmentally sustainable economy through the development of new CDM projects. This dissertation examines the introduction of section 12K in the Income Tax Act 58 of 1962 and how this novel incentive interacts with our current income tax legislation. This dissertation highlights some issues surrounding the section 12K exemption which may detract from its true potential and proposes ways to resolve these issues in order to make this incentive more attractive to the CDM project developers

Spray and Wait Protocol based on Prophet with Dynamic Buffer Management in Delay Tolerant Network

Delay tolerant network is a challenged network where end-to-end connectivity does not exits.DTN are characterized by intermittent connectivity, high error rate and long delivery time. Routing is a major issue in Delay tolerant network. In order to route the information efficiently in such an environment researcher have proposed various classes of routing protocol. In this paper we studied three routing protocols namely epidemic, PRoPHET and Spray and Wait routing. When we consider routing protocols of DTNs, the buffer management scheme and forwarding decision are important to improve the opportunity of successful message delivery. In this paper, we propose improved Spray and Wait routing based on the delivery probability with dynamic buffer management to reduce irrelevant overhead to the node

Automating graphology using computer vision

Graphology is the science of studying an individual\u27s personality traits through handwriting analysis. In this thesis, we have automated the graphology process, particularly automating the pattern analysis of the handwriting and inference of the personality traits. The thesis is based off computer vision techniques to build a pipeline for automated graphology using handwritten text, camera and a microcomputing device. In this work, we consider the intricate details of a handwriting sample, like the size and slant variations, the various patterns formed in the writing of the text as visual features for computer vision training and processing. Our experimental analysis on ~100 users resulted in 90\% overall accuracy of the system in personality trait mapping using the user’s feedback as a baseline for evaluation

Lethality of MalE-LacZ hybrid protein shares mechanistic attributes with oxidative component of antibiotic lethality

Downstream metabolic events can contribute to the lethality of drugs or agents that interact with a primary cellular target. In bacteria, the production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) has been associated with the lethal effects of a variety of stresses including bactericidal antibiotics, but the relative contribution of this oxidative component to cell death depends on a variety of factors. Experimental evidence has suggested that unresolvable DNA problems caused by incorporation of oxidized nucleotides into nascent DNA followed by incomplete base excision repair contribute to the ROS-dependent component of antibiotic lethality. Expression of the chimeric periplasmic-cytoplasmic MalE-LacZ[subscript 72 – 47] protein is an historically important lethal stress originally identified during seminal genetic experiments that defined the SecY-dependent protein translocation system. Multiple, independent lines of evidence presented here indicate that the predominant mechanism for MalE-LacZ lethality shares attributes with the ROS-dependent component of antibiotic lethality. MalE-LacZ lethality requires molecular oxygen, and its expression induces ROS production. The increased susceptibility of mutants sensitive to oxidative stress to MalE-LacZ lethality indicates that ROS contribute causally to cell death rather than simply being produced by dying cells. Observations that support the proposed mechanism of cell death include MalE-LacZ expression being bacteriostatic rather than bactericidal in cells that over-express MutT, a nucleotide sanitizer that hydrolyzes 8-oxo-dGTP to the monophosphate, or that lack MutM and MutY, DNA glycosylases that process base pairs involving 8-oxo-dGTP. Our studies suggest stress-induced physiological changes that favor this mode of ROS-dependent death.National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant R01CA021615)Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) (Grant HDTRA1-15-1-0051)National Science Foundation (U.S.) (Grant 1336493)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant K99GM118907

Sustainable biochemicals - Extraction of lipids and carotenoids from the oleaginous yeast Rhodotorula toruloides

Oleaginous yeasts, with their high lipid accumulation, offer potential as sustainable alternatives to vegetable oils. They also have a unique capability for accumulating carotenoids together with lipids. Also, they have the ability to thrive on various waste and low-cost carbon sources. This thesis examined ways of converting lignocellulosic biomass into fatty acids and carotenoids using oleaginous yeasts and potential methods for extracting these valuable compounds efficiently, with the ultimate aim of establishing a foundation for their future incorporation as essential ingredients in the food and feed industries.Comprehensive investigations into the impact of conventional and supercritical carbon dioxide (SC-CO2) extraction methods on the composition of lipid and carotenoid extracts derived from the yeast species Rhodotorula toruloides revealed that SC-CO2 has promising capability for isolating these compounds, particularly carotenoids, unlike conventional extraction methods. A previously undetected adverse influence of including saponification in conventional methods on yield and composition of carotenoids was observed. This novel insight highlights the need for re-evaluating and refining existing lipid and carotenoid extraction methods. Further analysis of the lipid and carotenoid profiles of various R. toruloides strains yielded valuable insights, particularly concerning the hybrid strain CBS 6016T , for which predominant inheritance and expression of genetic traits from one parental strain (CBS 14), but not the other (CBS 349), was revealed. This research offers significant biotechnological potential. SC-CO2 extraction enhances eco-friendly lipid and carotenoid production in R. toruloides, while insights into hybrid strain CBS 6016T can aid genetic engineering for higher yields. Overall, this thesis opens the way toward greener, more efficient processes in the food, feed, and biotech sectors

Sister acts:Nuns in Rumer Godden's Black Narcissus and at the Loreto Convents in India

This article draws into comparative conversation Rumer Godden's 1939 novel about nuns in the Himalayas, Black Narcissus, and the records of real-world nuns from the Loreto order in India. Through this comparison, we shed light on the under-studied field of nuns in India and on the intersection of gender and colonialism during the later period of colonial rule. Reading fiction against historical archives, we find that a novel that has been lauded for its anti-imperialist stance in fact retains elements of orientalism that dovetail with a misogynistic outlook. Meanwhile, an order that exhibited racist and colonialist tendencies also, despite and because of these, engineered a project with significant feminist purpose. This juxtaposition of Godden's novel and Loreto's internal archives reveals the ways in which white feminist goals can be at odds with anti-colonialist ones, but it also shows how the standard portrayal of nuns – represented by Godden's novel – as regressive and lacking agency does not hold up in the face of the historical record