With Christmas and New Year's Day moving quickly toward us, it is time to pause the newsletter schedule. There will be no newsletter on Friday, December 23. Publication will resume on Friday, December 30. News will continue to be posted to the website as needed. Happy Holidays.

The accusations that the Russians used hacking to influence the U.S. presidential election got a boost when someone found pictures given to fans signed "Donny and Vlady BFFs". ... The highly successful Disney "Cars" movies is being followed by a sequel "Used Cars".

Infor saw strong results from its entry into the retail market for the second quarter ended October 31. The giant software company moved into retail two years ago and performance "continues to outpace expectations", CEO Charles Phillips said in the company's recent earnings call. He noted one sale to Nordstrom which he said represented "the largest POS invoice ever signed in an industry."