Apple, Inc.

The number of U.S. businesses with solar energy installations grew to a new high in 2015. Enterprises ranging from family-run companies to some of the country’s biggest corporations are producing their own energy, cutting operating expenses and achieving environmental sustainability.

A recent report from the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) provides data and insights into the diverse mix of corporate offices, office buildings, retail, manufacturing, data centers, distribution and logistics centers, and convention centers that have gone solar.

Apple did not create the mobile payment market when it launched Apple Pay in September 2014.

However, Apple Pay did effectively bring mobile payment to the forefront of retailers’ omnichannel commerce strategies. Consumers are slowly starting to follow, with Deloitte data showing in-store mobile payments have increased from 5% of total in-store payments 2014 to 18% in 2015.

American Apparel is looking to make the final step in the path to in-store purchase safer, easier and more efficient.

The specialty apparel chain is deploying a cloud-based payments infrastructure from retail software provider Index. Leveraging the Index Hosted Gateway and Semi-Integrated Payments solutions, American Apparel will obtain the ability to secure card payments at the POS with both point-to-point encryption (P2PE) and EMV authentication. This will validate the cardholder at the moment of transaction and then protect their data as it is processed.

A disconnect between brick-and-mortar retailers and their mobile strategies could be hurting sales.

Retailers have yet to make a major move toward EMV compliance, but that doesn’t mean they are ignoring the need to secure card-based transactions.

According to a new special report from Boston Retail Partners, “Payment/Data Security in an Omnichannel World,” only 10% of retailers are performing EMV-enabled transactions that are working well, with another 12% saying their EMV-enabled transactions need improvement.

The nation’s top Internet retailer is also tops in corporate reputation.

The term “impulse buy” has a negative connotation to many. Picking up that guilty pleasure snack in the checkout line at the supermarket, that gadget you don’t really need, or those shoes that are on sale all qualify.