Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/283655
maltatoday, WEDNESDAY, 26 MARCH 2014 18 DYNAMIC Swiss watch brand, Mau- rice Lacroix, is pleased to announce a three-year partnership agreement with FC Barcelona – considered as one of the world's most prestigious foot- ball clubs with a global fanbase of over 300 million admirers and 100 million social media followers. Becoming the 'FC Barcelona Official Watch Partner' represents a landmark in the history of Maurice Lacroix. Through this innovative partner- ship, Maurice Lacroix and FC Barce- lona will join in facilitating access to the world of high-quality Swiss luxury for football fans and watch aficionados alike. Furthermore, both brands aim to remain close to their fans, speak the same language, and offer every one of them a high-quality Swiss luxury product. An affordable 'fan's' watch will provide an entry-level opportu- nity for Swiss timepiece ownership. For lovers of mechanical timepieces or for those wishing to make the big jump, a stunning "player's" watch and a sophisticated "executive" model will also be sold in all FC Barcelona bou- tiques and in the extensive worldwide network of official Maurice Lacroix retailers, including all Diamonds In- ternational outlets in Malta. Since the launch of its first watch in 1975, the stylish Swiss watches conceived by the creative and ambi- tious design team at Maurice Lacroix have gained international recognition. Maurice Lacroix timepieces offer ec- lectic and playful designs, patented technologies and new ultra-perform- ing materials. All are imbued with the enduring values of quality, reliability and authenticity. Just like FC Barcelo- na, Maurice Lacroix is a symbol of suc- cess that is all about style, substance, and a relentless passion for progress. Riding this wave of shared values and ambitions, the Swiss watchmaker and the Catalan football club make a per- fect team in jointly exploring innova- tive ways of reaching out to both foot- ball fans and watch lovers. Speaking about the partnership, Marc Gläser, Managing Director of Maurice Lacroix said, "Maurice Lac- roix is proud and very excited about this exceptional partnership. Our brands relentlessly strive for perfection and together we will form an impres- sive, striking and successful team." Maurice Lacroix watches are exclu- sively available at Diamonds Inter- national in Valletta, Portomaso, the Malta International Airport and the Hilton Events Medserv announce the award of two contracts for support offshore North Africa IN a company announcement issued today, Medserv have an- nounced that the company has won two competitive contracts to provide fully integrated logistic support services to two separate international oil companies (IOCs) operating offshore North Africa. "These contracts reaffirm our belief that North Africa still has a major role to play." said Godwin Borg, Chief Operations Officer for Medserv Group. "Our base in Malta is currently fully utilised, and as a result, we have recently also taken up an additional 30,000 square metres of land in Hal-Far in order to cater for demand. "These new facilities are in close proximity to our base in the Free- port and provide us with much needed additional open pipeyard space. This weekend the team were in fact transporting material to our new Hal-Far laydown area in preparation for these new con- tracts," added Mr Borg. The two contracts were signed in the first quarter of 2014 and both are for a period of two years with the option of extending for an ad- ditional two years. The two sup- port contracts, which will be ca- tered for from the Company's base in Malta, are designed to service multi-well programs offshore North Africa. Work is expected to start in the latter part of 2014. A couple of weeks ago, the Com- pany also announced that Med- serv Cyprus has been awarded a multi-million contract by Italian Oil giant, Eni, who have signed a contract that fully utilises the Company's new base in Larnaca, Cyprus. More information can be found at www.medservmalta.com Lateral living IF you've recently toured a newly built home, you may have noticed that a couple of things are not there any longer. Multi-storey layouts, for starters. Today's modern homes tend to re- flect a practical urban lifestyle, with the family centre being at the heart of the household. Open-plan spaces have become increasingly popular over the years and it's not very hard to see why. The Pros Lateral living, where a home spreads laterally across a single storey, rather than vertically across several, has been a trending home- design for a number of years now. This open-plan structure promotes the interaction among family and friends as walls are no longer im- pede this. In addition, this floor plan allows the increased ability of dividing your living space to suit your needs, giving you the flexibil- ity to tailor the size of specific areas as you please. The Cons Traditionally, open plan structures include an oversized, central room with a kitchen area, a casual dining area, and a living room. The options on how to personalise your liv- ing space however are endless. The current dilemma however, revolves around furnishing and interior de- sign. Up until recently, furnishing bespoke living environments has proven to be time consuming, labo- rious, and worst of all, increasingly costly. And finding furniture that allows a sense of uniformity across the entire apartment was another headache in itself. The Latest We've looked around and stum- bled upon The One, an interesting furniture fusion concept that incor- porates living, kitchen and sleeping areas into a single, competitive and entirely customisable catalogue. Launching in the coming weeks at the prestigious Salone Internazion- ale del Mobile in Milan, The One shall be revealing an entirely new range of design solutions for the en- tire home. The Verdict Design should both reflect as well as accommodate total living; two words that shape a home's interior design. Your personal space should represent your style, as well as im- prove the quality of your domestic life. It is for this reason that you should be at the centre of all your plans. Complete furniture solutions are definitely what we're on the lookout for this year and what you should be looking out for too. More information about complete furnishing solutions such as The One can be accessed via www.ide- acasa.com.mt/theone Maurice Lacroix is FC Barcelona's official watch partner TODAY marks a very important milestone in Malta's connectivity development as Melita announced several major breakthroughs to ad- dress an ever-increasing demand for high-speed broadband Inter- net. Prime Minister Joseph Muscat presided over Monday's official launch of melitaWIFI - a free next generation Wi-Fi broadband inter- net service offering seamless con- nectivity, indoors and outdoors. The service was soft launched last November for about 25,000 Melita customers and is now available for free to more than 100,000 Melita customers. During a launch event in St George's Square, Valletta, Melita Group CEO Andrei Torriani ex- plained that melitaWIFI is already available in 7 outdoor zones in- cluding The Strand, Sliema, Paola, Bugibba and Marsascala. "We ena- bled about 30,000 indoor Wi-Fi hotspots and this number is grow- ing daily. The service is free to all Melita mobile contract customers and we're now extending free ac- cess to all Melita customers on a trial basis until June" said Mr Tor- riani. Mr Torriani also announced that melitaWIFI outdoor zones are now also available in Valletta's busiest streets including Republic Street and Merchants' Street. melitaW- IFI takes advantage of Melita's superfast nationwide broadband network to deliver equally fast in- ternet on mobile devices via Wi-Fi technology. Meanwhile, the Group CEO also announced that Melita's entry-lev- el download speed has increased to 30 Megabits per second and all Melita customers will soon enjoy a minimum of 30 Megabits as their download speed. "That's 30 times more than just a few years ago. Our customers can already enjoy nationwide download speeds of up to 100 Megabits per second and in some areas, such as Sliema and St Julian's, even faster speeds of up to 250 Megabits are available", said Mr Torriani. More localities are expected to be upgraded to speeds of up to 250 Megabits per second throughout this year. The launch event was also ad- dressed by Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and Melita's Chairman Joseph A. Gasan. In his speech, Mr Gasan traced the company's humble beginnings as a cable TV provider and the evolution that fol- lowed over a period of more than 20 years. "Our passion for innova- tion and our financial investments are a clear testament of Melita's strong belief in Malta's potential. Melita's shareholders are commit- ted to this company and to Malta, and through their investments and international expertise we can ef- fectively implement projects like the one we're unveiling today. "We continue investing heavily in infrastructure, both locally and externally to connect Malta to the rest of the world. This enables us to offer even better and more reliable services," said Mr Gasan. Throughout the next five years Melita will be investing another 60 million Euros to continue upgrad- ing its services. For more information about melitaWIFI visit www.melita.com/ WIFI Prime Minister Joseph Muscat launches MelitaWiFi Change in cast for Double Fo THE quintessential theatre actors and directors' nightmare has turned into reality for the cast and crew of Unifaun Theatre Productions' Double Fo – a double bill of plays written by Italian playwright Dario Fo. One of the actors is indisposed leav- ing this fast-moving double bill of Fo farces one actor short. Luckily Edward Mercieca has kindly accepted to step into the breach. He will be taking on the role of the Marquis in the play 'Marcolfa' during the March 29 and 30 performances. The rest of the cast of 'Double Fo' is made up of Alan Paris, Philip Stilon, Mikhail Basmadjian, Renato Dimech, Coryse Borg, Charlotte Grech and Magda Van Kuilenburg. 'Double Fo' is being directed by Chris Gatt and is being put up at the Manoel Theatre on March 29 and 30 and April 4 and 6