Planet Business

Image of the week: Parisian pink They're dreaming of a pink Christmas in Paris, where the Galeries Lafayette department store is shaking off stagnant French consumer spending with some fancy festive lights. Inside the upmarket Boulevard Haussmann shop an upside-down, 25-metre Christmas tree hangs from the ceiling and is the site of a sound-and- light show that plays every hour. For les enfants, a "hilarious and mischievous" furry monster by the name of Gustave and his "roguish" gang perform impromptu in-store mini-shows and decorate animated window displays. Online shoppers miss out on so much. Photograph: Reuters/Charles Platiau

In Numbers: Biggest Apple

$700 billion Only one company in the world has ever had a valuation this high, and it is Apple. The iPhone maker crossed the threshold in trading on Tuesday.

19 Number of countries in the world that have a higher gross domestic product (GDP) than Apple, which first overtook oil company Exxon Mobil as the world’s largest company in 2011.

$875 billion Taking inflation into account, Microsoft’s peak market capitalisation of $613 billion in 1999 would be worth this much at 2014 prices, CNBC points out.

The Lexicon: Milka-Cola Would you drink milk produced by the Coca-Cola Company? Things must be going very flat indeed in the soft drinks market, because the US beverage giant has announced plans to launch its own brand of milk, called Fairlife but instantly dubbed "Milka-Cola" on social media. Set to debut at US dairy counters next month, Fairlife will have about 50 per cent more protein and 30 per cent less sugar than "normal" milk, while also costing about twice as much. According to Coke's global chief customer officer, Sandy Douglas, Fairlife is milk that has been "premiumised". Sadly, it may prove difficult to put it to the taste test, as Coke has no plans to flog "Milka-Cola" outside its apparently calcium-deprived homeland.

Getting to know: Napoléon Bonaparte's hair

Napoléon. You know the one: Military leader, first emperor of France, good head of hair. Some 193 years after his death, Napoléon merchandise took an unexpected turn this week when Swiss watchmaker De Witt said it was going to put some of his DNA inside limited-edition watches.Half-millimetre slices of Bonaparte locks will be placed into 500 watches that will also bear his likeness, said chief executive Viviane de Witt, who acquired the strands from a trove of memorabilia belonging to Monaco's royal family.

“Napoleon was already quite idolised when he was alive. When he got his hair cut people picked it up and kept it,” she said. It’s the perfect gift for the Francophile in your life and not at all weird or disgusting.

The list: Alternatives to LinkedIn

Even those who think the phrase “professional social network” is something of an oxymoron cannot deny that LinkedIn has cornered the market. But competitors to the 300-million-member company are fast coming out of the executive woodwork.

1 Facebook at Work The bad news for LinkedIn is that Mark Zuckerberg is planning on launching a "pro" version of Facebook where people will be doing a lot less bitching about their employers and there won't be any ads.

2 Doximity This “LinkedIn for doctors” tool has gained traction among US healthcare professionals and offers the (privacy-friendly) ability to “fax painlessly”.

3 Google+ Though often regarded as a social media ghost town (or jokingly referred to as social media for people who work for Google) its active user base is still growing.

4 RallyPoint A “LinkedIn for the military” for those US professionals with uniforms rather than business cards.

5 MuckRack MuckRack, a kind of multi-network tracking service, boasts to “PRs, marketers and sources” that it is the “easiest way to find and contact journalists using social media”. No comment.