Business, Financial & Legal News - Page 125

Disney has announced it will be ending its distribution deal with Netflix, with plans to launch their own streaming service sometime in 2019. This is a tectonic shift for the company, as they own Marvel, Pixar, Lucasfilm, and everything in between.

Netflix secured the Disney deal back in 2012 before the streaming giant was the size it is today, but Disney is making a move for the future as it turns into a streaming content provider. This means that Netflix will be losing Disney content, something that will include Marvel content - think Avengers, and MCU movies. It also means Pixar movies (Toy Story, Finding Dory), and even the entire Star Wars universe.

Disney plans to cut Netflix off with their 2019 movies, but have said that Netflix will be able to keep Disney movies through to the end of that year. This means that Netflix will have their hands-on the next two Star Wars movie, but will miss out on the final movie in the end. A spokesperson for Netflix has said: "We continue to do business with the Walt Disney Company on many fronts, including our ongoing deal with Marvel TV".

Qualcomm just gained a big fighter in their corner for the battle against Apple, with the US International Trade Commission announcing that it will be investigating the claims that Apple has infringed on Qualcomm's patents.

Some of the models of Apple's latest iPhone 7 are using an Intel-made modem and not the one from Qualcomm, and while Qualcomm notes that the modem doesn't violate patents, it's the implementation by Apple that does infringe on their patents.

Qualcomm released a statement not too long ago, where they said:

Apple has recently posted third quarter earnings, showing consistent revenue growth in key areas such as iPhone sales and services revenue.

In the three-month period ended July 1, technology juggernaut Apple generated a whopping $42.4 billion in total revenues, up 7.2% year-over-year, continuing its landmark Fiscal Year 2017 earnings trajectory. The Cupertino-based company earned $10.768 billion in operating income, up 6.56% year-over-year, and $8.717 billion in net income, up 11.81% over fiscal Q3'16. As Apple's earnings grow, so too does expenses: the company saw a mighty 12% increase of operating expenses to $6.720 billion in the quarter.

Apple CEO Tim Cook notes that third quarter growth was driven by record earnings from the company's services segment, which saw a big 22% spike in year-over-year revenues to $7.266 billion. Apple's services branch includes revenues from the App Store, iTunes, Apple Pay, and Apple Care. In fact, the services segment accounted for about 17% of total revenues for the quarter.

Sony Pictures, a division of Sony Corp, today announced that it has agreed to purchase majority stake in popular American anime producer Funimation.

Sony Pictures has acquired 95% of equity interests of renowned animation distributor Funimation for $143 million, the company has announced. Sony Pictures remains an ailing branch for Sony Corp, with the segment recording a $719 million loss in Fiscal Year 2016 operating income, and sales and operating revenue dropping 3.73% year over year to $8.06 billion.

"Sony Pictures Television Networks ("SPTN"), a division of Sony Pictures Television Inc., an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony Corporation ("Sony"), today announced that an SPTN affiliate has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire 95% of the equity interests in a Japanese anime distributor, Funimation Productions, Ltd. for approximately 143 million U.S. dollars," reads an official press release put out by Sony Pictures.

For the last 25 or so years, Intel has dominated the world as the biggest chip maker. This is different from manufacturers of chips because many manufacturers are fab-less manufacturers that rely on chip makers like Samsung and Intel to fabricate their chips. There are other companies like TSMC and Globalfoundries that also manufacturer chips, but they don't quite do it at the scale that Intel and Samsung do.

Now, Samsung overtook Intel position and became the biggest chip maker in Q2 2017.

Part of that reason has to do with the fact that Samsung has been expanding their chip manufacturing business and doing so at a rapid pace. Samsung's customers include the likes of Apple, Qualcomm, and Samsung. Between those three companies, it seems logical that Samsung could ship enough chips to overcome Intel's chip shipment numbers. Intel mostly manufactures chips for themselves and does so in PCs and servers, but very rarely for mobile.

Intel reports record second quarter earnings of $14.8 billion in revenues, and adjusts its total year earnings to reflect strong segment growth.

Intel today reported its fiscal Q2'17 earnings of $14.8 billion, up 14% year-over-year with impressive growth in client computing, which was up 12%, and an increase of 16% in data-centric businesses like its Data Center, Internet of Things, and Programmable Solutions Groups. The Santa Clara-based tech titan reported operating income of $3.8 billion, representing a massive 190% jump year-over-year. Earnings per share (EPS) was $0.58 during the three-month quarter, up a mighty 115% YoY.

Intel generated $4.7 billion in operational cash flow during the quarter, and as a result of two strong quarters of revenue growth, the company has adjusted its full-year outlook by $1.3 billion to $61.3 billion, and raised its EPIS outlook to $2.66, up 15 cents over previous forecasts.

Investment firm EagleTree Capital now owns the majority share of leading PC peripheral-maker Corsair, corroborating recent reports from Reuters.

In a transaction valued at approximately $525 million, EagleTree Capital has finalized a purchase agreement with Corsair's current management to purchase a majority stake within the company from its current owners Francisco Partners.

Corsair founder Andy Paul will retain his position as CEO in the company following the transaction, and key execs from EagleTree are keen on expending into new markets for the brand's fleet of premium peripherals and PC components, as well as possible acquisitions in the future. Corsair remains a private company, and it will be interesting to see if the new stakeholders will explore IPO plans in the coming years.

AMD has been enjoying success after success throughout 2017, bringing excitement to the CPU world with the release of not just Ryzen 7 1800X - but the entire Ryzen 5 and Ryzen 7 family of processors.

The company continued that upward trajectory with Ryzen ThreadRipper teases all year, with AMD's return to HEDT not just some lukewarm release - but a huge ass kicker to Intel who has been dragging their ass along the ground for years now. AMD's upcoming Ryzen ThreadRipper 1950X flagship processor is a 16C/32T beast for only $999, with Intel's closest processor costing nearly DOUBLE that.

Well, this has all turned into AMD making some massive strides on the books and in the market with AMD shares spiking 8.2% to $15.27 in extended trading on Tuesday. AMD is now expected to have an annual revenue increase of "a mid to high-teens percentage" compared to previous estimates that saw low double-digit percentage revenue growth. AMD is expected to push Q3 2017 revenues by 23% over the previous quarter.

One of the biggest insurers in the United States, State Farm, recently sued Apple blaming the company for a fire that occurred after an Apple user that bought an iPhone 4S had their iPhone catch fire and burned their home.

The lawsuit claims that a fire was started in the customer's home and that there was a significant source of heat that came from the smartphone's battery area and that they discovered an internal short inside of the battery that caused the fire to begin with.

This isn't the first time a smartphone has caused a fire, like the Note7, but this lawsuit is one of the few times that Apple has been sued for faulty batteries. Traditionally, other companies have been sued in the past for faulty batteries that have caused fires, but it sounds like the customer, in this case, didn't get a satisfactory response from Apple about their claim and neither did their insurance company, and now both are suing Apple for damages.

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, has announced that he has partnered up with Apple to develop a movie which stars no other than Siri. Because that makes total sense, right? If Steve Jobs got multiple movies, then it's only fair that Siri gets one too!

The movie is named The Rock x Siri: Dominate The Day, and it will be released on YouTube. Very little is known about the movie at this point, and the promotional poster reveals...very little or very much...

We can see The Rock holding an iPhone 7 Plus...then space, a plane, robot, car, and more Dwayne Johnson. Also Chinese lanterns?