Business, Financial & Legal - Page 122

The cash-strapped Jamaican bobsleigh team is in dire need of funds to reach the 2014 Sochi Olympic Games, and it looks like they might get there thanks to the crypto-currency, dogecoin.

A fundraising campaign was put together following news over the weekend that Team Jamaica had qualified for the Winter Olympics for the first time since 2002. Winston Watt, who leads Team Jamaica, spent his own money transporting the team to training sessions, but didn't have enough funds to make it to Russia.

Watt then opened a PayPal account, hoping to raise the $40,000 or so required to attend. Dogecoin founders, Liam Butler, Jackson Palmer and Billy Markus, all happen to be fans of the Jamaican bobsleigh team, with Butler telling the Guardian: "As someone who grew up in the '90s, Cool Runnings was the ultimate feel-good movie about underdogs out of their element achieving their dreams. When I was about seven years old, my best friend and I had a billy-cart that his dad built. When we would start our run down his driveway, we would shout out the catchphrase from the movie: 'Feel the rhythm, feel the rhyme, get on up, it's bobsled time!"

Amazon is getting a little scary as we shift into 2014, with a new patent for "anticipatory shipping". This patent will allow the US giant to sent items to shipping hubs in areas where it believes that particular item will sell well.

The new shipping scheme should slice delivery times down, as well as putting Amazon much higher up on the food chain than it already is. The company plans to box, and ship products it expects its consumers will buy preemptively, based on previous searches and purchases, wish lists, and how long the user's cursor hovers over an item online.

Amazon wants to go a step further, by having the products "speculatively shipped to a physical address" without knowing if the customer wants it. This would eventuate in returns of unwanted deliveries, but Amazon is willing to take that risk. Amazon stated in its patent: "Delivering the package to the given customer as a promotional gift may be used to build goodwill."

Nintendo had a stellar 2013 with its 3DS console, but overall, sales of its hardware are not impressing anyone. The Japanese gaming giant expects to post an operating loss of 35 billion yen ($335 million) for the year ending March 31, 2014.

It did have a projected operating income of nearly triple that, according to its full-year financial and dividend forecasts. Nintendo projected net sales of 920 billion yen and profit forecast of 55 billion yen for the current financial year. These numbers have been reworked now, dropping to 590 billion yen in sales, and a net loss of 25 billion yen.

Nintendo has said that the operating loss is thanks to a "significantly lower" holiday season of sales than it had originally forecasted. This is mostly due to hardware sales not meeting internal targets, and the year-end sales season "constitutes the highest proportion of the annual sales volume."

Some parents' kids racked up some massive in-app purchases through iOS-based game, which ended up in a Federal Trade Commission complaint. This complaint has ended with Apple having to hand over $32.5 million.

The FTC's complaint alleges that Apple failed to tell parents that by entering a password, they were allowing single in-app purchases, as well as additional purchases that their children could make without the parent intervening again. FTC chair Edith Ramirez said: "This settlement is a victory for consumers harmed by Apple's unfair billing, and a signal to the business community: whether you're doing business in the mobile arena or the mall down the street, fundamental consumer protections apply. You cannot charge consumers for purchases they did not authorize."

The FTC had received tens of thousands of complaints about unauthorized purchases by parents of children who used their iOS devices. One consumer saw a massive $2,600 bill from a game called Tap Pet Hotel.

BlackBerry's new CEO, John Chen, says that no one should start counting his company out just yet. In an open editorial for CNBC, Chen said that BlackBerry is "well-positioned for the future," and that even though the company faced "challenging circumstances," he believes that BlackBerry will once again rise to profit.

"It was important to make swift and impact changes to ensure that our customers' investments in BlackBerry's infrastructure and solutions are secure," said Chen. "I'm surrounded by a talented team of industry leaders, including our new leaders for enterprise, corporate development and strategic planning, and marketing. In the coming weeks, I'll continue to build out my leadership team with those who have the skills and passion to get BlackBerry back on the path to profitability."

Chen went on to say that BlackBerry is still king of the enterprise market and that the public should not be fooled by the "competition's rhetoric claiming to be more secure or having more experience than BlackBerry" Chen finished up the editorial by saying: "We've accomplished a great deal in these last couple months, and we're positioned for the long haul. We have a strong cash position with more than $3 billion on hand, a renewed spirit, and trusted technology, network and platform. I believe BlackBerry has a clear lane ahead of us to create new trails as a nimbler, more agile competitor.The journey has just begun."

HTC continues to get battered, with news breaking out in the last day or so that its ex-Lead Designer, Thomas Chien, prosecuted in Taiwan for fraud. The Taipei District Prosecutor's Office concluded its investigation on Chien, reporting that he leaked HTC's upcoming icon designs, and much more.

He took the designs, showing them to his then-future business partners for a new company they were planning to form. The investigation also concluded that Chien's friends took around $1.12 million in the way of false expense claims, as well as rebates from a supplier. A quarter of this cash was found in Chien's Audi, with another taken from him on another occasion.

The prosecutors' allegations were not denied by most of Chien's friends, but Chien himself was in denial about most of what he was being accused of, and has the prosecutors recommending that the court place a big sentence on Chien for his "malignant" behavior.

EA is already battling class action lawsuits over Battlefield 4, but now the first-person shooter has been banned in China, with the Chinese government citing "national security" concerns.

EA has declined to comment on the ban when The Wall Street Journal tried to make contact. The problem with Battlefield 4 is that the single player campaign involves China in the year 2020, with the Chinese admiral planning to overthrow the government. Then we have Battlefield 4: China Rising, which is a DLC for the first-person shooter, featuring maps, vehicles and a new gametype, all set on the Chinese mainland.

Wireless charging is something I've fallen in love with this year, but Apple is behind the game when it comes to pushing wireless charging technology into its devices, such as the iPhone. This is all set to change with a new patent from the Cupertino-based giant.

Apple's research labs have presented a surprise to the world, with an early patent filing that sees the company thinking about wireless charging being the next big thing. Apple was awarded a patent last week for a "desk-free computer". The description sees a device that is small, such as a Mac mini, that features a projector lens on one of its sides.

The device would also carry an accelerometer and a proximity sensor that would detect how far the device is away from the wall, where the image would be projected. The patent states: "The integrated projector may also provide flexibility in the location, relative to the computer system and/or the user, and/or in the size of the projected image. Display screens for both laptops and desktops are fixed in size, and have limited flexibility in location relative to the computer, either by wired connection and/or other physical constraint."

Overstock.com CEO, Patrick Byrne, has said that his company would be one of the first to accept Bitcoin, where it will accept the digital currency in the second half of next year.

Byrne spilled the news during an interview with the Financial Times, where he said there is going to be a market in Bitcoin, and he wanted his company to embrace it. Byrne believes Bitcoin will hold its value better than the fiat-based dollar, thanks to the fact that it is mathematically constrained, versus the limitless printing of the dollar through the Federal Reserve and government authorities.

The Overstock.com CEO stated that his company would bank the digital currency in the event that similar digital funds increase in popularity. If, however, the digital currency begins to deflate, the company would transfer Bitcoins to dollars on a daily basis.

Cyanogen Inc. secured $7 million in Series A funding a few months ago, but Series B funding has come and gone, with $23 million being secured. The Series B funding was led by Andreessen Horowitz, the same company that is working closely with Oculus VR and its latest Series B funding round.

One of the interesting points to take away from this is that Cyanogen Inc. is planning to launch a mass consumer brand or service late next year, or early 2015. We should hear more about the hardware side of things in the coming weeks and months, with the first CyanogenMod-powered smartphone, the CyanogenMod Edition of the Oppo N1 available.

We all know that Battlefield 4 is a jumbled mess right now across pretty much every platform its on, so it comes as no surprise that Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP has filed a class action lawsuit against EA.

The law firm claims that EA issued "materially false and misleading statements" regarding the quality, and playability of Battlefield 4. The lawsuit highlights the PS4 version of the first-person shooter, claiming that "players of Electronic Arts' games were being subjected to multiple glitches and significant crashes when attempting to play Electronic Arts' titles on PS4."

The bigger problem is that this is the second lawsuit the firm has slapped EA with, with the first an investigation to find out if EA misled investors regarding Battlefield 4's projected impact on company revenue. This is still an on-going case, something we'll be keeping an eye on.

Microsoft is currently narrowing down its short list of potential CEOs to take over after a tumultuous tenure of current CEO Steve Ballmer. There are only a handful of potential candidates that have the skillset and experience to lead the Redmond, Washington-based company, which has more than 100,000 employees worldwide.

Ford CEO Alan Mulally was rumored to be a potential replacement, but Ford confirmed its CEO will lead the company through 2014. Meanwhile, Qualcomm COO Steve Mollenkopf was also a potential candidate, but Qualcomm announced Mollenkopf will be promoted to CEO as on March 4, 2014. Microsoft is reportedly looking for a replacement both internally and externally, and it's difficult to try and predict who will step in and lead one of the most powerful computer companies in the world.

In late August, Microsoft announced Ballmer would step down as acting CEO, which immediately put the rumor mill into overdrive. Over its 38-year history, Microsoft has only had two CEOs, founder Bill Gates and Ballmer, and the next CEO will have a very interesting task ahead - Microsoft is still a software giant, but has had trouble trying to break into the mobile market, and is adjusting to a cloud-based market.

The Microsoft Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2 tablet models are selling out and have been difficult to find this Christmas shopping season. The devices are selling out at the official Microsoft Store and Walmart.com, while a quick look at Amazon.com shows a small supply of the surprisingly popular tablets.

It's plausible Microsoft released smaller shipments to retailers - or the devices are truly becoming popular - but we won't know until early 2014, when analysts are able to estimate sales numbers. Microsoft and the retailers aren't confirming shipment figures, so analyst groups will be left to estimate how the Microsoft tablets did against rival tablets.

Microsoft has found it difficult to compete with the extremely popular Apple iPad and Android-based tablets, but the Windows 8-powered devices are best suited to make a major impact in the enterprise. Meanwhile, analysts believe the Surface 2 tablets will continue to fight for market share in 2014, as Microsoft continues a massive marketing and advertising campaign.

Coby Electronics 32-inch flat screen HDTVs with the model number "TFTV3229" are being recalled due to potential fire risk, according to media reports.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) confirmed there have been at least six reports of TVs overheating, emitting smoke, or igniting in small fires. No reported injuries related to the faulty TVs.The TVs were sold starting in August 2011 until November 2013 at Best Buy, Fry's Electronics, H.H. Gregg, Toys 'R' Us, ABC Warehouse, P.C. Richard and Son, Sears/Kmart, and Nebraska Furniture Mart.

Coby was a Chinese-based high-definition TV manufacturer that is known for selling low-cost, entry-level HDTVs that are drastically cheaper than rival models from Samsung, Sony, LG, Sharp, and other competing companies. Unfortunately, Coby USA is no longer in operation, so the retailers are handling the recall.

Is Google feeling festive, or is the Mountain View-based giant feeling a little T-101ish? Well, Google has acquired robotics engineering company Boston Dynamics, which is best known for its quadrupeds, and super-impressive robots.

We've already seen BigDog, a motorized robot that is capable of walking through ice and snow, the Cheetah - which is capable of running at 29 miles per hour, and a convincing humanoid known as Arnold Schwarzenegger PETMAN. We don't know the business side of the deal, or the exact amount of money it took to acquire the robot maker.

We do know that a $10.8 million contract that the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) had with Boston Dynamics would still be honored after it has been acquired by Google. Something else I find fishy, is that a year ago the Director of DARPA left the defense agency, moving to... Google. Now Google acquires a high-end robotics maker? Yeah... Skynet is getting closer, folks.

Today VIA announced that it has filed suit against a subsidiary of Asustek as well as four of its employees over allegations of misappropriations of trade secrets. The civil lawsuit has been filed in the Taipei District Court with VIA seeking damages equating to $138 million US.

The lawsuit states that misappropriation of VIA intellectual property related to USB technology occurred and names Asmedia Technology, Asustek, Asmedia Chairman Jerry Shen, Asmedia President Lin Chewei, and other Asmedia employees as those responsible for the misappropriation.

"As a long-time leader in IC design and technology innovation, VIA strongly believes in the importance of protecting intellectual property rights," commented Wenchi Chen, CEO of VIA Technologies, Inc. "In addition to protecting interests of VIA and our shareholders, the aim of this suit is to ensure our industry operates in a healthy market environment that fosters innovation and promotes fair competition." Further information can be found in a excerpt from the official announcement below.

Just 10 days ago we reported that Bitcoins reached over $1000 in value each, which at the time was a meteoroic 4000% increase, year-over-year. Now? The digital currency has dropped to around $800 each, from their peak at $1200 just days ago.

Few thought that Bitcoins would reach parity with gold, some thought there was no end in sight, but you can't dispute the fact that the digital currency has stumbled, with no exact science or past on how it will react. Will it go down to $100 each? Will we see another country completely embrace it and see it skyrocket past $2000?

With China's central bank refusing to consider Bitcoins as legal tender, the drop in price quickly happened. But, the Chinese government didn't put an all-out ban on the digital currency, with all citizens still able to use Bitcoins legally. The central bank's refusal to use them is what hurts the most, as it could spread quickly throughout the world.

As I first reported yesterday, the US House of Representatives has been hearing arguments on a new bill that could put an end to many of the frivolous patent lawsuits filled each year by so-called patent trolls. As expected, the bill has passed in the House with support from both sides of the isle.

Known as the Innovation Act 325-91, the bill will now make its way to the senate where it is expected to pass with a bipartisan majority as well. Once it is finished in congress, the bill will make its way to President Obama's desk and he also is expected to sign it into law. If this does happen, we could see an end to the era of east Texas shell corporations that exist only to file and buy low-quality, low-detail patents that are so vague that they can be claimed as part of many technologies.

This is the first step into patent reform, and hopefully the next step will be a complete overhaul of the United States Patent and Trade office. With companies now patenting seeds, human, animal and plant genes, and even specific code, we need to work hard to prevent these sort of things from happening. If not, then I am afraid that we may see an immense slowdown in technological and scientific innovation and breakthroughs for decades to come.

The saga over who will become Microsoft's next CEO has taken yet another step forward today after a board member at Ford told press that Alan Mulally will not be leaving the car maker for Redmond, Washington. Since this news began to spread earlier this week, Microsoft's stock has fallen about 3.5-percent, equating in a $12 billion fall in market cap for the company.

The news came from Ford board member, Edsel Ford II who stated that "Alan is staying through the end of 2014," a time frame far past Steve Ballmer's departing date. This is good news for Nokia's Stephen Elop, who is also in the running to take the CEO seat. Today's news does not surprise me at all though, as I have expected Elop to be the "Chosen One" since Microsoft announced its acquisition plans for Nokia. Other reports suggest that Microsoft's head of Cloud Services Satya Nadella could head up the company, but I see that as a far stretch at this point.

In what is certainly one of the last pages in the OCZ saga, the company announced this afternoon that it has signed an asset purchase agreement with Toshiba Corporation to acquire substantially all of OCZ's assets in a chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding for $35 million.

The acquisition will land Toshiba access to OCZ's proprietary controller, firmware, and softeare and well as the engineering teams responsible for these technologies. OCZ will continue to operate and server existing and future customers during a transition phase, and Toshiba will provide the company with the capital to operate during this period. The sale is expected to finalize within the next 60-days.

SAN JOSE, CA -- (Marketwired) -- 12/02/13 -- OCZ Technology Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: OCZ), a leading provider of high-performance solid state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced that the Company has signed an asset purchase agreement with Toshiba Corporation, a global technology leader and manufacturer of NAND flash memory, to acquire substantially all of OCZ's assets in a chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding for $35M. Under this agreement Toshiba will acquire OCZ's client and enterprise solid state drive business. OCZ will continue to operate and serve existing and future customers during this process. Toshiba has agreed to provide the Company with DIP (Debtor-in-Possession) financing to ensure that there is adequate capital and flash supply to support the business during the contemplated sale period. The consummation of the asset purchase agreement is subject to an auction and approval by the bankruptcy court in the Company's bankruptcy case.