Business, Financial & Legal - Page 254

The online auction house giant eBay has updated their logo. Following in the footsteps of Microsoft, the new logo features a cleaner, more modern design, which eBay says is to reflect who they are today. It's taken them 17 years, but they finally took out a ruler and managed to get all four letters in a straight line.

Seventeen years ago, eBay created a new way for people to buy and sell. Since that time, we've enabled millions of people to launch their own businesses, and helped change the way the world shops for things they need and love. We're pleased to introduce our refreshed logo. It reflects who we are today - a global online marketplace that offers a cleaner, more contemporary and consistent experience.

The new logo will begin to show up across eBay's sites and marketing campaigns in mid-October. As the years have progressed, eBay has tried to diversify into a multi-platform e-commerce giant, which they have seemingly done to great success. As it stands currently, the majority of items sold are listed as new and with a fixed BuyItNow price.

Apple's new iPhone 5 is only a few hours old, with no consumers actually laying their hands on one just yet, the legal battles have begun. Samsung did threaten Apple that they would "immediately sue" the company if they used 4G LTE connectivity, and according to an industry source the Korean Times are reporting:

Samsung Electronics has decided to take immediate legal action against the Cupertino-based Apple. Countries in Europe and even the United States ― Apple's home-turf ― are our primary targets.

Samsung haven't taken legal action just yet, but I do not doubt we'll see some legal movement from the South Korean company. But, and here's the big but, HTC have already come out, lawyers swinging. The struggling device maker has lawyered up, presenting a patent claim to the US International Trade Commission Judge. Judge Thomas Pender has told Apple:

It looks like Google were a little surprised by the patent win by Samsung, but not at the case itself, but with the smaller details. Bloomberg had Google's Vice President of Corporate Development, David Lawee, in front of the camera for an interview.

Lawee says in the interview itself that "we didn't know rounded corners were patentable", and covers that the company wasn't "aggressive" enough in patenting their intellectual property. The one thing I took away from this video is I think Apple have pushed every other large company to re-think where they stand with patents and IP.

Does this mean we're looking at a future of much more back room deals with companies, letting each other use the other company's patents? Or are we looking at companies who will be really held back if they don't have any decent IP or patents of their own? Did Apple just kick every other company in the balls with their Samsung attacks? I think so. Check out the interview over at Bloomberg.

It looks like the next-generation Xbox is about to get a kick up the arse in terms of immersion within gaming, is a new patent submitted to the United States Trademark and Patent Office from Microsoft is anything to go by. The new technology would completely transform the room your next-gen Xbox is in, into a gaming environment. The patent reads:

An immersive display environment is provided to a human user by projecting a peripheral image onto environmental surfaces around the user. The peripheral images serve as an extension to a primary image displayed on a primary display.

This could work in a few ways, with either a projection of an image from the Kinect sensor, or wearable computing. I'd be leaning more toward wearable computing - as this would allow the Xbox and Kinect system to just send the information to the headset, where it would display a 2D graphic in front of the player. This would translate into you looking at your wall, and seeing a crushed wall for example, with an enemy behind it shooting at you. You would then turn physically, facing the wall, to shoot your enemy.

Google has partnered with Boingo to make 4,000 of its hotspots available nationwide for free for people accessing them with Android, OSX, or Windows. Interestingly enough, users of iOS and Windows Phone appear to be excluded from this offering, showing Google is really pushing Android with this latest stunt.

The hotspots are available across the United States in "high-traffic locations," coffee shops, hotels, and other areas. Google and Boingo are even offering this service at some of the major airports, including NY's JFK, O'Hare, and Seattle-Tacoma, along with the Boingo-enabled subway stations around Manhattan.

Dawn Callahan, vice president of consumer marketing for Boingo Wireless:

Alright, this is the stop for ridiculous - anyone who wants to get out and read this news, step off the train and onto the platform, joining Apple. The company who has more lawsuits going than there are stars in the sky are now suing a Polish online grocery store over the 'A.pl' domain.

The Cupertino-based company has asked the Polish patent office, the UPRP, to cancel a trademark belonging to the store. A meeting reportedly took place in August 29, but ended up being adjourned, and deferred to a later date. Polish site Telepolis, has said that if the dispute isn't settled out of court, it could take two to three years to resolve.

Considering that A.PL have absolutely nothing to do with technology, and are an online grocery vendor, Apple are really clutching at straws here. There's no Apple-like imagery on the website, and it's all in Polish, meaning that it really is only for people who can read the language, and I'm sure it doesn't beat against the door of any Apple-owned patents.

The New York Times are reporting that "over the years", EA have tried to buy Valve. If these talks between the two companies ever reached negotiation, would've valued Valve at "well over $1 billion", the Times reports.

But, that $1 billion figure is a huge understatement, as no one truly knows what Valve are worth. Valve are a private company, controlled by founder Gabe Newell, who doesn't release any financial information. Wedbush Securities analyst, Michael Pachter, has estimated that Valve are worth $2.5 billion today.

Newell have said that Valve's employees would scatter, and that Valve would "disintegrate" before they'd be sold. Newell adds:

HP's global staff numbers are expected to get slashed nearly 10% more than previous reports, where up to 29,000 people will lose their jobs with the company. Previous figures pegged HP at cutting 27,000 jobs from their workforce, according to the company's 10-Q quarterly filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), where they said they will "eliminate approximately 29,000 positions in connection with the 2012 Plan through fiscal year 2014."

Back in May, HP said that they would cut roughly 8% of their global workforce, which would see 27,000 jobs cut, saving around $3-$5 billion which would then be thrown into R&D. The cuts would be done over a two-year period, but overall R&D spending will increase from the 3% of revenue which it stands at now. The filing note also touches on their multi-year restructuring plan, which HP call the "2012 Plan", and is aimed to "simplify business processes, accelerate innovation and deliver better results for customers, employees, and stockholders".

HP also expects charges of around $3.7 billion through the end of the company's fiscal 2014 calendar, with $3.3 billion of this coming from workforce reductions, and $400 million on "other items", including datacenter consolidation. HP have already slashed 3,800 jobs by the end of July 2012, which represents around 7% of the now revised 29,000 figure.

There are some people who think that potential future President of the United States, Republican nominee Mitt Romney is hiding something. There have been various reports, and you can Google (or Bing) it yourself for some more information.

Last week we reported that hackers had gotten their hands on Mitt Romney's previous tax returns, and are asking for $1 million Bitcoin's or they'd release them. Now we have founder and publisher of Hustler magazine, Larry Flynt, hitting the wire that he is offering $1 million as a reward to anyone who can give him Romney's tax information.

Flynt took out a full-page ad in the Sunday's edition of The Washington Post, promising "up to $1 million" for the dirt on Romney's "unreleased tax returns and/or details of his offshore assets, bank accounts and business partnerships." When money is being thrown around like this, someone might step forward. But, if you had this type of information, and it did involve, and prove that Romney has something very sinister to hide, that is completely provable, would you really want to share it?

Alibaba Group is China's largest e-commerce firm, which is looking to have a massive year for 2012. The group expects to sell more merchandise than competitors Amazon and eBay, combined. This is according to Alibaba's chief strategy officer, Zeng Ming.

The group is aiming for around 3 trillion yuan ($473 billion) in annual transaction value from their Taobao e-commerce units in the next 5 to 7 years, says Ming. Jack Ma, Alibaba's founder, said that in 2011, Taobao's transaction value for 2012 would reach 1 trillion yuan. Alibaba have not revealed what percentage of online sales come from Taobao, but it seems to be the number one source of the company's profit engine.

Zeng talks of Amazon and eBay, America's top online retailer and auction site, respectively: