Business, Financial & Legal - Page 92

Apple will be opening up its new spaceship campus is nearing completion, with a beautiful 4K video shot with his drone, providing a Christmas/New Year update for us all. Check it out.

The footage looks great, showing that Apple is using 100% renewable energy for the campus, with the entire ring around Apple's new HQ plastered with solar panels. Matthew Roberts, the person behind the 4K drone footage said that there's around 65% of the total solar panels installed so far.

Apple has designed the campus where it will feature 3000 specially designed, and engineered curved glass panels that will measure in at around one mile in circumference. Steve Jobs said during a Cupertino City Council meeting a few years ago: "There's not a single straight piece of glass in this building. We've used our experience in building retail buildings all over the world. We know how to make the biggest pieces of glass for architectural use. And, we want to make the glass specifically for this building here. We can make it curve all the way around the building... It's pretty cool".

Oculus is in the headlines for all the wrong reasons today, with Oculus' Head of Computer Vision Dov Katz being arrested in a sting involving a police officer who was posting as a 15-year-old girl.

TechCrunch reports that Katz meeting with what he thought was a 15-year-old girl at Embassy Suites in Tukwila, Washington - aftrer he had text messaged the 15-year-old girl agreeing to pay $300 with her for sex without a condom. The police officer pretended to be a 19-year-old who, closer to the time of meeting Katz, said she was being honest and act ually a 15-year-old. The Oculus engineer responded saying "sure", adding: "do you have another pic?".

Some sickening stuff right there, with Katz ending being arrested without incident, with $600 found in the room along with his smartphone. The police officer in question said he arrested Katz for 'Commercial sexual abuse of a minor', but Katz said he was a hero, and instead was "there to rescue her and call the police".

Apple is making strategic movies to get into the TV and movie industries, with Mega founder Kim Dotcom - yeah, Kim Dotcom, predicting that Apple will purchase a massive Hollywood studio in 2017.

Dotcom tweeted: "Watch Apple buy a Hollywood Studio in 2017. #InsiderIntel". It would make sense, considering how massive some of these TV shows are getting these days on Netflix, HBO, etc. Apple has had interest in the film industry for a while, with the company having a "strong but secretive" presence at the Sundance Film Festival.

Apple reportedly met with "triple A-list" talent to talk about making a lineup of original TV shows, and even more of a tease - Apple is working with Hollywood studios to bring movies to iTunes, "even while they're still in theaters" reports 9to5Mac.

Nokia has announced that it filed complaints against Apple in Germany and the US, alleging that Apple products infringe a number of Nokia patents.

Ilkka Rahnasto, head of Patent Business at Nokia, said:

Nokia is suing Apple for 32 of its patents covering technologies such as display, user interface, software, antenna, chipsets and video encoding.

Apple's enormous campus in Cupertino is scheduled to open in 2017, and the latest drone footage from YouTube user Matthew Roberts shows how much the spaceship-like structure changed in the last six months.

The building is the brainchild of the late CEO, Steve Jobs, and designed by acclaimed architect, Lord Norman Foster. Steve Jobs spent a large part of two years on the project before his death in 2011.

The construction started in 2013, and you can see in the newest footage that it's almost ready for its grand opening.

AMD has had a massive year, starting it off with the push of Polaris - and then the launch of the Radeon RX 400 series in May and June. Throughout the year, AMD launched a new driver initiative - releasing more drivers in the first 6 months of the year, than they did throughout the entire of 2015.

Then the Zen leaks and teases started to flow, teasing Core i7-5960X performance ($999+) for much less (purportedly $499) - and then the Vega 10 graphics card teases began. AMD flew us out to their annual AMD Tech Summit 2016 in Sonoma, California - teasing Ryzen, the new CPU family under the Zen architecture, as well as our first real glimpse of Vega 10.

AMD teased a Vega 10 graphics card with 8GB of HBM2 memory running DOOM at 4K 60FPS+ on Ultra/Nightmare settings, as well as their new Radeon Instinct push that will see AMD technology inside of supercomputers. What has that done for the company? Drive its stock prices up by a mammoth 280% over the year, rising from the sub $3 mark to $10+ right now, settling in at $10.66 at the time of writing.

Synaptics announced they are partnering up with OXi Technology, a Shanghai-based developer of unique and patented optical fingerprint technology.

The two will work on developing new proprietary optical sensing solutions for smartphones, tablets, and PCs.

Rick Bergman, President, and CEO of Synaptics, said in an official statement:

In October, we reported that the worldwide smartwatch market experienced a round of growing pains in the third quarter of 2016, resulting in a "year-over-year decline in shipment volumes." The IDC reported that the smartwatch sales dropped in the Q3 by 51.6%, and Apple had the biggest drop - almost 72%, but they still maintained their position as the overall leader of the worldwide smartwatch market.

However, it seems that Apple has nothing to worry about because the sales of Apple Watch during the first week of holiday shopping season set a new record, and the current quarter is on the track to be the best ever for the Watch, Tim Cook told Reuters.

Cook didn't mention any numbers, but according to him, Apple Watch will be one of the most popular Christmas gadgets, which isn't surprising because if you are a fan of Apple, the Apple Watch is still one of the cheaper products from their lines of products.

After approving Google Fiber in September, the city of Nashville, Tennessee saw resistance from AT&T and Comcast. Both sued the city over streamlined utility pole attachment rules which would see quicker and easier adoption of Fiber, a threat to both companies' own services.

Now, the city of Nashville has filed a motion to dismiss the Comcast suit (no word yet on the AT&T suit), saying its within its rights to regulate public rights of way and that its methodology does not introduce "substantial impairment" to utility pole operator NES or its contracts, and that even if it did, what it's doing serves a "significant and legitimate" purpose for its people.

As it stands, about 50 percent of the 88,000 poles Google needs to attach fiber to in the city require extra work, but only 33 of them have actually received the work. Rivals to Fiber have been accused for years now of exploiting this loophole to stall adoption, and it appears that's very much the case here.

Today, you can order basically anything online, including groceries. But you are still going to end up grocery shopping at one point or the other, and the huge lines can be really annoying. Amazon has an alternative and has introduced Amazon Go, a shopping experience where instead of traditional checkouts, lines and cashiers, you enter, get your stuff and exit. No lines, no cashiers.

Amazon said they call this 'Just Walk Out Shopping' experience. First, you will have to download their Amazon Go app and use it when you enter the store. You take the products you want and walk out.

The checkout-free shopping experience is made possible by the same types of technologies used in self-driving cars: computer vision, sensor fusion, and deep learning. The technology automatically detects when products are taken from or returned to the shelves and keeps track on your app. When you leave the store, Amazon will send you the receipt and charge your Amazon account.

In November, Elon Musk announced that he plans to choose a location for Gigafactory 2 in Europe next year. He also said that the factory would combine both the production of batteries and complete cars.

Of course, many European countries would be thrilled to become the home of the Gigafactory 2. And rightfully so because the Gigafactory would create between 6,000 and 10,000 direct jobs, and an investment of around $5 billion, says Electrek.

Portugal is using social media to try to attract Elon to their country. They formed a Facebook group called 'Bring Tesla Gigafactory to Portugal!' and they already have more than 25,000 members, and growing. The group description states: "Let's bring the European Tesla Gigafactory to Portugal! Invite your friends to this group, including Tesla employees. Let's show Tesla how welcome they will be in Portugal and how Portugal is the place to be for their new factory in Europe."

World AIDS Day, designated on 1 December every year since 1988, is dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of the HIV infection. Governments, non-governmental organizations, and individuals around the world mark this day, often by organizing educations on AIDS prevention and fundraising.

In honor of World AIDS Day, Apple is offering ways for customers to join (RED) in its mission to create an AIDS-free generation. Apple is the world's largest corporate contributor to the Global Fund, founded by, among others, Melinda and Bill Gates and Kofi Annan. This year marks Apple's 10th anniversary supporting (RED) in the fight to end AIDS.

Tim Cook, Apple's CEO, said in an official statement:

"The cosmonaut training in Moscow saved my life," said Esther Dyson at the European Business Angels Network (EBAN) conference in Zagreb, Croatia. Back in the 2008 and 2009, she went through the training as a replacement for Charles Simonyi, a Hungarian-born American businessman who became the fifth space tourist in 2007, and in March 2009 he made a second trip to the International Space Station.

During her training, Dyson had gone through extensive coaching and learned a lot about every aspect of living in space. One of the routines during training were detailed medical inspections during which she was warned that she should carry out regular checks of the esophagus. She listened to the doctors and made sure she do as they said. This year she was diagnosed with esophageal cancer, luckily in the earliest stages and the cancer is completely curable. Dyson noted that if she hadn't gone through the space training and tests, the cancer might have been detected too late.

This journalist, investor, and philanthropist now invests in the non-profit sector, and during her speech, she explained that she didn't completely stop with the classic investments. One of the projects she invested in "sounds boring," she said jokingly because it's a private company that develops products and offers services for the commercial utilization of space - NanoRacks.

The European Business Angels Network (EBAN) conference opened its doors today in Zagreb, Croatia. One of the first speakers and certainly the biggest star of the event was Bruce Dickinson, the voice of the legendary band Iron Maiden.

Those who follow Dickinson's work know that he is so much more than an amazing voice behind the iconic band. He's a pilot, an entrepreneur, and an investor. Dickinson spoke about his business adventures and said that he approaches business the same way he writes songs. It doesn't matter if the music or the lyrics come first during the process, what matters is that it all fits in.

"You need to remember what it was like to be a child. Not childish, but child-like. You need to dream," said Bruce.

Tesla recently snatched one of Microsoft's top designers, Andrew Kim. According to his LinkedIn profile, Kim spent three and a half years at Microsoft and will now join Tesla Motors to take up the role of Lead Designer.

During his work at Microsoft, Kim was highly involved in HoloLens, Microsoft's augmented reality project, so it's no wonder that everyone's asking what does Elon Musk have next in mind for his electric cars.

Perhaps we will soon see a first vehicle that uses augmented reality to its fullest. Imagine your windshield turning into a map, or your mirrors into monitors, etc.

Apple's enormous campus in Cupertino is scheduled to open in 2017, and the latest drone footage from YouTube user Sexton Videography shows the progress of the spaceship-like structure.

The Apple Campus 2 looks nearly finished, and the video shows that most of the walls and solar panels are now in place.

The cost of the Apple Campus 2 is estimated to around $5 billion plus the cost of the land which was around $160 million. When finished, the campus will accommodate around 13,000 employees which is not nearly enough to house all of Apple's Bay-Area employees.

The Galaxy Note7 fiasco left some serious consequences for the Korean giant. For the first time, Huawei has beaten them to become the world's most profitable Android device maker.

According to the new report from research company Strategy Analytics, the Q3 2016 shows a huge drop in profit for Samsung. Although they surpassed other Android smartphone manufacturers regarding volume and value of the devices they shipped, their profits dropped. The report notes that three other Android manufacturers reported a higher profit in the third quarter than Samsung.

To no one's surprise, Apple still holds the majority of the global smartphone profits. The report says Apple earned $8.5 billion in Q3, which is 91% of the total share. Huawei comes second with 2.4% of the share, or $200 million. Interestingly, Chinese manufacturer Vivo holds 2.2% of the share with just under $200 million, and the same results for Oppo in Q3 as well.

Amazon is looking to extend its retail dominance into the Middle East with the rumors that it will be acquiring Souq.com, which some call the Amazon of the Middle East.

Bloomberg is reporting that Amazon will be making the $1 billion deal that would give it a large presence in the Middle East, in countries like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Souq has been doing good things in the Middle East, overcoming issues we overlook in the US and around the world, like having to develop a new payment platform for a part of the world where credit cards aren't everywhere.

This means people can shop for products on Souq with prepaid cards sold at brick-and-mortar retail stores, topping them up when they need to. The other issue that needs to be considered is logistics, which is something that Amazon knows a little about - so I guess that means we can expect drones flying around in a country that doesn't have tight laws pressed on them like the FAA do in the US.

Xiaomi blew everyone's mind last month when they announced their Mi MIX phone, which whether you like it or not, brought some innovation and courage (not the "let's remove the headphone jack" courage) to the market.

However, the company, according to the recent report from the research firm IDC, is struggling with smartphone sales. Last year, they missed their global smartphone target by 12%, and this year's Q3 sales in China, which is their primary market, have dropped by 45%.

We asked Anshel Sag, Associate Analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, what caused the drop in Xiaomi's smartphone sales.

Amazon has kicked off its massive Black Friday sales, claiming that it will have the lowest price on TVs from Samsung, LG, and Sony during their Black Friday promotions.

The big sales will kick off during Turkey 5, which starts on Thanksgiving, and runs through to Cyber Monday. Amazon has announced it started its Black Friday sales earlier this year, and will also extend them far beyond the Thanksgiving weekend - running the Amazon Black Friday 2016 promotions until December 22. Amazon is offering "new deals as often as every five minutes", and some of those deals are awesome.

If you have an Amazon Prime membership (which costs $99 for 12 months), then you'll get early access to Lightning Deals. As for the deals Amazon is running, check out some of these products: