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Microsoft Goes Underwater
Technology giants are finding some of the strangest places for data centers these days.
Facebook, for example, built a data center in Lulea in Sweden because the icy cold temperatures there would help cut the energy required for cooling. A proposed Facebook data center in Clonee, Ireland, will rely heavily on locally available wind energy. Google’s data center in Hamina in Finland uses sea water from the Bay of Finland for cooling.
Now, Microsoft is looking at locating data centers under the sea.
The company is testing underwater data centers with an eye to reducing data latency for the many users who live close to the sea and also to enable rapid deployment of a data center.
Microsoft, which has designed, built, and deployed its own subsea data center in the ocean, in the period of about a year, started working on the project in late 2014, a year after Microsoft employee, Sean James, who served on a U.S. Navy submarine, submitted a paper on the concept.
A prototype vessel, named the Leona Philpot after an Xbox game character, operated on the seafloor about 1 kilometer from the Pacific coast of the U.S. from August to November 2015, according to a Microsoft page on the project.
The subsea data center experiment, called Project Natick after a town in Massachusetts, is in the research stage and Microsoft warns it is “still early days” to evaluate whether the concept could be adopted by the company and other cloud service providers.
“Project Natick reflects Microsoft’s ongoing quest for cloud datacenter solutions that offer rapid provisioning, lower costs, high responsiveness, and are more environmentally sustainable,” the company said.
Using undersea data centers helps because they can serve the 50 percent of people who live within 200 kilometers from the ocean. Microsoft said in an FAQ that deployment in deepwater offers “ready access to cooling, renewable power sources, and a controlled environment.” Moreover, a data center can be deployed from start to finish in 90 days.
Courtesy- http://www.thegurureview.net/aroundnet-category/microsoft-goes-deep-with-underwater-data-center.html
Is nVidia Going All-In On Autonomous Cars?
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Nvidia is applying all that it knows about deep learning to enable autonomous vehicles.
The GPU vendor has launched NVIDIA DRIVE PX 2 which is an autonomous vehicle development platform powered by the 16nm FinFET-based Pascal GPU.
The GPU maker issued a version of DRIVE PX last year to its automotive partners including Audi, BMW, Daimler, Ford and dozens more. This newer version is equipped with two Tegra SOCs with ARM cores plus two discrete Pascal GPUs.
Nvidia said that the new platform is capable of 24 trillion deep learning operations per second ten times more than the last generation.
It can also offer an aggregate of 8 teraflops of single-precision performance which is a four-fold increase over the PX 1 and many times faster than using a slide rule or counting on your fingers.
The development platform includes the Caffe deep learning framework to run DNN models designed and trained on DIGITS, NVIDIA’s interactive deep learning training system.
Nivida wants to take humans out of the drivers’ seat to reduce the one million automotive-related fatalities each year.
Perception is the main issue and deep learning is able to achieve super-human perception capability. DRIVE PX 2 can process 12 video cameras, plus lidar, radar and ultrasonic sensors. This 360 degree assessment makes it possible to detect objects, identify them and their position relative to the car, and then calculate a safe and comfortable trajectory.
Courtesy-Fud
Nvidia Teams Up With Volvo For Self-Driving Car Computer
January 15, 2016 by admin
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Nvidia Corp. took the wraps off of a new, lunchbox-size super-computer for self-driving cars and announced that Volvo Car Group will be the new device’s first customer.
Volvo, of Sweden, is owned by China’s Geely Automotive Holdings.
Nvidia made the announcement at the beginning of the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas. Calls to Volvo’s spokesman in China were not immediately answered.
The new Drive PX 2, said company CEO Jen-Hsung Huang, has computing power equivalent to 150 MacBook Pro computers, and can deliver up to 24 trillion “deep learning” operations – allowing the computer to use artificial intelligence to program itself to recognize driving situations – per second.
Partnerships between automakers and Silicon Valley companies on self-driving technologies are taking center stage at this year’s show.
Also on Monday, General Motors Co. announced a $500 million investment in ride-sharing service Lyft.
Huang didn’t offer revenue projections for Drive PX 2, but automotive is the fastest-growing business segment for Nvidia, whose largest revenue source is video games.
Source-http://www.thegurureview.net/aroundnet-category/nvidia-teams-up-with-volvo-for-self-driving-car-computer.html
Will MS Debut A Lumia Business Phone Next Year?
December 7, 2015 by admin
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Microsoft surprised the world when its new phone range failed to contain anything to interest business users – now it seems it is prepared to remedy that.
Microsoft promised that its Lumia range would cover the low end, business and enthusiast segments but while the Lumia 950 and Lumia 950 XL and Lumia 650 should cover the low-end segment as well nothing has turned up for business users.
This was odd, given that business users want phones that play nice with their networks, something that Redmond should do much better than Google or Apple.
Microsoft’s CFO Amy Hood told the UBS Global Technology Conference that business versions of the Lumia were coming. She said:
“We launched a Lumia 950 and a 950 XL. They’re premium products, at the premium end of the market, made for Windows fans. And we’ll have a business phone, as well.”
There were no details, but we have been hearing rumours of a Surface phone being sighted on benchmarks. It was thought that his would be a Microsoft flagship, but with the launch of the Lumia 950/950 XL, it is possible that this Surface phone could be aimed at the business user. The word Surface matches nicely with Microsoft’s Surface Pro branding.
Source-http://www.thegurureview.net/mobile-category/will-microsoft-debut-a-lumia-business-phone-next-year.html
Sprint Confirms Jobs To Be Cut
November 17, 2015 by admin
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Sprint Chairman and SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son has confirmed that job cuts at Sprint will be “in the thousands” as part of a restructuring plan.
His comments came as SoftBank, which owns more than 70% of Sprint, reported its quarterly earnings.
“Sprint is now in the position to increase the pace of user acquisition while cutting costs,” Son said, according to Bloomberg and other news sources. “We will also cut staff. The cuts will be in the thousands.”
Son’s comments are not out of line with things Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure has been telling Sprint workers for months.
On Tuesday, Sprint’s stock price sagged downward after an earnings report included a statement saying that the carrier plans to cut $2 billion or more in operating expenses for its 2016 fiscal year, which begins in April.
Son also said the $2 billion is a “minimum target” and should be the amount slashed annually, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal. The company now has more than $25 billion in annual costs.
Sprint has been investing in attracting new customers — an effort that has been costly but effective. On Tuesday, Sprint reported it gained 237,000 postpaid phone customers in its second fiscal quarter, which ended Sept. 30. It was the first time the company had showed gains on that measure in two years. It also reported its lowest customer cancellation rate in company history.
In November 2014, Sprint had said it would cut 2,000 jobs as part of $1.5 billion in cost reductions. That announcement came after Sprint had cut 5,000 jobs from January through September 2014. The company had 31,000 workers at the start of its current fiscal year on April 1.
Source- http://www.thegurureview.net/mobile-category/sprint-confirms-thousands-of-jobs-to-be-cut.html
China Keeps Supercomputing Title
A supercomputer developed by China’s National Defense University still is the fastest publically known computer in the world, while the U.S. is close to an historic low in the latest edition of the closely followed Top 500 supercomputer ranking, which was just published.
The Tianhe-2 computer, based at the National Super Computer Center in Guangzhou, has been on the top of the list for more than two years and its maximum achieved performance of 33,863 teraflops per second is almost double that of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Cray Titan supercomputer, which is at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
The IBM Sequoia computer at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California is the third fastest machine, and fourth on the list is the Fujitsu K computer at Japan’s Advanced Institute for Computational Science. The only new machine to enter the top 10 is the Shaheen II computer of King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia, which is ranked seventh.
The Top 500 list, published twice a year to coincide with supercomputer conferences, is closely watched as an indicator of the status of development and investment in high-performance computing around the world. It also provides insights into what technologies are popular among organizations building these machines, but participation is voluntary. It’s quite possible a number of secret supercomputers exist that are not counted in the list.
With 231 machines in the Top 500 list, the U.S. remains the top country in terms of the number of supercomputers, but that’s close to the all-time low of 226 hit in mid-2002. That was right about the time that China began appearing on the list. It rose to claim 76 machines this time last year, but the latest count has China at 37 computers.
The Top 500 list is compiled by supercomputing experts at the University of Mannheim, Germany; the University of Tennessee, Knoxville; and the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Panasonic Appears To Be On The Hunt
April 8, 2015 by admin
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Japanese electronics giant Panasonic Corp said it is gearing up to spend 1 trillion yen ($8.4 billion) on acquisitions over the next four years, bolstered by a stronger profit outlook for its automotive and housing technology businesses.
Chief Executive Kazuhiro Tsuga said at a briefing on Thursday that Panasonic doesn’t have specific acquisition targets in mind for now. But he said the firm will spend around 200 billion yen on M&A in the fiscal year that kicks off in April alone, and pledged to improve on Panasonic’s patchy track record on big deals.
“With strategic investments, if there’s an opportunity to accelerate growth, you need funds. That’s the idea behind the 1 trillion yen figure,” he said. Tsuga has spearheaded a radical restructuring at the Osaka-based company that has made it one of the strongest turnaround stories in Japan’s embattled technology sector.
Tsuga previously told Reuters that company was interested in M&A deals in the European white goods market, a sector where Panasonic has comparatively low brand recognition.
The firm said on Thursday it’s targeting operating profit of 430 billion yen in the next fiscal year, up nearly 25 percent from the 350 billion yen it expects for the year ending March 31.
Panasonic’s earnings have been bolstered by moving faster than peers like Sony Corp and Sharp Corp to overhaul business models squeezed by competition from cheaper Asian rivals and caught flat-footed in a smartphone race led by Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics. Out has gone reliance on mass consumer goods like TVs and smartphones, and in has come a focus on areas like automotive technology and energy-efficient home appliances.
Tsuga also sought to ease concerns that an expensive acquisition could set back its finances, which took years to recover from the deal agreed in 2008 to buy cross-town rival Sanyo for a sum equal to about $9 billion at the time.
Is RadioShack Going Bankrupt?
September 23, 2014 by admin
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Troubled electronics retailer RadioShack Corp says filing for bankruptcy protection is an option if its cash situation worsens, after reporting its tenth straight quarterly loss.
The company said it was also exploring other options, including a sale or an investment, and liquidation as the last resort.
RadioShack, whose sales have been in free-fall since 2010 as it struggles to compete with internet retailers, said in a regulatory filing it was working with its lenders and landlords to restructure its debt and cut costs.
“It would surprise me if we got to Nov. 1 without a bankruptcy,” Wedbush Securities Inc analyst Michael Pachter told Reuters.
RadioShack shares, which are in danger of being delisted from the New York Stock Exchange, were up 2 percent at 95 cents in volatile early trading.
The company said same-store sales declined 20 percent in the latest quarter, while total sales plunged to their lowest in more than 20 years.
The company is being advised by a restructuring attorney at law firm Jones Day as it tries to strike a deal with creditors to close stores, two people close to the matter told Reuters on Wednesday.
RadioShack tried to close 1,100 stores this year, but reduced that number to 200 a year when lenders did not agree to the plans.
RadioShack’s landlords, however, may be open to mass store closures if they believe it will allow them to find new tenants more quickly than in a bankruptcy, a source close to the matter told Reuters.
David Tawil, president of hedge fund Maglan Capital that focuses on companies approaching bankruptcy, said he saw “major execution risks” to RadioShack’s recapitalization and turnaround efforts.
“I don’t think that the chances are great that RadioShack survives,” Tawil said, adding that the company’s credit default swaps were trading higher, pointing to market expectations of a near-term debt default.
The company ended the second quarter with $30.5 million in cash and $658.0 million in debt, which matures between 2018 and 2019.
Will IBM Realize Growth In 2015?
International Business Machines Corp said it is projecting growth in its hardware sector next year as the company invests in research and development and abandons low-performing ventures.
The comments come less than one month after the world’s largest technology service company reported its lowest quarterly revenue in five years, weighed by sluggish global demand for its hardware, which plunged 23 percent in the first quarter of 2014.
The company added that growth in Latin America, the Middle East and Africa remain strong, and blamed falling revenue in China on government reforms affecting state-owned clients, and on the country’s hardware-heavy portfolio.
“We move on and we spread ourselves out, more industries, more clients, cloud, data, et cetera, around there,” said IBM Chief Executive Ginni Rometty at an investor briefing on Wednesday.
Chief Financial Officer Martin Schroeter said to stabilize the hardware sector IBM would continue to “refresh” hardware and further invest in research and development.
“Quite frankly, we are seeing very good growth out of software, good growth out of services, but challenges in hardware,” said Schroeter. “We will stabilize that hardware base and I am comfortable we will make that happen in 2014,” he said.
He reiterated the company’s EPS target for 2015 of at least $20. He expects a shift to higher-value business to bring in $3.25 and share repurchases to add $2 in earnings per share by 2015.
SEC Plans Cybersecurity Meeting
February 27, 2014 by admin
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The Securities and Exchange Commission said that its making plans to conduct a roundtable next month to discuss cybersecurity, after massive retailer breaches refocused the attention of the business community and policymakers on the area.
The SEC said that it would hold the event on March 26 to talk about the challenges cyber threats pose for market participants and public companies.
Recent breaches at Target Corp and Neiman Marcus have sparked concern from lawmakers and revived a long-running spat among retailers and banks over who should bear the cost of consumer losses and technology investments to improve security.
Last Thursday, trade groups for the two industries announced they are forming a partnership to work through the disputes.
U.S. lawmakers have also considered weighing in on how consumers should be notified of data theft. But progress on legislation is not guaranteed in a busy election year.
The SEC in 2011 drafted informal staff-level guidance for public companies to use when considering whether to disclose cyber attacks and their impact on a company’s financial condition.
SEC Chair Mary Jo White last year told Congress that her agency was reviewing whether a more robust disclosure process is needed. But she told reporters last fall she felt the guidance appeared to be working well and that she didn’t see an immediate need to create a rule that mandates public reporting on cyber attacks.