Archive for the 'High Tech & Media' Category

Google Can Now Buy and Sell Electricity

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ron
on February 21, 2010
in Global Strategy and High Tech & Media
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Google’s ever-expanding empire has added another branch: subsidiary Google Energy has been granted an order by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to buy and sell energy at market rates. See previous post.

Does this mean Google is set to become your power company? Not yet — instead, Google wants more control over the high energy costs of its many data centers, and also aims to become carbon neutral.

A Google spokesperson told CNET: “Right now, we can’t buy affordable, utility-scale, renewable energy in our markets. We want to buy the highest quality, most affordable renewable energy wherever we can and use the green credits.”

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Is Korea Losing its Digital Edge?

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on February 18, 2010
in High Tech & Media
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How Korea, a onetime digital trendsetter, became a laggard in an era of smartphones—and amazing apps.

Even though Korea is home to the number two and three global handset maker, respectively Samsung and LG it losing ground in setting the pace and guiding the mobile (notably smartphone) industry. As in result, the Korean government had been preparing to shift focus to software from hardware for about a year, but the iPhone sensation provided a wake-up call. Initiatives such as launching a state-funded program to nurture software start-ups. The Ministry of Knowledge Economy is budgeting some $880 million to back software companies over the next three years. It aims to double the number of Korean software engineers to 300,000 in 2013 from 2008 and triple software exports to $15 billion.

Nonetheless, despite the government’s software worries, Korea has had some notable successes. Such as in gaming (online fantasy game Lineage),social networking service Cyworld, which was launched earlier than Facebook, is dominant in Korea. After eight years of offering Korean-language search, Google has just 2% of the market, compared with 64% held by Naver [Source].

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iPad is here!

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ron
on January 28, 2010
in High Tech & Media
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Even though the Apple iPad won’t be available for another 60 or 90 days (depending on the model), Apple already has its official iPad website up and running.

In addition to showing off some of the applications, features and design and technical specifications, the website also features an eight-minute video with Apple’s design and development team discussing the device and showing it off. If you love Johnny Ive and well-produced promo videos, you’ll want to check it out!

You can watch the video over at Apple.com here. Please also find a NYTimes article on how “The iPad: A Media Machine That Opens Up a New Front” here.

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iTablet coming soon?

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ron
on January 26, 2010
in High Tech & Media
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Tomorrow, Apple is likely to unveil its long-rumored and much anticipated tablet device.

Speculation about the Apple Tablet — its pricetag, its function, and its impact on computing — has been flying around the web for years. Mashable has gathered all the pertinent news, rumors, and discussion about the fabled device in one place.

McGraw-Hill’s CEO Terry McGraw told CNBC this afternoon that Apple will make a Tablet announcement tomorrow. He thinks the tablet will be “really terrific” for e-books in the higher education and professional markets, two industries that we’ve long suspected the Tablet would target [Source].

The daily Telegraph reports on “Five ways the Apple iTablet could change our lives” here.

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A Global Melting Pot of Ideas

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ron
on January 23, 2010
in High Tech & Media, International Business and Social Media
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Follow live coverage of the DLD in Munich, Germany, a gathering of 800 entrepreneurs, investors, philanthropists, scientists, artists and creative minds from around the world.

With global diversity in attendees and an interdisciplinary perspective of digital, media, design, art, science, brands, consumers and society, the conference is known as the European forum for the “creative class”. Follow live coverage here.

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Solar-Powered iPhones?

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on January 19, 2010
in High Tech & Media
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In an advancement of a patent originally filed in 2008. Last week Apple filed a patent that revealed the design for a solar powered portable device (i.e. an iPod or iPhone).

Although, no word on when we might see a solar-powered iPhone in stores, but Apple’s move to update its 2 year-old patent makes us think that the company still has solar on the brain [Source].

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Google Energy

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ron
on January 9, 2010
in High Tech & Media
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The Internet giant has taken the unusual step of applying for approval from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to become an electricity marketer, essentially giving it the authority to buy and sell bulk power at market prices, just the way large utilities and energy traders do. The move offers an indication of just how much electricity large tech firms now consume in order to run their sprawling networks of servers and mainframes.

“We’re interested in procuring more renewable energy as part of our carbon neutrality commitment, so we applied for the ability to buy and sell energy on the wholesale market to give us more flexibility,” Google spokeswoman Niki Fenwick said on Friday.

Google’s FERC application could also potentially allow the company to play a much larger role in energy markets, even becoming a wholesaler of electricity to other big buyers. Google has a long history of downplaying forays into new areas, only to later surprise competitors with new products and services.

Other technology companies that aren’t conventional energy players, like Microsoft Corp. and Intel Corp., also are studying energy markets for opportunities to make money by helping the nation improve the efficiency of the electricity business [Source Reuters] [Source WSJ].

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Google unveils Nexus One phone

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ron
on January 5, 2010
in High Tech & Media
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Google has unveiled an own-brand smartphone called the Nexus One. Google is aiming to take on Apple’s iPhone and defend its dominance in Internet search, introduced a touch-screen mobile phone that runs on its own Android operating system.

The device is 0.45 inches (11.5 millimeters) thick, about the same as the iPhone, and has a larger screen than its rival. The phone will cost US$179 with a T-Mobile USA contract and US$529 without it, Mario Queiroz, Google’s vice-president of product management, said today at an event at Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, California [Source 1] [Source 2].

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America’s Most Promising Startups

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ron
on December 17, 2009
in High Tech & Media
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entering-startupWant to be the first to know what companies will be the next household name? BusinessWeek has started a section on its webpage that will keep track of promising start-ups that might see the limelight. Flip through the slide show for a look at all the profiles. You can also make a suggestion of a new company worth profiling and send it in to BusinessWeek.

Welcome to America’s Most Promising Startups, an ongoing series profiling new companies from across the country that embody the creativity and resiliency common among today’s entrepreneurs. Based on suggestions from our readers and staffers, we’ll be adding more profiles on a regular basis, so check back often. Our goal is to showcase promising companies before they become household names.

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Google focuses on Cloud Computing

Published
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ron
on December 6, 2009
in High Tech & Media
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googleStrategyIn an interview with CNBC, Google’s CEO (Eric Schmidt) told a little bit about its 2010 strategy. Schmidt told that cloud computing is the centerpiece of Google’s 2010 strategy.

“It’s a new model. You basically put all your information on servers and you have fast networks and lots of different kinds of personal computers and mobile phones that can use the applications… it’s a powerful model and it’s where the industry is going. It is the centerpiece of our 2010 strategy”.

In addition, Schmidt worries not so much about Yahoo or Microsoft but about missing the “next big thing”.

I worry about the next entrepreneurial company that will take cloud computing into an area that we have not anticipated. (I worry about) something that we don’t foresee that could really take off. There’s evidence that a lot of new companies could be built.

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