Bloomberg It’s official. BlackBerry Ltd., the Canadian company that invented the smartphone and addicted legions of road warriors to the “CrackBerry,†has stopped making its iconic handsets. Finally conceding defeat in a battle lost long ago to Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co., BlackBerry is handing over production of the phones to overseas partners and turning its full attention ...
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Amazon’s plan to infiltrate homes this season
Bloomberg The race is on to get more consumers hooked on Amazon ahead of the holidays, and music is the latest lure. Amazon.com Inc. is working on a stand-alone music-streaming service and will release more details in the coming weeks, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. With a price tag reported to be about $5 a ...
Read More »Automakers show off electrics at Paris show
AFP Global automakers are showing off new electric vehicles at the Paris auto show as they look ahead to a world of tighter environmental standards on emissions. Volkswagen on Thursday displayed the I.D, a battery-powered compact it says will sell for about what a fully equipped Golf diesel does when a production version eventually goes on the market in ...
Read More »Developers face challenges capturing wave energy
AFP Although wave-generated power could meet a quarter of America’s energy needs, the technology lags other renewables such as wind and solar. But the U.S. Navy has established a test site in Hawaii, where power from floating devices travels a mile through undersea cables to Oahu’s power grid — the first wave-induced electricity online in the US. Some things ...
Read More »Gamer leaves Sony behind to bring eye-tracking to VR
Bloomberg Virtual reality is on the cusp of becoming mainstream, but one startup in Japan is betting the technology won’t really succeed unless it cracks one critical piece of the puzzle: human eyeballs. Fove Inc. is introducing the world’s first commercially available VR goggles equipped with tiny infrared cameras to follow eye movements. By tracking human irises, the gadget ...
Read More »Apple to expand HealthKit from tracker to diagnosis tool
Bloomberg So far Apple Inc.’s HealthKit has mostly collected fitness data from its devices. In the future, if the company gets its way, the software will interpret that information, turning it into advice for users, doctors and others. Scores of health-care experts hired by Apple in recent years are building improved electronic health record software that can better analyze ...
Read More »Microsoft to plug Renault-Nissan cars into the cloud
Bloomberg Microsoft Corp. agreed to provide cloud-computing services for cars made by Nissan Motor Co. and Renault SA as the manufacturers push ahead with developing connected vehicles. Microsoft will build cloud infrastructure for the two carmakers that can host navigation data and allows drivers to predict gas usage and check on their cars remotely, the Redmond, Washington-based software producer ...
Read More »BlackBerry to outsource handsets, will halt production
AFP BlackBerry, the Canadian firm that helped pioneer the smartphone market, said Wednesday it will stop making handsets, outsourcing production to an Indonesian partner. Handsets with the BlackBerry name will be produced under license by PT Tiphone Mobile Indonesia Tbk, allowing the Canadian firm to concentrate on software and services, a statement by the firms said. BlackBerry, which a ...
Read More »McLaren unveils its first all-electric car
Relaxnews British supercar brand McLaren clearly likes toying with its fans because its newest model is a battery-powered hypercar for the under sevens. It would appear that with its latest offering, McLaren has taken recent surveys regarding the next generation of drivers and their willingness to get behind the wheel of an electric car quite literally. The newest edition ...
Read More »Phone dead? These firms seek to charge it from a distance
Bloomberg Energous Corp. has seen its share price more than double this year, largely on the promise of a smartphone future without electrical outlets or charging mats. San Jose, California-based Energous is one of a handful of companies racing to introduce technologies that may allow our phones, tablets and smartwatches to be powered from across a room —all at ...
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