Technology

  Bloomberg Inside a packed Vodafone Group Plc store in the Zambian capital of Lusaka, a group of the city’s tech-savvy students wait in line for wireless modems they hope will transform their ability to surf the internet. They don’t even care that they won’t be able to get a voice plan to talk over the British mobile operator’s network ...

  Bloomberg GlaxoSmithKline Plc, the UK’s biggest drugmaker, is forming a joint venture with Google parent Alphabet Inc.’s life-sciences business to explore using electrical signals to treat diseases. Glaxo will hold a 55 percent stake in the venture, called Galvani Bioelectronics, and Alphabet’s Verily Life Sciences LLC will hold 45 percent, according to a statement on Monday. The companies will ...

  Relaxnews Funai Electric Company, the last remaining Japanese manufacturer of VCR devices — sold under various brand names, such as Sanyo in North America — has announced an end to production this summer. The manufacturer reported sales of 750,0000 video recorders worldwide in 2015. This latest nail in the coffin for the VCR spells the end of a technological ...

  AFP Hong Kong’s 2014 pro-democracy “Umbrella Revolution” was re-imagined as a zombie apocalypse by gamemakers who transformed politicians and protesters into the walking dead using virtual reality technology at a comic and games expo recently. Teenagers and video game enthusiasts packed the Ani-Com show at the city’s harbourfront convention centre and queued for “Hong Kong Infected”, where they shot ...

  AP You’d be wrong to think that Facebook’s Messenger app is all about messaging. Although people typically install it on their phones to chat privately with their Facebook friends, Facebook also uses Messenger to bring features and capabilities that might not make sense, or even be possible, as part of the main Facebook service. And of course, a separate ...

AP The little robot that caused a big stir when it hit crowdfunding site Indiegogo is now a retail reality. After passing its funding goal by some 300%, Riley, the AppBot, is now officially on sale at a number of retail outlets and on Amazon for $229. As homes get smarter and connectivity becomes the norm, it’s only going to ...

  Relaxnews The Nestlé Institute of Health Sciences and Samsung are pooling their considerable resources in order to build a connected health and lifestyle platform that will interact with everything from smart TVs to wearables in order to help people make healthier choices. As more and more areas of our lives — from the homes we live in to the ...

  Bloomberg Social game developer Zynga is moving into school spaces in an official capacity as “Words With Friends” receives an educational edition. First introduced in 2009, the mobile sensation “Words With Friends” has been made over for use within school teaching settings. “Words With Friends EDU” is the result of Zynga’s refit, and it’s being released as a free ...

  Bloomberg Oracle Corp., lagging the competition in cloud-based services, is essentially buying market share with its $9.3 billion acquisition of NetSuite Inc. Oracle has been trying for years to shift from selling software installed on corporate customers’ gear the old way to delivering it over the internet. Yet in its most recent quarter, the company said the cloud division ...

  Relaxnews September brings with it a first reveal of Nintendo’s next home console, and a new report indicates that it will be a tablet-style affair with big screen capabilities. The Nintendo NX will combine handheld and stationary console design standards, with each controller comprising a display “bookended by two [detachable] controllers on each side,” according to a new report. ...