Data-integration giant Informatica has made itself a private company in a $5.3 billion deal that includes investments from Microsoft and Salesforce.com.The deal, said to be the biggest leveraged buyout this year, means Informatica’s stock ceased trading on the Nasdaq on Thursday. In exchange, Informatica stockholders are getting $48.75 per share in cash.It’s part of a trend in which companies have been taking themselves private to make themselves more competitive. Dell, Tibco Software, Riverbed and Compuware have all made similar moves.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Tesla has issued a security update to its Model S car after security researchers discovered six flaws that allowed them to control its entertainment software and hijack the vehicle.With access to the entertainment software, Kevin Mahaffey, CTO of security startup Lookout, and Marc Rogers, a security researcher at CloudFlare, turned off the engine while a person was driving, changed the speed and map information displayed on the touchscreen, opened and closed the trunk and controlled the radio.The pair, who will discuss their findings Friday at the DEF CON hacking conference in Las Vegas, also uploaded a remote access application that allowed them to lock and unlock the car using an iPhone.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The answer is yes, at least based on this headline the other day in The Wall Street Journal: Review: Epson Kills the Printer Ink Cartridge.However, reading the analysis underneath the headline reveals a much more complicated picture: Epson has a new printer line that can store so much ink that you can practically forget about the need to ever refill it again.From the review written by Wilson Rothman:
Epson, the maker of my nightmare printer, has finally put an end to the horror of ink cartridges, at least for people willing to throw cash at the problem up front. The five new EcoTank series printers look like normal models, only they have containers on their sides that hold gobs and gobs of ink. How much? Years’ worth. Enough that your children—or at least mine—could go on a two-hour coloring-page-printing bender and you wouldn’t even notice.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
IBM plans to buy Merge Healthcare in a $1 billion deal that promises to bring new image-focused capabilities to its Watson Health platform.Under the terms of the acquisition, which was announced Thursday and is expected to close later this year, Merge shareholders will receive $7.13 per share in cash. The deal is IBM’s third and largest major health-related acquisition since it launched its Watson Health unit in April.Merge’s technology provides medical image handling and processing and is currently used at more than 7,500 U.S. health care sites. IBM plans to use its Watson Health Cloud to analyze and cross-reference Merge’s medical images against lab results, electronic health records, genomic tests, clinical studies and other health-related data sources amounting to 315 billion data points and 90 million unique records.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Only 20% to 50% of in-house server capacity is actually used, even with virtualization gains, according to numbers from MIT-connected startup Jisto. The company says it has a solution, though, which will save enterprises money.The problem that Jisto is looking to solve is that, although companies usually provision plenty of cloud and in-house server space, artificial static walls, which are created with ownership profiles and resource groups, create waste. Servers are underutilized.Redundancy-prone
It isn't just the in-house servers, either. Cloud capacity is also redundancy-prone.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Qualcomm has entered into an agreement to acquire Ikanos Communications in order to speed up its efforts to build home gateways with integrated support for G.fast, which promises to offer hundreds of megabit per second over copper.If all goes according to plan, Ikanos will become part of the company’s Qualcomm Atheros subsidiary. Qualcomm seems keen on getting Ikanos, because it’s paying US$2.75 per share, compared to the $1.75 Ikanos’ shares were worth at the close of the market on Wednesday.Qualcomm’s plan is to combine its own Wi-Fi, powerline, small cell, and ethernet chipsets with Ikanos wired modem technology to create a more complete offering for home gateway products, it said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
WASHINGTON -- If startups in the tech sector and other high-growth industries are going to continue to emerge and thrive, the business landscape must become a more inclusive environment, one that is more welcoming of women, minorities and regions outside major urban and university centers, the White House is warning."We've got to make sure that everybody is getting a fair shot," President Obama said this week in remarks at the White House. "The next Steve Jobs might be named Stephanie or Esteban. They might never set foot in Silicon Valley. We've got to unleash the full potential of every American -- not leave more than half the team on the bench."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Continuing to struggle in the smartphone industry, HTC is hoping its upcoming products in virtual reality and wearables can pull in some sales.The Taiwanese company’s earnings took a big dive in the second quarter, with a NT$8 billion (US$257 million) loss. This came as revenue dropped by almost half year over year to NT$33 billion.The weak earnings could continue into the next quarter. On Thursday, HTC estimated that its revenue in the third quarter would reach between NT$19 billion to NT$22 billion. Compared to last year, that could amount to another 50 percent decrease in revenue.Its latest flagship product, the HTC One M9, has so far failed to buoy sales. The phone itself hasn’t been a big enough upgrade from the last generation, according to some reviewers, and this may have prevented it from standing out in the market.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
IBM's year-long partnership with Apple took a new turn on Wednesday with the PC giant's announcement of new cloud services designed to help large companies incorporate Macs into their IT infrastructures.With the new offering, which is part of IBM's MobileFirst services portfolio, clients can order Macs and have them delivered directly to their employees without the need for any additional setup, imaging or configuration. Employees can then quickly and securely gain network access, connect to email and download business applications, IBM said.The services can also accommodate employees' own, personal Macs in corporate "bring-your-own-device" settings. They are delivered via the cloud as a software-as-a-service (SaaS) product but are also available on-premises in clients' data centers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
IBM's year-long partnership with Apple took a new turn on Wednesday with the PC giant's announcement of new cloud services designed to help large companies incorporate Macs into their IT infrastructures.With the new offering, which is part of IBM's MobileFirst services portfolio, clients can order Macs and have them delivered directly to their employees without the need for any additional setup, imaging or configuration. Employees can then quickly and securely gain network access, connect to email and download business applications, IBM said.The services can also accommodate employees' own, personal Macs in corporate "bring-your-own-device" settings. They are delivered via the cloud as a software-as-a-service (SaaS) product but are also available on-premises in clients' data centers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A cell phone and Internet outage Tuesday evening in several Southeastern states was caused by a hardware problem, AT&T reported."Wireless and wireline service has been restored for all customers in parts of the Southeast affected by a hardware-related network issue," AT&T said in a statement Tuesday. "Our engineers completed repairs and service is running normally. We apologize for any inconvenience."AT&T would not describe the nature of the hardware problem, and said it only could speak about service for its own customers.MORE: 10 mobile startups to watch
However, the outage was reported on social media and other sources to have affected thousands of customers for all the major carriers, lasting from about 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. ET Tuesday. It hit customers in parts of Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Alabama, Georgia and Missouri, and possibly other states.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
And there I was, thinking I was making the most of my MacBook Air box by using it as a stand for my laptop rather than forking over the money for a fancier stand.But the IT department at George Fox University in Oregon easily has me beat with its human transport wheel, made from 36 trapezoid-shaped iMac boxes. They took out the computers and styrofoam, and built the 120-pound iWheel.According to the school's blog, sysadmin Mike Campadore had been plotting the iWheel for more than a year, initially estimating he'd need 38 boxes. He joined with colleague Rich Bass this past Friday (SysAdmin Day, as it turns out) and gave the wheel a big old spin across campus. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
And there I was, thinking I was making the most of my MacBook Air box by using it as a stand for my laptop rather than forking over the money for a fancier stand.
But the IT department at George Fox University in Oregon easily has me beat with its human transport wheel, made from 36 trapezoid-shaped iMac boxes. They took out the computers and styrofoam, and built the 120-pound iWheel.
According to the school's blog, sysadmin Mike Campadore had been plotting the iWheel for more than a year, initially estimating he'd need 38 boxes. He joined with colleague Rich Bass this past Friday (SysAdmin Day, as it turns out) and gave the taped-together box wheel a big old spin across campus. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Users of Salesforce’s Marketing Cloud on Tuesday gained easier access to Instagram’s roughly 300 million users thanks to an integration made possible by a new API.Marketers can now use Salesforce’s cloud software to buy and manage Instagram advertising, publish content and offer customer service on the photo and video sharing site, among other capabilities.Making the new integration possible is Instagram’s Ad API, which was originally announced in June. At the time, the site said it would initially open up the application programming interface just to a select group of Facebook marketing partners and agencies.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
In a move to round out its portfolio of enterprise identity management software, CA Technologies is acquiring security software provider Xceedium.The purchase will allow CA to offer to enterprises more comprehensive coverage of who is allowed on their sensitive networks and systems, according to CA.Identity management is proving to be an increasingly vital component to securely managing the enterprise. It is the process of assigning each employee or contractor a systems account, and then limiting that user to only those systems that he or she has a legitimate reason to use.The recent breach at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management might have been thwarted, for instance, through tighter access controls.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Microsoft has overhauled a program for promoting diversity at the law firms it works with, to promote higher representation for lawyers of different minority groups in the firms’ leadership ranks.The company’s Law Firm Diversity Program has been changed to offer bonuses to 15 law firms it works with, based on how many attorneys in positions of power are female, from racial and ethnic minorities, openly LGBT, people with disabilities or military veterans.Microsoft started the program 7 years ago and originally offered firms a 2 percent bonus on their billings if a set percentage of the hours they billed to the company were worked by diverse attorneys.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Advance, a global media group that owns the Condé Nast group of consumer publications, has ventured into the realm of data analysis, purchasing New York-based analytics firm 1010data for $500 million.Advance plans to infuse 1010data with capital to expand its operations, so it can take on more of the growing market for big data-styled analysis services.Sandy Steier, 1010data co-founder and CEO, in a statement issued Monday that there will be no disruption to its customers, employees nor to its business as a result of the acquisition, which will instead allow 1010data to grow more quickly.The purchase is a bit of an unusual one for Advance, which has filled its portfolio with traditional media properties.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Attacked then abandoned in Philadelphia, Hitchbot’s attempt to thumb a lift across the U.S. ends in disasterA robot that counted on the kindness of strangers to help it travel around the world has met a cruel fate in Philadelphia, barely three weeks into an attempt to hitch-hike across the U.S. Hitchbot, developed by robotics researchers at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, had already hitch-hiked successfully across Canada and Germany, but U.S. residents turned out to be less welcoming, AP reports.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
China plans to limit exports of advanced drones and supercomputers for national security reasons.The new export controls on certain drone and high-performance computing technologies will come into effect Aug. 15, Chinese government regulators said Friday. Affected vendors will have to apply for a government permit to ship their technology outside China.The regulations target more advanced drones that can be flown for at least an hour, “beyond the natural sight of the operator” and function more as an unmanned aerial vehicles.Shenzhen-based DJI, a major Chinese builder of drones, seems confident the new export controls won’t disrupt its business.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
New products of the weekOur roundup of intriguing new products. Read how to submit an entry to Network World's products of the week slideshow.Out-of-Band Dry Contact Management SwitchKey features: Remotely manage four dry DC contacts plus one AC outlet. Includes monitoring, alarm and logging functions to track temperatures, power outages and other conditions and events at remote equipment sites. More info.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here