Microsoft profit beats expectations on strong cloud demand

on Thursday reported strong fourth-quarter earnings on the back of its fast-growing cloud computing business, stoking optimism that the once-stagnant company has found a new groove.

The results were the clearest sign yet that the strategy put in place by Chief Executive Satya Nadella when he assumed the top job in 2014 is paying off. He has shifted the company's focus away from a dying personal computer software business and reinventing it as a provider of cloud computing and subscription-based software.

“Our technology world view of an intelligent cloud and an intelligent edge is resonating with customers everywhere,” Nadella said on the company’s earnings conference call with investors on Thursday afternoon.

Most notably, revenue from the cloud unit, which includes the flagship Azure platform and server products, rose about 11 percent to $7.43 billion in the fiscal fourth quarter ended June 30.

Analysts on average had expected cloud revenue of $7.32 billion, according to data and analytics firm FactSet. Revenue from Azure, which competes directly with Amazon.com's market-leading AWS division, nearly doubled in the quarter. (bit.ly/2oQAzSJ)

Highlighting Azure's growth were notable increases to Microsoft's long-term unearned revenue, which rose by more than 61 percent year-over-year. The metric is used to indicate long-term commitments for services and products, said Kim Forrest, vice president and senior equity analyst at Fort Pitt Capital Group, a portfolio management firm.

In a bid to continue this momentum, Microsoft last week launched Azure Stack, a new service that allows customers to run a local version of the company's cloud technology.

“This isn't just a one-quarter wonder,” Forrest said. "Amazon is going to be paying attention to this."

Michael Turits, analyst at Raymond James & Associates, noted that Azure is smaller than Amazon's service but that it is growing faster. "I think it is appealing well to existing enterprise customers who might not immediately be drawn to the Amazon platform," he said.

Beyond cloud, Microsoft's various businesses mostly performed well.

The commercial offering of Office 365 was up 43 percent while Dynamics 365, Microsoft's customer relationship management and enterprise resource planning service, saw a year-over-year increase of 74 percent.

Revenue dropped 2 percent in the personal computer division, which includes Windows 10 and Microsoft's line of Surface hardware. The company said it recorded $306 million in restructuring charges following a reorganization of its sales and marketing teams that was announced earlier this month. The restructuring resulted in layoffs for thousands of Microsoft employees.

"I don't think the layoffs are a worry at all," said Jan Dawson, chief analyst at Jackdaw Research. "They're just part of the ongoing transition Microsoft is going through as cloud grows and its legacy business shrinks."

Net Income Doubles

Microsoft's net income more than doubled to $6.51 billion or 83 cents per share in the quarter, from $3.12 billion or 39 cents per share in the year-earlier period.

Excluding one-time items, Microsoft earned 98 cents per share. On an adjusted basis, revenue rose 9.1 percent to $24.7 billion.

Analysts on average had expected an adjusted profit of 71 cents per share and revenue of $24.27 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Source:Reuters

Google Earth to let users post stories, photos in coming years

Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O) wants users to post millions of stories, video and photos on its Google Earth platform in the next few years, the program chief said on Tuesday at a launch event in Brazil for content focused on showcasing the Amazon rainforest.

The "Voyager" tool allows internet surfers to take interactive tours of exotic destinations on Google Earth led by the likes of primatologist Jane Goodall, with photos, information and maps.

However, regular users will be able to create their own unedited content for private or public use within two to three years, Google Earth Director Rebecca Moore told Reuters.

"The story of your family history, the story of your favorite hiking trip – it could be anything. It doesn't have to be profound," she said at the event in Sao Paulo.

Moore took the stage at an event in Sao Paulo to unveil the "I am the Amazon" project, which has mapped 11 sites to document the relationship between the rainforest and its people, touching on topics like food, water and cultural origins.

To tell the stories of communities such as the Yanomami people, Cinta Larga and the Boa Vista Quilombola, Google and partners used tools like 3D cameras to accompany satellite images with videos and text.

Moore did not reveal the budget for the project but she ruled out the idea of advertising on the platform and said it is not Google's intention to turn a profit from the venture.

"Google Earth is our gift to the world," she told Reuters. "In terms of budget, Google has nice revenue from advertising, and not everything Google does has to make money."

Source: Reuters

Humanoid robot to host a program in Japan

A humanoid robot which was presented on Wednesday in Tokyo will be the new host of a live television program in Japan, as part of a recent social experiment, aiming to prove that a robot can develop and grow through communication with human beings.

"Androidol U" measures 1.6 meters (around 5 feet 2 inches), weighs approximately the same as a human being and responds automatically to people who talk to it through a video portal Niconico.

During the presentation, the robot came on stage in a ball chair and read some of the comments made by people.

"U" has the appearance of a young Japanese woman; with medium-length hair and bangs, a white top, jeans and high heels. Make-up, painted nails and long eyelashes complete the human look.

In Japan, such robots are often seen in display windows, in theatre plays or even movies, including "Sayonara" (Goodbye in Japanese).

Japanese scientist Hiroshi Ishiguro, considered the father of android robots and known for creating a robotic copy of himself, said that in coming years robots will provide assistance in public spaces, malls, stations and schools, and even teach as professors.

"U" is the first of these new robots; the weekly interactive program will increase its vocabulary and contribute to improving its artificial intelligence.

Communication with users helps to minimize the robot's limitations; as the robot gathers more data, it develops more, according to Ishiguro, who is also a professor at Osaka University and the director of the Intelligent Robotics Laboratory.

The project has been developed by Ishiguro himself, in collaboration with telecommunications company Dwango - Niconico's owner - and departmental store giant Parco.

Ishiguro, who wants the robots to gradually help human beings to communicate with each other, described the program as an interesting way to know what the people really think of "U".

The exact start date of the program is still unknown, and the project's officials have also so far dismissed the robot being available for sale.

Source: EFE

Bristol joins race to be test bed for ultra-fast 5G technology

A recent Ofcom report suggested 20% of homes in urban areas struggle with poor 4G phone signal.

In rural areas, it's as high as 80%. Little wonder then Britain languishes at 54th place in the global league table of 4G connectivity, behind Albania, Estonia and Peru.

The hunt is now on for test beds to develop new 5G technology - Bristol, Kings College London and the University of Surrey are all said to be interested.

The government has announced a fresh drive to bring us up to speed for the digital age. It has put superfast connections at the heart of its Industrial Strategy, backed up with investment of £1bn.

Inside the Smart Internet Lab at the University of Bristol - I discover just how much progress they've already made.

They've designed a small box that emits 5G. The promise is super-fast, super-reliable connectivity wherever you go.

It's an essential component in the driverless car technology they're also working on here. When you're travelling at 60mph in a car reliant on mobile signals for direction, you can't afford to slip into a digital desert.

Lab director, Professor Dimitra Simeonidou, said: "5G is a revolution. It's not just about having a faster connection in our mobile phones - it's also about creating a seamless connectivity with the network and it's about having complete reliability."

"Often in your home you have great connectivity. Your teenagers might be on YouTube while you're watching programmes streamed on iPlayer. Then you get into your car and you don't even get a 3G service. 5G will stop all of this."

As our data demands climb exponentially we need a network that can support them. Now the race is on to design the framework for that digital dream.

Source: BBC

Brazilian techies close in on biofuel vehicle distance record

Two Brazilian researchers are expected to arrive Thursday in Montevideo, setting a distance record for a vehicle powered by biomethane, a gas obtained from anaerobic digestion of organic matter.

On arrival, the researchers will complete a journey of 856 kilometers (532 miles) from the Brazilian city of Montenegro to the Uruguayan capital.

The vehicle is completing the trip as part of the "Montenegro-Montevideo Challenge," the Uruguayan Industry, Energy and Mines Ministry said in a statement.

Biomethane is "a fuel with all the features of natural gas and the advantage of being produced through processes from renewable sources," such as organic waste from ranches and agro-industry, the ministry said.

The biofuel could become "an attractive alternative to traditional fuels" in agricultural sectors that use machinery intensively, the ministry said.

The Brazilian vehicle's arrival in Montevideo will also help promote the "Biovalor" project launched by Uruguayan officials to study and promote different biogas generation technologies, the ministry said.

The Montenegro-Montevideo Challenge is being coordinated by Surear Institute for the Promotion of Latin American Integration president Fabrizzio Cedraz and bioenergy specialist Alexandre Wentz, of the Brazilian School of Technology and Science.

The researchers plan to spend two days in Montevideo promoting the use of biomethane.

Source: EFE

Colombian small farmers using eBay-type app to boost profits

After years of being battered by onion crop losses, a family in this central Colombian town leveraged its modest computer programming knowledge to create an eBay-type app for buying and selling agricultural products with no need for intermediaries.

The online tool, known as Comproagro and now used by thousands of small farmers in Colombia, was created by 39-year-old Rosalba Vergara and her twins, Brayan and Alejandra Jimenez.

Source: EFE

Tech companies to meet on legal challenge to Trump immigration order

A group of technology companies plans to meet on Tuesday to discuss filing an amicus brief in support of a lawsuit challenging U.S. President Donald Trump's order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, said a spokesperson for a company organizing the gathering.

The meeting is being called together by GitHub, which makes software development tools.

Amicus, or friend of the court, briefs are filed by parties who are not litigants in a case but want to offer arguments or information to the judge.

Alphabet Inc's Google, Airbnb Inc and Netflix Inc are among the companies invited, a separate person familiar with the situation said.

Representatives for Google and Netflix could not immediately be reached for comment. An Airbnb spokesman declined to comment.

The technology sector has become the clearest corporate opponent to the ban announced last week. The industry depends on talent from around the world, and companies have been considering the best way to muster their resources, with efforts so far including statements condemning the move and financial support for organizations backing immigrants, such as the American Civil Liberties Union.

The Trump administration says the rules will increase national safety and are well within its powers.

Michal Rosenn, general counsel for fundraising company Kickstarter, which will be involved in a filing, said the effort began on Monday.

"We're all very shaken. We're shaken to see our neighbors and our families and our friends targeted in this way," Rosenn said. "All of us are trying to think about what we can do."

The discussions among the tech companies come after Amazon.com Inc and Expedia Inc filed declarations in court on Monday supporting a lawsuit filed by the Washington state attorney general. Amazon and Expedia said Trump's order adversely impacts their business.

A separate lawsuit challenging Trump's order as unconstitutional was filed on Monday by the Council on American-Islamic Relations. If the tech companies decide to file an amicus brief as a group, it is unclear which case they would weigh in on.

Other companies invited to meet include Adobe Systems Inc, AdRoll, Automattic Inc, Box Inc, Cloudera Inc, Cloudflare Inc, Docusign, Dropbox, Etsy Inc, Evernote Corp, Glu Mobile Inc, Lithium, Medium, Mozilla, Pinterest, reddit, Salesforce.com Inc, SpaceX, Stripe, Yelp Inc, and Zynga Inc, the source said.

A representative for internet communications company Twilio confirmed it will be involved in filing an amicus brief.

Cloudflare Chief Executive Matthew Prince said the internet security company is willing to consider and sign an amicus brief. Denelle Dixon, chief legal and business officer for Mozilla, said the immigration order was "misplaced and damaging, to Mozilla, to the technology industry and to the country."

Spokespeople for Box and AdRoll said they would attend the meeting. An Etsy spokeswoman said the company received Github's invite but could not confirm if it would move forward with the group.

Salesforce declined to comment. Representatives for the other companies could not immediately be reached for comment.

Source: Reuters

Facebook to develop app for television set-top boxes: WSJ

Facebook Inc is creating an app for television set-top boxes, including Apple Inc's Apple TV, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The world's biggest online social network is also in discussions with media companies to license long-form, TV-quality programming, the Journal reported on Tuesday. (on.wsj.com/2kNGMgx)

Facebook declined to comment.

An app for set-top boxes would bring Facebook closer to live video and video advertisements.

Getting advertisers to buy more video ads is key to Facebook's continued revenue growth as such ads fetch higher rates from advertisers than text or photo-based ads.

Live video is also becoming a highly competitive feature on social platforms, with companies competing to stream major sports events and exclusive video components from high-profile events such as the Oscar and Grammy awards shows.

In April, Facebook expanded its live video product, Facebook Live - a potential threat to broadcast television, giving it prominent placement on its app and rolling out features to make it easier for users to search and comment in real time.

Source: Reuters

Mobile payments in China grew 31.2 percent in 2016

The number of people, who opted for mobile payments in China soared by 31.2 percent in 2016 to reach 469 million, according to a study by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) cited in official media reports Monday.

This strong growth was partly due to a continued increase in users connecting to the internet through their mobile phones, which grew 75 million, or 12.1 percent, in 2016, to stand at 696 million.

Source: EFE

Spiders can 'tune' webs for good vibrations, researchers say

Spiders can control the tension and stiffness of their webs to optimize their sensory powers, helping them locate and identify prey as well as partners, according to researchers at Oxford University.

Much in same way that notes travel along a plucked guitar string, spider silk transmits vibrations in different frequencies, sending information back to the spider.

"Spiders use vibrations not only from prey which is caught in their web, where obviously it's important that they know ...where it is and what it might be," researcher Beth Mortimer told Reuters.

"But vibrations are also important in courtship ... A lot of males will actually generate a very specific kind of musical pattern which the females can use to determine not only that they're a male but they're the right species and whether she might want to mate with them as well."

Spiders can also use the information to assess their web's condition, she said.

As part of a study published last month in collaboration with the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, researchers in Oxford took a web from the garden cross spider - Araneus diadematus - and sent measured pulses into its silk strands.

They used a laser to measure vibrations propagating through the web, showing how the waiting spider altered wave amplitude by changing tension and silk stiffness.

"They're able to very closely change the tension of their webs... This means they have a mechanism for directly controlling both the tension and the stiffness of their silk fibers," Mortimer said.

"(These mechanisms) allow them effectively to tune their web's properties so that they can control how sensory information is getting to them in the middle of the web."

Mortimer plans to conduct similar tests with more exotic species, including golden orb-weaver spiders.

Source: Reuters

JNintendo triples net profit after sale of Seattle Mariners stake

Between April and September, Japanese video game company Nintendo earned a net profit that is almost triple of what it earned in 2015, owing to the multimillion-dollar sale of its stake in the United States baseball club Seattle Mariners, reported economic daily Nikkei newspaper Monday.

Nintendo is expected to announce its results for the first half of the Japanese fiscal year Wednesday, which will include a net profit of approximately $288 million, reported Nikkei.

Source: EFE

Tesla says it will roll out Uber-style ride services program

Tesla Motors Inc (TSLA.O) is planning to roll out a ride services program and will announce details next year, the luxury electric vehicle maker said on its website, a service first outlined by Chief Executive Elon Musk in his master plan in July.

News of the Tesla Network was in a disclaimer about the self-driving functionality on new Model S vehicles. Musk said on Wednesday Tesla is building new vehicles with the necessary hardware to eventually enable full autonomy, although the software is not yet ready.

"Please note that using a self-driving Tesla for car sharing and ride hailing for friends and family is fine, but doing so for revenue purposes will only be permissible on the Tesla Network, details of which will be released next year," read the disclaimer.

Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for more detail.

Car makers have rushed to invest in so-called mobility services, hoping to capture the potential trillions of dollars in revenue from selling both vehicles and such on-demand services, while carving out a stake in the industry dominated by Uber UBER.UL.

Barclays analyst Brian Johnson wrote in a note to investors on Thursday that although a Tesla Network could "excite the market" over its potential earnings stream, it was a costly proposition.

"While we think ride-sharing/hailing is the future of mass-market mobility, we have some financial concerns with the idea of an OEM-owned fleet," Johnson wrote.

Venture capitalists and corporate investors had poured nearly $28 billion into the ride services sector in the past decade as of June, according to a Reuters analysis.

General Motors has made the biggest bet, investing $500 million in Lyft in January. GM's upcoming electric Chevrolet Bolt was designed expressly with car sharing in mind, executives have told Reuters.

Money-losing Tesla lacks the deep pockets of GM, and ride services companies like Uber and Lyft burn billions of dollars in price wars to secure regional dominance, as occurred with Uber in China before it ceded to local rival Didi Chuxing.

In his "Master Plan, Part Deux" in July, Musk outlined a system in which a Tesla owner could add a car to a shared Tesla fleet using a phone app, allowing it to "generate income for you" and lower the cost of ownership.

Musk said that in cities where car ownership is lower, Tesla would operate its own fleet.

Source: Reuters

Microsoft shares hit high as cloud business flies above estimates

Microsoft Corp said sales of its flagship cloud product doubled in its first quarter, propelling earnings above analysts' estimates and sending its shares to an all-time high, breaking past a level hit in 1999 at the peak of the tech stock bubble.

The company's shares have doubled since August 2013 with Chief Executive Satya Nadella restoring investor confidence by focusing on mobile and cloud computing rather than PCs.

Long known for its Windows software, Microsoft has shifted focus to the cloud where it is dueling with larger rival Amazon.com Inc to control the still fledgling market. Its jump in revenue underscores how businesses around the world are turning to new applications in the cloud and leaving once critical software programs and other hardware in the dust.

Shares of Microsoft rose as much as 6.2 percent to $60.79 in after-hours trading. They later pared gains to $60.43, still adding nearly $25 billion to its market value.

The Redmond, Washington-based company said sales from its flagship cloud product Azure, which businesses can use to host their websites, apps or data, rose 116 percent. Revenue for its broader "Intelligent Cloud" business rose 8.3 percent to $6.38 billion, beating analysts' average estimate of $6.27 billion, according to research firm FactSet StreetAccount.

"We are not just building or moving (clients') IT," Nadella said on an analyst call. Customers "are building new digital services for hyper scale. And that's what is probably unique in terms of what has changed year over year for us.

"It's not just the Silicon Valley startups anymore; it is the core enterprise that is also becoming a digital company. And we are well-positioned to serve them," he said.

The company forecast that sales for its Intelligent Cloud business will be between $6.55 billion and $6.75 billion in the current quarter, compared with $6.34 billion in the same period a year earlier.

"There’s a huge runway for them to show growth," said Trip Chowdhry, managing director of Global Equities Research.

HEAD IN THE CLOUDS

Early investment in the cloud, coupled with machine learning and applications that can scale at different levels, have set Microsoft and Amazon Web Services apart from smaller rivals - and precipitated the decline of older software companies, Chowdhry said.

Microsoft had an effective monopoly on computing software in the 1990s and was for some time the world’s most valuable publicly traded company.

But its power waned in the 2000s after a bruising battle with the U.S. Department of Justice over how it used its monopoly power to squeeze competitors.

Co-founder Bill Gates stepped down as CEO early in 2000 and Microsoft spent the next decade and a half in a strategic dilemma as it clung to its PC-centric view of the computing world while it was outflanked by Google in the internet and Apple Inc in smartphones.

Earlier this year, Nadella made headlines when he orchestrated Microsoft's biggest-ever deal, agreeing in June to buy the social network for professionals LinkedIn Corp for $26.2 billion.

But the focus on mobile applications and the cloud's blockbuster growth masked dips in sales for other units of the company in the quarter.

Worldwide PC shipments fell 3.9 percent in the quarter ended Sept. 30, according to research firm IDC, although that was much less than the 7.1 percent it had previously estimated.

Revenue in the unit that includes Windows software and the company's struggling mobile business fell 1.8 percent to $9.29 billion. Microsoft forecast the division will have sales of up to $11.6 billion in the current quarter - well below the $12.7 billion it posted for the unit a year earlier.

The decline in Lumia smartphone sales was a "blemish," said Patrick Moorhead of Moor Insights & Strategy, albeit an expected one.

"At some point that Windows number needs to start to rise, but given market declines, it’s hard to expect that," he said.

Including deferred revenue from Windows 10, Microsoft earned 76 cents per share in the just-ended first fiscal quarter of 2017, beating analysts' average estimate of 68 cents, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

On an adjusted basis, Microsoft reported revenue of $22.33 billion, above the average estimate of $21.71 billion.

Source: Reuters

In his basement, son designs prosthetic arm for father in Belarus

Sergei Galtsev, a Soviet army captain at the time, lost his right arm in an explosion on a military firing range when his son, Oleg, was four years old.

Almost three decades later the 53-year-old Belarussian became the first tester of a prosthetic arm designed and made by his own son in the basement of his apartment building.

"We wanted to create a simple and affordable prosthesis," said Oleg, a 32-year-old software engineer.

Two years ago he teamed up with engineer Sergei Arefyev to develop an artificial arm. The video of its final tests hit almost a million views on YouTube, with the partners making all the designs and software available on the internet for free.

"We did not patent it as it made more sense to spend money on development," Oleg said.

"It's like Lego, designed for people who are not at ease with electronics: just put the parts together. If I managed it, then others can do it, too."

In a country better known for its Soviet-era collectivized farming and run by President Alexander Lukashenko since 1994, the software industry is thriving. Belarus's 54 universities turn out 4,000 software engineers every year.

The prosthetic arm was created in a small workshop in the basement of a residential building in Minsk. Some parts were created using a 3D-printer, some were bought on the internet.

Galtsev and Arefyev say their design is 10 times cheaper than $15,000 mechanical prostheses from big manufacturers, although it lacks sensor controls.

Sergei Galtsev says his world was turned upside down by the accident which befell him when he was 26. It ended his military career and he took his wife and two children back to the home town of Chechersk in what is now Belarus.

His new arm has brought new possibilities within reach.

"It is a very good thing, and it can help so many people," he said after testing the device at his house in the country.

"I sawed wood, mowed the lawn, did some other work around house".

Source: Reuters

IBM, Google, others to unveil new open interface to take on Intel

Technology giants IBM Corp, Google and seven others have joined hands to launch an open specification that can boost datacenter server performance by up to ten times, to take on Intel Corp.

The new standard, called Open Coherent Accelerator Processor Interface (OpenCAPI), is an open forum to provide a high bandwidth, low latency open interface design specification.

The open interface will help corporate and cloud data centers to speed up big data, machine learning, analytics and other emerging workloads.

The consortium plans to make the OpenCAPI specification available to the public before the end of the year and expects servers and related products based on the new standard in the second half of 2017, it said in a statement.

Intel, the world's largest chipmaker, is known to protect its server technologies and has chosen to sit out of the new consortium. In the past also, it had stayed away from prominent open standards technology groups such as CCIX and Gen-Z.

"As artificial intelligence, machine learning and advanced analytics become the price of doing business in today's digital era, huge volumes of data are now the norm," Doug Balog, general manager for IBM Power, told Reuters.

"It's clear that today's datacenters can no longer rely on one company alone to drive innovation," Balog said.

Advanced Micro Devices Inc, Dell EMC, Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co, Mellanox Technologies Ltd, Micron Technology Inc, NVIDIA Corp and Xilinx Inc are also members of the OpenCAPI consortium.

Source: Reuters

Pixel smartphone leads Google charge into hardware

Tech giant Google on Tuesday at a San Francisco news conference presented a new family of its products, featuring the new Pixel smartphone and the launching of the Daydream View virtual reality headset.

Pixel was, without a doubt, the star product at the event.

Source: EFE

Toyota announces release of 'Kirobo Mini' robot companion

Toyota Motor announced Monday that its "Kirobo Mini" robot, a compact robot designed as a communication assistant, will go on sale across Japan in 2017.

This will be preceded by a presale campaign at designated dealers this winter in Tokyo and Aichi Prefecture.

Source: EFE

Uber expands food delivery business into South Africa

Uber Technologies starts its UberEats food-delivery service in South Africa on Thursday before expanding in the rest of the country and into the continent, it said on Wednesday.

It will begin delivering meals in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg, South Africa's largest city, before moving across the Gauteng province and to Cape Town in 2017, Uber Operations and Logistics Manager Dave Kitley told reporters.

Uber is making an aggressive global drive into takeaway meal deliveries, gearing up with a big staff recruitment campaign to enter at least 22 more countries. UberEats already operates in six countries and will launch in Amsterdam on Thursday.

Uber launched its ride-hailing service in South Africa in 2013 and since then the service has grown to over 4,000 drivers in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth.

"Johannesburg was the first city in Africa to have Uber launch and based on the success of launching in Africa as well as the characteristics of Jo'burg and where we are right now in terms of our maturity it is really about testing the product and being the first city in Africa," Kitley said.

Kitley said Uber would look to expand UberEats into Africa "as quickly as we can, but right now no imminent plans for that".

Source: Reuters

Snapchat to offer camera-equipped sunglasses in first hardware push

Snap Inc, the newly renamed parent company of messaging app Snapchat, plans to start selling camera-equipped sunglasses starting this fall, Chief Executive Evan Spiegel told the Wall Street Journal in an interview.

The sunglasses, dubbed Spectacles, will be sold via limited distribution for about $130, said Spiegel, who described the device as a toy.

The first hardware to be sold by Snap, the sunglasses will record video from the user's perspective in 10-second increments that can be synched with his or her smart-phone.

Source: Reuters

UPS launches U.S. drone test flights for urgent medical deliveries

United Parcel Service Inc said it began testing the use of drones for emergency deliveries of medical supplies this week with a flight in rural Massachusetts, which the company hopes will eventually lead to federal approval of drones as a regular delivery option.

The test flight on Thursday was handled by CyPhy, a Danvers, Massachusetts-based drone maker in which UPS, the world's largest package delivery company, owns a stake.

The drone delivered a small package from Beverly, located about 25 miles northeast of Boston, to Children's Island, a summer camp for children three miles off the Atlantic coast.

The drone, painted brown and with a UPS logo on the front, made the journey in about 8 minutes.

"This demonstrates a drone is the best and most efficient way to deliver a package in a medical emergency in a remote location," Helen Greiner, chief technology officer and founder of CyPhy, told Reuters.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) last month published rules that restrict the use of drones to within the line of sight of the operator.

Mark Wallace, UPS senior vice president of global engineering, said the company hopes to persuade the FAA to allow UPS to expand on its tests and eventually offer emergency deliveries by drone as part of its services.

Earlier this year UPS announced it was backing a start-up using drones in Rwanda to transport life-saving blood supplies and vaccines.

Drones are seen as having great potential to deliver packages, once FAA concerns over safety have been addressed.

Online retailer Amazon.com Inc has been testing drones in the United Kingdom, Canada and Denmark, while Wal-Mart Stores has been using them to manage inventory at warehouses.

Source: Reuters