firm

Apple has announced that the people in charge of iOS and its retail store business are leaving the company. Surprisingly, industry analysts aren't concerned about the departures. Apple iOS chief Scott Forstall and retail executive John Browett have ... both announced they are leaving the Cupertino, California-based firm. Browett, who is leaving immediately, has been on the job only six months. Forstall has been with Apple for fifteen years. The company has previously said it considers him one of the lead architects of the firm's popular Mac OS X operating system. (Source: bostonherald.com ) Maps ... (view more)

Microsoft wasn't the only firm to report significant revenue losses last week. Advanced Micro Devices, popularly known as AMD, revealed that its revenue recently hit a three-year low. In response, the firm says it must cut costs by eliminating close ... to 1,800 jobs worldwide. AMD is a major producer of computer microprocessors. A few years ago it was neck-and-neck with Intel in the race for market leadership. Today it's still in second place, but much farther behind. Overall PC sales are down throughout the industry, leaving the entire personal computer market to face an uncertain future. Part ... (view more)

Chinese PC maker Lenovo now ships more computers than any other company in the world. It's the first time in history the firm has held the leading market position. Technology research firm Gartner recently reported that Lenovo holds a 15.7 per cent ... share of the global PC market. The company's huge market share was helped by the 13.77 million PCs shipped in the third quarter alone. Lenovo now surpasses Hewlett-Packard (HP), which previously led the PC market. However, HP is not far behind Lenovo, selling 15.5 per cent of all computers traded on the global market. World's PC Shipments Decline ... (view more)

A new report indicates that Apple's next version of the iPhone smartphone, the iPhone 5, will hit stores in late September, 2012. Internet blog TechCrunch says it has learned from a "trusted Verizon employee" that the mobile communications firm will ... begin an employee vacation blackout on September 21. The Verizon worker says the firm will prevent employees from taking time off from then until September 30, a period of nine days. Such a blackout is significant because it suggests Verizon will need all hands on deck for the release of a very popular new product. (Source: techcrunch.com ) Short ... (view more)

There's no doubt 2011 has been a very tough year for Research in Motion (RIM), makers of the BlackBerry smartphone and PlayBook tablet, as sales of both devices are down across the board. Now, after the Waterloo, Canada-based firm knocked hundreds ... off the price of its PlayBook last month, a new report says RIM is losing nearly half a billion dollars on the item. The PlayBook tablet first shipped way back in the spring of 2011 with very high expectations. Featuring BlackBerry integration, it was supposed to be the "must-have" item for fans of the company's popular smartphone. ... (view more)

Google has made a formal and public apology to Chinese authors after including their works in its book search project without permission. It's a striking contrast to the way the firm responded to similar complaints in the United States and Europe. ... Google Book Search involves scanning books with optical character recognition so that the text can be searched. The firm argues that this is simply to make it easier for users to find information in books and that they are limited to seeing the relevant pages rather than it being a free way to read an entire book. The firm has consistently ... (view more)

As Microsoft and independent firms alike try to find out more about the " black screen of death " issue plaguing some users of Windows 7, the firm which first reported the problem has earned its fair share of criticism. However, that same firm ... maintains that despite getting the cause wrong, it still has the best solution. Fix for Some, Not All Cases Although it's now clear that Prevx misidentified Microsoft's update as being responsible for the problem, and grossly overestimated how many people could be affected, the firm has produced a fix which is reported to work in many, but not all, ... (view more)

Microsoft has withdrawn its demand for a hearing after it was found guilty of anti-competitive behavior in Europe. The firm says it could not hope for a fair hearing because many officials will be unable to attend. The European Commission, the EU's ... administrative wing, issued a 'ruling in principle' in January that Microsoft had breached competition laws by bundling Internet Explorer with Windows while not allowing other browsers to be included with the system on new machines. Nobody's Listening The hearing on this issue had been scheduled for June 3rd through June 5th, but Microsoft says it ... (view more)

If you have a need for speed, Cablevision could be the broadband firm for you. It's offering subscribers a new U.S. record of 101Mbps: fast enough to download an high definition (HD) movie in less than 10 minutes. The package, known as 'Ultra', will ... launch on May 11 and will cost $99.95 a month. It also allows uploads of 15Mbps and has no monthly limits on either: uploads or downloads. Cablevision is also doubling the speed of its WiFi service, which is available free to subscribers and uses hotspots in various locations across the northeast. (Source: dslreports.com ) Cablevision uses a ... (view more)

Google will invest a whopping $100 million in start-up companies over the next 12 months, and says a recession is an ideal time to invest in firms that could someday make it big. The money comes from a scheme titled Google Ventures, which aims to ... combine the firm's technical knowledge and financial resources with the creative ideas of new companies. The firm says it will focus on industries including "consumer Internet, software, clean-tech, bio-tech, health care" and others. (Source: theregister.co.uk and nytimes.com ) Google says there's no reason not to invest during an economic slowdown ... (view more)