#Verizon new, experimental Fios service is 10 times faster than Google Fiber Verizon's Fios network is already capable of top speeds of 500 megabits per second,
which lets you download an HD movie in about 15 seconds. But the Fios of tomorrow could be as much as 20 times faster than even those blazing speeds.
Verizon has just finished testing a next-generation fiber-optic Internet technology that allows the company to transfer data at rates of 10 gigabits per second.
For those keeping track, that's 10 times faster than even Google Fiber, which offers some of the speediest fiber you can buy today.
Verizon believes its new technology called NG-PON2 hort for"next-generation passive optical network"ould eventually grow to support speeds of 80 Gbps. That's thousands of times faster than
what most average U s. households get today. Fiber-optic cables work by sending data that's been encoded as packets of light.
NG-PON2 transmits the data using certain wavelengths of light that can handle 10 Gbps of capacity each, according to a company release.
The company tested NG-PON2 at a customer's house three miles away from Verizon's central office in Framingham, Mass.
It also tried it out with a business customer. A burgeoning arms race is occurring in the broadband industry.
Comcast for instance, has been working on a 2 Gbps service that it recently said will cost $300 a month.
While this version of Fios probably won't be coming to your area anytime soon and would be insanely expensive
even if it did the demonstration shows just how fast the Internet will someday become. That capacity will be used to accommodate new technologies like driverless cars,
smart appliances and a host of other emerging products we haven't even invented yet.
Read more: Here how much Comcast is charging for its answer to Google Fibercharlottesville is about to get oogle Fiber lite,
thanks to this small wireless carriergoogle ultra-fast Internet service expands to San Antoni p
#MIT researchers create X-ray vision to protect the elderly It all started in 2012, with
what MIT grad student Fadel Adib called a crazy idea. What if Wifi could see through walls?
Adib posed the question to his adviser, professor Dina Katabi. It set them on a journey to today.
In a new paper they describe a sensor that sends radio signals through a wall and can identify people.
The team plans to launch a start-up in 2016 to commercialize the technology. The most appealing initial use is to determine
if a senior citizen has fallen in his or her home. The team expects the sensor to be able to see through multiple walls and look as far as 40 feet.
There are devices the elderly can wear to send for help in the event of a fall
but research has shown they aren worn always when falls happen. The MIT solution wouldn require anything to be worn.
The system would learn to identify the person, and could send alerts in the event of a fall. e want to provide peace of mind without intruding too much on lives or taking independence away,
Katabi said. The researchers foresee other uses too, such as for video games, and smart-home sensors.
Nest, for example, monitors the movements of residents so that it can adjust temperatures and keep utility bills low.
The system works by sending a radio signal that will bounce off a person and back to the device.
These signals travel through walls just as Wireless internet signals do. Data from body parts that curve away from the device won be recognized
because the signals deflect away from the device. But the device stitches together what data points return to it as the person moves,
to create a generally identifiable silhouette. Their system, however, isn eagled-eyed. The images of humans look like heat maps,
but in their tests that was enough data for the system to distinguish between five people with 95.7 percent accuracy,
and 15 people with 88.2 percent accuracy. They were also able to identify which body part a person was moving
while standing nearly 10 feet away, with 99 percent accuracy. The team is clear that the technology is still a work in progress.
Currently the sensor needs a person to be walking directly at it to function. A person walking at an angle is harder to pick up.
Theyl be presenting their research at a conference next month in Japan. The researchers acknowledge there are related privacy concerns,
and say they will consider them as they continue to develop the technology o
#MIT researchers create X-ray vision to protect the elderly It all started in 2012, with
what MIT grad student Fadel Adib called a crazy idea. What if Wifi could see through walls?
Adib posed the question to his adviser, professor Dina Katabi. It set them on a journey to today.
In a new paper out of MIT Computer science and Artificial intelligence Lab, the researchers describe a sensor that sends radio signals through a wall
and can identify people. The team plans to launch a start-up in 2016 to commercialize the technology.
The most appealing initial use is to determine if a senior citizen has fallen in his or her home.
The team expects the sensor to be able to see through multiple walls and look as far as 40 feet.
There are devices the elderly can wear to send for help in the event of a fall
but research has shown they aren worn always when falls happen. The MIT solution wouldn require anything to be worn.
The system would learn to identify the person, and could send alerts in the event of a fall. e want to provide peace of mind without intruding too much on lives or taking independence away,
such as for video games, and smart-home sensors. Nest, for example, monitors the movements of residents so that it can adjust temperatures and keep utility bills low.
The system works by sending a radio signal that will bounce off a person and back to the device.
These signals travel through walls just as Wireless internet signals do. Data from body parts that curve away from the device won be recognized
because the signals deflect away from the device. But the device stitches together what data points return to it as the person moves,
to create a generally identifiable silhouette. Their system, however, isn eagled-eyed. The images of humans look like heat maps,
but in their tests that was enough data for the system to distinguish between five people with 95.7 percent accuracy,
and 15 people with 88.2 percent accuracy. They were also able to identify which body part a person was moving
Currently the sensor needs a person to be walking directly at it to function. A person walking at an angle is harder to pick up.
and energy saving desalination technology Researchers at the Alexandria University in Egypt have developed a new desalination technology that can produce potable water at reduced energy.
Titled as'Desalination of simulated seawater by purge-air pervaporation using an innovative fabricated membrane,
Developed by University of Alexandria researchers Mona Naim, Mahmoud Elewa, Ahmed El-Shafei and Abeer Moneer,
Alexandria University agricultural and biosystems engineering associate professor Ahmed El-Shafei was quoted by Yahoo News as saying:"
"Using pervaporation eliminates the need for electricity that is used in classic desalination processes, thus cutting costs significantly."
The research team from Egypt is also working on a pilot desalination unit for testing the method on a larger scale e
#Gallium nitride and Sol-Gel Transistors to Change Electronics and Energy consumption Cambridge Electronics, Inc. CEI), whose motto is"Dream it.
"is a Massachusetts company on a mission to reduce energy consumption while giving energy users access to all the familiar technology they want and need.
How can it achieve this promise? Through a new semiconductor material, gallium nitride (Gan. Already being used in LED light bulbs, television and computer displays,
and mobile phones, Gan has efficient light emission capability, something silicon cannot duplicate. But silicon remains the defacto material of choice semidconductors
and transistors found in all the computing devices of our modern world. CEI, through Gan, hopes to change because not only is the material more efficient in light emission,
it also handles power more efficiently than any silicon-based transistor. Over nine years CEI has been perfecting Gan
and today it can outperform silicon providing 1/10th the resistance of silicon transistors. This means faster switches
faster computers, and smaller form factors. For example a Gan power adapter can be integrated into a laptop
and other electronic devices eliminating the clunky brick that is commonly comes with a device's power cord.
It also means huge savings for energy utilities who will benefit not only from the use of Gan in power generating equipment
but also in capacity to fulfill consumer demand. So why aren't we seeing a flood of electronic devices on the market made from Gan now?
Because the expense of Gan manufacturing when compared to silicon has always been its Achilles heel.
But that's changed. New Gan manufacturing techniques that mimic silicon wafer fabrication have brought the cost down to match the latter.
It should be a no brainer for Gan going forward, a material that cuts power consumption by more than 90%,produces the same or better levels of performance,
and reduces the size and cost of electronic devices. Massachusetts institute of technology, the brain trust from which CEI was hatched believes using Gan in data servers, electric vehicle inverters
solar power inverters, industrial motor controllers, and other electronics will produce $900 billion in energy savings annually by 2025.
That's impressive. But don't count silicon out just yet. That's our next story.
Hybrid Silica Changing Sol-Gel Supercapacitors A new material made from a common fatty acid, octylphosphonic acid,
may soon be found in supercapacitors used in electromagnetic propulsion, electric vehicles, defibrillators and other instant quick-discharge devices.
Sporting higher energy density than lithium-ion we may even see batteries made with this material.
Called sol-gel thin film, it is made up of a single layer of silicon atoms and a nanoscale self-assembled layer of octylphosphonic acid.
The structure provides low current leakage high energy extraction and heat tolerance. Performance of sol-gel thin film electrodes at Georgia Tech's laboratories has exceeded all existing commercial electrolytic capacitors and thin-film lithium-ion batteries.
States Professor Joseph Perry, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Georgia Tech,"sol-gels...such as phosphonic acids are well known...
but to the best of our knowledge, this is the fist time these two types of materials have been combined into high-density energy storage devices...
this is the first time I've seen a capacitor beat a battery on energy density.""The research into sol-gel supercapacitors appeared in the July 14th edition of the journal, Advanced Energy Materials.
Now the question becomes, can the materials be scaled up and become cost competitive e
#Stash App Brings $5 Investments, and Advice, to Newcomers to Trading The ebb and flow of the public markets gets a lot of attention these days,
but to novices, understanding stock trading can be like picking up wet spaghetti barehanded. On Wednesday, the Stash app made its public debut,
giving advice on trading and letting people invest for as little as $5. David Ronick (pictured above),
CEO and cofounder, says New york-based Stashinvest developed the app in response to a trend that troubled him
and his fellow cofounders. ur nephews and nieces are in their 20s and they don invest at all,
because investing historically has been one of the best ways to make money over the long-term.
Ronick says traditional investing services can seem opaque to the general public, leaving them confused about
With Stash, people can make investments based on their personal beliefs, wants, and likes, he says,
For instance, someone concerned about the environment might choose to invest in the Clean & Green category.
Underneath the hood though they are investing in the ishares S&p global clean energy index fund. The app lets users choose from some 30 types of investments
a move Ronick says offers them choice without becoming overwhelming. The app also explains some of the concepts of the financial markets in layperson terms to help educate them about making investments.
Users can buy fractional shares, which lets folks get started with just $5. Cofounder Brandon Krieg says Stash buys whole shares from the market,
and then with clearing partner on the backend, allocates fractional shares to usersaccounts. y owning fractional shares you still get dividends,
so you aren missing out, he says. Stashinvest is not alone though in trying to be a stepping stone for neophytes in investing.
New york-based Goldbean which demoed at last month New york Tech Meetup, also gives newcomers to stock trading a way to get a better grasp on buying
The idea is to help investors take small steps, reach milestones, and develop solid investment habits.
As people sign up for Stash, they are scored on their financial risk, which screens potential investments so they only see things they can reasonably take on. he user can override their risk profile,
Krieg says. Stash will also show users how others with similar risk profiles are investing through the app
he says. ee not trying to force people out of their comfort zone, he says. e want them to invest in ways they should be investing.
Prior to Stashinvest, Ronick co-founded Creatorbox, an alum of the Kaplan Techstars Edtech Accelerator.
Stashinvest has raised $1. 5 million so far from angel investors; its app is available on ios with Android to follow in a couple of months.
Ronick says the team interviewed more than 100 other people who largely believed investing was confusing
and expensiveomething Stashinvest thinks it can change. He also says 52 percent of Americans do not invest, especially folks under the age of 30,
#Amazon wants you to stick Dash wi-fi'buy'buttons all over your home Amazon has released new wi-fi-connected Dash buttons for people who never want to run out of laundry detergent, coffee,
Once connected to the home wi-fi network, the buttons allow the user to click to order from a range of around 200 items supplied by Amazon.
Currently the Dash button is an invite-only offer to members of Amazon Prime, the two-day delivery service that in future Amazon wants to be powered by drones.
The new Dash buttons appear to be an extension of a Dash system it launched last year aimed at its Amazon Fresh subscribers
Amazon is also working with a handful of manufacturers to integrate Dash functionality into the hardware.
and printer firm Brother. The company is also on the hunt for all sorts of device makers that have goods to sell alongside their own devices.
but with so many conveniently placed'buy'buttons around the home, you'd be forgiven for thinking it would be a little too easy for kids to accidentally overstock the house.
an alert is delivered to the home owner's smartphone, which they can then cancel if needed.
and economy of the US.""I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with this threat,
while Iranian hackers have targeted American banks. Writing on Medium he said:""Networks that control much of our critical infrastructure-including our financial systems
"White house homeland security adviser Lisa Monaco said there had been a significant increase in the frequency, scale and sophistication of cyber incidents targeting the US in the past year.
or Italy, the level of youth unemployment in Turkey remains significant. According to the latest official figures,
Women have it harder at 22.2 percent reflecting a more general gender issue in the labour market.
and in which internet penetration while still low (46 percent) compared to Western europe standards (though ahead of many other countries in the MENA region)."
it was local graduates who started developing local versions of foreign services.""We have received around 11,000 applications in the last six years the Turkish market,
"mostly from males aged 25 to 30, well-educated, with a university degree. Initially, in the first two or three years, a higher percentage of the applications were for launching ecommerce companies."
"Everybody's not-so-secret dream, then, was following the footsteps of ebay and Amazon,
with the hope of sooner or later being acquired by an established company. It was a dream that came true for one company.
In 2011, ebay bought auction marketplace Gittigidiyor, essentially a clone of the American multinational, for $22m.
a flower delivery service. window. console && console. log && console. log("ADS: queuing sharethrough-top-552658eaec1d7 for display";
"var cbsigptdivids=cbsigptdivids; cbsigptdivids. push("sharethrough-top-552658eaec1d7";"With time, the scene started to become more and more professional and diversified."
or candidates with significant work experience, pursuing truly innovative ideas. And last but not least, we are finally seeing both R&d-based scientists, engineers,
and innovation is confined longer to auction sites, the wave of online retail websites is still rampant:
recently, celebrity-endorsed fashion shopping site Lydiana. com now serves over 90,000 customers per day,
while Yemeksepeti (also known as foodonclick), an online food delivery platform which employs more than 200 staff serving over 1. 2 million registered users in eight countries.
But nowadays, there are many companies and startups that are focusing on other sectors: from gaming to software development and mobile applications."
"Most common companies we see are based internet ones that do need not to much initial funding to thrive.
A real issue in Turkey is having access to capital at an early stage. Seed money is almost nonexistent:
it's possible to get some early funding only through competitions, but there are no structured seed money programs,"Viveka accelerator's cofounder Ece?
dil Re? a Kasap told ZDNET. Things change when it comes to angel funding, with sums ranging around $100, 000.
Endeavor estimates that there are an estimated total of 450 active business angels in Turkey nowadays;
the most renowned angel investor networks include Arya Women's Investor Platform, BIC Angels, Etohum, Galata Business Angels, Keiretsu Forum, Metutech-ban and Sirket Ortagim.
A little off-scale is'super angel'and former entrepreneur Hasan Aslanoba, who invested a total of $46m in 53 companies over the last two years,
single-handedly doubling the total value of angel funding during the period. The Turkish government has done also its part to help the ecosystem grow with the launch in 2013 of an incentive program that allows qualified angel investors to access significant tax deductions on their angel investments (up to 75 percent or 1 million Turkish lira.
In addition, there's a small group of local venture capital funds-Ilab Ventures, Mediterra Capital, Pera Capital, Revo Capital,
and 212 Ltd-that can help startups access larger funding rounds. Not that you always have to rely on VCS to make it big,
as the story of Pozitron, a mobile money company founded in 2006 by Fatih and Firat Isbecer, shows.
Starting from scratch and growing the business with zero venture funding, the two brothers were able to scale from 13 engineers in 2007 to more than 250 engineers across five countries
when they were acquired fully by UK-based Monitise in 2014. As the two Isbecers could confirm
The effect of election years on currency fluctuations for the Turkish lira is very challenging for startups,
Not to mention the effect that bans on sites such as Twitter and Youtube have, like those repeatedly ensued by prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
have to rely on social media for their marketing efforts. Other common complaints concern the difficulties of securing work visas for international employees and some negative cultural aspects
such as the low tolerance to failure and a strong"family effect",by which children are encouraged to choose safer careers.
I think we can survive better during times of economic crisis,"Re? a Kasap says.""What's more,
In October last year, the European Bank for reconstruction and development, together with six Turkish banks, launched the Finance and Advice for Women in Business programme,
designed to strengthen the role of female entrepreneurs in the economy. While not tech-related, the success of B-Fit, a franchise of women-only gyms across Turkey launched in 2006 by Bedriye Halya,
represents an inspiring case history for would-be female entrepreneurs. And the"Woman Entrepreneur of the Year"award
#Every company now a software company, continued In this space, we've talked about the great shift that has been taking place across the business landscape--that is, every company,
no matter how far from tech they may seem--is evolving into a software company, and by extension, a data company.
That widget manufacturer down the street likely has a data center and has developed and maintains a portfolio of its own custom software that keep evolving.
Now, it also may be employing services, with a layer of analytics on top, that extends out to its networks of supply chain vendors,
business partners, and customers. The company may even be renting out its software-based online services to others in its industry.
Gil Press, managing Partner at gpress, a marketing, publishing, research and education consultancy, talks extensively about this great shift in his latest Forbes post, in
which he looks at the rise of financial services companies as developers and sellers of IT services.
Press observes that while a few large vendors--IBM, Cisco, EMC, Oracle, HP, and a reinvigorated Dell--still dominate the IT sector,
he argues that this model of IT delivery we've know for decades"is on its last legs,"
, Google, Facebook, Amazon) Large, IT-intensive enterprises (e g.,, financial services companies) The emergence of financial services companies as IT providers is something that has been brewing for some time.
Even before the tech onslaught, many large banks have rented out their services (such as check processing) to other institutions as additional sources of revenues.
Now, with development of sophisticate digital offerings, these companies are primed to move into new markets. Press cites some interesting examples--such as Santander being the first global bank"to offer cloud data storage services to corporate customers"
and Bank of america planning"to have 80%of its workloads running on software-defined infrastructure inspired by Web companies."
"These enterprises seek"further return--and possibly new sources of revenues--from their large investments in IT,
"Press observes. They also seek to remain clear of IT vendor lock in. It's not just financial services companies that are leveraging their IT assets to branch out into new digital lines of business, of course.
Aerospace companies, consulting firms, retailers and even educational institutions are exploring these new universes. Thanks to cloud
and service oriented architecture, the lines between software providers and software consumers have blurred, almost to the point in
which they are indistinguishable from one another. That means more choice and a lot more flexibility foe everyone e
#Europe to slug Google with antitrust charges and open Android probe The European commission today formally charged Google with violating EU competition law by abusing its dominance in search to gain an edge over specialist rivals.
The charges could force Google to change the way it does business and pay fines of up to $6. 4bn,
or approximately 10 percent of its global revenues last year. On Wednesday the European commission commissioner Margrethe Vestager said the EC had sent formally a statement of objections to Google.
The statement says Google"abused its dominant position in the markets for general internet search services in the European Economic Area (EEA) by systematically favouring its own comparison shopping product in its general search results pages"
breaching antitrust law, according to the EC.""In the case of Google I am concerned that the company has given an unfair advantage to its own comparison shopping service, in breach of EU antitrust rules.
Google now has the opportunity to convince the Commission to the contrary. However, if the investigation confirmed our concerns,
Google would have to face the legal consequences and change the way it does business in Europe,
"Vestager said in a statement. A fortnight ago, Vestager sought permission from complainants to publish their claims,
suggesting that formal charges were imminent. Past complainants include Microsoft, Tripadvisor, and Yelp, as well several German and French publishers.
The charges will bring to a head the EC's five-year investigation into Google's business practices in Europe
where it has a market share of over 90 percent share for search. The investigation has focused previously on
whether Google used its dominance to give its own specialised searches in shopping, travel and other categories an edge over rivals,
'as well as claims Google reused content from rivals without authorisation, and forced publishers to use Google ads.
According to the FT, some of the 28 commissioners that will be shown the charges today are concerned that Vestager has narrowed the scope of the claims against Google.
ZDNET has sought also comment from Google and will update the story if it receives one.
Google has acknowledged however the charges in a letter to staff yesterday reprinted by Recode, noting that it was"obviously very disappointing news,
"warning staff to expect"tough"criticism. As Google points out though, the statement of objections is not a final finding
and it has the opportunity to respond and have modified the claims-a process that could take two years.
One of the key reference points for the EC's actions against Microsoft in 2007, which ultimately saw the company fined hundreds of millions of euros.
If the EC proceeds with a $6bn fine it would become the largest fine it has issued to date.
However in its memo, Google told staff it has a"very strong case, "that competition was alive and well,
and noted that mobile and apps"has changed everything, "offering consumers a way to get information directly from a mobile app rather than via search."
"The competition is just one click away -and it's growing. People can use Bing, Yahoo, Quora, Duckduckgo,
and a new wave of search assistants like Apple's Siri and Microsoft's Cortana, as well as more specialized services like Amazon, Idealo, Le Guide, Expedia, or ebay.
In addition, users increasingly turn to social networks like Facebook and Twitter to find news and suggestions-where to eat or which movies to watch,
"Google said. The EC on Wednesday confirmed it was opening a probe into Android and whether Google has been breached antitrust law here too."
"The Commission will assess if, by entering into anticompetitive agreements and/or by abusing a possible dominant position,
Google has hindered illegally the development and market access of rival mobile operating systems, mobile communication applications and services in the European Economic Area,
"the EC said. There are three areas the Commission will investigate -whether Google hampered rivals by forcing OEMS to only use Google services;
whether it stopped those OEMS from using and marketing non-Google-controlled versions of Android;
and whether bundling its services with Android has hurt competition. Google also acknowledged the EC's investigation into Android in its memo.
Google has faced a number of complaints from rivals, including over its bundling of Google apps like Youtube
and Maps as well as complaints Google has blocked third-party app stores on Android. Here too, Google says it has a strong case,
since Android had lowered prices and increased choice for consumers and pointed out that Samsung's new Galaxy S6 included pre-installed apps from rivals."
"Consumers decide which apps they use and download on Android devices. Apps that compete directly with Google such as Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft office,
and Expedia are easily available to Android users; and"Many of these apps come pre-loaded onto Android devices.
Google apps, like Search, Maps, Gmail, and Google Play, are also available out of the box on many handsets.
The recent Samsung S6 is a great example of this-there are pre-installed Facebook, Microsoft,
and Google apps
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