We had heard that the EU was planning to levy a substantial fine on Google for its alleged favoring of its own services in search over those belonging to competitors last year already, and the Telegraph is reporting that the European Commission is now estimating a hefty €3 billion ($3.4b) tag…
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Reuters reports that almost 200 Samsung managers have “voluntarily” handed back a quarter of their first-half bonuses in anticipation of what is expected to be the company’s worst quarterly profit for two years.
The decision to return some of the bonus was partly a gesture to demonstrate that managers are taking responsibility for the earnings decline, and partly a way to show that management will work harder, the source told Reuters on Friday, declining to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Earlier today, access to Google’s variety of web services was finally restored in China, after weeks of them being offline. This evening, however, Reuters reports that once again, the Mountain View company’s services are being disrupted in China. This includes tools such as Google Search, Maps, Gmail, advertising services, and more.
Image via Reuters
Update: The WSJ reports that Google agreed to block access to the email, and advised that it had not been read
According to a new report from Reuters, investment banking firm Goldman Sachs is taking legal action against Google over an email that it accidentally sent to the wrong address. The report claims that a Goldman Sachs employee was sending an email, but instead of putting the correct @gs.com ending, the employee put @gmail.com, which in turn caused the email to be sent to a total stranger.
Photo: Associated Press
The European Union Court of Justice (ECJ) has ruled that individuals have a right to require Google to remove sensitive information from search results, reports Reuters.
The ruling […] came after a Spanish man complained to the Spanish data protection agency that an auction notice of his repossessed home on Google’s search results infringed his privacy […]
Google says forcing it to remove such data amounts to censorship.
The ruling reflects a 2012 proposal by the EU known as the “right to be forgotten,” in which it was argued that even accurate information may become “outdated or irrelevant” after a period of time has elapsed …
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HTC acknowledges that it needs more than high-end handsets
While HTC technically ended 2013 in profit, the company says that declining margins are likely to see it end the first quarter of this year with a loss. HTC reported a wafer-thin profit of $10M from revenues of $1.4B, the latter figure 28 percent down year-on year. Its global market share of shipments was just two percent.
Reuters reports that the company plans to make a wider range of more affordable phones – the same strategy used by Samsung. Samsung made most of its money last year from a combination of its chip-manufacturing business and low- to mid-range handsets, and has itself come under pressure from low-cost competitor handsets …
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Google CEO Larry Page and Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing
Update: Motorola and Google have both confirmed the acquisition of Motorola by Lenovo for $2.91 billion. Google will, however, retain the “vast majority” of Motorola’s patents. Google CEO Larry Page says that Motorola will be better unitized and more beneficial to Lenovo. This will also give Google more time to drive “innovation across the Android ecosystem.” The deal still has to pass regulatory approval in China and the U.S., and until then, Google says it is business as usual for the two companies.
According a tweet from Reuters reporter Gerry Shih, Lenovo is nearing completion on a deal to purchase Motorola from Google for around $3 billion. A report from China Daily news corroborates Reuters, but claims the deal is closer to the $2 billion mark. China Daily claims that the deal will be announced to the public Thursday morning in Beijing, which is just a few hours from now. Google is also holding an earnings call tomorrow, so it’s very possible that the information will officially drop during the call.
TechCrunch has “confirmed reports” of the acquisition, saying the terms of the deal have not yet been revealed, but that it was around $3 billion. It’s also important to note that the deal includes Motorola Mobility, which Google paid $12.5 billion for, not the entire Motorola company.
With a reporting yesterday indicating that Samsung’s Galaxy Gear smartwatch had “flopped” with only 50,000 units sold, the manufacturing giant is refuting that report. However, even as Samsung speaks to the media regarding the Galaxy Gear as a successful product, there is some confusion about whether or not the company has “shipped” or “sold” 800,000 units …
Reuters has some vague new information on the Nexus 7 successor from Google today. Rather than being available at Google I/O in May (which would have been my guess), Reuters thinks it won’t hit the mass market until July. Perhaps a limited run will be available to developers in May?
As far as specs…
Vint Cerf, “father of the internet” and Google’s chief internet evangelist, is speaking out about Google’s decision to push users toward using their real names across services. In a recent interview with Reuters, the Google executive said the initiative to get users using their real names across profiles on various services such as Google+ and YouTube has “sparked intense debate” at the company:
Over the past year, the company has strongly encouraged users to merge their accounts on YouTube, Gmail and other Google properties into a single Google+ identity, the company’s social network offering that asks users to use the “common name” they are known by in the real world.
“Using real names is useful,” Cerf said. “But I don’t think it should be forced on people, and I don’t think we do.”
Vint said not using real names is “perfectly reasonable” in certain situations, especially in countries with governments seeking to ban anonymity:
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Reuters reported today that a U.S. Federal Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington rejected Apple’s attempt to get a sales ban on Samsung’s Galaxy Nexus. Apple asked the court to revisit a previous decision to reject the company’s request for the sales ban leading up to a full trial set for March 2014. The case involved patents not included in the California trial that awarded Apple a $1.05 billion verdict against Samsung.
Apple wanted the full Federal Circuit of Appeals, made up of nine active judges, to reverse the earlier ruling. But in a brief order on Thursday, the court rejected Apple’s request without detailed explanation or any published dissents… Several experts had believed that Apple faced long odds, as the legal issues in play were not considered controversial enough to spur full court review.
Reuters noted that Apple could still appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court:
Apple could still appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. However, the high court has made it more difficult for patent plaintiffs to secure sales injunctions in recent years.
Reuters reported yesterday that Google purchased a 2.4-acre lot at London’s King Cross Central development with plans to build its new United Kingdom headquarters. Reuters has since updated its story with confirmation from Google Vice President for Northern and Central Europe Matt Brittin. According to the report, citing several unnamed sources, Google is spending 650 million to 1 billion pounds and expects to finish development of the site by 2016. It will also move its current U.K. offices to the new site when construction—slated to begin in late 2013—is complete.
“This is a big investment by Google, we’re committing further to the UK – where computing and the web were invented. It’s good news for Google, for London and for the UK,” Google’s Vice President for Northern and Central Europe, Matt Brittin, said in a statement.
Google will move from its current offices in the UK capital’s Victoria and Holborn districts in 2016 when the building completes. Construction on the site will start in late 2013 and the building will range in height from 7 to 11 storeys.
According to a report from Reuters, citing its usual “sources familiar with the matter,” Google is in the process of creating a new late-stage investment group that its current chief of mergers and acquisitions David Lawlee will oversee. The report did not provide much more information, but it claimed the new investment fund would focus on “longtime and outgoing corporate development.” Replacing Lawlee as head of M&A at Google is one of Google’s lawyers, Don Harrison:
Don Harrison, a high-ranking lawyer at Google, will replace Lawee as head of the Internet search company’s mergers and acquisitions team.
Reuters reported today that Vringo released a statement to confirm a jury has upheld its patent claims against a handful of companies. One of those companies is Google, which was found to infringe two old Lycos patents. Vringo is receiving much less than the $696 million it sought—$30 million from all the companies combined. Of that, Google will pay $15.8 million:
Vringo inherited the lawsuit after it acquired Innovate/Protect (I/P), a company which specializes in monetizing intellectual property, in March.
I/P had filed a patent infringement lawsuit against AOL, Google, IAC, Gannett and Target Corp in 2011.
After finding that the patent claims were both valid and infringed by Google, the jury found that reasonable royalty damages should be based on a “running royalty”, and that the running royalty rate should be 3.5 percent, Vringo said.
According to a report from Reuters, Google issued a statement that a Wisconsin federal court has decided to dismiss Apple’s “patent lawsuit with prejudice.” The report explained this particular case was brought on by Apple in part to determine what the courts considered fair and reasonable licensing terms for the patent portfolio Google acquired when purchasing Motorola.
Google said in a statement that it is still interested in making a deal with Apple “at a reasonable and non-discriminatory rate in line with industry standards”:
“We’re pleased that the court has dismissed Apple’s lawsuit with prejudice,” a Google spokeswoman said in an emailed statement on Monday…”Motorola has long offered licensing to our extensive patent portfolio at a reasonable and non-discriminatory rate in line with industry standards,” Google said in its statement. “We remain interested in reaching an agreement with Apple.”
Reuters explained the case being dismissed with prejudice means it is officially over at the trial court level. However, Apple can still appeal:
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This is not the first time we heard major Android vendors are aiming to hit lower price points in the months to come. With iPad mini expected to eat into a large chunk of the 7-inch tablet market, and recent price drops and refreshes to the Kindle lineups, it makes sense Google and other Android manufacturers are aiming to offer an even better value following its launch. Digitimes, despite not having the best track record, stated confidently in September, while citing its usual supply chain sources, that Google is planning a $99 Nexus 7 tablet. It also claimed an upgraded model would take over the $200 price point. This would seem to make sense with rumors of a 32GB Nexus 7 landing for under $250. Leaked retail inventory listings and even a unit that accidentally shipped have backed up those rumors.
Digitimes is once again claiming today that Google’s $99 Nexus tablet is real, adding that Taiwan-based manufacturers have confirmed it will launch in the fourth quarter of this year. Where this leaves the rest of the Nexus line is unclear. If the $99 tablet and 32GB Nexus for $250 are real, it could mean the $99 tablet comes with 8GB or 16 GB. There is also a chance Google keeps a tablet at the $199 price point. This would seem to point to a 8GB model at $99, 16GB model at $199, and 32GB model at $250. However, we are not quite buying the idea tht Google will offer an extra 16GB for only $50 more than a $199 16GB model…
A Reuters report (via CNBC) from this afternoon claimed top U.S. Federal Trade Commission officials want to bring an antitrust case against Google over numerous complaints about it abusing search dominance to suppress competition in the market.
The FTC announced earlier this year that Washington lawyer Beth Wilkinson is leading its investigation, while FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said last month they would reach a decision by 2013. If found guilty, the FTC and Google could enter settlement talks to resolve the matter or duke it out in court.
Reuters cited “three people familiar with the matter,” and it indicated Google could soon face the gristly negotiation process:
Four of the FTC commissioners have become convinced after more than a year of investigation that Google illegally used its dominance of the search market to hurt its rivals, while one commissioner is skeptical, the sources said. All three declined to be named to protect working relationships. Two of the sources said a decision on how to proceed could come in late November or early December. A long list of companies has been complaining to the FTC, arguing that the agency should crack down on Google.
Yelp and Nextag have both criticized Google at open hearings in Congress, according to Reuters, asserting Google unjustly gives “their web sites low quality rankings in search results to steer Internet users away from their websites and toward Google products that provide similar services.”
Google has continually rebuffed any lawlessness or partial practices, and the search engine’s vice president of engineering, Amit Singhal, even stormed to the Google Public Policy Blog earlier this summer, in an aggressive tactic not usually taken by the Mountain View, Calif.-based company, to address the antitrust accusations in a “claim vs. fact” format.
U.S. Judge Lucy Koh granted Apple’s request for a preliminary injunction against Samsung’s Galaxy Nexus smartphone in June, and the decision resulted in the temporary removal of the device from Google Play pending a software fix with Android 4.1. Today, Reuters reported that Apple’s U.S. injunction on the Galaxy Nexus has been reversed.
TheNextWeb got its hands on the official order. Samsung argued that its product would “sell almost as well without incorporating the patented feature” :
Samsung argued, somewhat humiliatingly, that the sales of the Galaxy Nexus were so poor that they didn’t pose a threat to Apple’s iPhone and that the unified search feature was not essential to the success of its device. The appeals court apparently agrees, as it states in its official order:
…it may very well be that the accused product would sell almost as well without incorporating the patented feature. And in that case, even if the competitive injury that results from selling the accused device is substantial, the harm that flows from the alleged infringement (the only harm that should count) is not.
According to Reuters, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled the court “abused its discretion in entering an injunction” and will send the case back to the California court for consideration.
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According to the Mannheim Regional Court in Germany, Motorola Mobility does not infringe on a Microsoft patent enabling a “method and radio interface layer comprising a set of application programming interfaces (APIs).” The patent, which Reuters described as allowing “applications to work on different handsets,” is considered a rare victory for Google’s Motorola. Throughout its countersuits, Microsoft has been able to win three patent cases against Motorola in Germany. As noted by Microsoft-funded blogger Florian Mueller, “Microsoft should actually thank Motorola for this initiative, which at this stage has been far more productive for Microsoft than for Google.”
Microsoft is expected to appeal the decision, as usual, but the Judge Voss did not go over the reasoning behind the ruling during the announcement. Microsoft’s associate general counsel David Howard provided a statement to Reuters:
Theocratic countries have blocked Google’s products left and right, but a new report from Reuters today indicated Iran is lifting its one-week-old block on Gmail due to a flurry of official complaints.
According to Reuters:
Iranian authorities have reopened access to Google Inc’s email service a week after blocking it, a government official and Iranians said on Monday.
Iran maintains one of the world’s largest Internet filters, blocking access to tens of thousands of websites on the grounds that they are criminal or immoral, but the block on Gmail had even prompted complaints in parliament.
Gmail reportedly went live again for Iranians Sunday night, after an official announced on Sept. 23 that Iran would block YouTube throughout the country “until further notice.” Committee Member Mohammad Reza Aghamiri told the Mehr news agency that Gmail’s ban was an ” unintended consequence” of trying to block YouTube. Various local news agencies attributed the banning of YouTube to a controversial anti-Islam film posted on Google’s video-sharing platform.
Toys R Us might be running into a bit of an issue getting its $150, Android 4.0-powered tablet for kids, which we told you about earlier this month, off the ground. According to a report from Reuters, Fuhu Inc., creator of another tablet for children called “Nabi,” is suing Toys R Us. Fuhu claimed it agreed to exclusively sell the Nabi to “learn product secrets” before launching its own competitive tablet:
Fuhu accused Toys R Us of fraud, breach of contract, unfair competition and trade secret misappropriation. Fuhu also said that Toys R Us copied Nabi’s butterfly-shaped bumper,which is used to help protect the tablet, for Tabeo… According to the lawsuit, Toys R Us agreed in October 2011 to become the exclusive Nabi distributor, but in the end did “virtually no promotion” and only ordered for the holiday season a little more than what Toys R Us said could be sold in one day.
Walmart apparently sent a memo to store managers on Sept. 19. announcing plans to stop selling Amazon’s line of Kindle products.
“We have recently made the business decision to not carry Amazon tablets and eReaders beyond our existing inventory and purchase commitments,” said Walmart in the memo. “This includes all Amazon Kindle models current and recently announced.”
Reuters, which cited the memo and an unidentified source “familiar with situation,” first reported the news:
In the memo, Wal-Mart said the decision was consistent with its overall merchandising strategy. While Wal-Mart dwarfs other retailers in overall sales, it trails Amazon and others online and has been stepping up efforts to increase its presence there. Consumers who buy Kindle tablets such as the new Kindle Fire HD can shop on the devices for more than just digital books, pushing Amazon into further competition with stores.
The publication did not provide additional details, but Walmart.com currently reflects the reported change. When searching for “Kindle” on the national retailer’s website, no Kindle-related products appear in the queue. It is unclear if Walmart’s website ever offered the tablets, however.
Apple and Samsung appeared in a San Jose federal court today, where U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh presides, to give opening statements starting at 9 a.m. PST.
Apple filed the first suit in this monumental case in April 2011. The Cupertino, Calif.-based company claimed Samsung infringed its patents by “slavishly copying” its iPhone. Samsung, a South Korea-based Company, promptly countersued.
This is one of the important cases to go to trial among a slew of other litigations on smartphone patents. If Apple wins, Samsung could suffer a financial blow and the ability to sell its infringing products in a large market. If Apple loses, its “thermonuclear war” against Android smartphone manufacturers could essentially wither away as Samsung collects royalty fees.
This morning’s most notable highlights are below (continually updated).
