Category: News

Taco Bell, perennial favorite of those who love cheap, tasty food that kills you slowly (myself included), has apparently begun testing a new waffle taco as part of their breakfast menu. Though Taco Bell officials have remained quiet on the subject, the restaurant’s customers began seeing the new menu option at three southern California locations over the weekend.

Last year Taco Bell began experimenting with a new breakfast menu dubbed the “Firstmeal” menu, a reference to the “Fourthmeal” ad campaign they ran several years ago when they began staying open later several years ago. The Firstmeal menu was initially brought to several hundred restaurants scattered across the country. If it is successful in its test market, the new menu will likely be rolled out to the rest of the Mexican-ish food chain’s 6,000 restaurants before long.

According to witnesses, the waffle taco consists of a waffle (hence the name) with a sausage patty and scrambled egg, stacked and then folded into the shape of a taco (again, hence the name). It is reportedly served with a side of syrup and sells for a whopping $0.89.

With Google opening up its Google Compute Engine (GCE) for anyone and expanding the feature set of its Google Cloud Platform, the web giant appears to have its gaze fixed on easing Amazon Web Services’ lock on the Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) market. But it won’t be easy, with many startups and enterprises already entrenched in AWS thanks to its early general availability and plethora of services.

Some developers hanging out at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco on Wednesday thought Google could be a viable option for certain workloads going forward, but they don’t see it as the it cloud for today. And that might be all right, because adoption of IaaS clouds is still far from complete, and because Google is indicating that it has plenty of ideas for enhancing the Google Cloud Platform.

“We’ll continue to add new services which lower the amount of tedious grunt work that developers have to do,” Greg DeMichillie, a director of product management for the Google Cloud Platform, told members of the press in a roundtable discussion following the Google cloud announcements. Better networking services could be one area for innovation, he suggested.

Indeed, my colleague Barb Darrow has expressed on multiple occasions that Google’s position in the IaaS world is worth watching. The trouble is, the road ahead looks steep.

The current cloud market

A July-October 2012 survey of 100 IT professionals at medium and large enterprises from 451 Research showed that 19 percent that were running IaaS deployments were doing so on Amazon, considerably more than on other options. Verizon came in second with 8 percent, followed by Rackspace with 5 percent. Google apparently held 1 percent or less. Looking toward the future, respondents named the vendors they expected their companies to move to, with CenturyLink, Amazon and Verizon coming out on top. Google had 1 percent or less there, too.

Why the lack of presence from Google in the standings? For one thing, “Amazon has been pushing this game along for a long period of time,” said Peter ffoulkes, research director at 451 Research. The other factor is that not many enterprises are ready to run on public clouds. ffoulkes fully expects Google to show up in the rankings in forthcoming surveys, but it’s too early for him to say when.

To be fair, since the 2012 survey wrapped up, Google has added to the Google Cloud Platform, with moves such as adding capabilities to BigQuery. It’s also acquired Talaria for software that could make Google server use more efficient. And remember that Google Compute Engine launched less than a year ago and just became generally available today.

Google has serious work to do in making the Google Compute Engine a top choice for enterprises. For one thing, Google has not (yet) opened a marketplace of services on par with AWS. Such a step could help Google in its efforts to drive more developers onto GCE.

What developers think

Google has a few opportunities to gain marketshare with GCE. One startup I spoke with has run workloads on Google App Engine (GAE) for a few years but still does data analysis and data mining on on-premise servers. Since GAE and GCE hook in well with each another, the startup is looking at moving the on-prem activities to GCE. Another area of opportunity is around using GCE for narrowly tailored high-performance workloads that scale out. Engineers at one major retailer in the United States said they were exploring public clouds for certain jobs, and Google Compute Engine is a possibility for exactly this sort of thing. Generally speaking, strong results could lead to larger deployments beyond tests and lower-priority applications.

Developers praised Google for introducing granular pricing down to the minute instead of the hour after a 10-minute minimum and increasing the size of a persistent disk from 1 TB to 10 TB.

But just as AWS has had notable service issues, Google App Engine, the Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) piece of the Google Cloud Platform, has had multiple service disruptions of its own, and that doesn’t help adoption.

Plus, several developers noted that Amazon was the forerunner in the AWS market, which seems to be a major reason why Google faces a steep road. One developer said his hosted VoIP company just moved from on-premise servers to AWS. Translation: Too little, too late, Google.

The lock-in question

However long it takes for Google Compute Engine to get on the board in the IaaS conversation, the ease of migration from AWS and other IaaS providers to Google will eventually become a hot topic. What sort of lock-in issues could arise? That’s been a good question since cloud computing took off a few years ago and as options have proliferated. Amazon in particular has faced criticism on the lock-in point.

Performance is a whole other matter. Will GCE be a kind of exotic car of public clouds? Different customers will have different answers to that question, as not all workloads were created equal. Benchmarks attempt to give some insight into this, but they have drawbacks.

As developers try spinning up instances on GCE and do comparisons for themselves, the subject of price will come up. Google foresees more price cuts to its cloud services, as it’s in the company’s best interests to make its infrastructure as efficient as possible. That could entice more enterprises to join in. At the same time, AWS is likely to keep growing, slashing its prices and speedily bolting down enterprise customers. (To get a peek at what Amazon has in mind, check out GigaOM’s Structure conference in San Francisco on June 19, when Werner Vogels, Amazon’s chief technology officer, will take the stage.)

However the game plans play out, Google is optimistic at the moment. “It’s obviously a hugely important use case for us, a hugely important customer set,” DeMichillie said of enterprise users. “It’s early days, but we think over the next 12 months, we expect to see a pretty big upswing in that.”

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• The fourth quarter of 2012 in cloud
• Cloud computing 2013: how to navigate without a map
• Infrastructure Q1: Cloud and big data woo enterprises

Google TV has always been shunned a little more than other Google products, despite running Android. Well, if you were an early adopter of Google TV, there’s good news. According to Google, Google TV is being moved to Android 4.2.2, and Google TV is being reworked to allow OEM partners to quickly update their devices. The time frame will supposedly be cut from “months” down to “weeks.” Google TV will also be moved to the latest version of Chrome, as well as Chrome’s rather speedy six-week release cycle. Good news for owners, as this means your devices won’t be obsoleted quickly.

Google also said in their Google+ post that older devices should begin receiving updates soon, and we can expect to see new devices later this year. Nexus Q 2.0, anyone?

source: Google Plus

Come comment on this article: Google TV gets bumped to Android 4.2.2 and the latest version of Chrome

A Florida man was wounded on Tuesday when the pistol he was carrying accidentally discharged while he was bowling.

The man was bowling at the Jupiter Lanes Bowling Alley in Jupiter, Florida. Witnesses say that the gun, which was apparently in his pocket, was struck by the ball during the man’s backswing. The bullet grazed the man’s leg before lodging in the floor.

According to local authorities the man, whose name has not yet been released, owned the firearm legally and had a license to carry it concealed. As such, they do not expect to file charges in the incident.

We told you about Map Diving last week. It’s a skydiving simulator created by Instrument, a Portland tech startup. We finally got to see it action at Google I/O, and yours truly even gave it a shot. They created this simulator using Google Maps and it’s pretty darn cool. Don’t worry, everyone will get a chance to try it out because it will land on Chrome Experiments soon. When that happens, you won’t use your body, but you will be able to use your tablet’s accelerometer to control the skydiver that’s on your desktop. Hit the break for the video and to find out why I never took up skydiving.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Come comment on this article: Hands on with the Map Diving simulator at Google I/O

 

If you missed the Google I/O keynote this morning or want to watch it all over again, you’re in luck— you can view it right here at your leisure. Poke around Talk Android for other updates and releases that were announced throughout the day and check back for some more cool Google I/O news for the rest of the conference.

Click here to view the embedded video.

 

Come comment on this article: Re-experience all three exciting hours of the Google I/O 2013 keynote right here

College graduates would love to land a job at Google, Apple or one of the many startups in Silicon Valley. But according to a survey from Universum Global, there are quite a few students who would prefer the rainy days in Washington over working in the golden state. The American Student Survey asked students from five different fields of study — business, engineering, IT, natural sciences and liberal arts — about their ideal company to work for. Companies such as Google and Apple unsurprisingly topped the charts in almost all categories, however there were some surprising results: Microsoft consistently outranked both Facebook and Amazon. The company ranked higher than Amazon in all fields of study and even higher than Apple in IT. Students found Microsoft more appealing than Facebook in almost all categories as well, with the exception of liberal arts.

It may not be glamorous, but it’s true – each year, urinary tract infections lead to more than 9 million doctor visits in the United States alone. But the infection can now be tested for through an iPhone app — uChek — developed by TEDFellow Myshkin Ingawale. This app could also be an effective tool for diabetics whose doctors have recommended regular urine analysis, and for the monitoring of bladder, liver and kidney disorders. It could also be a powerful tool for healthcare professionals in the developing world who hope to bring testing to patients wherever they are, instead of the other way around.

Ingawale, who previously created the noninvasive anemia diagnosis tool ToucHb, has just released the app, which was demoed at TED2013. But there have been adjustments made since.

“Early prototypes like the one demoed at TED 2013 were ‘work in process’ and were susceptible to certain ambient light changes and movement errors, and when checked against a conventional laboratory urinalyser it showed lower accuracy,” Ingawale says in a Q&A with the TED Fellows blog. “We made some design changes in the system — most notably, the introduction of our patent-pending ‘cuboid’ — a foldable, reusable stand for the iPhone, which improved the accuracy of the new system, making it comparable with a laboratory urinalyser.”

Ingawale explains that the changes were needed to move uChek from being considered a “wellness tool” to being a “medical device.”

Next up for Ingwale — expanding uChek to Android and other platforms. And, of course, coming up with new ideas for medical apps. “This is our first really big initiative in the world of apps,” he says. “We are looking forward to seeing where this road leads.”

As a serious smartphone addict who jumps at the sound of an iPhone buzz, I know that I really don’t need more internet in my life. So I haven’t had much interest in Google Glass so far, assuming it would just serve to put more apps in front of my face that my current attention span doesn’t need, and that my iPhone could easily handle.

But this morning when I was walking through downtown San Francisco before Google’s I/O conference, I was crossing a street when I saw a particularly pretty scene of the sun rising between two buildings. Hoping I’d have enough time before the walk signal ended, I dug my iPhone out of my bag, swiped to open the camera, snapped a photo, and then jogged to the curb to avoid getting hit by cars. (Mom, I hope you’re not reading this.)

So a few hours later, when I tried on Google Glass for the first time and said the command “take photo,” instantly capturing a photo of my colleague Kevin Tofel standing in front of me without moving either my head or my hands, I started to see the appeal of Glass.

I’d read a decent amount about the technology since Sergey Brin dropped from a helicopter at last year’s Google I/O, and not only was I sort of confused by the specifics of how Glass works (A camera on your face? Facebook on top of everyday life? How do people see when they’re wearing them?), I was turned off by the severely dorky appearance and the idea of constantly monitoring the things around you. They seemed vaguely creepy and intrusive. I was not attracted to the idea of wearing them as a normal person walking around town.

But even though I only got a short spin with the technology on Wednesday, it only took a few seconds for me to understand why people are so jazzed about Glass.

I put them on my face and was immediately impressed with how lightweight they felt. Despite their futuristic, clunkly-on-one-side appearance, they didn’t feel very bulky or heavy on my face, and it was easy to see the room around me while wearing them. (Even though they weren’t fitted specifically for my face the way they would be if I purchased them.) The screen felt much smaller and unobtrusive than I’d imagined, and it wasn’t hard to swipe the side of the glasses to navigate the screen. But it was the voice commands, and the “take photo” command, that changed my perspective on the technology.

Would I spend $1,500 on them right now? Definitely not. If you need prescription glasses of any kind, it would be hard to combine those with Glass. While Google has launched them in some jazzy new colors, you still look absurd wearing them (whether you’re in the shower or not). This probably makes me somewhat vain, but I’d want them to look cooler and less futuristic before I wore them in everyday life (seriously, embed them in some Warby Parker frames, and I’d be way more down with the idea.)

And once apps start streaming into the glasses, I can’t imagine how seeing New York Times headlines and tweets wouldn’t be distracting while you’re doing things like walking or driving. Of course, none of this even gets into the new etiquette that would have to arise from the spread of Glass.

But despite all the drawbacks, speaking the words for the “take photo” command made me realize that even if wearable computing has a pretty dorky image right now, the potential practical applications for real-life people who don’t consider themselves nerds are endless — once the technology gets a little more refined, and we figure out how to use them in public.

I talked to one Google employee who said she sat in her sister’s graduation and streamed video through Glass to family members from afar, and another who said she uses it to take photos of her little kids when her hands are full. I would imagine it could be huge for people with disabilities, or people doing outdoor sports (Kevin mentioned you could take photos of mile markers while running a marathon.)

“Every time we’ve tried to do something crazy we’ve made progress,” Larry Page said on stage today. So does Google Glass seem a little nuts right now? Sure. But if a few years from now I can snap a photo of a sunrise without having a near-miss with traffic, I’m open to the possibilities.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Analyzing the wearable computing market
• Social media in Q1: commerce and discovery dominated
• Google doesn’t like walled gardens — except its own

So much for my hardware predictions of what to expect at Google I/O. Instead of an updated Nexus 7 tablet or a new Chromebook model, Google spent three hours during Wednesday’s keynote to discuss services and feature upgrades for both Chrome and Android. I do think that in the coming months we’ll see improved Google devices, but that’s not what this year’s I/O event is all about. And even though I’m a gadget guy, I can appreciate the message Google is sending this week.

Unification was the big theme

As I tweeted during our live blog, there was a very common theme throughout the keynote and it had absolutely nothing to do with hardware:

If I could describe #io13 in one word it would be "unification". Same features, services, UI and experiences on Chrome and Android.—
Kevin C. Tofel (@KevinCTofel) May 15, 2013

Any thoughts of Chrome merging with Android in the traditional sense can be dismissed based on what I heard at the keynote. Instead, the two distinct platforms are sharing services, APIs, and design cues. What does that mean? Whatever Google services you use on an Android phone or tablet can be used on a desktop or laptop in Chrome, for example. For the first time, Chrome as a browser is good enough to be the glue that ties user experiences together between mobile devices and traditional computers.

Where are the commonalities between web, tablet and phone now?

How so? Take a look at the new Google+ stream. It appears more card-based — akin to Google Now — and looks the same whether you’re viewing it in Chrome on a Windows PC or on a Nexus 10 tablet. And although it’s a smaller screen, the same basic view appears in Google+ on an Android phone or an iPhone for that matter.

The phones only show a single column of information and you can have the exact same Google+ view in Chrome, or you can set the browser to show two columns. (Hint: Click More in Google+ on Chrome, scroll to the bottom of the menu and you’ll see the Stream Layout option)

Here’s another example (and one I’m very happy to see): not only can developers take advantage of Google Cloud Messaging for push notifications in apps or web, but Google is synchronizing notifications. So if you get a new Google+ comment notification on your Android device and read the comment, that same notification won’t appear in Chrome. Or vice versa, of course. Many of the the same services — including the new Google Play Games services — are supported Chrome, Android and even iOS, now so Google is unifying the experience, making it irrelevant whether you’re using the web, a phone or a tablet.

Google definitely has a two platform approach

Google has said in the past that we’ll see a merger of sorts between Chrome and Android. Now it has shown what it means: Iterate and mature the browser with new technologies that can provide the same experience as some native apps in Android and iOS. It won’t matter what you use in the future in Google’s world: Chrome is the realm of the desktop and laptop while Android (which also has a Chrome app) will power phones and tablets.

The services and APIs that Google offers, however, will allow developers to extend their reach across both of these platforms. With the new Google+ single sign on service, for example, users can get access to a web app or its Android counterpart. In fact, I was most impressed when Google demonstrated a web app that, upon signing in, asked if it should remotely install the Android application on a phone. These services are the glue that will tie Google’s two platforms together.

So what about the next version of Android and hardware?

Frankly — and in hindsight — I’m not sure Google needed to introduce an Android update, a refreshed Nexus 7 tablet a new Nexus phone. The story today was about making the experience better and seamless on existing hardware. And we still have tens of millions of devices that haven’t been upgraded to the Jelly Bean version of Android: Iterating it again only exacerbates the Android update challenges. Instead, Google has provided developers new tools to further improve their web and Android apps at the same time.

I can already see the benefits on my Chromebook Pixel: Google+ is already better, the new Hangouts messaging is improved and my preview of the updated Maps app is incredible. Using the touchscreen, I could zoom out to see the Earth with real-time cloud cover, see the stars where they’re supposed to be and then zoom back in to view panoramic virtual tours of historic locations. The new photo editing in Chrome is on my Pixel, as well, and Google’s cloud power is making my photos look better automatically.

Do I wish there was new hardware? Perhaps, but that’s just the gadget geek in me speaking. Software and services are just as important as hardware and, so far, I like what I see there. As long as Google continues to unify the Chrome web and Android experience in a positive way, I can live with my old phone and tablet.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Analyzing the wearable computing market
• Carrier IQ and the continued erosion of operator trust
• Siri: Say hello to the coming “invisible interface”

It doesn’t have a cool name like Cassandra, Voldemort or MongoDB, but Google is offering up a non-relational database called Google Cloud Datastore. Like almost everything the company has done since announcing its Compute Engine service at last year’s IO conference — including the rest of the features it announced on Wednesday — Cloud Datastore looks like a direct shot at current cloud champion Amazon Web Services.

AWS has a managed NoSQL database service called DynamoDB that’s replicated across three availability zones to ensure its stays up. Google’s Cloud Datastore sounds eerily similar, according to the product’s website (although Google calls its product “NoSQL-like). It’s fully managed, built for speed and scale and is replicated across data centers. For some queries, Google even promises that Cloud Datastore will support ACID transactions.

You can get details on the service and how it works here. Pricing information is available here.

If its goal is to compete with AWS, though, Google’s cloud platform still has a long way to go. Yes, it has most of the key services in place and even some seeming advantages in certain areas, but it’s lacking the incredible breadth of services AWS offers — everything from virtual server instances to a devops service to a hosted data warehouse. It’s also lacking a seven-year reputation for being an all-around reliable platform and an ever-growing list of large-enterprise users.

Of course, there’s also an argument to be made that Google doesn’t really have to compete with AWS at all when it comes to cloud computing. AWS made a name for itself by  taking all the new workloads from startups and corporate developers who wanted to build new types of applications and didn’t want to deal with the IT department; Google has the same opportunity ahead of it. New programming languages like Go and the unique nature of the rest of Google’s services, Cloud Datastore included, could make it the go-to place for a class of developers that likes to push the envelope in terms of application design.

Oh, and Google has a little ace up its sleeve called Android. If someone is so inclined to develop mobile applications for the most-popular mobile operating system on the planet, there are worse places to host them.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Infrastructure Q1: Cloud and big data woo enterprises
• Amazon’s DynamoDB: rattling the cloud market
• Emerging trends in the non-relational database market

It’s rare to see a company that is so established yet as cutting-edge as Shapeways. The company, founded in 2007 as a spin-off of Royal Philips Electronics, began as a one-off 3D printing service that offered basic plastic items for sale online. Over the years, however, the company has branched off into some amazing materials – steel, ceramic, and even sandstone – and they’ve already been able to support full color printing in 3D.

Now the company is opening a series of facilities in the US and they invited us to their first print shop in Long Island City, New York. In this massive, warehouse-like space, the company has set up a number of acrylic printers as well as a small customer service team. They plan on expanding further, adding more machines to an already impressive array. The goal is to offer 3D print shops close to major US metropolitan areas to reduce wait-times and to spread out the manufacturing process among different factories. The company will have 30 to 50 printers in the LIC location once it is complete.

I spoke with co-founder Peter Weijmarshausen about the Shapeways process, the printers, and what it takes to become a 3D-printing powerhouse in a nascent market. It’s great to see such a cool company expand and it’s even more fun to get to tour the facilities even before the machines, printers, and staff becomes fully operational. Enjoy the tour and tune in next time for another TechCrunch Makers!

TechCrunch Makers is a video series featuring people who make cool stuff. If you’d like to be featured, email us!.

HP on Wednesday announced the Android-powered SlateBook x2 and the Windows-powered Split x2. The SlateBook x2 is equipped with a 10.1-inch 1920 x 1200-pixel display and a new 1.8GHz quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 4 processor. The tablet also features 2GB of RAM, up to 64GB of internal storage, a rear-camera capable of 1080p video recording, an SD card slot, HDMI-out, a USB port and Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

Continue reading…

Wi-Fi is everywhere and more often than not it’s free for the taking. Pretty much everyone but airlines and fancy hotels are opening their networks to all comers. The only problem is that open networks are, well, wide open. They’re unencrypted and insecure, exposing users to a world of electronic eavesdroppers and attacks.

Hotspot maker Ruckus Wireless, however, has developed a kind of ad-hoc security system for open hotspots, which it plans to release next week with the next version of its access point management software. Called Open Secure Hotspot, the technology automatically generates encryption keys for any user who logs into an open Ruckus hotspot, granting them a secure connection within moments, Ruckus VP of marketing David Callisch told GigaOM.

Ruckus started out as a supplier of IPTV wireless streaming nodes and enterprise wireless LANs, over which security measures were much easier to enforce. But as Ruckus’s public access network business grew it found itself supplying more Wi-Fi gear that enterprises and service providers simply wanted open to the public, Callisch said. Those customers didn’t want their open networks turning into playgrounds for Firesheep, man-in-the-middle attackers and other internet nasties, Callisch said, so they pressed Ruckus to develop a secure form of open Wi-Fi.

The rather confusing diagram above details how the security software works, but here’s what it boils down to: Anytime an unknown user connects to an upgraded Ruckus hotspot he or she will receive the option of establishing a secure connection to the network. If the user opts in, Ruckus’s network gateway will generate what Ruckus is calling a dynamic pre-shared key, randomly generated for each device. Users can either input the key by launching an executable file sent by the gateway, or they can manually enter the key into their Wi-Fi settings.

It may not seem like the most elegant way of getting online in a hotel lobby or public square, but Callisch but it’s still a relatively simple process, and it beats the alternative – surfing the internet over a naked connection or installing virtual private network (VPN) software on the fly.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• New solutions for the evolving mobile network
• CES 2012: a recap and analysis
• How to deliver the next-generation web experience

H.I.G. Capital announced Wednesday the final close of H.I.G. Bayside Loan Opportunity Fund III (Europe). The pool, which will invest primarily in debt obligations of small and medium-sized European companies, exceeded its $1 billion target.

PRESS RELEASE

MIAMI–(BUSINESS WIRE)–H.I.G. Capital announced today that it has held its final closing of H.I.G. Bayside Loan Opportunity Fund III (Europe). Total capital commitments to the fund exceeded its $1 billion target. The fund will invest primarily in debt obligations of small and medium-sized European companies, both existing loans acquired on the secondary markets as well as newly originated primary loans. With offices in London, Paris, Hamburg and Madrid, H.I.G. Capital has a team of 70 investment professionals in Europe.
Sami Mnaymneh and Tony Tamer, co-founders and Managing Partners of H.I.G. Capital, commented: “We are gratified by the continued support of our investors, which will allow us to continue to pursue this attractive credit strategy.” John Bolduc, Executive Managing Director of H.I.G. Bayside, added: “The bank deleveraging process in Europe has resulted in tight credit conditions, especially for smaller businesses. Our strong credit team in Europe is very well situated to address this need and to capitalize on the compelling investment opportunities available in the European loan markets today.”
About Bayside Capital
Bayside Capital, an affiliate of H.I.G. Capital, is an investment firm with approximately $4.5 billion under management. Focused on middle-market companies, Bayside Capital invests across several segments of the primary and secondary debt capital markets with an emphasis on long-term returns. With twelve offices throughout the U.S. and Europe and over 250 investment professionals to draw upon, Bayside has the experience, resources, and flexibility to provide capital solutions quickly, and the strategic and operational expertise to help support its investments.
Bayside Capital is active across a wide spectrum of industries, including business services, manufacturing, healthcare, retail, food/agriculture, and specialty finance. With the ability to invest in all parts of the capital structure, Bayside is able to develop creative financing solutions and consummate transactions on an expedited basis.
Bayside Capital is a credit affiliate of H.I.G. Capital, a leading global private investment firm with more than $12 billion of equity capital under management. Since its founding in 1993, H.I.G. Capital has invested in more than 200 companies worldwide and has developed an impressive track record for creating value for its partners and investors. For more information, please refer to the Bayside Capital website at www.bayside.com.
About H.I.G. Capital
H.I.G. is a leading global private equity investment firm with more than $12 billion of equity capital under management. Based in Miami, and with offices in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, New York, and San Francisco in the U.S., as well as international affiliate offices in London, Hamburg, Madrid, Paris, and Rio de Janeiro, H.I.G. specializes in providing capital to small and medium-sized companies with attractive growth potential. H.I.G. invests in management-led buyouts and recapitalizations of profitable and well managed manufacturing or service businesses. H.I.G. also has extensive experience with financial restructurings and operational turnarounds. Since its founding in 1993, H.I.G. invested in and managed more than 200 companies worldwide. The firm’s current portfolio includes more than 80 companies with combined sales in excess of $30 billion. For more information, please refer to the H.I.G. website at www.higcapital.com.

 

The post H.I.G. Closes Bayside Loan Opportunity Fund III appeared first on peHUB.

Just after 6:00 PM ET, President Obama spoke from the East Room of the White House about the Treasury Department's review of the Internal Revenue Service.

"I’ve reviewed the Treasury Department watchdog’s report, and the misconduct that it uncovered is inexcusable," he said. "It’s inexcusable, and Americans are right to be angry about it, and I am angry about it. I will not tolerate this kind of behavior in any agency, but especially in the IRS, given the power that it has and the reach that it has into all of our lives. And as I said earlier, it should not matter what political stripe you’re from — the fact of the matter is, is that the IRS has to operate with absolute integrity. The government generally has to conduct itself in a way that is true to the public trust. That’s especially true for the IRS."

The President laid out a series of steps aimed holding the responsible parties accountable and putting new safeguards in place to prevent future issues.

Read more in the full remarks, or watch the statement below:

If you’ve ever tried to call your doctor with an impromptu medical question, you know that a single call can quickly turn into non-stop game of phone tag that may or may not have a productive ending.

PingMD, a New York startup, initially launched a few years ago as an app to help digitally-savvy parents communicate with their kids’ pediatricians. But after analyzing how tens of thousands of patients and doctors were communicating during their pilot, they decided to expand their scope. This month, they relaunched their app for iOS and Android as a service that enables doctors to securely communicate with their patient, as well as peers. And on Wednesday, the company said it had raised $2.5 million from angel investors, including RT Investment Partners, Stonewater Captial and SNL Financial. The round follows $1.33 million raised last year.

According to a 2010 New England Journal of Medicine study analyzing communication in a Philadelphia doctor’s practice, the average doctor in that practice took 24 phone calls a day and wrote 17 emails on top of seeing a full load of patients, processing their prescriptions, reviewing lab reports and completing all the other tasks that come with the territory.

“There’s a lot of call volume going on,” said CEO Dr. Gopal Chopra, who co-founded PingMD with his wife Dr. Manju Chopra. “And the indirect cost is the time spent trying to get you [the patient] an answer.”

Even though electronic medical records and digital practice management tools can enable doctors to look up patient information and history more efficiently, Chopra said the call volume can be difficult for doctors. And that’s especially true for those doctors who are open to emailing or messaging with patients through mobile phones or other more secure services.

Through PingMD, doctors can enable patients to securely message them with text, as well as relevant pictures and video, and they can easily loop in other doctors and nurses in their practices as well as other specialists.

For example, if you have a weird rash on your arm, you could send a note and picture to your doctor and then she could reply with her feedback, as well as add a dermatologist to the circle.

While Chopra estimates that response times on email and other secure messaging systems tends to average 72 hours because the message is routed through an administrator and then the doctor, the average response time on PingMD is an hour (although it can take from a few seconds to several hours depending on the severity of the case).

To make money, PingMD takes a software-as-a-service approach, billing itself to hospitals and physician networks as a way to gather data about how doctors are communicating and spending their time and how the hospital should allocate their resources. At the moment, Chopra said they’re piloting PingMD with several institutions and physician networks.

The startup is one of several companies attempting to help doctors improve their productivity and prepare for an influx of new Obamacare patients. American Well and Sherpaa, for example, work with employers to help patients and doctors connect via video chats and phone calls. HealthTap targets consumers with a service for messaging and querying a network of doctors. And Ringadoc offers doctors a simple service for handling after-hours calls and streamlining patient communication.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Health care and big data in 2012
• A near-term outlook for big data
• The future of mobile health, 2011–2016

This day full of Google goodness, keeps on rolling, and Google just made it easier to send money to our friends and family with the help of  Gmail and Google Wallet. The two have been integrated to allow you to send money. In Gmail there will be an option next to the attachments, in the form of a dollar sign $. By clicking on this button you can now send money to the people you care most about. There are limitations to the service however, which are covered after the break:

Fees

“It’s free to send money directly from your bank account or using your Google Wallet Balance. There’s a flat fee of 2.9% per transaction (minimum $0.30) to send money using a credit or debit card. Receiving money is always free regardless of the funding source the sender chooses, 

Limits

There’s a transaction limit of $10,000 USD and a $50,000 USD transfer limit per 5 day period. This includes both money sent to others as well as money transferred in and out of your Wallet Balance. Please keep in mind that these limits may be subject to change in the future.

Transfer times

Sending money with your Google Wallet Balance is always free and usually instant. You can also send money using your bank account, which may take up to 10 business days to complete. Sending money using your credit or debit card is almost immediate, and usually takes up to a couple of minutes.

Currently this is only available on the desktop, but can be used form the phone’s browser by going to wallet.google.com, and note that this isn’t expected to rollout for a couple of months here in the U.S. Checkout the video below to get an idea of what I’m talking about.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Source: Google Wallet
Via: Google Commerce

Come comment on this article: Gmail and Google Wallet can now help you get money to the people in your life

Given the potential safety and privacy concerns surrounding Google Glass, Google has put some very tight restrictions on what kinds of applications developers can build for the headset. Or has it? Technology Review reports that Google will hold a session at its Google I/O conference this week dedicated specifically to giving developers root access to Glass and teaching them how to create experimental applications. Developers who hack into Glass will render their warranties null and void, of course, but Google still wants them to take that risk and test the limits of what Glass can do. Technology Review says that such hacks into Glass may be crucial to shaping the platform since Google still hasn’t finalized what features the headset will have when it’s released to consumers next year.