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  • PanaCast Is A Unique Panoramic Video Conferencing Experience

    panacast image

    Video conferencing, especially in a work setting, can be a real pain in the ass. But PanaCast, unlike other video conferencing platforms, actually seems like something that would be both fun and exceedingly useful.

    PanaCast is a crowdfunded panoramic video conferencing platform that Ross Rubin covered back in December in one of his Backed Or Whacked posts. Ross wholeheartedly backed the project, and since then PanaCast’s Kickstarter blew past its original fundraising goal of $15,000, raising nearly three times that amount.

    Today PanaCast will be made available for the public to purchase for what they call a “market disrupting price” of $599 with a monthly subscription fee of $19.99.

    What PanaCast offers is a unique panoramic video conferencing experience. It utilizes a special webcam that resembles, as Ross noted, an odd-looking UFO on a tripod. When the webcam is attached to the stand, it seems to be about two feet tall, so it’s fairly portable.

    Setting up the webcam is easy. Once you have the PanaCast app open on your iOS device and a cellular or wi-fi connection, you scan in the barcode on top of the webcam to connect to it.

    The webcam is composed of six different cameras that have had their feeds synchronized for one 200 degree video image that’s 2700 pixels wide and 540 pixels tall. The image itself is crisp and sharp, without any distortion whatsoever, and you can scroll and zoom to any part of the live video feed inside PanaCast’s iOS app.

    From the live demos I was shown by Altia Systems, the company behind PanaCast, it’s also extremely responsive. There wasn’t the slightest bit of lag with scrolling and zooming at all. Within the app, you can also switch between multiple feeds pretty easily.

    For now, PanaCast is only compatible with iOS devices. They’re planning on releasing desktop and mobile versions of the PanaCast app on Windows, Mac, and Android sometime in the near future.

    The PanaCast app is a free download in the iOS App Store, and you can place orders for the PanaCast Camera at Altia’s website here.

  • Microsoft told to bring back Start button as ‘a sign that it listens to its customers’

    Microsoft told to bring back Start button as 'a sign that it listens to its customers'
    While Windows 8 has a lot going for it, it’s also proven to be a very polarizing operating system that many users have criticized for departing too much from earlier versions. The most common complaint lobbed at Windows 8 is that it lacks the classic Start button that Microsoft users have long relied on as a central navigation tool. But with rumors percolating that Microsoft is considering dialing back some of the changes it made to Windows with the next major update to the operating system, Forrester analyst J.P. Gownder is encouraging the company to go all-out and bring back the Start button as a nod to users’ constructive criticisms.

    Continue reading…

  • Google Fiber’s Next Stop May Be In Provo, Utah

    Google Fiber is starting to pick up pace in Kansas City again, and Google is just starting to plan out its expansion into Austin, Texas. While all that’s happening, Google may be bringing its gigabit Internet service to another city.

    Provo Buzz reports that the city of Provo, Utah may be next in line to receive Google Fiber. Their reasoning seems to stem from an official Provo city Web page that promises we’ll “be amazed.” City officials are reportedly saying it will an “epic announcement.”

    So what makes Provo the more likely Google Fiber candidate over other past rumored locations like New York City? For one, Provo already has the Fiber infrastructure in place. The city has had a Fiber network for a few years now thanks to a project called iProvo. The project soon ran out of money, however, and transferred ownership to Veracity. After that, Veracity sold the network back to the city under a 14 month lease.

    According to Provo Buzz, that lease is now just about up. This gives the city and Veracity the perfect opportunity to unload the costly fiber infrastructure onto Google who will then use it to offer Google Fiber to the citizens of Provo.

    Of course, all of this is merely speculation for now. The city could be announcing something entirely different as there hasn’t been a single leak yet. There were numerous leaks before the announcements in Kansas City and Austin so it seems a little suspect that Provo could keep a Google Fiber announcement secret until today.

    We’ll continue to watch the Provo Web site for any sign of Google Fiber. If the city announces an expansion today, we’ll be sure to let you know.

    [h/t: DroidLife]

  • John McAfee Talked About Ricin Attacks In January, Puts Out Statement

    As you may know, letters poisoned with ricin were sent to President Obama and Senator Roger Wicker, though both were intercepted before they could do any harm. Investigators, reportedly see no link from the letters to the explosions at the Boston Marathon, at least so far.

    Interestingly a statement has come out from none other than McAfee antivirus founder John McAfee, who, if you’ll recall, was the center of a big manhunt in (and out of) Belize late last year. In January, McAfee did an interview with Alex Jones in which he predicted ricin attacks on U.S. soil.

    McAfee, today, took to his blog to say that he has been contacted my members of the press (linking to CNN), and asked about this prediction. “Meanwhile the same mainstream media channels reporting the current events refused to publish my findings of a potential threat,” he says.

    What he considers to be his comment on the matter is as follows:

    “The press is generally more interested in sensationalism than Truth. It is only when the Truth and the Truly Sensational coincide that the Truth plays much of a role in reported events.”

    He goes on to say, “In January I told the truth about my discoveries in Belize about impending Ricin attacks, but the more sensational story at the time was the story of a deceptive madman on the run who was manufacturing stories. I am tired of the games played by the press and now choose not to play.”

    He closes by saying that the truth is being told in an authorized movie of the events from Impact Future Media. Remember that?

    In the Alex Jones interview, McAfee talked about the Belize government aiding terrorists, resulting in ricin making its way into the U.S. He said that Belize has been accepting Hezbollah terrorists, changing their identities, giving them European names, then shifting them off through various countries, and eventually into the U.S. with ricin. The John McAfee story sums up his story:

    John goes on to say, that for the past three months he has employed two operatives that have infiltrated a Hezbollah Terrorist camp in Nicaragua who are manufacturing tons of Ricin that is destined for a major attack on USA soil. He has also placed three people who have gathered information from the Los Zetas Cartel about working with Hezbollah in trading weapons for access to drug routes. He says the Terrorists are using the drug routes for moving the Ricin … he claims the CIA must know about this. He says the pending Terrorist Attack will be much worse than 9-11.

    Here’s the Alex Jones video. The interview starts at 48:40

  • Samsung Galaxy S 4 officially confirmed by Sprint and T-Mobile

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    The cat is out of the bag as both Sprint and T-Mobile will carry the Samsung Galaxy S 4. The S 4 can be found on both carrier’s websites, with Sprint having a big banner that uses Samsung’s tag line: “Countdown To The Next Big Thing”. Additionally, there is also a countdown clock with just under 13 and half hours to go at the time of this writing. T-Mobile has it on their site as well however it is a little less in your face, with just a little box with “Coming Soon” on it.

    We have already seen Verizon and AT&T confirm the S 4, as well as Telus in Canada, and even Walmart has started taking preorders for the device. So the fact that Sprint and T-Mobile has joined the game, should be of no surprise for Samsung’s new flagship phone. Sprint is offering the device for $249 with a new two-year contract. Existing customers can get it for $149 with a new two-year contract. In a hope to gain new customers, Sprint has extended that price offer to new customers willing to switch their numbers. So if you switch your number to Sprint, you can also pick up the S 4 for only $149 with a new two-year contract.

    T-mobile is more mum on their plans. There is however, a sign up page for anyone who wants to receive information on the phone. If you don’t feel like signing up for it, don’t worry we already signed up, and will always pass along any info we get to the readers.

    Source: Sprint, T-Mobile
    via: Gotta Be Mobile


     

    Come comment on this article: Samsung Galaxy S 4 officially confirmed by Sprint and T-Mobile

  • Kickstarter’s Video Mode Is a Cool New Way to Explore Projects

    Kickstarter has just announced a new way to explore projects on the site. It’s called “Video Mode” and it’s a “full-screen presentation where you can watch every single live project video”

    Video mode is an interesting new way to jump around to various Kickstarter projects. One you enter, you’ll be shown a fullscreen video from a random project. If the video interest you, and you wish to learn more about the project, just click the green “explore this project” button and you’ll be directed to that project’s main page.

    Or, if the particular project bores you are just looks plain stupid, you can move on. At this point, you have three options:

    One, you can be taken to a project that’s completely different from the one you’re currently viewing. Or, you can find a similar project video by a) geography (something near Evanston) or b) category (something else in Short Film).

    “Since Kickstarter launched in 2009, over 75,000 project videos have been uploaded to Kickstarter. From day one, we’ve been blown away by the amazing videos you’ve created — from the singer Allison Weiss setting the standard early on, to the incredible Wes Anderson spoof the Inman Park Squirrel Census produced, and all of the amazing “Oh hey, I didn’t see you there” videos. For a long time we’ve been wanting to find a good way to show these off, so people could explore projects through the medium of video,” says Kickstarter.

    Kickstarter launched its first-ever iOS app back in February, and has since announced a couple of milestones including $100 million total pledges to games through the site.

  • Julianne Hough: Mystery Man Spotted Holding Her Hand at Coachella

    Dancer-turned-actress Julianne Hough has had a wild few months in the tabloids. Apart from revealing that she was abused as a child and showing some leg through a torn dress at the Golden Globes, Hough’s love life has been the topic of much speculation. The dancer broke up with longtime boyfriend Ryan Seacrest in March, and since that time has been linked to actor Alex Pettyfer. Now, it seems that Hough has a new romantic interest that she is showing off in public.

    This week, rumors are swirling following the revelation that Hough was spotted at the music festival Coachella holding the hand of an unknown man. According to a report from the New York Post, Hough was spotted with this mystery man at an exclusive Armani Exchange party held at the event. The report cites an anonymous “spy” as saying the man was “a hunky Australian mystery man named Tommy.”

    Hough recently starred in the movie adaptation of the Nicholas Sparks novel Safe Haven. She has also been cast in a Diablo Cody-directed movie titled Paradise.

  • Facebook to Display Your Open Groups on Your Timeline

    Facebook is adding a new Timeline section to highlight the groups to which you belong. The new Groups section will appear on the About tab on the new Timeline.

    Facebook launched their new Timeline design, a one-column format with more focus on interests, in early March. The main Timeline page got a facelift, streamlining stories and moving other information and activities to the left-hand side. More relevant to this story, the About section also got retooled. Each interest now has its own section, and you can also add custom apps like Instagram or Foursquare activity if you so choose.

    Facebook is still in the process of rolling out the new Timeline.

    Anyway, Facebook tells Inside Facebook that the new Groups section on your Timeline will only show the “open” groups that you belong to. Both closed and secret groups should be hidden from the new panel, something that should please those concerned with privacy in light of Facebook’s problems with Groups visibility.

    Groups will join individual boxes for your friends, photos, music, movies, Tv shows, books, games, likes, and app activity on the About section on your Timeline. Facebook just unveiled the new Games section a couple of weeks ago.

  • iPhone 5S, low-cost iPhone and Retina iPad mini launches all reportedly pushed back

    iPhone 5S, low-cost iPhone and iPad mini launches all reportedly pushed back
    Apple went from investors’ darling to Wall Street whipping boy in a matter of months, and the stock is now down more than 35% from the record high it hit last September. Shares plummeted to levels not seen since 2011 on Wednesday afternoon thanks in part to a recent note from Jefferies & Company analyst Peter Misek, who said Apple could be in for another couple of “disappointing” quarters as nearly all of its major mobile launches will happen later than expected this year.

    Continue reading…

  • Dan Pfeiffer: “When it matters most”

    This afternoon, Dan Pfeiffer sent the message below to the White House email list asking people to pledge to speak out in favor of reducing gun violence. If you didn't get the email, be sure to sign up.

    read more

  • The Puc Is A Kickstarted Steel “Ice Cube” That Won’t Wet Your Whiskey

    6d8e55c780ddd2d0cb77d7a64aaf0884_large

    Designers Dave and Calvin Laituri have joined forces to kickstart Pucs, small, stainless-steel icecube replacements that promise to chill your drink without wetting it down. The Pucs are milled of solid steel and come in a handsome wooden tray that you can place right into the freezer.

    The Pucs are rechargeable in that they will not degrade and hold their temperature for quite a while – the creators suggest adding and removing them as you see fit – and the will even reduce the temperature of hot beverages.

    Pucs are an excellent heat absorber as well. A room-temperature Puc will take the edge off of blazing hot coffee, quickly bringing it to a more drinkable temperature. Take them on the road, you’ll be glad you did.

    The team is looking for $2,500 to ship the first batch and they’re nearly at $2,000.

    While the Pucs aren’t that amazingly new – similar rocks and metal cubes have been available for years – the process that the creators are going through is particularly interesting. Hardware startups don’t all have to be making smart watches or robotic arms. A cool, fun project like this is what makes crowdfunding so unique. First, the lads don’t have to make thousands of these, ship them, and hope they sell through a distributor. Whereas household goods are traditionally sold at big box stores and discounters, this process allows the creators to build just as many as they need and, when they’re ready to make more, they have a solid word-of-mouth list that they can approach for updates and further orders.



  • ACLU files FTC complaint about Android security

    Is the American Civil Liberties Union an iPhone shop, or is the organization really looking out for your best interests? I ask because the complaint filed yesterday with the Federal Trade Commission (and revealed today) is the kind of marketing Apple probably couldn’t afford. This thing is a goldmine of FUD (you know, fear uncertainty and doubt) — Christmastime good, when Santa packs the room with presents and they’re all for you.

    But, wait, Google gets gifted, too! Because the complaint is more about carriers dragging their bums updating Android than any fundamental security problem with the platform. The operating system has “known, exploitable security vulnerabilities for which fixes have been published by Google, but have not been distributed to consumers’ smartphones by the wireless carriers and their handset manufacturer partners”, according to the legal filing.

    The 16-page complaint is a wonder. The FTC is charged with protecting consumers, for which the ACLU accuses U.S. carriers inflict much harm by way of Android phones: Devices “that do not receive regular, prompt security updates are defective and unreasonably dangerous”.

    There’s a well-spring of FUD marketing for Apple here. “The wireless carriers have failed to warn consumers that the smartphones sold to them are defective, that they are running vulnerable software, and that other smartphones are available that receive regular, prompt updates to which consumers
    could switch”, the ACLU complaint states. Apple makes the majority of handsets sold in the United States receiving timely updates. Google ranks second with devices like Nexus 4.

    But there is plenty of goodwill for Google, which struggles to get carriers and manufacturers to update Android in timely fashion. Only one-quarter of Android devices accessing Google Play in the 14 days before April 2 run current version Jelly Bean, which released in July. ACLU does Google goodness by demanding that carriers are accountable for releasing updates that, at the least, patch vulnerabilities.

    “The slow rate of adoption of the most recent versions of Android does not reflect a failure by consumers to seek out and install operating system updates”, according to the complaint. “Instead, it reflects the fact that for most Android smartphones in use, updates to the most recent version of the operating system simply have not been made available for consumers to install”.

    Unsurprisingly, ACLU demands change, and as I read the document so beneficial to Google maybe I should wonder if the group is an Android shop — or if the search-and-information giant isn’t somehow involved here. I ask in part because the section about browsers could have been written by a Google marketer: “The majority of Android phones used by consumers are also running an out of date, insecure version of the default Android web browser”. Well, maybe Google wouldn’t so strongly word such a sentence but benefits if more people use Chrome mobile.

    The complaint singles out major cellular carriers — AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon Wireless.

    “If the mobile carriers are not going to provide important security updates, the FTC should at a minimum force them to provide device refunds to consumers and allow consumers to terminate their contracts without penalty so that they can switch to a provider who will”, Chris Soghoian, ACLU senior policy analyst, says today.

    The ACLU requests that the Commission investigate the major wireless carriers and enjoin their unfair and deceptive business practices. Specifically, the ACLU requests that the Commission:

    A. Compel the major wireless carriers to warn all subscribers using carrier-supplied Android smartphones with known, unpatched security vulnerabilities about the existence and severity the vulnerabilities, as well as any reasonable steps those consumers can take to protect themselves, including purchasing a different smartphone.

    B. Compel the major wireless carriers to permit consumers under contract who are using carrier-supplied Android smartphones which have not received prompt, regular security updates to end their contracts early, without any early termination fee.

    C. Compel the wireless carriers to permit consumers who are using carrier-supplied Android smartphones less than two years old which have not received prompt, regular security updates to either:

    1. Exchange, at no cost, their existing device for another phone that will receive prompt, regular updates directly from Apple, Google, Microsoft or another mobile operating system vendor.
    2. Return the phone and receive a full refund of the original purchase price.

    If you’re looking for an excuse to get out of your contract and switch to iPhone or another Android, ACLU may offer a way.

  • Can brands evolve from digital advertisers to mass communicators?

    Social media advertising is all the rage today, but Jeff Dachis, CEO and founder of marketing consultancy The Dachis Group, questions whether brands are really getting the concept. Inserting what are essentially billboards into people’s Facebook feeds doesn’t count as true engagement, he said Wednesday at GigaOM’s paidContent Live conference in New York City.

    “This shift from what I believe to be mass communications to a mass of communicators has created a strong fundamental shift in the way brands are going to be built going forward,” he said. “They’re going to have to figure out how to engage with people instead of advertising at them.”

    For Dachis that means direct engagement with people influential in their field through social media channels. Those influencers can then, in turn, amplify their message through the same social media outlets, he said.

    Speaking on the same panel as Dachis, Google VP of Partner Business Solutions Bonita Stewart took issue with the idea that older formers digital marketing were ineffective. Contrary to popular belief, Stewart said, some display CPM rates are increasing, and Google’s publisher partners are seeing a lot of success using a combination of traditional advertising and new social marketing tools such as Hangouts.

    Check out the rest of our paidContent Live 2013 coverage here, and a video embed of the session follows below:


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  • Next-gen battery tech can charge a smartphone in seconds

    Next-gen battery can charge a smartphone within seconds

    Mobile devices have come a long way in a short period of time. It seems as if smartphones and tablets are capable of just about anything, however battery restrictions are holding these powerful devices back. The rate of innovation has not be been the same in the battery field and users are forced to bring chargers with them wherever they go. Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign are looking to change that with a new lithium-ion battery that is 2,000 times more powerful than comparable  technologies.

    Continue reading…

  • It’s not just about big data: here’s why small data matters to your health

    Big data may be a rising star in health care but small data can play a powerful role, too. At the TEDMED conference on Wednesday, Deborah Estrin, a computer science professor at New York City’s Cornell Tech, gave a compelling case for how your “digital exhaust,” including location data, searches and social media posts, could provide a valuable window into your wellbeing.

    “We’re continuously generating digital breadcrumbs from the services we interact with,” she said. But “there are no existing vehicles that package that data about me in a format that’s useful for me and that make it accessible to me. [And] there should be because there’s a lot that I can learn about my personal health from my digital behavior.”

    Search engines, social networks and mobile carriers capture and analyze that data to serve up advertising, improve services and provide personalization. But delivered to the user, Estrin said, that data could generate a “digital social pulse” for tracking health in more implicit ways than Fitbits (see disclosure), Nike Fuelbands and other quantified self-type devices.

    For example, she said, an app could process data from a mobile carrier to determine whether new supplements for early-stage arthritis are actually helping a patient. If the patient is checking her phone earlier in the morning and moving around more frequently, that could indicate that the medicine its doing its job.

    Service providers may balk at the prospect of releasing their troves of user activity data – and Estrin acknowledged that they would likely worry about PR headaches and privacy issues. But not only should enhanced transparency provide the foundation for a strong privacy policy, she argued that access to their data would make smartphones and data services even more valuable to customers.

    Startups like Personal and the Locker Project have started building tools that help people manage and use their personal information. And Ginger.io uses sensor data from mobile phones and other devices to identify signals of behavior change to understand users’ mental and physical health.

    But Estrin wants to encourage an entire ecosystem of apps. And, along with colleagues at the mobile health non-profit OpenM Health and Cornell Tech, she’s beginning to build prototypes that demonstrate the benefits of using small data for personal health, as well as create the architecture for service providers, app developers and others to create additional small data health apps and algorithms. (You can learn more about Cornell’s small data initiative here.)

    “We need an open architecture, so that a rich market of apps and services can grow up around that data just like http created the World Wide Web and led to the rich array of internet services,” she said.

    Image by Digital Storm via Shutterstock.

    Disclosure: Fitbit is backed by True Ventures, a venture capital firm that is an investor in the parent company of this blog, Giga Omni Media. Om Malik, founder of Giga Omni Media, is also a venture partner at True.

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  • Apple stock tanks on bad news from audio chip supplier

    A company you’ve never heard of is being blamed for dragging Apple’s stock down to its lowest point since late 2011, $401.68. Cirrus Logic, which makes audio chips, reported revenues of $170 million for first quarter, missing analysts’ expectations by nearly $30 million. The reason Apple investors reacted the way they did is because Apple is believed to be Cirrus Logic’s biggest client: if its sales are down, it signals Apple’s mobile device sales could be down too.

    According to Bloomberg:

    Cirrus will record a net inventory reserve of $23.3 million for the fiscal fourth quarter, which ended in March, the Austin, Texas-based company said in a statement yesterday. Most of that — $20.7 million — is from a high-volume product from one customer, Cirrus said, without naming the client.

    Bloomberg reports that the unnamed client is Apple, and that 90 percent of Cirrus Logic’s revenues come from selling audio chips that Apple puts inside of iPhones and iPads. If Cirrus Logic has huge amounts of unsold inventory, the thinking is that it’s because Apple had no need for them — that it possibly overestimated the number of iPhones and iPads it was able to sell during the first three months of 2013.

    Even if that’s true, there’s more than one possible explanation for Cirrus Logic’s excess supply of chips. Apple could have switched providers of those chips, for instance. Apple CEO Tim Cook warned when similar negative supplier reports caused a massive freakout among investors a week before earnings last quarter: “I’d stress that even if a particular data point were factual, it would be impossible to interpret [the meaning] for our overall business. Yields can vary, supplier performance can vary … there’s an inordinately long list of things that would make any single data point not a great proxy for what’s going on.”

    And here we are again, a week from Apple reporting its fiscal second quarter earnings, which will take place April 23. The signs that this isn’t going to be a blowout quarter are there: Apple had no major new product introductions between January and March, and it might also be drawing down production on some models of iPhones and iPads as it may be preparing for new devices this summer.

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  • Evernote Wants To Build Its Own Hardware, First With Partners And Then In-House

    evernote_top

    Online note-taking company Evernote revealed something very interesting via its CEO Phil Libin, who told IDG News Service that his company wants to design hardware products and eventually make them itself. Libin said Evernote will move soon to start releasing Evernote-branded gadgets, which will be co-designed and manufactured by external OEM partners.

    Libin didn’t share too much in terms of details around what kind of products we might see bearing the Evernote logo, offering only that they’d look to create devices that are “new and magical” in the IDG interview, instead of wading in to compete with others in existing categories.

    Evernote has already done some work with hardware partners and products, like the Evernote Smart Notebook by Moleskine. The book allows users to snap a photo of its pages, which use “specially formatted paper” designed to work specifically with Evernote, and have their handwritten notes converted to a digital format. It seems likely this is the type of product Libin is referring to: ones that uniquely suit Evernote’s vision of a pervasive, constantly connected digital notebook that stores any kind of media.

    So while we probably won’t see an Evernote Phone or Evernote Tablet, other opportunities would seem to abound. Image- and audio-capturing devices, for instance, with direct connections to Evernote make a lot of sense in the same vein ans the Moleskine connected notebook.

    A hardware ecosystem would probably still be a secondary concern for Evernote, which remains focused on the problem of building apps that work seamlessly across devices according to Libin, but it could be a route toward greater visibility among the general public, and toward greater engagement from existing users.

    We’ve reached out to Evernote directly to see if they can share more about their hardware plans, but they did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

    [via Engadget]

  • Toyota Supra Rally Car?

    Toyota Supra Rally Car

    If you were to build a car to compete in the WRC (World Rally Championship), the odds of you choosing something that’s relatively compact with all-wheel-drive would be pretty good. Cars like the Subaru Impreza and Mitsubishi EVO immediately come to mind, but a late model rear-wheel drive Toyota Supra?!? Hmm… that may not be the best choice. Norway’s Kenneth Moen however not only disagrees, but has set up one of the sweetest Supra’s I’ve ever seen. Click through and get ready to see (and hear) one of the coolest rally cars on the planet!

    Source: TheSmokingTire.com

  • European power giant E.ON partners with Ericsson on grid big data

    European power giant E.ON is building out a smarter grid across its various networks, including rolling out smart meters, and on Wednesday announced a new big data partnership with grid gear and software provider Ericsson. E.ON says it will increase its data delivery by 3000 percent, and Ericsson will provide software and services to manage that data.

    The deal is focused around 600,000 smart meters in Sweden. But E.ON is one of the largest power and utility companies in the world and operates in 30 countries with 26 million customers, so clearly its a relationship with a lot of potential.

    Ericsson competes with GE, Siemens, ABB and others to sell software, services and hardware to utilities and power companies. Increasingly utilities and power companies are interested in buying more data analytics tools as their networks are becoming IT networks that need to monitor, digest, and analyze data to run more efficiently. As global electricity grids add more clean energy (solar panels and wind turbines), and energy storage (battery farms), better data analytics and predictions tools will also be needed to keep the grid stable.

    Some of the power gear vendors are turning to the big data startup leaders for partnerships around the latest analytics. For example, earlier this week Siemens announced that it’s working with data warehouse veteran Teradata.

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  • Reduxio Raises $9M From Jerusalem Ventures & Carmel Ventures

    Reduxio Systems said it raised $9 million in a Series A round led by Jerusalem Venture Partners and Carmel Ventures. Reduxio is developing a storage operating system.

    PRESS RELEASE

    REDUXIO, THE SCALE-OUT HYBRID STORAGE COMPANY, RAISES $9M IN A ROUND LED BY JERUSALEM VENTURE PARTNERS AND CARMEL VENTURES

    The Israel-Based Company has Developed a New Storage Operating System that Leverages Flash to Bring Disruptive Functionality to the Enterprise

    Apr. 17th, 2013, Tel Aviv, Israel – Reduxio Systems, a next generation hybrid innovator, announced today that it secured $9M in a Series A round led by two of Israel’s leading venture capitalist firms, Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP) and Carmel Ventures.

    Storage industry veterans Mark Weiner, Nir Peleg and Amnon Strasser founded Reduxio in 2012 after recognizing the challenges of integrating new key functionality and hardware advances into legacy storage systems.

    “Designing a system from the ground up allowed us to break free of all the limitations and to fully take advantage of new network, server and drive architectures,” said Mark Weiner, CEO of Reduxio. “In this way, we can deliver revolutionary functionality to match the particular needs in cloud, virtual machine and structured data environments.”

    “We are seeing a paradigm shift in storage, as SSDs and 10GbE adoption rates increase. Reduxio’s novel approach is a game changer,” Said Ori Bendori, General Partner at Carmel Ventures.

    “We’re excited by the hybrid space and how Reduxio’s technology accelerates flash adoption in the enterprise,” said Kobi Rozengarten, General Partner at JVP and a veteran of the flash memory industry, “We invested in Reduxio early and used our incubator to partner from their founding.”

    Reduxio’s cost-effective hybrid provides an alternative to the expensive all flash arrays. Mainstream vendors have been struggling to integrate SSDs into their legacy architectures and to have different key features work together. The fast growing storage needs of cloud and corporate cloud environments that are virtualized and application dependent are demanding more innovative solutions.Reduxio’s disruptive storage technologies provide a much needed solution to these challenges.

    “Reduxio was born from the idea that the only way to truly introduce new and innovative functionality in conjunction with the newest hardware required a completely new base-architecture designed from the ground up – taking advantage of the latest advances,” said Reduxio CEO Weiner. “For the past decade, spinning disks have not kept up with the performance advances in the rest of the storage architecture. New functionality added to older systems is not always compatible as one layer of complexity is added onto the next. Reduxio is providing answers to these challenges.”
    About Reduxio Systems

    Reduxio’s hybrid arrays are specifically designed for the particular needs of today’s storage environments focusing on cloud, virtual machines and structured data sets. The ReduxOS operating system and next generation smart placement algorithms will reset price/performance and functionality requirements moving forward.

    About Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP)

    Based in the JVP Media Quarter in Jerusalem, JVP (www.jvpvc.com) is one of Israel’s largest and most active venture capital funds with over $900 million raised to date. Founded in 1993, JVP has helped build over 90 companies and has orchestrated 25 of the largest exits in the region with 14 industry sales and 11 IPOs on NASDAQ. Established in 1993 by JVP Founder and Chairman Erel Margalit, JVP’s General Partners are Gadi Tirosh and Kobi Rozengarten.

    About Carmel Ventures

    With over $600 million currently under management, many successful exits, and a growing portfolio of promising start-ups, Carmel is among Israel’s top-tier venture capital funds. Founded in 2000 by pioneers and leaders of the Israeli high tech industry, Carmel provides significant capital and active, hands-on support through the growth cycle of its portfolio companies and is recognized as a true company-building fund in Israel. Carmel, headquartered in Herzliya, is a member of the Viola Group, Israel’s premier technology focused Private Equity group with $2B under management. For more information, please visit www.carmelventures.com.

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