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The Nikkei: Sony Interested In Buying A 20%-30% Stake In Olympus

Posted: 24 Jan 2012 01:03 AM PST

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More news on the Sony-Olympus alliance that’s supposed to be announced soon: Japan’s biggest business daily The Nikkei is reporting today that big S is interested in purchasing a stake as large as “20%-30%” in its potential, scandal-hit partner (that would be up from the 0.03% Sony currently owns).

The capital and business alliance would be mainly aimed at bringing together Sony’s strength in imaging sensor technology with Olympus’ expertise in endoscopes and other medical equipment.

According to the Nikkei, Sony plans to expand investments in the health care field, as the company has been reporting weak financial numbers for their core consumer electronics business for quite a while now.

The paper also says it learned that Fujifilm and medical equipment maker Terumo are two other companies interested in Olympus.

On January 18, Olympus said it will hold an extraordinary shareholders meeting in April. During the announcement, the company also said it will sell a part of its shares to a strategic partner to help get it out of its crisis – it looks more and more like that partner will be Sony.

Daily Crunch: All Pass

Posted: 24 Jan 2012 01:00 AM PST

Federal Judge Rules You May Be Forced To Provide Decryption Password

Posted: 23 Jan 2012 06:42 PM PST

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In July, we wrote about an ongoing case wherein a woman accused of fraud was being asked by the prosecution to provide the password to access her computer’s data, which otherwise would remain encrypted and unreadable, weakening their case. They got permission to compel her to reveal the password, but the defense said that it was unconstitutional to do so, as providing that information was essentially self-incriminating testimony.

The defense and the prosecution disagree, there is no single compelling precedent, and even the Supreme Court, which has weighed in on a similar topic, isn’t quite sure what to make of the situation. So, doing what Judges are made to do, Judge Robert Blackburn made a decision: “the Fifth Amendment is not implicated by requiring production of the unencrypted contents of the Toshiba Satellite M305 laptop computer.”

His opinion, which is embedded at the end of the post, is not a poorly informed or foolish one (like some inevitably are in tech), though it isn’t very transparent. One earlier decision in a child pornography case, though the situations are not particularly analogous, is more lucid and describes its reasoning in more detail, something that may be important in a potentially major precedent-setting case.

The interpretation he gives, notably, eschews analogies (the battle has been over whether providing the password is an expressive act or more akin to simply handing over a key) and sticks to what he feels are the more relevant legal realities: the location and nature of the data is known by the prosecution, the owner of the data and the laptop have also been established, and whatever documents are discovered will be authenticated not by the defendant’s production of the password but by other means. To him, it seems, everyone is arguing over the wrong aspects of the case. It’s a practical decision, but because it is so practical (and specific to this case), it probably won’t live long as a serious precedent.

The question everybody is asking is not whether Ramona Fricosu will be convicted of fraud, but how access to data should be considered in a courtroom. It’s long, long past time when this should have been settled definitively.

But the debate over whether access is “more like” one thing or another, over which there are precedents already, doesn’t seem very forward-thinking. This doesn’t seem like an issue that’s going to be settled by this kind of decision, unfortunately, because as the debate shows, nothing is really an adequate comparator for something like a password to an encrypted drive. The parallels are only superficial, and building legal precedent on superficial similarities just because it’s easier for some people to grasp is no way to build the future.

Unsurprisingly, Fricosu’s lawyers are fighting the decision, asking for a stay of execution on the order so they can take it to the next level, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. No doubt the debate will go on for some time, but this case will certainly be considered one of the key documents.

SigFig: CES Gets Public Investors Excited About Companies, But Stock Prices Don’t Go Up

Posted: 23 Jan 2012 06:05 PM PST

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The Consumer Electronics Show, that turgid January gadget fest in Las Vegas, has been widely seen in the industry as a great place to show off your wares if you’re not Apple. But is that true? SigFig, the stealth investing startup that’s growing out of stock portfolio manager Wikinvest, has run some numbers on the market performance of the show’s big-company attendees during the event.

The main trend is pretty clear: there’s lots of buying and selling, but no significant gains. And actually, losses are not uncommon.

This data, I should note before getting further, is from SigFig users — a relatively small but statistically significant group of retail investors who use nearly 70 brokerages to handle stock sales and purchases. The overall market data also shows similar big volume changes, but is partially obscured by the large-block trading activities of institutional investors (which in many cases happens for other reasons).

So, in other words, for all the money and time that electronics companies put into the event, they’re not winning many more believers than they’re losing. Maybe it’s just what they’re announcing that isn’t building enough new enthusiasm to drive prices up? Maybe it’s these sorts of data points that helped convince Microsoft to dial down its participation this year?

Now that all the trades have closed from that week, here’s more detail on how this year looked for some top publicly-traded attendees versus previous years.

Intel, which makes semiconductor chips used by many of the electronics companies in attendance, grabs the spotlight every year with a CES keynote about its plans for the future. This year, on keynote day, its stock price jumped a relatively small $0.82 per share — even though shares bought increased by 129% and shares sold also rose by 123% among retail investors on SigFig. Overall, the stock closed down 2.22% by the end of the four-day show. In 2010, meanwhile, the stock ended up 0.48% on top of an 1402% increase in volume, and in 2011 it ended down 0.05% with a 215% increase in volume.

Google, whose Android operating system can be found in more and more devices at the show, has also not seen big gains among SigFig investors. On its biggest day of trading during the show — 90.64% above the average volume — its shares fell by 0.6%. In 2010 it grew by 1.4% during a 374.84% volume increase, and in 2011 it fell by 1.21% with its trading volume at 369.7% above normal.

What about other firms with a big presence at CES?

AT&T’s CES keynote on the 9th mostly failed to register this year, with only minimal volume increase to show — the volume of those buying actually dropped by over 13%, and continued falling during the conference. Verizon, meanwhile, had purchases surge by 1209% (there’s no decimal missing from that number). The price, however, only increased by 0.82%. Both carriers had volume increased around 100% in the past two years, with AT&T losing 2.77% in 2011, and Verizon losing 3.82%.

More analysis is needed to fully understand what’s going on here, like a broader view of all publicly traded companies that have news at the event, over more years. But I have a bit of speculation, following on my earlier point. Maybe CES is really good at generating attention for these companies, but their own announcements are perenially underperforming the hype? If that’s the case, there’s nothing wrong with attending CES, it’s what you bring with you to launch that matters.

By the way, TechCrunch made the CES trek in a big way this year, and generated all sorts of coverage about the events whether it helped the above companies’ stock prices or not. Check out our hub site here for all the details.

Kickstarter: eye3, An Affordable Aerial Photography Drone

Posted: 23 Jan 2012 04:16 PM PST

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A couple years back, I got to take part in the production of a music video being shot locally on a RED and filmed partially on board a custom helicopter build. It was interesting watching the operator and director work using the rig, but I was struck by how very specialized the copter was. Built from scratch by AerialPan Imaging, it was far from a personalized or affordable solution.

A new Kickstarter project called eye3 intends to make just that: an affordable aerial platform that can be automated and controlled from afar, yet is robust and customizable enough to meet the demands of serious photographers.

There are plenty of rigs out there, but they tend to be extremely expensive, often only available for rent, and not all are built with certain requirements or limits in mind. The six-rotor eye3 is designed for stable, user- or computer-controlled flight, on-board processing and location management, with up to ~12 pounds of camera and lens on board.

Some assembly will be required: it’s shipped as a kit and you’ll need to do a little soldering, but the electronics and main components are all ready to go. The hard part — designing and testing the rig and flight software — has been done.

It also runs in tandem with APM2, a high-quality (they say, and I’m sure they are right) and open-source flight planning and tracking platform built for this sort of thing. They aim to sell the basic kit for $999, with another $2500 package that includes a bunch of the accessories you might need or want.

[via ExtremeTech]

Sony Claims New RGBW Sensors Improve Exposure, Low-Light Performance

Posted: 23 Jan 2012 01:26 PM PST

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Sony has announced a new line of image sensors that will, in all likelihood, end up in dozens of smartphone models. The improvement is not in megapixels, which have more or less hit a ceiling, but in the actual layout of the light-sensitive wells that make up the pixels in the image.

The new sensors have, in addition to the usual red, green, and blue-filtered pixels, an unfiltered pixel element as well that will accept any wavelength of light. It can’t be used to determine color, but it will add (they say) to both sensitivity and brightness. Essentially what they’re doing is including a hard luminance-detecting element. This is good, much more accurate than taking the average from the RGB elements, and should in fact make low-light photography significantly better.

The press release shows off an improved low-light shot (seen above) and a video where an “HDR” function is used to reduce blowouts and even out exposure. By decoupling the color from the luminance measurements, more latitude is given to the image processor to create an image within clipping boundaries.

The idea isn’t new; in fact, LCDs already exist that use the image-producing (as opposed to capturing) variant of this. Sharp’s “Quattron” TVs have a fourth, yellow pixel that adds to both brightness and warmth. It’s different, of course, but the principle is similar.

And interestingly, Sony isn’t the first to do this, or at least they are not the first to attempt it: Kodak, the poor dears, were granted a patent for this very thing in 2007. It’s very likely that Sony developed this independently, but may have had to license the technology from Kodak in order to actually sell this type of sensor. Given how aggressively Kodak has been pushing its patents in the last year, the timing seems unlikely to be a coincidence — but it is not stated one way or the other. Sony says, however, that the technology was unfeasible until they designed this new chip around it, which reduces the area needed for a photosite and presumably enables higher pixel density.

Don’t expect any devices to ship with these new RGBW sensors for a while: the first 13-megapixel sensors will be shipping in June, and 8-megapixel ones in August. So phones and cameras using this technology likely won’t be appearing until the end of 2012. Something to look forward to.

Asus Transformer Prime Users Still Reporting Major GPS Issue After Official Fix

Posted: 23 Jan 2012 07:59 AM PST

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Right on cue, Asus started rolling out Ice Cream Sandwich to Transformer Prime tablets last week. The update not only brought Android 4.0 to the tablet, but also a fix for the lackluster GPS performance. But apparently the GPS is borked for some. Users are still experiencing poor performance and worse yet, some are even stating that the GPS no longer works in ICS when it did prior to the update.

The update reportedly enabled the tablet to obtain satellite information via Wi-Fi, which, in theory, should allow the GPS radio to lock-on quicker. But remember, as Asus previously stated, the Transformer “is not a professional GPS device.” So, you know, that means users shouldn’t expect certain functions to work as advertised.

The common theory prior to the update stated that the Prime’s metal back plate was interfering with the GPS radio. That could still be the case but it seems less likely now that satellite information is provided by a data connection.

Issues often arise after a product launch. Asus is not unique in this situation. However, the company is seemingly sweeping problems under the rug rather than directly addressing them. The company already removed all mentions of a GPS radio from the Prime’s product page (Amazon hasn’t though). Simply issuing a statement that the Prime is not a “professional GPS device” does not cover it. It speaks to the company’s inexperienced in the consumer electronic realm.

As many users point out on XDA, the Prime is still a fine tablet minus the GPS ability. Some users state the GPS works fine. But it’s completely broken for others. Consumers have a responsibility to hold manufacturers and companies responsible for their errors and mistakes. Only ignorant fanboys grin and bear it. The rest try to get issues resolved.

New RIM CEO: “I Don’t Think There Is A Drastic Change Needed”

Posted: 23 Jan 2012 06:21 AM PST

ThorstenHeins

RIM’s new CEO Thorsten Heins has only been at the reigns for an evening, but he did a very “BlackBerry” job of presenting himself to the media this morning on his introductory media call.

It felt a lot like the media calls of yore, with Balsillie and Lazaridis at the helm. Especially when Heins referred to Apple as “the other fruit company,” noting the two companies shared strategy of vertical integration. Unfortunately, vertical integration of software and hardware is about all that these two fruits have in common.

Remember folks, Heins is coming off of a four-year stint at RIM. At the relatively young company, Heins worked under founder Mike Lazaridis and his partner in crime Jim Balsillie. That said, you can basically hear Lazaridis-style hubris in Heins’ comments.

When asked if there was anything Heins wanted to do in the past, but was held back from by his position, Heins confirms that he (along with the freshly removed prior leadership) doesn’t see much wrong with RIM.

“At the time, the company was growing but still acting as a startup,” said Heins. “But startup processes don’t scale. Every company goes through that phase. I had the opportunity to learn about RIM here. I don’t think that there is a drastic change needed. We are evolving our tactics and processes. I don’t feel that I was held back in any way to do what I needed to do.”

So, let’s just parse this out, shall we? Heins, as COO, was never held back in executing operational decisions or strategies. That means that anything he has wanted to do to help grow (and likely save) the brand, he could’ve already done. In other words, don’t expect a brand new BlackBerry or a brand new RIM.

But the new CEO had plenty more to talk about, namely that he has no plans to split the software and hardware businesses. So you can kiss dreams of an Android-powered BlackBerry out the window for now.

No, it’s BB 10 all the way, courtesy of QNX. When asked whether QNX is really “the thing,” Heins responded by saying that “QNX is not developing an OS. It’s an existing OS. It’s used already. It’s a multi-threaded OS. What that allows us to do is true multitasking. You can have many apps open at the same time and really run them real-time in parallel.”

He finished his shpeel by noting that QNX is “an extremely competitive OS today.” Of course, we have no way of judging that until RIM fiddles around with it, makes it usable on a smartphone, and then finally releases it.

Heins also mentioned that he’d be open to licensing BB 10 to other manufacturers, “if it makes sense strategically and tactically.” But again, other manufacturers would likely need to see consumer reaction to the OS before anything like that went down, which brings us back to RIM’s most pressing and important near-term goal: get BB 10 to market quickly.

[via Engadget]