Adobe will buy advertising company TubeMogul for $540 million
Photoshop software maker Adobe Systems Inc said on Thursday it would buy advertising company TubeMogul Inc for about $540 million, net of debt and cash, giving it a bigger presence in the rapidly growing online video market. Adobe’s $14 per share cash offer represents an 82.5 percent premium to TubeMogul’s Wednesday close.
Shares of TubeMogul, which allows advertisers to buy video ad space using its software, jumped to $13.95 in early trading on Thursday. The deal will help Adobe add an ad buying platform to its digital marketing unit, which offers tools for businesses to analyse customer interactions and manage social media content.
Advertising technology firms such as TubeMogul, Rocket Fuel Inc and Tremor Video Inc face fierce competition from online advertising giants Facebook Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google. Up to Wednesday’s close, TubeMogul’s shares had fallen nearly 44 percent this year.
Facebook, Google and Twitter Inc have all been betting big on video over the past year, a format where advertisers are willing to pay a premium for a few seconds of users’ undivided attention.
“Whether it’s episodic TV, indie films or Hollywood blockbusters, video consumption is exploding across every device and brands are following those eyeballs,” said Brad Rencher, Adobe’s executive vice president of digital marketing. Adobe said the acquisition would not have an impact on its adjusted earnings in the year ending December 2017.
Lawmakers approve coordinated rollout of 700MHz spectrum for wireless broadband in Europe
European Union lawmakers on Thursday approved plans to coordinate the rollout across the bloc of the 700MHz spectrum band for wireless broadband by 2022 to provide faster mobile broadband and improved access to Internet services. The 700 MHz band (694-790 MHz), currently widely used for digital television signals and wireless microphones, can penetrate buildings and walls easily and cover larger geographic areas with less infrastructure than frequencies in higher bands.
The EU hopes that the new allocation of the 700 MHz band will facilitate the launch of the next-generation 5G mobile technology that is expected to support driverless cars, remote healthcare and billions of everyday objects connected to the Internet. “5G will change the logic of our economies. Successfully launching 5G in the European Union will require the efficient use of spectrum,” said MEP Gunnar Hokmark, who steered the legislation through European Parliament.
Thursday’s vote means that the European Parliament can start negotiations with EU member states to reach a final accord, after which the proposal will become law. “Europe needs to ensure enough spectrum is allocated to mobile broadband in order to cope with future data traffic needs,” said Lise Fuhr, Director General of ETNO, a trade group representing telecoms operators such as Orange, Deutsche Telekom and Telefonica.
Disney will gradually move towards online streaming as consumers continue to cut the cord
As more and more people get their favorite TV shows and movies online, Disney is also learning to embrace the stream.
The Walt Disney Co. once resisted offering channels like ESPN directly over the internet, preferring old-fashioned cable subscriptions. Its investors are fretting over ratings as more people cut the cord and cancel cable or satellite service. NFL game viewership is also down, and the contentious election drew viewers away from Disney networks like ABC to cable news networks.
Disney stock was down 9.6 percent for the year, at Thursday’s closing. But despite a weaker-than-expected earnings report, which showed a drop in ESPN revenue, shares rose more than 2 percent late Thursday after an initial dip in extended trading. The media conglomerate, which owns Marvel, Star Wars and its own Pixar and Disney Studios, is forging ahead with new streaming deals involving Netflix, Hulu and others.
“Disney is the one media company that can succeed in taking its brands directly to consumers,” said Nomura analyst Anthony DiClemente. He expects Disney could one day offer ESPN as a stand-alone service, for example, similar to HBO’s $15-a-month “HBO Now.”
Burbank, California-based Disney hasn’t gone that far yet. But last quarter it took a $1 billion stake in BAMTech, which provides streaming for Major League Baseball. The company said it plans to use that technology to offer an ESPN streaming service that offers live game streaming and programming not offered on regular ESPN.
The BAMTech deal is a “great way for us to move ESPN and probably other Disney assets into digital, mobile platforms in a more effective way,” Disney CEO Bob Iger said at a Goldman Sachs conference in New York in September. It’s also a way for Disney to learn more about its viewers for advertising purposes, he told analysts on a conference call Thursday.
Meanwhile, in the U.K. there is Disney Life, launched a year ago, a 10 pound ($15) monthly service that offers Disney movies, TV shows, e-books, and other children’s content online. Iger said Disney wants to learn from that service before launching a similar service in the United States. While there’s some “inevitability” to launching a similar service in the U.S., “I’m not prepared to discuss timing,” Iger told analysts.
“You can use that as a template for what they might do in the U.S.,” Nomura’s DiClemente said. So far in the U.S., Disney has been working with streaming services Hulu and Netflix to bring its properties to the stream. Its deal with Netflix, inked in 2012, finally kicked in this September, and gives Netflix the right to stream Disney movies like “Zootopia” before others. Netflix is also the exclusive home for Marvel TV shows like “Jessica Jones” and “Luke Cage.”
And last week, Hulu said there would be a Disney channel on its upcoming live online TV service. Disney owns part of Hulu, which is a joint venture between Disney, 21st Century Fox and Comcast’s NBCUniversal and Time Warner. In short, Disney is adapting to the stream, and those efforts will pay off eventually, DiClemente said.
Investors hope that day comes soon. Disney reported Thursday that fiscal fourth-quarter net income rose 10 percent to $1.77 billion, while sales fell 3 percent to $13.14 billion. But adjusted earnings amounted to $1.10 per share, which fell short of Wall Street estimates. Analysts surveyed by FactSet were expecting $1.16 per share on revenue of $13.5 billion.
Disney said sales and operating income in media networks, its biggest unit, were down because of lower advertising and affiliate revenue from ESPN, along with higher programming costs. Disney Channels also saw lower results.
Revenue from Disney parks and resorts grew slightly, while the studios division saw revenue rise 2 percent to $1.81 billion. The company said the films “Finding Dory” and “Captain America: Civil War” are still drawing crowds, making up for the weaker-than-expected performance of “Pete’s Dragon” and “Queen of Katwe.”
No, the new Rs 2000 notes don’t have a “nano-GPS” chip embedded in them
No, the new Rs 2,000 note doesn’t have an embedded nano-GPS chip (NGC) that will let the Income Tax Department of India track the location of your “hard-earned” cash in real time.
A WhatsApp forward, which started doing the rounds soon after PM Modi’s announcement that Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes will cease to be legal tender, stated that all Rs 2000 notes would use “embedded NGC” technology for tracking the notes.
The forward also claimed that the chip was passive, needing no power source, and that it acts as a “signal reflector.” Even if you ignore the fact that such a chip doesn’t even exist yet, just the fact that such a chip flies in the face of all conventional wisdom around GPS should have triggered off alarm bells in everyone’s heads.
As it happens, the message went viral to the extent that RBI Officials had to deny the existence of the chip at a press conference. This despite the RBI publishing a detailed description of the new notes and their security features.
Here’s the message that’s been doing the rounds and stirring so much trouble. Please just delete this forward, the next time you get it or tell your friends or family that they shouldn’t believe every WhatsApp forward that shows up on their timelines.
“Why RBI is issuing Rs 2000 Rupees Notes
How the embeded NGC Technology Works?
The unique feature of the NGC is it dosent need any power source. It only acts as a signal reflector. When a Satellite sends a signal requesting location the NGC reflects back the signal from the location, giving precise location coordinates, and the serial number of the currency back to the satellite, this way every NGC embedded currency can be easily tracked & located even if it is kept 120 meters below ground level. The NGC cant be tampered with or removed without damaging the currency note
How will this help eradicate black money menace?
Since every NGC embeded currency can be tracked. The satellite can identify the exact amount of money stored at a certain location. If a relatively high concentration of currency is found a certain location for a longer period of time at suspicious locations other than banks & other financial institutions. The information will be passed on to the Income Tax Department for further investigation
Vespa Elettrica: The stylish scooter is going electric by 2017
It’s all about style, simplicity and fun when it comes to Piaggio’s Vespa brand. And with the electric vehicles stepping into the automotive scene, Piaggio does not want to be left behind in the two wheeler space. At this year’s EICMA 2016, Piaggio has decided to showcase its Vespa Elettrica concept that will give customers a glimpse into the company’s electric future that is expected to take off as soon as the second half of 2017.
Yes, this would be a first for Vespa indeed. And this comes after a good 70 years of sticking to traditional fuel driven engines. According to the press release, the brand is pretty clear about what it is out to achieve with the new concept, “the new mobility solution according to the most elegant and beloved two-wheeled brand in the world that takes a step into the future in complete consistency with the values that have accompanied its history.”
While we do have an image of the concept, no details have been shared as to how much power or range Vespa is looking at. What we do know is that it will still look like Vespa as the design sticks to vintage Piaggio design that many have grown up with and loved the world over.
What we also know is that the Vespa Elettrica (in its final incarnation) will have some “technological and innovative connectivity solutions” in place. So be prepared for a better connected and smarter Vespa’s in the coming year.
Facebook testing a LinkedIn-like feature to help find your next job
After revealing a competing service to Steam last week, and a Craigslist competitorbefore that, it seems Facebook is now ready to take on LinkedIn. The company said today that it was testing a feature that allowed administrators to create job postings and receive applications from interested candidate.
We first spotted the feature back in October:
What’s unclear at this time is if Facebook plans to monetize this service. LinkedIn makes a hefty chunk of its revenue by tapping job hunters and recruiters who pay a monthly fee to connect. These individuals are then able to contact potential employers, post a resume, and connect with people within the corporate social hierarchy.
Facebook’s jobs feature would have the unfortunate task of trying to mix business and pleasure, something most of us are probably doing on the platform anyway. For job seekers and employers though, this could be great news. Tapping the world’s largest social network for potential jobs — or the best hires — makes a lot of sense.
Plus, we’re typically following our favorite businesses on Facebook anyway. As a final bonus, it keeps us from having to jump in waist-deep while trying to wade through the hell hole that LinkedIn has become.
No word on when the service might launch, but we’ll update you as we know more.