Nokia posts a sharp drop in earnings as downturn hits telecom equipment business

Image Credit: REUTERS

  27 Oct 2016 , 17:24

Nokia has succumbed to a downturn in the telecoms equipment business, posting a sharp drop in quarterly earnings and warning that demand for the kit which drives global network traffic would shrink further in the coming year. Its shares fell more than 7 percent to their lowest in three years.

The network gear market is in decline after demand for 4G equipment peaked last year and a new cycle of 5G network upgrades is not expected to begin until around 2020, a trend which earlier this month pummeled rival Ericsson. So far Nokia is seeing scant benefit from the purchase of Franco-American Alcatel Lucent, bought in a 15.6 billion euro ($17 billion) all-share deal earlier this year, though the company said integration efforts were on track.

“Although their underlying profitability is solid, it does not compensate for reported figures being weak… It’s a bit better than Ericsson’s, but it is not a good report,” said Swedbank analyst Mathias Lundberg, who rates the stock “neutral”. “In the near term, Nokia will have tough time ahead … But given time, and with the successful integration of Alcatel Lucent, Nokia could be a very forceful company,” Lundberg added.

Nokia’s third-quarter network sales fell 12 percent from a year ago to 5.32 billion euros against an average expectation of 5.39 billion. Operating profit for the unit fell 36 percent to 432 million. The company said network sales were set to decline at a similar rate in the fourth quarter as in the third, and the market would continue to shrink next year.

“As we look forward, we expect (market) conditions to stabilize somewhat in 2017, with the primary addressable market in which Nokia competes likely to decline in the low single- digits for that year,” Chief Executive Rajeev Suri told a conference call.

Synergy Programmes

Sweden’s Ericsson earlier this month reported a more than 90 percent plunge in third-quarter profit and replaced its chief executive. Yet Nokia is less dependent than Ericsson on mobile broadband demand, as the Alcatel-Lucent merger gave it a larger fixed-line network business. Nokia’s Suri said the company, which is cutting thousands of jobs worldwide, was on track with its Alcatel synergy programme which targets savings of 1.2 billion euros in 2018.

“Challenging networks markets are nothing new to Nokia and I believe we remain well positioned … with our disciplinced operating model, focus on efficiences and costs and our broad portfolio,” Suri said. Nokia’s total third-quarter operating profit fell 18 percent to 556 million euros, but that figure was buoyed by a one-off patent licensing payment.

The company also said Chief Financial Officer Timo Ihamuotila, hailed for Nokia’s succesful recent M&A moves, would quit to join Swiss engineering group ABB, to be replaced by insider Kristian Pullola. Once known for its mobile phones, Nokia sold the handset business to Microsoft in 2014, leaving it with the networks business and a portfolio of technology patents.

Reuters

Finance Minister Jaitley emphasises that India needs to undergo rapid urbanisation in next 2 decades

Image: Urban Engines

  27 Oct 2016 , 19:00

Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Thursday stressed on India’s need to urbanise rapidly in the next two decades in line with its present development in order to relieve the pressure on agriculture. “In the next two decades, India will have to go for rapid urbanisation, in line with what we see already — the growth of satellite towns, of suburbanization around metros, etc,” Jaitley said.

The Minister was addressing the ADB-Asian Think Tank Development Forum here on sustainable urbanisation organised by the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, ADB and ICRIER. “Urbanisation is inevitable to relieve agriculture from the number of people still living off the land. Urban India is now 31 percent of the country’s population..urban centres have become engines of growth in the states,” he added.

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Jaitley mentioned Bengaluru and Gurgaon as two rapidly developing centres in recent times. He noted the hitherto “unorganised construction” involved in this urbanisation process and stressed on the need for more “participation of organised construction to create organised townships.”

Asking, “Are we ready for this massive urbanisation in terms of infrastructure like water, transport, roads and sanitation,” Jaitley said that more resources were likely to be given to the states under the Smart Cities initiative.

“The Smart City initiative has prompted substantial competition among cities, themselves organised around the basis of objective criteria. More resources are soon likely to be given to the cities,” Jaitley said. “The Swachch Bharat — Clean India campaign will be integral to the urbanisation process,” he added.

IANS

2017 Mini Cooper SE Countryman ALL4 is the largest Mini ever; it’s also a plug-in hybrid

By tech2 News Staff /  27 Oct 2016 , 16:44

Mini has unveiled its largest vehicle ever in form of the 2017 Mini Countryman. Apart from the 2017 Countryman, Mini also announced the new Cooper and Cooper S which are expected to go on sale in March 2017. The Cooper SE Countryman ALL4 plug-in hybrid will arrive in markets starting June 2017. All three variants of the Cooper will go official at Los Angeles International Auto Show, which takes place on 16 November.

Out of these the Cooper SE ALL4 plug-in hybrid is the most interesting one. “The Mini Cooper SE Countryman ALL4 will be powered by both a three-cylinder Mini TwinPower Turbo Technology gasoline engine and

German Chancellor Angela Merkel asks Google and Facebook to release privately-developed algorithms

  27 Oct 2016 , 16:08

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has accused technology giants Facebook and Google of “narrowing perspective” and demanded that they make public their privately-developed algorithms, media reported. Merkel, who had previously blamed the social media for anti-immigrant sentiment, said: “The algorithms must be made public, so that one can inform oneself as an interested citizen on questions like, ‘what influences my behaviour on the internet and that of others?’.”

“These algorithms, when they are not transparent, can lead to a distortion of our perception, they narrow our breadth of information,” RT.com quoted Merkel as saying in Berlin this week. Google and Facebook use algorithms to decide which search results are shown first and the order of the news feed respectively. The companies decide to include posts from a user’s liked pages and friends and also promote links to news articles, often based on a user’s own media interests.

According to the report, these algorithms comprise some of the most highly protected trade secrets in the world, potentially worth billions. No internet giant has ever revealed its inner workings. “The big internet platforms, via their algorithms, have become an eye of a needle which diverse media must pass through to reach users. This is a development that we need to pay careful attention to,” Merkel noted.

IANS

OnePlus may launch OnePlus 3T with Snapdragon 821 and Sony IMX398 sensor ; to cost $80 more

By tech2 News Staff /  27 Oct 2016 , 15:55

OnePlus is currently working on an enhanced version of the OnePlus 3 with a newer processor and a better display. The new version is known as OnePlus 3T and could launch is expected as soon as December this year. OnePlus 3T will come with Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 and a larger LCD as reported earlier. However, the new device will not come at the same price as the OnePlus 3. Instead, it will cost $80 more than the OnePlus 3 as hinted by tipster Evans Blass.

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The hardware refresh for the OnePlus 3 is in response to newer smartphone flagships like the Google Pixel, Asus Zenfone 3 Deluxe, Xiaomi Mi Note 2, Xiaomi Mi MIX and other smartphones. Snapdragon 821 will keep OnePlus flagship stay competitive until the time Snapdragon 830 launches next year. This move will give time for people to wait for the OnePlus 4 that is likely to be equipped with Snapdragon 830. In addition to the processor upgrade, there are rumours that the company may switch to LCD screen panels as it faces a shortage of AMOLED display panels. But OnePlus co-founder, Carl Pei took to Twitter to clarify that the company is not moving away from Optic AMOLED display panel.

OnePlus will be staying with Optic AMOLED displays for the foreseeable future. — Carl Pei (@getpeid) October 13, 2016

Though it is not clear if the company will stick to the Full HD display or it will upgrade to a 2K display, which is ideal for the upcoming Google VR technology, DayDream.

Additionally in another Weibo discussion, a user revealed that the OnePlus 3 may pack in a Sony IMX398 sensor. The new sensor is currently featured in the Oppo R9s and even though it sticks to the traditional phase detection autofocus, it is supposed to be quicker when it comes to focusing on moving objects.

European Union plans to develop rockets to stop dependance on Russia

Image: Reuters

  27 Oct 2016 , 12:42

EU officials said on Wednesday they planned to invest 12 billion euros by 2020 to develop new rockets to launch satellites for defence and data-driven businesses and reduce reliance on Russian launchers. With limited options to launch orbiters and Russia controlling a large share of the market, businesses currently wait years for a window to put satellites in space.

The European Commission wants to help Europe’s top rocket contractor, Airbus Safran Launchers, to develop the Ariane 6 rocket by 2020 to better compete with U.S. and Russian rivals on cost and payload size. Existing Ariane launchers cost roughly 150 million euros compared to 80 million for Russia’s Soyuz, EU officials said.

“We don’t want to use the other launchers. We are now using the Soyuz because there is no other way,” Europe’s Industry Commissioner Elzbieta Bienkowska told reporters. With the global space industry growing faster than any other sector, the EU unveiled its strategy on Wednesday to ensure it does not fall behind in sectors, including defence, that use earth-observation data.

“We know who are the biggest global space powers: It is the U.S., it is Russia and China and India are coming so we want to be second or third,” Bienkowska said. The Commission plans to promote the use of its own global satellite navigation system Galileo in mobile phones and make the data available for business. Europe will launch more than 30 satellites over the next decade to complete Galileo, which will work in tandem with the U.S. GPS system, EU officials said.

“Galileo data will be much more precise than GPS,” Bienkowska said. Russia and China have launched their own global positioning systems to underpin their defence industries and civilian commerce. Europe is the world’s third largest satellite manufacturer and the 28-nation bloc hopes investment in the space sector can increase the number of related jobs from the current 230,000.

“The benefit for the economy from one euro invested in space is seven euros back,” Bienkowska said.

Reuters

Lenovo, Dell, HP, Acer and Asus will ship Windows 10 VR headsets starting at $299

By tech2 News Staff /  27 Oct 2016 , 10:46

At the big Microsoft event held in New York, the company made its keen interest in virtual and augments reality, among other thing quite evident. Interestingly, the company also said that third-party vendors will now offer ‘affordable’ virtual reality (VR) headsets for Windows 10 PCs.

Acer, Asus, Lenovo, HP, and Dell are said to the companies that will begin offering the headsets soon, starting at $299 (roughly Rs 20,000). The headsets will offer users the experience of reality content like 3D version that has been customised in the new Paint 3D app on desktop.

“By supporting the launch of these new devices, Microsoft wants to avoid the cost and complexity of powerful VR headsets like the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive, and even Microsoft’s own HoloLens augmented reality (AR) headset. And because they’ll work with Windows 10 PCs, they might not require all the high-end specs you’d find on a powerful desktop VR rig — a laptop may be just fine on its own,” VentureBeat explains.

Furthermore, these headsets are said to be the first to come with inside-out six-degrees-of-freedom (6DOF) sensors. “We are building Windows for each of us (and enabling) people to experience computing in new ways,” Chief Executive Satya Nadella said at a New York event to launch the new products.

According to reports, revenue for the Windows and computing unit fell 1.8 percent last quarter to $9.29 billion. It forecasts division sales of as much as $11.6 billion for this quarter, well below year-earlier results of $12.7 billion. However, Microsoft is riding high on its fast-growing cloud business, which companies can use to host their websites, apps or data. Shares of Microsoft have doubled since August 2013, with Nadella restoring investor confidence by focusing on mobile and cloud computing rather than PCs.