AT&T and TPG Capital Complete DirecTV Spin-Off

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AT&T and TPG Capital Complete DirecTV Spin-Off

AT&T and TPG Capital have completed their DirecTV deal, spinning off the brand from AT&T.

After buying DirecTV in 2015 for $48.5 billion ($67.1 billion including debt), the service lost millions of subscribers in the ensuing years. As a result, AT&T decided to spin off the satellite TV company in a deal with TPG Capital.

The new DirecTV company will own DIRECTV, AT&T TV and U-verse video services. HBO Max, owned by AT&T’s WarnerMedia, is not included in the deal.

AT&T will retain 70% ownership of the new company, while TPG Capital will own the remaining 30%.

AT&T and TPG Capital Complete DirecTV Spin-Off
Matt Milano

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Google Debuts Its Own Tensor Chips to Power Pixel Smartphones

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Google Debuts Its Own Tensor Chips to Power Pixel Smartphones

Google is taking a page from Apple and building its own system on a chip (SoC) processors to power its Pixel line of smartphones.

Apple is the undisputed leader in mobile performance — both phones and tablets — in large part because of its custom chips. Although its chips are based on Arm Holdings’ designs, Apple has customized them to offer a level of performance its competitors can’t match.

Google is debuting its own Tensor chips, similar to ones it makes for its data centers. The chips have a heavy focus on artificial intelligence.

“Tensor is our first custom-built SoC specifically for Pixel phones, and it will power the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro later this fall,” writes Rick Osterloh,

Senior Vice President, Devices & Services.

“Tensor was built for how people use their phones today and how people will use them in the future,” Osterloh added. “As more and more features are powered by AI and ML it’s not simply about adding more computing resources, it’s about using that ML to unlock specific experiences for our Pixel users.”

It remains to be seen if the new processor will help Google’s Pixel line grab a larger share of the market.

Google Debuts Its Own Tensor Chips to Power Pixel Smartphones
Matt Milano

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Cloud Infrastructure Spending Hit $42 Billion in Q2

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Cloud Infrastructure Spending Hit $42 Billion in Q2

The cloud infrastructure market continued its impressive gains, with spending hitting $42 billion in Q2, according to Synergy Research Group.

Synergy’s latest data is good news for the industry, and provides a number of important revelations. According to the company, the top three cloud companies continue to be AWS, Microsoft and Google, with 33%, 20% and 10% of the market respectively. Alibaba, IBM, Salesforce, Tencent, Oracle and “Others” round out the industry.

Interestingly, that means the top three companies account for 63% of money spent on cloud infrastructure.

“This market continues to be a runaway success story for Amazon, Microsoft, Google and some other cloud providers. You would not normally expect to see growth rates actually increasing in such a huge and rapidly developing market, yet once again that is what our research has shown,” said John Dinsdale, a Chief Analyst at Synergy Research Group. “It must be said that this success is hard earned. Amazon, Microsoft and Google in aggregate are typically investing over $25 billion in capex per quarter, much of which is going towards building and equipping their fleet of over 340 hyperscale data centers. There remains a wealth of opportunity for smaller, more focused cloud providers, but it can be hard to look away from the eye-popping numbers coming out of the big three.”

Synergy’s report is further evidence that, despite the accelerated cloud transition as a result of the pandemic, there appears to be plenty of room for further growth.

Cloud Infrastructure Spending Hit $42 Billion in Q2
Matt Milano

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Android 2.3.7 and Older Versions in the Cold

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Android 2.3.7 and Older Versions in the Cold

Google is cutting off Android 2.3.7 and older from logging in, leaving the aging versions of the mobile OS in the cold.

Android is currently on the 11th major version, with versions 2.3 released over a decade ago. Nonetheless, some users are still running the ancient version of the OS.

Google is warning that it will soon block Android 2.3.7 and older from logging into Google services, effective September 27.

As part of our ongoing efforts to keep our users safe, Google will no longer allow sign-in on Android devices that run Android 2.3.7 or lower starting September 27, 2021. If you sign into your device after September 27, you may get username or password errors when you try to use Google products and services like Gmail, YouTube, and Maps. 

If your device has the ability to update to a newer Android version (3.0+), we advise you to do so in order to maintain access to Google apps and services on that device.

While no on likes being left behind, Google has certainly supported the older OS far more than what would be considered a reasonable amount of time.

Android 2.3.7 and Older Versions in the Cold
Matt Milano

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Google Cloud Unveils New Tools to Unify Data

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Google Cloud Unveils New Tools to Unify Data

Google Cloud has unveiled its latest innovations, aimed at helping companies unify database, analytics and AI.

Google Cloud is the third leading cloud provider, behind AWS and Microsoft Azure. The company is particularly viewed as a good option for machine learning development, and has strong support for open source software.

The company’s latest tools will go a long way toward improving its stand even further, with Dataplex, Datastream and Analytics Hub.

Dataplex is designed to “centrally manage, monitor and govern your data across data lakes, data warehouses and data marts, and make this data securely accessible to a variety of analytics and data science tools.”

Datastream, currently available in preview, helps “move and synchronize data between heterogeneous databases, storage and applications reliably to support real-time analytics, database replication and event-driven architectures with Datastream, our serverless change data capture (CDC) and replication service.”

Analytics Hub is designed to make it easy to “access and share valuable datasets and analytics assets (think BigQuery ML models, Looker Blocks, data quality recipes, etc.) across any organizational boundary.” Those interested will need to sign up for preview access.

The company’s latest tools should go a long way toward helping its customers make the most of their data, as well as AI applications.

Google Cloud Unveils New Tools to Unify Data
Matt Milano

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Zoom Settles Class Action Privacy Lawsuit for $85 Million

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Zoom Settles Class Action Privacy Lawsuit for $85 Million

Zoom has agreed to settle a class action privacy suit for $85 million over missteps the company made early in the pandemic.

Few companies have benefited as much or become so synonymous with pandemic-fueled remote work and learning as Zoom. Once a company that focused priorly on the enterprise, Zoom has become a household name, used across industries and demographics.

Unfortunately, its meteoric growth came with some major growing pains. The company overstated the level of encryption it provided; it used an SDK that sent data to Facebook without users’ permission; and it failed to provide the necessary security to prevent Zoom-bombing. The missteps were severe enough to prompt the company to enact a 90-day moratorium on new features until security issues could be addressed.

The company was the target of a number of lawsuits over the missteps, lawsuits which were consolidated into a single class action suit. Zoom has now agreed to settle and make changes to improve its security even more, according to ZDNet.

Among the changes the company will make is improved notifications to better inform users when a host uses a third-party application, as well as inform users who can access user information and content.

The plaintiffs are also requesting their legal fees be paid, which would add an additional $21.25 million to the settlement.

Zoom Settles Class Action Privacy Lawsuit for $85 Million
Matt Milano

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Square Buying Afterpay Limited

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Square Buying Afterpay Limited

Square has announced it is purchasing Afterpay Limited, the Australian firm that made its name in the “buy now, pay later” business.

Square is one of the leading companies in the payment processing market. Afterpay, allows customers to buy a product, and then pay interest-free over four installments.

The two companies’ clearly see their services as complimenting one another in their shared purpose to revolutionize the financial market.

“Square and Afterpay have a shared purpose. We built our business to make the financial system more fair, accessible, and inclusive, and Afterpay has built a trusted brand aligned with those principles,” said Jack Dorsey, Co-Founder and CEO of Square. “Together, we can better connect our Cash App and Seller ecosystems to deliver even more compelling products and services for merchants and consumers, putting the power back in their hands.”

“Buy now, pay later has been a powerful growth tool for sellers globally,” said Alyssa Henry, Lead of Square’s Seller business. “We are thrilled to not only add this product to our Seller ecosystem, but to do it with a trusted and innovative team.”

The deal is worth approximately US$29 billion, and is expected to close in the first quarter of 2022.

Square Buying Afterpay Limited
Matt Milano

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