iRobot is starting its own venture capital firm in order to invest in robotic companies, TechCrunch has reported. The company is in the midst of looking for a West Coast investor to head up its firm and is looking to make five to 10 investments a year, according to TechCrunch. “There’s a lot going on … continue reading
Ford is opening up a new Silicon Valley research center in order to advance development in mobility, autonomous vehicles, customer experience and Big Data. “This new research center shows Ford’s commitment to be part of the Silicon Valley innovation ecosystem—anticipating customers’ wants and needs, especially on connectivity, mobility and autonomous vehicles,” said Mark Fields, president … continue reading
When the Linux Foundation first published its Guide to the Open Cloud in 2013, the pickings were slim and from a bygone era. Today, however, the Guide for 2015 is packed with information on the open-source projects that are quickly becoming part of the new model for cloud software stacks. The 2015 Guide states that … continue reading
Along with much of the software industry, Microsoft is betting on Docker. The company announced a wide-ranging partnership with Docker back in October, as well as planned integrations with Windows Server and Microsoft Azure. Microsoft is in the process of following through on the Azure front, detailing the four steps needed to run an ASP.NET … continue reading
Samsung may or may not be in talks to buy BlackBerry. According to a Reuters report, Samsung recently approached BlackBerry with a buyout offer of as much as US$7.5 billion. The report stated that executives met last week to discuss the proposed deal. BlackBerry announced a security partnership with Samsung this past November, but for … continue reading
Firefox Hello, the WebRTC in-browser chat feature first included in Firefox 34, is now available to all with the launch of Firefox 35. The real-time communication feature allows users to start plug-in-free video chats within the browser in the form of a pop-up box, without the aid of a service such as Google Hangouts and … continue reading
Developers today are looking seriously at the advantages to be had from free entry-level versions of commercial software—so-called “freemium” software. Developers often see freemiums as great test beds for potential commercial products. This is a trend that looks to be taking hold in the enterprise and developer communities. Freemium, a mix of “free” and “premium” … continue reading
Code.org has revealed a milestone with its computer-science learning platform, Code Studio. The organization announced that more than 1 million girls, along with 1 million African-American and Hispanic students, have enrolled in Code.org’s computer-science education program. “We all know tech has a diversity problem. The problem in computer-science education is even worse. To work to … continue reading
BlackBerry is jumping into the wearables space. The company just announced BBM support for a wide range of Android Wear wearable devices. “The integration of BBM to support wearable technology is just one way we’re expanding the capabilities of our portfolio and delivering exciting options for customers to easily access BlackBerry’s cross-platform technologies,” said Herman … continue reading
With 2014 now completely past us, the mobile picture in the enterprise for 2015 is becoming more evident. After a plethora of discussions with customers, developers and pundits, I believe these will be the top trends in enterprise mobility for 2015. 1. Business analysts will create more than 25% of enterprise apps using visual development … continue reading
Software-defined networks and Network Functions Virtualization will redefine enterprise computing and change the dynamics of the cloud. Data thefts and professional hacks will grow, and development teams will shift their focus from adding new features to hardening against attacks. Those are two of my predictions for 2015. Big Security: As 2014 came to a close, … continue reading
In 2014, the selection of cloud platforms and services was more plentiful than ever before, and it saw countless partnerships and integrations to tie them all together. Cloud users and developers are dropping eggs in many different baskets, be it Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, IBM Cloud or open-source platforms such as … continue reading