Is Microsoft Xbox One Still The Company Priority

Microsoft seems to be completely neglecting Xbox One now.

Microsoft Corporation is dealing with a lot of skepticism for the initiatives taken by the company recently. For all those who are not aware of the updates, the software giant has taken certain decisions that are quite controversial in nature for its gaming console Xbox One’s first party exclusive titles along with studios. The company made an announcement regarding the closure of its Lionhead Studios along with the decision to cancel the launch of the Fables Legends.  

It is believed that Microsoft has embraced one of the potentially most ground breaking news where Phil Spencer, the head of gaming division posted on Twitter to confront the fans by stating, “Xbox is not going anywhere”. He further assured that the Xbox One will not go anywhere and the organization is still devoted to its first party studios. Moreover, the company will also work on new IPs and franchises for the Xbox One.

Spencer clearly mentioned that he at this point cannot unveil the details so as to why the company took this decision and he understands that such actions are not very well received by the masses. However, all the Microsoft fans out there need to understand that Spencer is still devoted to the platform.

Keeping all the statements made by the executive aside, it is common observation that the Xbox One’s first party developments have slowed down tremendously. During the E3 which took place last year, the company came up with various new IPs and exclusives however none of them seem to be progressing now. Moreover, the cancellation of the Fable Legends also highlights the peculiar conditions of the Microsoft Studios.

The company is quietly removing the studios from the company’s website highlights the present scenario as well. It is not an unknown fact that the Xbox One is not doing quite well in the fraternity and the company is also moving towards Windows 10. Thus, it seems like the company is giving up on the gaming console amid statement refuting this claim by Phil Spencer.

Considering the present scenario, there has been negligible development in terms of the Xbox One games where some games that took the industry by a storm are being neglected completely. No update has been observed on games like Crackdown 3, Scalebound along with others. And all those that are surfacing are merely going on Windows 10.

Oublication houses are not just the ones accusing the company but their own first party developers have also accepted the fact that the market for Xbox One is quite saturated. Since the market is limited thus spending money and investing on it is a relatively difficult thing for MSFT. However, it needs to be understood that the present situation for Windows 10 and Xbox One is quite critical which is causing problems.

Hence in a nutshell, it is high time that Phil Spencer buckles up so that the issues can be countered and Xbox One surfaces back in the market once again. On the other hand, PlayStation can rejoice their winning streak.

Walmart Employees In Pennsylvania and Oklahoma Receive Pay Raise

Walmart is not stopping when it comes to raising pays for employees around the world and has now made headlines of giving a raise to workers in Oklahoma and Pennsylvania.

Walmart Stores announced the decision last year of giving wage raises to its employees around the world. The retail chain was definitely very serious; it has recently been making headlines of giving these raises to employees in different countries, cities and states. It is now giving a raise to workers in Pennsylvania and Oklahoma.

The grocery chain is giving a raise to 30,000 employees it has in Oklahoma, out of which 18,000 of them are in the city area. These employees of Walmart Stores Inc. will receive the hike in their wages within this week according to the announcement of the store on Wednesday. Their paycheck this week might make them happy this time.

All the employees of Walmart Stores that have been hired before January 1, this year, will be getting $10 per hour, while new entry workers hired after January 1 will continue to work at $9 per hour. They will gradually be moved to $10 per hour upon the completion of their training in retailing skill, which is widely known as, ‘Pathways’. The employees who are already earning $10 each hour are going to receive a hike in their yearly pay, effective from March 1.

Walmart’s 45,000 employees in Pennsylvania who are working at the company’s own stores and its exclusively owned brand Sam’s Club will witness a hike in their hourly payments too, which they will witness and be able to enjoy on Thursday when they receive their checks with new number on them. The retailer has 1.4 million workers around the United States, who are all receiving a wage raise, in return the company hope for better output from them leading to better customer experience. The retailer is optimistic for this cycle to be successful.

Walmart Wholesale millions of workers receiving a pay raise come from the company’s plans to invest approximately $2.7 billion in two years, as an effort to provide its employees with better training and working conditions with educational opportunity. This move is partially because of the immense pressure faced by the company last year from many of its workers and other labor agencies in the US, which protest in favor of workers, asking the retail chain to give them wage raises, more discounts on store products, and more job benefits. At the end, it had to evidently finally give in to some of the demands, if not all.

Walmart has more than 160 stores in Pennsylvania, and all of the employees working in these stores are going to receive a hike in their paychecks, which shows that their efforts and input to the company have finally paid off.

The End Might Be Near For Yahoo

Yahoo might be approaching towards the end of its wonderful journey in the tech sector.

Yahoo Inc. – the tech giant that completely transformed the course of the tech fraternity – is now stumbling to keep up with its pace. It is disappointing to see that being one of the pioneers as a Web and search company, it completely failed to grow its business and directly compete against its rival, Google. It has been going through a very rough patch since the past two to three years and all the troubles it faced this time show how a tech business needs to be well ahead in the tech sector.

In case of Yahoo, it did not stay well ahead and could not keep up with the industry pace. Now it is paying the price by being left behind. Once a market leader, the company is on the verge of being sold out. In recent years, it started to lose track and almost went out of business, Google made history and lead the market with no competitive threat behind it. The only difference is that the latter kept up with the industry pace.

Despite of the fact that Yahoo has officially launched an auction process to sell its core business, it is trying for a few last attempts to change the fate, but investors and shareholders are not in favor of it. So far, CEO Marissa Mayer has been successful in persuading the board of directors to look for other options rather than selling, but the activist investor of the firm, Starboard Value, is not in favor of other options.

Furthermore, Starboard Value wants Yahoo to dismiss Marissa Mayer for her poor performance since the day she was hired. The CEO failed to turn around the fate of the company in her three years’ tenure.

Investors said to launch a proxy battle if Yahoo fails to meet all demands in the coming times. It has started to approach bidders already and is looking to receive a deal valued between $6 billion to $8 billion, according to analysts.

Numerous organizations, including Comcast Corporation and Verizon Communications, are linked with a potential deal to buy out Yahoo. Regardless of poor performances and major downfall in its business, the company has some significant allure, which the buyer can still cash in on and benefit from. Mostly, buyers are interested in the core internet and advertising business. Its core business includes Yahoo Mail, Yahoo Sports, search and advertising.

Previously, the board of directors decided to spin off the firm but Starboard Value opposed. However, this is supposed to be a more feasible option for the company to now sell its core business.  

Alibaba, Ali Fortune Acquires AGTech Holdings To Boost Lottery Business

Alibaba and its main financial affiliate spends $308 million to own nearly 60% of the AGTech Holdings to boost lottery businesses in China.

Reports published by Bloomberg suggest that Alibaba Group Holding, along with its financial affiliate, is willing to spend nearly $308 million (HK$ 2.39 billion) for its lottery business in China. Alibaba will be investing to have the control of AG Tech Holdings, which is listed in Hong Kong’s market but will help in boosting the lottery business of the company in its domestic market.

The main financial affiliate, which is majorly owned by the largest online retailer in China, is known as Ali Fortune Investment Holding. The deal suggests that the company has agreed to buy shares valued at HK$ 1.68 billion and convertible bonds valued at HK$ 712.6 million in AGTech Holding. According to its investment, Alibaba Group will have almost 59.45% ownership in the firm upon full conversion. This was confirmed by a regulatory filing to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

Recently, Alibaba asked numerous banks to raise an amount of up to $4 billion in order to fund its expansion plans. The firm is looking to expand in rural areas and improve its market status in international regions. It is currently focused to make an impact in the Indian market where it is directly taking on Amazon. However, it has not launched its own business in the foreign markets. It said to first create an image in the regions and then slowly expand for maximum results.

AGTech Holdings is already known for running lotteries in various provinces of China. With this acquisition, it seeks to further expand its game in the territory. This acquisition also means that Alibaba Group is returning to the profitable and moneymaking lottery businesses in China. Previously it was in this business but was forced to back out and stop operations because of severe restrictions imposed by the government.

AG Tech stated that it would expand its games, hardware, and distribution throughout China within the coming times. The company added that the lottery business of China had a participation rate of only 7.5% in 2013. It should be considered that this sector is strictly regulated as per the decision and restrictions of government. The Hong Kong’s lottery business participation rate in 2012 was 56%, which is impressive and showed signs of growth.

The leading e-commerce giant said that with its main financial affiliate, Alibaba Group will assist AG Tech with cloud computing.

Ali Fortune is a company majorly owned by Alibaba, which means that 60% of the main financial affiliate is with Alibaba Group whereas the remaining 40% is owned by Ant Financial, also known as Alipay’s operator ‘Zhejiang Ant Small & Micro Financial Services Group’.

Alibaba has been doing a tremendous business when it comes to e-commerce but its overall earnings and results were hurt because of its lottery business suspension. After a long time, it is all set to make it return in the business.  

Facebook Adds 36,000 Telenor Employees

Facebook has added 36,000 Telenor employees for Facebook at Work.

Facebook at Work- which is the corporate platform derived by the social media giant enables businesses to establish their own social networks that are secure. The company has been successful in having 60,000 firms on the waiting list while it is still in closed beta.

Facebook Inc. is geared up to launch this service globally along with various new features such as an app platform by the end of 2016. The company is proudly announcing its collaboration with Telenor, a wireless network carrier service based in Norway with operations in 13 countries globally- its new big client. After this, the company will have 36,000 employees worldwide.

The President and Chief Executive Officer of Telenor Group, Mr. Sigve Brekke told TechCrunch that Telenor has been one of those companies which tried the product in coherence with a bigger collaboration with the social media giant. The idea is to transform the way people work internally. This encompasses not just how one communicate to employees but making use of groups so that the contemporary work structure gets modified and we get better communication in return.

The company chose the social media giant since many employees already use the platform and are comfortable with it. Be it on desktop or in the regions where Telenor is operations on mobiles.

Telenor is rendering its services in emerging markets like Myanmar, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh along with minor stakes in 14 more companies. The wireless giant is said to be the eraly collaborator on ventures like Free Basics along with the efforts Facebook has been making in terms of engineering to expand the reach of its mobile network like Infra (which was launched during the Mobile World Congress).

There are presently almost 450 companies that are making use of Facebook at Work where more and more companies are being added on a steady pace. The reason why each and every one are not being highlighted is that Telenor is notable amongst them all.

Julien Codorniouo, the head of Facebook at Work’s global offering claims that Telenor is the biggest enterprise to join forces with them to date. The service is a global network carrier. There other companies who have plans of doing so but so far it is just Facebook.

And to have a carrier also means that the company might want to grow its consumer base in the future. Carriers generally have a strong hold in the Information Technology business where services are retailed which is present on their network. Thus, making them a sales channel for the social media platform.

One of the core reasons that a channel carrier makes perfect sense is that it can assist the social media behemoth to scale its business without the need of scaling its own employees. As per the company, sales is said to be that area which is considered to be the major bottleneck for the firm whilst they are striving to scale the enterprise business. Hence, the collaboration makes perfecr sense for Facebook considering the long term prospects.

Indonesia Prefers BlackBerry Over Other Devices and Services

The loyal customers of BlackBerry still stick to the device and its services.

WhatsApp recently announced that it would end its support from BlackBerry by the end of the year. The move did shake Canadian organization but it still has something to rejoice. Although its relevance in global smartphone market might be shrinking, its instant messaging is still a major hit in Indonesia.

BlackBerry Messenger, dubbed as BBM, is very popular among the loyal Indonesians, which use the service to stay connected with their friends and family. An Indonesian user cited that he has been using BBM accounts for so many years to efficiently manage online business that comprises of selling imported goods from China. He added that three out of four BBM accounts are run on a BlackBerry device and the reason he has chosen BBM is that in Indonesia, a large number of people use BBM instead of Line or WhatsApp.

Facebook’s WhatsApp has major dominance in the global messaging market with a whopping billion monthly active users but not all is same in Indonesia. In a statement in January, BlackBerry disclosed that the BBM has over 55 million monthly users which make it significantly dominant in Indonesian messaging app market. In comparison, with around 50 million active users for each app, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp apparently tread behind, deduced by the estimates of We Are Social – a U.K. based social media consultancy.

A segregated account representing the number of users of both applications has not been provided by Facebook, which owns both messaging platform. It has only told that currently, worldwide 800 million people use the app. Last year, as of fourth quarter, the social network, was reported to have 82 million monthly active users in Indonesia. According to a Facebook spokeswoman, 77 million out of 82 million active users access the app through mobile devices.

Due to its secure ecosystem, many Indonesian companies and professionals chose BlackBerry over the rest of the devices which made the Southeast Asian nation top market for its BBM. Furthermore, BlackBerry has dominance in Nigeria and South Africa.   

In 2014, BlackBerry introduced new features which include an in-app shop. The in-app shop enabled users to get stickers along with other virtual items, advertising tools for brands, sponsored contents, and mobile payment. In Indonesia alone, 750,000 channels were created including major online retailers so that they use the platform for the efficient promotion of their goods and services.

The app also made the interaction of the sellers with the consumers convenient. Also, the company reported that stickers became significantly popular among the users which can be supported by the fact that over 1 billion stickers were received and sent by the users monthly.

The $4 billion organization envisions creating an app which is the amalgamation of advertising, chat, and e-commerce similar to WeChat – an app created by China’s Tencent Holdings.

Although the company is hopeful about maintaining its dominance in the Indonesian region but the analysts showed their skepticism, fearing that other messaging platforms have a lot of potential to take over BBM. Few analysts have purported that in order to maintain its lead in Indonesia, BlackBerry should choose a singular platform – either a multifunction platform like WeChat or like WhatsApp – a pure chat application.

IBM To Make Its Cyber Security Stronger

IBM to strengthen its cyber security division by acquiring Resilient Systems.

International Business Machines Corp. is keen to take over cyber security service “Resilient Systems”. The company is devoted to improve its security service and come up with high speed automated responses when a cyber-attack takes place. The news surfaced during the RSA Security Conference that is taking place in San Francisco.

During the conference, the firms related to cyber security showcase their platform that generate and automate the responses for potential security violations and attacks. Resilient which is based in Cambridge will come up with a similar platform for IBM. According to the announcement that surfaced yesterday, the company’s present workforce which encompasses 100 employees will be linked to the cyber security team- X-Force Incident Response Service at IBM.

X-Force will now act as a consulting division that will enable companies to deal with potential attacks, manage and cope up with them.

Resilient is likely to link its automation and orchestration tool with the intelligence platform of IBM known as QRadar. This platform was acquired four years back when the tech giant established its security division. The association would assist the company in detecting potential cyber-attacks, prevention, analytical service, response via one offering.

IBM has also decided to have Mr. Bruce Schneier on board who is the Chief Technology Officer at Resilient. Mr. Schneier is a globally known security analyst and cryptographer who has coined several books that talk about cyber security. This actually is a major breakthrough for IBM, since it now has the industry expert to lead the company’s security team.

It seems like a great idea by the company to expand its hold in the cyber security domain. The department currently has 7,300 employees and has garnered $2 billion in terms of revenues. Through the company’s recent acquisition, IBM will get access to the huge consumer base of Resilient that encompasses around 30 companies belonging to Fortune 500. The company’s recent initiative is on par with their transformation plans that focus on shifting from the major software business to new areas such as security, cognitive computing and analytics.

IBM has been reporting a consistent decline in revenues for the consecutive 15 quarters because of the transformation that is taking place. Recently, Mr. Warren Buffet stated that he might have committed a mistake by investing in IBM stocks.  It is also claimed by several analytical firms that the company’s plans to transform will be beneficial but it will also take some time to come up with the results. The impact will rather be long term than short term.

By acquiring Resilient Systems , one thing is for sure that the company will get a step closer to achieving its dreams of evolving and redeeming itself again in the industry. The company lost track since a long span of time but has finally realized where it went wrong and what needs to be done to redeem itself back in the fraternity.