[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

FullContact raises $25M more to take on LinkedIn in contact management

By Ingrid Lunden as written on techcrunch.com

As LinkedIn inches closer to completing its $26 billion acquisition by Microsoft, smaller rivals have stepped up their game building viable alternatives for those who might want more independent products when it comes to managing contacts in their professional networks. FullContact — one such competitor — has now raised a further $25 million.

The funding brings the total raised by Denver-based FullContact to just under $45 million. Lorang said the company is not disclosing its valuation.

The big elephant in the room for FullContact is LinkedIn. Fast approaching 450 million users, the company is one of the bigger players in the area of online professional identity and has become the go-to place for people looking to connect with people in their professional networks. On its own it was already a competitive threat, and its acquisition by Microsoft may be even more so, as it speaks to the bigger company’s ambitions to leverage LinkedIn’s social networking in its own enterprise-focused products, from sales through to productivity services.

But rather than wilting under the obvious challenges that this poses to FullContact and others in the space, FullContact’s co-founder and CEO Bart Lorang has a more constructive view on the deal and what it means for his startup.

“The LinkedIn acquisition demonstrates the power of the single ID and a unified contact record in the ecosystem,” he said in an interview.

The key thing for him is that Microsoft remains a proprietary platform, and LinkedIn has not demonstrated itself to be particularly happy to share its data with the rest of that ecosystem, either. “FullContact’s strategy is to create an open platform that is owned by humanity. We allow and invite developers to integrate with our platform, unlike LinkedIn. It has been rather closed off. They very much want to build a wall,” he added a little mischievously, borrowing a phrase more commonly (and controversially) associated with something and someone else. 

Led by Foundry Group with participation from Baird Capital, Shea Ventures and Blue Note, FullContact’s latest round will be used for acquisition — “I see a lot of distressed startups out there in our wider field unable to raise more money for sure,” said Lorang; and also hiring, business development, and adding in new features that will expand FullContact beyond contact management and into new areas.

One of those new features, Lorang said, sounds like a way to use your contact information in FullContact’s database as an identity card across the wider web.

“We have quietly been working on FullContact Connect, our next-generation platform capabilities where you will have your own ID, your own contact record, and you can use it to consume and control content online,” he said. “We are working on that. We do have ambitions.”

Founded in 2010 in Denver (where it is still based), FullContact has built itself out as one of a group of companies that is trying to tackle the issue of managing contacts that you make through your normal business life, as well as growing that list through intelligent searches based on the people you already know, and turning piecemeal contact info into more complete profiles.

The company has its own primary data that it augments with data from across the web, and using algorithms — both built in-house and also picked up by way of acquisition of competitors like Brewster — it merges all of it to create a database of some 40 billion contacts that its users can access. (FullContact does not disclose its actual user numbers, except to say that they are in the ‘millions.’)

FullContact today makes revenues from three categories of customers: individuals, businesses and software developers. It taps the first of these groups via freemium-style iPhone and Android apps that let you do things like scan and digitize business cards and then augment that information with more data about those people.

Meanwhile, the business and developer solutions let third parties tap into FullContact’s database by way of APIs to help create more complete customer profiles. The latter of these is a smart area for the company to develop to pick up developers and others who found themselves in a lurch when LinkedIn shut down similar API functionality in 2015.

Ironically, while FullContact has built its business on the concept of being able to enhance contact information, another area where Lorang also agreed it might move in years ahead might be in helping manage that info for those who don’t want it out in the open.

This is a trend that we see picking up some speed with the recent surge in interest in online privacy and data protection. For example, in Europe, you have the “right to be forgotten” development, where Google and other search engines are required to remove search links on people’s names when requested to do so by those individuals.

“I love the trend of being more transparent,” said Lorang. While Lorang said you can already claim and manage a profile on FullContact, it’s now working on ways of expanding that to other data repositories. “We are just starting to roll out that type of capability to remove yourself,” he said. “You’ll see more from us on this in the next year.”

For now, FullContact and its investors are happy to keep the startup in Denver and well outside the Valley bubble to grow.

“With over 40 billion contact records under management, FullContact was already on track to more than double recurring revenue for the fourth straight year,” said Brad Feld, MD of the Foundry Group, in a statement. “The funding will be used to support the company’s rapid growth by further expanding sales, marketing and engineering as well as pursuing strategic acquisitions that bolster our technology and data assets.”

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

HoloLens Development Edition Updates

By Alex Kipman as written on blogs.windows.com

In the four months since we began shipping Microsoft HoloLens to our developer and commercial partners, we’ve been absolutely amazed at the innovation shown by the creative people and companies building real solutions using HoloLens. From training aircraft mechanics and flight crews, to helping golf pros and fans get more out of their game, I’m inspired by the experiences you are creating.

In May, we announced the first major software update to Windows Holographic, and today, I’m excited to share our second major update: the Windows 10 Anniversary Update. This is our fastest and most reliable version yet. Some exciting changes are on tap with this release, as well as some new policies making it easier than ever for more developers to create the future of holographic computing.

We’ve also heard that companies are looking for a solution they can confidently pilot and deploy in their enterprises, so today we are introducing the Microsoft HoloLens Commercial Suite, which includes the Development Edition hardware as well as enterprise features for added security and device management.  Check out this video to learn more about the HoloLens Commercial Suite:

[/vc_column_text][grve_video video_link="https://youtu.be/tNd0e2CiAkE"][vc_column_text]

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Delta flights grounded as power outage takes down computers

By Darrell Etherington as written on techcrunch.com

People flying Delta may have woken up this morning to find out they aren’t flying at all – a massive networked service outage resulting from a power failure in Atlanta, the airline’s home base, has delayed all of today’s current flights and is causing widespread cancellations.

Delta confirms that the outage began at around 2:30 AM ET, and affected its computer systems across the globe. Flights that were currently in the air at that time will continue to operate as normal, the airline said in a statement, but systems might be showing upcoming flights as incorrectly still on time.

Regarding any potential resolution, Delta has only said that it’s “working to resolve the problem as quickly as possible,” but has no timeline for a fix. It’s also now offering a waiver for anyone with travel booked on Delta between August 8 and August 12, suggesting it anticipates travel over the next few days to be impacted as well.

The power outage in Atlanta has affected flight status displays, the carrier’s website, and both mobile and on-the-ground airport software tools, according to Bloomberg. The media outlet also points out that it’s the second-largest disruption at a U.S. airline this month, following Southwest’s recent computer failure that led to the cancellation of over 1,000 flights.

Delta had around 3,300 flights booked for today, sot he affected group is potentially much larger. But what these incidents highlight most of all is that commercial airline tech still lags a lot of other industries, and can be brought low with incidents that would hardly bruise dedicated cloud service companies like Google and Amazon.

The failure here is on both the flight side, and the information side, meaning it’s difficult even to properly make affected customers aware they’ll be delayed, and it’s a strong argument in a series of recent computer-related airline flubs that modernization in the industry’s systems is long overdue.

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text][vc_single_image image="10959" img_size="full" alignment="center"][vc_column_text]

Why Pokémon Go captured our imagination — and huge market share

By Llraz Margalit as written on techcrunch.com

When a franchise that essentially died more than a decade ago comes back to life with such fervor, we need to ask ourselves how and why that happened. And if you’re able to stop playing Pokémon Go long enough to read this article, you’ll find the phenomenon is deeply rooted in evolutionary psychology.

Matthew Lynley recently explained the brilliant ploys used by the creators of Pokémon Go to promote engagement, retention and virality. As a web psychologist, I am naturally inclined to dive deep into the aspects of human behavior that make us prone to embrace the game.

From an evolutionary standpoint, our brains operate much better in a natural environment that’s rooted deeply in our mind, compared to a setting based in virtual reality. Our behavior is governed by two parallel processes: The conscious process that revolves around our immediate tasks (in this case, winning Pokémon Go) and the unconscious process that is responsible for ensuring that there are no threats or sudden changes in our environment.

When playing virtual reality games, the unconscious computation in our brains is forced to work much harder, because it’s not familiar with this strange virtual reality environment. In contrast, playing Pokémon Go involves our actual environment, with which our mind is far more familiar; thus, playing within that setting delivers a comforting feeling of cognitive fluency — a mental shortcut that signals familiarity in a treacherous world.

The idea behind cognitive fluency might seem obvious — people prefer things that are easy to think about. The experience of the real world is psychologically easier to process than that of the VR world of other games. Fluency guides our thinking in situations where we have no idea that it’s at work, and it affects us in any situation where we need to process information.

Pokémon Go scratches some basic psychological itches.

This sense of familiarity has a strong influence over what types of things people find attractive and enjoyable. Playing games in a familiar setting is much more enjoyable, and familiarity has played a strong role in human survival. In prehistoric times, if something (or someone) was familiar, it meant that you had already interacted with it, so it was probably not going to kill you.

Pokémon Go scratches some basic psychological itches. First, the game itself is simple to understand and easy to play, for children and adults alike. Each time a level advances, the challenge is revived and thus the crave is renewed and the desire to continue receiving those fresh doses of gratification causes us to continue playing.

One of the rewarding building blocks of the game is the unexpected gratification of finding the monsters as we walk. We don’t know when to expect them; they can appear at any time or place. Our attraction to this kind of action is attributed to a neurotransmitter called dopamine, a chemical found in our brain.

Scientists initially associated dopamine with feelings of enjoyment (a high level of dopamine being visible during activities such as eating chocolate, having sex and hearing favorite music), but research in the past decade has indicated that dopamine has additional functions besides activating gratification and pleasure. This molecule helps us in detecting changes in the environment.

The system centers around expectations. We can expect high levels of dopamine when we encounter unexpected rewards (three or four times as excited, as measured by the strength of the dopaminergic firing). In other words, the reward is more pleasurable the more surprising it is.

When we receive unexpected cash on a randomized basis, it forces us more strongly into obsessively repeating our action than cash on a predictable basis would. This tendency was best illustrated by B.F. Skinner, a pioneer of behavioral psychology, in the 1950s. When his lab rats received an unexpected reward from pushing a pedal, they would continue pushing it even after the reward stopped arriving. This element of surprise helps explain why people just can’t get enough of Pokémon Go.

Additional bursts of pleasure also come from the nostalgia this game evokes. Being outside chasing monsters activates old and enjoyable memories, providing us with a priceless opportunity to relive a piece of our childhood again, and bring our childhood experiences to life. It activates memories from a simpler time in which we were out in the streets playing social games like tag or hide-and-seek.

Pokémon Go players feel as if they are taking part in an actual activity with other people.

Those games we used to play involved human partners, or at least involved manipulating real objects in real space (like throwing a ball). Pokémon Go players feel as if they are taking part in an actual activity with other people, rather than a remote observer behind a screen. Throwing the ball at a Pokémon brings up exciting memories that were closed in a box that belongs to the past. These memories have a positive influence on our well-being as we get a secret key to a magical period.

In addition, playing Pokémon Go can fulfill an everlasting fantasy. Walking through the streets fighting monsters that pop up unexpectedly out of nowhere can easily drive our imagination to assume the masterful role of superhero, or warrior, fulfilling a fantasy and giving our senses and emotions an other-worldly experience. Such games boost adrenaline levels, and they awaken strong feelings of power — as well as frustration, gratification and enjoyment.

A central part of the gratification Pokémon Go players experience is akin to the old-fashioned games we used to play, where people would go outside and interact more socially. Many studies have illustrated the mood-boosting effect of physical activity, and social ties are equally important for mental health. Some research suggests that even shallow conversation with strangers boosts well-being.

However, Dr. David Sack recently cautioned in Psychology Today about the fine line between behavior and addiction, questioning whether Pokémon Go will drive up the percentages of internet addiction or pathological gaming.

He quotes a DSM-5 fact sheet studying gamers: “When these individuals are engrossed in Internet games, certain pathways in their brains are triggered in the same direct and intense way that a drug addict’s brain is affected by a particular substance. The gaming prompts a neurological response that influences feelings of pleasure and reward, and the result, in the extreme, is manifested as addictive behavior.”

“Such compulsive play pushes aside other interests and responsibilities, threatening relationships, academics, jobs and more,” Dr. Sack writes. “Although this research focused on traditional online gamers, it’s no stretch to expect the same to apply to Pokémon Go players.”

To conclude, there is a thin line between having fun with a game and becoming addicted to it. The problem is that this line starts creating changes in our brain, generating new connections — before we even realize we are addicted.

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

New Video Series This Week on Windows Highlights Windows 10 Anniversary Update

As written on blogs.windows.com

The Windows 10 Anniversary Update begins rolling out today for customers around the world. The Anniversary Update is full of features and innovations that will bring new experiences with Windows Ink*, Cortana**, gaming and more. To give you an overview of new features that are rolling out in the update, check out the video below. It’s a part of a new weekly series we are piloting called This Week on Windows, where we’ll bring you the latest in Windows news, apps, and tips from experts here at Microsoft.

[/vc_column_text][grve_video video_link="https://youtu.be/80Qz0Gbjh6Q"][vc_column_text]

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Pokemon Go to get more Pokemon, trading, and customizable PokeStops

By Darrell Etherington as written on techcrunch.com

Pokemon players will eventually be able to fill out their collections via trades, which is very good news for people eyeing region-specific Pokemon like Australia’s Kangaskhan from the other side of the world. Niantic CEO John Hanke revealed at a San Diego Comic Con panel that Niantic is indeed working on adding trading (and new training features) to their game, as well as customizable PokeStops and more Pokemon from later generations of the Nintendo franchise. He also said Niantic is thinking about adding the ability to breed Pokemon, too.

One of the most interesting things Hanke discussed that we might see implemented soon are custom PokeStops. The idea, as described by Hanke, is that players could get alternate items that would function like Lures (which you add to PokeStops to attract more Pokemon to the area), but that would change the Stops in different ways. Hanke suggested, for instance, than an object could turn a PokeStop into a healing location, essentially making it a temporary PokeCenter. You could also imagine items that help a PokeStop attract a certain type of Pokemon, like an all-electric Lure, or something that sets what kind of items the PokeStop provides to trainers that activate it.

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]

New Pokemon are confirmed to be on their way, too. Currently, only the original 150 Pokemon included in Pokemon Red/Blue are present in Pokemon Go for trainers to catch, but Hanke told the panel that the company is “looking forward to finding interesting ways” to incorporate Pokemon “beyond first generation” into the Go realm. It sounded like Hanke didn’t have any very specific timeline on when this would happen, or what it would look like – though his wording did suggest the introduction of other Pokemon won’t be as straightforward as batch updates with entire subsequent generations added.

Hanke also briefly mentioned that trading features are currently being developed. Trading has been a feature of Pokemon since the original generation of games, and it makes sense for Go: You’ve likely already had the experience where you’ve doubled up on some kind of Pokemon while out with a friend and wish you could just swap with them for something you need to get a different one to evolve. Breeding, too, is another Pokemon series staple, which makes sense as a more targeted way to generate Eggs for players to hatch.

Training improvements could be welcome, too. So far, the only way to improve Pokemon in Go is by catching others of the same kind and exchanging them for seeds, which you use to power up a basic CP stat. Fighting your own team’s Pokemon at team-owned gyms is also called ‘training’ in game, but essentially just nets you some experience and improves the gym’s power ranking. A better training mechanic that gives you alternate ways to improve your existing Pokemon would be very welcome.

The main reveal of new stuff for Pokemon Go at SDCC was putting actual faces to the silhouettes of team leaders in the game. Valor, Mystic and Instinct are headed up by Candela, Blanche and Spark, so now we’re not just blindly following some shadowy figure. But the roadmap is far more interesting, even if we have to wait “months” or even “years” per Hanke’s projected timeline for new Pokemon, and likely around the same for any other new features.

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Microsoft’s Q4 earnings beat Street with $22.6B in revenue, $0.69 EPS

By Frederic Lardinois as written on techcrunch.com 

Microsoft today reported earnings for its fourth fiscal quarter of 2016, its first earnings report after announcing its proposed acquisition of LinkedIn. The company’s earnings came in at a non-GAAP revenue of $22.6 billion ($20.6 billion GAAP) and $0.69 of non-GAAP per-share profit ($0.39 GAAP), and were well above expectations. Like in previous quarters, the results reflect strong growth in Microsoft’s cloud businesses.

Wall Street expected the company to report earnings per share of $0.58 on revenue of $22.14 billion.

The company’s stock was trading up 3.5 percent right after the earnings were announced.

As Microsoft’s director of investor relations Zack Moxcey told me after the earnings announcement, the GAAP results this quarter still reflect the charges Microsoft took related to its phone business and adjustments for Windows 10 revenue deferrals. He also attributed part of Microsoft’s higher than expected earnings to the company’s lower than expected tax rate.

In the year-ago-quarter, Microsoft’s revenue was $22.2 billion, but earnings per share came to a $0.40 loss because of the $7.5 billion charge Microsoft took related to its acquisition of Nokia. Without the charge, the company’s earnings per share would have been $0.62.

“This past year was pivotal in both our own transformation and in partnering with our customers who are navigating their own digital transformations,” said Satya Nadella, chief executive officer at Microsoft. “The Microsoft Cloud is seeing significant customer momentum and we’re well positioned to reach new opportunities in the year ahead.”

Like in previous quarters, analysts will be especially interested in Microsoft’s cloud revenue. In its Q3 report, Microsoft said revenue from its “Intelligent Cloud” business had grown to $6.1 billion, up 3 percent (or 8 percent in constant currency). Azure revenue had grown 120 percent year-over-year while its server products and cloud services revenue had increased 5 percent.

This quarter, Intelligent Cloud revenue hit $6.7 billion and Azure revenue grew 102 percent year-over-year.

Microsoft has long said that it expects its commercial cloud business to hit a $20 billion run rate by 2018. In Q3, it reported that its run rate was $9.4 billion. With this new report, that number has now hit $12.1 billion, which Microsoft prominently highlighted in its earnings release. Moxcey told me that the company is standing by its plan to reach a $20 billion run rate by 2018.

Sadly, Microsoft doesn’t provide geographic breakdowns of its revenue numbers, but Moxcey attributed some of the growth in the company’s Azure business to Microsoft’s wide geographic footprint with regard to Azure regions.

As far as Intelligent Cloud goes, Moxcey also noted that the company doubled its customer base for its enterprise mobility solutions year-over-year (it now has 33,000 customers), and that the installed base grew nearly 2.5x year-over-year.

Here is a breakdown of Microsoft’s numbers for its other business units:

Productivity and Business Processes

(this includes Office, consumer Office and Dynamic, among other products): $7.0 billion, compared to $6.3 billion in revenue in the last quarter. Microsoft attributes this to strong growth across its productivity services and especially the fact that Office 365 commercial revenue grew 54 percent year-over-year and that its Dynamics CRM paid seats are growing at more than 2.5x year-over-year.

More Personal Computing 

(including Windows, Devices, Gaming and Search): $8.9 billion in revenue, compared to $12.7 billion in the last quarter. Phone revenue, unsurprisingly, declined 71 percent, but the company’s revenue from its Surface line continues to increase and was up 9 percent in the last quarter (mostly driven by the Surface 4 and Surface Book).

Windows OEM consumer revenue grew 27 percent. For the commercial market, it grew 2 percent (which sounds low, but is far better than in previous quarters). Because Microsoft’s revenue in this area is largely driven by new purchases, Microsoft doesn’t expect the end of the free update offer to have a markable influence on next quarter’s results.

Microsoft also announced that Xbox Live now has 49 million monthly active users and that its search advertising revenue was up 16 percent, largely due to the deeper integration of its search tools into Windows 10. During today’s earnings call, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella also noted that Windows 10 users have now asked Cortana 8 billion questions to date.

For the full year, Microsoft reported $92 billion in non-GAAP revenue and $2.10 in adjusted earnings per share. The company’s operating income was $27.9 billion on a non-GAAP basis.

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Microsoft Stream is a new video service for businesses

By Frederic Lardinois as written on techcrunch.com

Microsoft today launched Stream, a new business video service that aims to give businesses that want to share video internally the same kind of tools and flexibility that YouTube offers to consumers — but with the added benefits of the security tools enterprises expect from their document management services. The service is now available as a free preview.

As James Phillips, Microsoft’s corporate VP of its Business Intelligence Products Group, told me, all it takes to get started with Stream is an email address. The user experience in Stream does take its cues from consumer services like Vimeo and YouTube, and includes a number of social features, including likes and comments, as well as recommendations.

“We’ve all been trained as consumers to understand what beautiful and fully featured software looks like,” Phillips told me. “And we are now delivering on those experiences in business software.”

Some of the basic use cases for using video in a company include training and employee communications.

It’s worth noting that Microsoft already offered a business video service in the form of Office 365 Video. “Microsoft Stream builds upon the learnings success of Office 365 Video and over time the two experiences will converge with a seamless migration to ensure a consistent experience both within and outside of Office 365,” Phillips writes in today’s official announcement and also notes that current Office 365 Video users will not see any differences in the service for now.

Compared to Office 365 Video, Microsoft Stream will leverage more of Microsoft’s existing technologies to offer a more consumer-like experience. Phillips tells me that team is looking at work being done in Microsoft Research and by the Azure Machine Learning teams, for example, to bring features like speech-to-text, automatic translations, and support for face recognition to future versions of Stream. Phillips tells me the team is also looking at adding support for live streaming in the future.

What’s even more important for enterprises and their IT admins, though, is that Stream treats videos like every other enterprise document. For them, a video is just like any other digital artifact in the enterprise and they can assign rights to videos, set access groups, remove access, and ensure that videos aren’t shared outside of the company.

Developers will also be able to take the Microsoft Stream API and build new applications on top of it. In this first stage, this mostly means they will be able to embed videos, but over time, the team will likely add more features to the API.

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]