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Politics : Sioux Nation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: altair19 who wrote (190284)	4/27/2010 11:55:45 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 362350

Joule Biotechnologies, a Cambridge, Mass.-based developer of technology to convert carbon dioxide into ethanol, has raised $30 million in Series B funding led by Flagship Ventures, according to VentureWire. joulebio.com

To: altair19 who wrote (190284)	4/28/2010 7:30:07 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 362350

HP's Palm deal: What it says about future of mobile phones techflash.com

To: altair19 who wrote (190284)	4/29/2010 1:14:16 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 362350

Amazon Looks to Widen Lead in Cloud Computing businessweek.com With Microsoft and IBM now offering rival services, Amazon says its own efforts could one day surpass retailing revenues By Aaron Ricadela Bloomberg Businessweek April 28, 2010, 11:01PM EST To widen its lead in the cloud computing market, Amazon.com is working to make its Web services compelling to more customers as computing giants such as Microsoft (MSFT) and IBM (IBM) attack the same territory. On Apr. 28, Amazon (AMZN) announced the opening of a new data center in Singapore to give customers in Asia, India, and Australia speedier access to its Amazon Web Services business. That business lets companies buy from Amazon, on an hourly basis, computing power that's delivered over the Internet. The Singapore data center will target Asian customers and Western companies that have many users in the region. In coming weeks, Amazon plans to introduce simplified management software for more of its 16 cloud computing products. "Amazon Web Services wants to be the data center for the world," says James Staten, a principal analyst at Forrester Research (FORR). Amazon has established a booming business selling cloud computing services including processing, disk storage, and database software to what it says are hundreds of thousands of users, at hourly fees based on how much computing power they consume. "Amazon Web Services can be as big as our retail business, in the fullness of time," says Andy Jassy, the senior vice-president in charge of Amazon's cloud computing business, sitting in the converted Seattle hospital that's long served as Amazon's headquarters. Jassy joined Amazon in 1997 after Harvard Business School and has held a variety of jobs in the company, including as CEO Jeff Bezos' technical assistant. He launched Amazon Web Services in 2006, and has turned it into an unlikely success. "Lot of Momentum" It could take years for Amazon's cloud business to rival the size of its retail sales, executives admit. Amazon won't break out the unit's sales. Citigroup (C) estimates cloud computing services could generate about $650 million in sales for Amazon this year, or about 2% of its total. "There's no doubt it's got a lot of momentum," says Mark Mahaney, an analyst at Citigroup. He has a buy rating on Amazon shares. In a February report, Goldman Sachs (GS) said that 77% of companies it surveyed using cloud computing development tools were using Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud service. About 17% were using software from Google and Salesforce.com (CRM), and 10% chose Microsoft's Windows Azure. Amazon has been "running the table," says Tim O'Brien, senior director of platform strategy at Microsoft. Businesses are rethinking how they manage computing. Given the falling costs of transferring data over the Internet and companies' realization that managing complicated hardware and software building blocks is often a losing proposition, many are willing to outsource some of the job. In fact, some venture capital firms "have made it almost a precondition of investing in (startups)" that they use Amazon's cloud software, says Citigroup's Mahaney. The cloud can lead to sizable savings. InstaColl, a Bangalore (India)-based company that sells online productivity software, was able to save more than 60% on the cost of running the computing, storage, and networking behind its applications by using Amazon Web Services instead of having its own hardware, CEO Sumanth Raghavendra said. He said InstaColl's savings are higher than most companies would reap. Large Clients Beyond small startups, Amazon counts larger organizations including Eli Lilly (LLY), Pfizer (PFE), NASA, Adobe Systems (ADBE), and Netflix (NFLX) as cloud computing customers. On Mar. 23, it released a software development kit so Java developers could more easily write applications that take advantage of its computing services. An Apr. 15 deal with NetSuite (N) lets customers of the online accounting software firm store their data on Amazon's computers. Amazon.com has always thought big. Since its founding 15 years ago, the Seattle-based company has grown to an expected $33 billion in 2010 sales and has a market value of more than $62 billion. Along the way, there have been detours. Bezos has dabbled in search engines and tablet computers, and Amazon operates an online grocery that's limited to Seattle. Many of the company's side projects haven't panned out. A six-year-old search engine, A9, hasn't captured Web users' attention, and searches on Amazon sites have less than 1% market share, according to ComScore (SCOR). The Kindle e-book reader is being challenged by Apple's iPad. And as consumers shift to downloadable books, music, and movies, Amazon's pack-and-ship retail model is feeling pressure. The company on Apr. 22 forecast second-quarter earnings that missed analysts' estimates. Rivals Gather Moreover, Amazon's competitors are ramping up their own cloud computing operations. Microsoft has attracted customers including 3M (MMM) and the Associated Press to Windows Azure, its software for building applications that run in Microsoft-operated data centers. Azure will also let developers write applications for Windows-powered smartphones, says Microsoft General Manager Doug Hauger. "It is now core to the work we're doing," he says. IBM is also using cloud computing to try to become nimbler and more appealing to startups, which often eschew its pricey and complex software. On Mar. 16, it announced versions of its developer tools, middleware, and database software that programmers can access over the Web to build applications. They're designed to appeal to startups that often don't consider buying traditional business software. "If you don't have a cloud-based model for your software, then you just can't play with those companies," says Dave Mitchell, IBM's director of strategy and emerging business. Other deep-pocketed tech companies are building cloud platforms as well. Google runs a cloud product called App Engine, and has shown a willingness to invest when it wants to branch into areas ancillary to search. VMware (VMW) is also marketing its data center software for companies that want to build computing "clouds" themselves. "This is going to be an extremely crowded market," says Scott Crenshaw, a vice-president at Linux vendor Red Hat (RHT). "It's going to expand before it contracts." Amazon has several advantages over its competitors. Its cloud computing engineers haven't had to satisfy requirements of large customers, so they've been free to make decisions that emphasize new technology and low costs, says Marten Mickos, CEO of software company Eucalyptus Systems and a former executive at MySQL and Sun Microsystems. Trending Amazon's Way Adam Selipsky, a vice-president of product management and developer relations at Amazon, says the company learned how to run data centers inexpensively and at a large scale as a result of building its retail business. Many companies will pare back their data center operations in the next decade or two, turning the computing business into one of higher volumes and lower profit margins—a scenario where Amazon excels, Selipsky says. "We're four years into a trend that's probably decades long," he says. Already, Amazon Web Services consumes more computing power than the company's retail business. For Amazon, expanding geographically and into the IT departments of larger customers will be key as it tries to make the cloud a plank of its growth. With larger rivals aiming to swipe some of Amazon's momentum in this frontier of business computing, Amazon will need to press every advantage it can. Ricadela is technology editor for Bloomberg Businessweek.com in San Francisco.

To: altair19 who wrote (190284)	4/30/2010 5:20:04 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 362350

Oil Spill’s Blow to BP’s Image May Eclipse Costs ______________________________________________________________ By CLIFFORD KRAUSS The New York Times April 29, 2010 HAMMOND, La. — BP says that the offshore drilling accident that is spewing thousands of barrels of oil a day into the Gulf of Mexico could cost the company several hundred million dollars. Nobody really knows whether the London-based oil giant is being too conservative about the cost for the April 20 accident, which some experts say could end up as the biggest oil spill in history. The 1989 grounding of the Exxon Valdez off Alaska, for example, cost Exxon Mobil more than $4.3 billion, including compensatory payments, cleanup costs, settlements and fines. But regardless of the out-of-pocket costs, the long-term damage to BP’s reputation — and possibly, its future prospects for drilling in the Gulf of Mexico — is likely to be far higher, according to industry analysts. The magnitude of the Deepwater Horizon disaster seems to be finally sinking in with investors. BP’s stock plunged more than 8 percent Thursday in American trading in an otherwise strong day for stocks. Since the accident, the American depositary receipts of the company have fallen about 13 percent, closing Thursday at $52.56. For Tony Hayward, who has led BP for the last three years, the accident threatens to overshadow all of the efforts he has made to burnish the tattered reputation of the company after a refinery explosion in Texas in 2005 and a pipeline leak in Alaska in 2006. As Mr. Hayward said to fellow executives in his London office recently, “What the hell did we do to deserve this?” A BP spokesman said no executives were available for an interview Thursday. But in response to a written question, Mr. Hayward said, “Reputationally, and in every other way, we will be judged by the quality, intensity, speed and efficacy of our response.” So far, the company’s failure to stop the seepage from the underwater well has frustrated government officials. On Thursday, President Obama offered the assistance of an array of government agencies, including the military, while noting that, under federal law, “BP is ultimately responsible for funding the cost of response and cleanup operations.” Mr. Hayward, who has blamed the rig’s owner and operator, Transocean, for the accident, said that it was nevertheless BP’s responsibility to deal with the immediate problem. “We take it with the utmost seriousness,” he wrote. “Nothing else matters right now.” Wall Street experts say that while the company is spending an estimated $6 million a day on fixing the mess, it is impossible to accurately estimate how much the incident will eventually cost. BP, which leased the platform from Transocean, has said that drilling and operating relief wells to plug the runaway well may cost as much as $300 million, but those same wells will eventually be used to produce profitable oil. The cost of an environmental cleanup will depend largely on how much oil reaches shore. The government could assess fines or other penalties. And lawyers have already filed a flurry of suits on behalf of commercial fisherman, shrimpers and injured oil workers against BP; Transocean; Cameron, the company that manufactured the blowout preventer; and other companies involved in the drilling process. Cleanup costs will be divided among BP, which has a 65 percent ownership of the field, and minority partners Anadarko and Mitsui. Transocean’s stock price fell nearly 7.5 percent Thursday, and is down more than 14 percent since the accident. The company has insurance that covers the rig that was lost, but any broader assessment of Transocean’s liability will be determined after investigators understand what caused the accident. Regardless of the final assessment of blame, Wall Street analysts warned that everything BP does from now on will come under increased scrutiny by regulators and that potential partners in drilling ventures may well look elsewhere. “In the last two years, it seemed BP had really cleaned up their act,” said Fadel Gheit, a managing director and oil analyst at Oppenheimer & Company. “Now it looks like a house of cards that has totally collapsed.” Under Mr. Hayward’s predecessor, John Browne, BP rebranded itself as “Beyond Petroleum,” a company that was environmentally conscious and wanted to develop alternative energy sources like solar and wind power. Its insignia of a blooming flower was intended to portray the company as one that was responsive to growing public concerns about climate change. But the company seemed to lose its focus on maintenance and safety, BP executives later acknowledged. The 2005 explosion at a refinery in Texas City, Tex., killed 15 workers and injured hundreds more. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined BP a record $87 million for neglecting to correct safety violations. Only a year later, a leaky BP oil pipeline in Alaska forced the shutdown of one of the nation’s biggest oil fields. BP was fined $20 million in criminal penalties after prosecutors said the company had neglected corroding pipelines. Soon after the incident, Mr. Browne quit amid tabloid headlines about his private life. Mr. Hayward, a geologist who had been in charge of exploration and production, took over and promised to refocus the company and change the culture, emphasizing safety. He also expanded the company’s already aggressive exploratory efforts in the deep waters of the gulf. Last year, the same platform that has now sunk to the sea floor drilled the deepest well in history, opening one of the largest new fields in the world. Despite the accident, BP says it remains committed to its gulf drilling program, which contributes 11 percent of the company’s worldwide production. Senior executives insist that the explosion that sank the Deepwater Horizon rig and killed 11 workers does not reflect the company’s safety standards or Mr. Hayward’s management. “This accident took place on a rig owned, managed and operated by Transocean,” said Andrew Gowers, a BP spokesman. “It involves the failure of a piece of equipment on that rig. So the unfolding events do not arise from a failure of BP’s safety systems.” But critics in Congress and elsewhere have questioned BP’s commitment to safety. Last year, when the federal Minerals Management Service proposed a rule that would have required companies to have their safety and environmental management programs audited once every three years, BP and other companies objected. The agency is also investigating charges by a whistle-blower that the company discarded important records from its Atlantis Gulf platform. Henry A. Waxman of California, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, is demanding documents from BP and its drilling contractors in what looks likely to be a full-blown investigation. “A striking feature of the incident is the apparent lack of an adequate plan to contain the spreading environmental damage,” he said in a letter to company officials. The faltering cleanup effort comes at a time when the company’s business is otherwise going well. Continuing the excellent performance of recent years, BP just announced earnings of $5.6 billion for the first quarter, more than double the profit during the same quarter a year ago. “Certainly, BP will survive this,” said Cathy Milostan, an oil stock analyst at Morningstar. “This will test Tony and his ability to respond to this situation. We will see if we are seeing a new BP.” -John M. Broder contributed reporting from Washington.