Technology
Technology is the collection of techniques, skills, methods and processes used in the production of goods or services or in the accomplishment of objectives, such as scientific investigation. Technology can be the knowledge of techniques, processes, etc. or it can be embedded in machines, computers, devices and factories, which can be operated by individuals without detailed knowledge of the workings of such things.
Technology can be most broadly defined as the entities, both material and immaterial, created by the application of mental and physical effort in order to achieve some value.
Apple Technology
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, that designs, develops, and sells consumer electronics, computer software, and online services. The Company’s products and services comprise iPhone, iPad, Mac, iPod, Apple TV, a portfolio of consumer and professional software applications, the iOS and OS X operating systems, iCloud, and a variety of accessory, service and support offerings. The Company also delivers digital content and applications through the iTunes Store, App StoreSM, iBookstoreSM, and Mac App Store. Its online services include the iTunes Store, the iOS App Store and Mac App Store, and iCloud.
Apple’s worldwide annual revenue totaled $233 billion for the fiscal year ending in September 2015.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), reported that the company sold 51 million iPhones in the Q1 of 2014 (an all-time quarterly record), compared to 47.8 million in the year-ago quarter.
Apple also sold 26 million iPads during the quarter, also an all-time quarterly record, compared to 22.9 million in the year-ago quarter.
The Company sold 4.8 million Macs, compared to 4.1 million in the year-ago quarter.
During Friday’s trade, Shares of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), lost -2.19% to $113.63.
Stifel Nicolaus’s Aaron Rakers this morning reiterates a Buy rating on shares of Apple (AAPL), and a $150 price target, writing that the company used an “extremely well-timed FX hedging program” in 2015 to hold onto $4.1 billion in revenue and 70 cents per share in net income, by his estimates, that it otherwise would have lost as the U.S. dollar rose against other world currencies, according to Barrons.com
Apple, in effect, managed better than some companies the dollar effect that crimped many tech results.
On the other news report, The December quarter is the most important quarter for the US economy (SPY) due to holiday shopping. Apple anticipates revenue for fiscal 1Q16, or the quarter ending in December, to be $75.5 billion to $77.5 billion. This will be a year-over-year (or YoY) revenue growth of only 2.5%, which is at the mid-point of Apple’s projection for fiscal 1Q16. Comparatively, Apple’s YoY revenue growth for the previous quarters has been much better, according to Market Realist
Facebook Technology
Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB), is an online social networking service headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The Company is engaged in developing products that enables users to connect and share through mobile devices and personal computers. It offers various services focused on people, marketers and developers. Recently The Company is releasing for free the designs of a powerful new computer server it crafted to put more power behind artificial-intelligence software. Serkan Piantino, an engineering director in Facebook’s AI Research group, says the new servers are twice as fast as those Facebook used before. “We will discover more things in machine learning and AI as a result,” he says, according to Technology Review
The social network’s giveaway is the latest in a recent flurry of announcements by tech giants that are open-sourcing artificial-intelligence technology, which is becoming vital to consumer and business-computing services. Opening up the technology is seen as a way to accelerate progress in the broader field, while also helping tech companies to boost their reputations and make key hires.
Shares of Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB), dropped -2.06% to $103.25, during its current trading session.
Facebook said Thursday that the company will open source the designs for its custom servers built to run its artificial intelligence algorithms, according to bizjournals
The machine is code-named Big Sur and is adept at deep learning, which is used to assist computers with perception. This applies to applications that require voice and photo recognition.
The move comes shortly after competitor Google open sourced its AI software, TensorFlow, last month.
“At Facebook, we’ve made great progress thus far with off-the-shelf infrastructure components and design,” the company wrote in a blog post. “We’ve developed software that can read stories, answer questions about scenes, play games and even learn unspecified tasks through observing some examples.”
Facebook needs AI to identify faces, curate content for your News Feed and execute tasks via M, Facebook’s AI personal assistant. Big Sur comprises eight GPU boards, each containing dozens of chips that consume only 300 watts of power. After 18 months of development, Big Sur is twice as fast as Facebook’s previous neural network system, according to Wired.
“Most of our AI research is focused on understanding the meaning of what people share,” Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a Facebook post in July. “For example, if you take a photo that has a friend in it, then we should make sure that friend sees it. If you take a photo of a dog or write a post about politics, we should understand that so we can show that post and assist you connect to people who like dogs and politics.” Bizjournals Report
On the other latest news report, Facebook will finally launch its social network for using at work:
Facebook at Work, Facebook’s professional version of its social network, is expected to launch in the coming months, after spending a year in tests, a company executive said, according to telegraph
The new service, geared towards workplace collaboration, is nearly identical to its ubiquitous social network, with a scrolling newsfeed, “likes” and a chat service.
Julien Codorniou, director of global platform partnerships at Facebook, said almost everything on Facebook at Work is the same as the regular Facebook social network, with some minor exceptions.
“You cannot play Candy Crush on Facebook at Work,” he told Reuters. “I would say 95 per cent of what we developed for Facebook is also adopted for Facebook at Work.”
Facebook started beta-testing the service in January and has kept it as a free, “invite-only” service for companies so far. The service will be open to all companies once launched and Facebook plans to charge “a few dollars per month per user” for premium services such as analytics and customer support. Telegraph Report