Category Archives: oud

Verizon, Disney Bury The Hatchet Over ESPN, Skinny TV Bundle

Verizon Communication s ( VZ ) and Walt Disney ’s ( DIS ) ESPN are friends again after resolving their legal dispute over the sports network’s availability on a slimmed-down programming package. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed. Disney reports earnings Tuesday after the market close. Shares in Verizon were up a fraction, above 51, on the stock market today . Disney’s stock was up 1.1%, near 106.50, in afternoon trading. Verizon launched “Custom TV” in April 2015. The less-expensive programming package, with fewer channels, was designed to attract new customers for its FiOS TV service. Verizon’s base package excluded Disney’s ESPN, which garners the highest fees among cable networks. Disney sued Verizon claiming it doesn’t have rights to exclude its sports channel from TV bundles under programming deals. Verizon in February revamped its “Custom TV” package by offering two standard bundles — one with sports channels ESPN, Fox Sports and NBC Sports and one without them. Both companies on Tuesday issued statements. “We have a long-standing relationship with Verizon,” said Sean Breen, ESPN’s senior vice president, affiliate sales. “We look forward to working with them to provide great content to consumers for years to come.” Terry Denson, Verizon VP, content strategy and acquisition, said: “ESPN is an important partner of ours. We look forward to further collaborating with them to deliver customers content across all of our platforms.”

Why Qihoo, YY, Going-Private Chinese Tech Stocks Are Rebounding

U.S.-listed Chinese stocks Qihoo 360 ( QIHU ), YY ( YY ), E-Commerce China Dangdang ( DANG ), Momo ( MOMO ) and Vianet ( VNET ) rebounded Tuesday after tumbling for days on reports that Chinese regulators might put the brakes on their plans to delist from the American market and relist in mainland China. The China Securities Regulatory Commission is mulling limits on the number of reverse mergers from previously foreign-listed companies, sources told Bloomberg. But that eased fears of an outright ban. YY YY shares gained 5% in afternoon trade on the stock market today but have tumbled about 17% since last Wednesday alone. YY stock sliced both its 50-day and 200-day lines on Friday. Reports surfaced late last week of possible regulatory scrutiny regarding the music and entertainment social network. Qihoo 360 After losing 11.3% Monday and briefly sipping below its 200-day line, Qihoo shares rebounded more than 8%. The China-based search engine and security firm announced in December a $9.3 billion deal to go private. Qihoo is a rival to much-larger Baidu ( BIDU ). Baidu has its own problems involving sponsored posts, with the stock edging down Tuesday but tumbling 13% so far this month. Momo Momo, which said last June that it had received a going-private bid from its CEO and affiliates, rose 8% intraday but remain 21% below its close of May 4’s trading session. Momo, a Chinese mobile dating app, is currently trading below its 50-day and 200-day levels. Dangdang Dangdang shares perked up nearly 11% intraday Tuesday after tumbling for three straight trading days, including a 13.3% free fall Monday. The e-commerce firm received a going-private proposal last July. Vianet Vianet rose 15% intraday after crashing 29% over the prior three sessions to the lowest level since September 2014. The Internet data carrier got a buyout offer last June. The China Securities Regulatory Commission believes some of these companies’ valuations are too high, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Apple R&D Spending Rises But Still Trails Google, Facebook, Amazon

Spending on research and development is soaring at Apple ( AAPL ), Facebook ( FB ), Amazon.com ( AMZN ) and Alphabet ’s ( GOOGL ) Google as they race against each other in artificial intelligence, virtual reality, cloud computing, electric cars, drones, the Internet of Things and many other technologies. Apple’s R&D spending rose 30% in Q1 to $2.51 billion. In a regulatory filing, Apple said R&D, including stock compensation for engineers and other technical employees, was 5% of sales, up from 3.3% in the year-earlier period. By that yardstick, however, Apple lags Google by far, as well as Facebook. Facebook’s R&D spending has climbed to 13.4% of sales, up from 10% in 2014 and only 7% in 2010. In Q1, Facebook’s R&D spending rose 26% to $1.34 billion, with the company pushing into Internet drones, virtual reality and augmented reality. While virtual reality immerses a user in an imagined or replicated world (like video games), augmented reality overlays digital imagery onto the real world. Amazon and Google, though, are still the biggest spenders, according to a Bloomberg report . In Q1, R&D totaled 16.6% of Google revenue , Bloomberg said, up from 13.8% two years earlier. While Google aims to make gains in artificial intelligence , it’s trailing in software bots , an area where both Microsoft and Facebook made recent announcements. Google’s R&D spending will rise 16% in 2016 to $14.3 billion, BMO Capital Markets estimates. Then there’s Amazon. In Q1, Amazon’s R&D spending was up 28% to $3.53 billion, Bloomberg reported. At that growth rate, Amazon’s R&D spending will likely top Google’s this year.