Life

Samsung unveils smartwatch that can make calls

(Reuters) – Samsung Electronics Co Ltd on Thursday unveiled what it said was the first smartwatch capable of making and receiving calls without a mobile phone nearby, in the South Korean firm’s latest effort to find a new growth driver. The world’s biggest smartphone maker has been pushing hard to develop the wearable devices market as it looks to counter slowing earnings in its mobile division, which led to weaker-than-expected second-quarter earnings. Samsung is hardly alone in pushing wearables, […]

NASA says new heavy-lift rocket debut not likely until 2018

(Reuters) – NASA’s new heavy-lift rocket, designed to fly astronauts to the moon, asteroids and eventually Mars, likely will not have its debut test flight until November 2018, nearly a year later than previous estimates, agency officials said on Wednesday. NASA is 70 percent confident of making a November 2018 launch date, given the technical, financial and management hurdles the Space Launch System faces on the road to development, NASA associate administrators Robert Lightfoot and […]

Senegalese WHO doctor with Ebola arrives for treatment in Germany

(Reuters) – A who contracted Ebola while working for the World Health Organisation (WHO)in Sierra Leone arrived in Hamburg on Wednesday for treatment at a tropical medicine unit, becoming Germany’s first patient with the disease. At a news conference on Wednesday the clinic’s tropical medicine specialist said the man would not be given new experimental drugs such as ZMapp but that his treatment would at first focus on managing his symptoms. The Senegalese doctor arrived […]

Look, no hands! Test driving a Google car

(Reuters) – The car stopped at stop signs. It glided around curves. It didn’t lurch or jolt. The most remarkable thing about the drive was that it was utterly unremarkable. This isn’t damning with faint praise. It’s actually high praise for the car in question: Google Inc.’s driverless car. Most automotive test drives (of which I’ve done dozens while covering the car industry for nearly 30 years) are altogether different. There’s a high-horsepower car. A […]

Ebay in talks to take bitcoins at payments unit : WSJ

(Reuters) – Ebay Inc’s (EBAY.O) is in talks with Coinbase Inc and other bitcoin transaction providers to integrate the virtual currency within its Braintree payments system, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday. Executives at PayPal, which owns the service that handles payments for startups from room-bookings network AirBnB to car-on-demand service Uber, have not struck any agreements, the Journal cited people familiar with the matter as saying. A deal would be an endorsement for […]

‘Candy Crush’ decline continues for King, shares fall

By Malathi Nayak SAN FRANCISCO Tue Aug 12, 2014 6:50pm EDT (Reuters) – Social and mobile game company King Digital Entertainment Plc reduced its 2014 forecast after reporting lower-than-expected second-quarter revenue on Tuesday, as gamers continued to spend less money on its “Candy Crush Saga” game. King also announced a $150 million special dividend, or 46.9 cents per share, payable to shareholders of record on Sept. 30. Its shares, however, slipped 22 percent in after-hours trading […]