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Global Commission on Internet Governance calls for ‘a new global social compact’

The European Union escalated its four-year-old probe into Google Inc. on Wednesday, accusing the Internet giant of abusing its dominance of the search-engine market and starting a new investigation into its Android mobile-phone software.

The European Commission sent a “statement of objections” to Google that alleges the company unfairly favors its own comparison shopping service above rivals. Regulators will also look at Google’s contracts with phone and tablet makers to check if they are forced to use the company’s services or blocked from adopting modified versions of Android.

“If the investigation confirmed our concerns, Google would have to face the legal consequences and change the way it does business in Europe,” EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said in a statement Wednesday. “I want to make sure the markets in this area can flourish without anti-competitive constraints imposed by any company.”

The EU’s patience with Google has run out after three settlement bids failed to satisfy critics, who said the Mountain View, California-based company was wielding its power over search results to unfairly promote its own services and paid ads. The Android inquiry opens a new front that may hamper Google’s bid to gain a stranglehold on the mobile ad market.

Amit Singhal, senior vice president of Google Search, said that the company looks forward to make its case in response to the EU complaints.

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“While Google may be the most used search engine, people can now find and access information in numerous different ways – – and allegations of harm, for consumers and competitors, have proved to be wide of the mark,” Singhal said in a statement.

Google has 10 weeks to respond to the EU’s objections and can seek a closed hearing with regulators to make its case.

Sending antitrust objections, which lay out where the EU thinks Google is breaking the law, pushes the investigation into new territory. Apart from the risk of fines, it may result in demands for Google to change its behavior. Any order for it to change how search results are generated or how advertising is displayed may affect revenue.

“We do not wish to interfere with screen design, with or how the algorithm works, Vestager told reporters. ‘‘This is not what we are thinking about. What we would like to see is that shoppers are able to see the best shopping results.’’

The EU is continuing to investigate other concerns about Google’s search advertising, such as exclusivity requirements and ‘‘undue restrictions’’ on advertisers, it said. The EU is also looking at the legality of Google’s copying of rivals’ web content.

The European market contributes about 35% of Google’s revenue, according to Carlos Kirjner, a New York-based analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Its market share in search exceeds 90% in most European markets, compared with about 65% in the U.S.

The EU’s move is a U-turn from earlier efforts to seek a settlement, which would have seen them drop the investigation if Google made minor changes to its search pages. Negative feedback from companies, as well as criticism from French and German politicians, forced the EU ditch an accord last year.

The EU has been probing allegations since 2010 that Google’s search page isn’t fair when people seek services online. Microsoft Corp., Expedia Inc., publishers and others have asked the EU to examine complaints that Google favors its own services over competitors and hinders specialized search engines that compete with it.

Regulators have been looking at Google’s Android software for mobile phones since 2013 after receiving a complaint from an industry group backed by Microsoft and Nokia Oyj.

Google said in a separate statement that its partner agreements with mobile-phone makers are voluntary.

‘‘We understand that with success comes scrutiny,” said Google’s Hiroshi Lockheimer, VP of engineering for Android, on Google’s European blog Wednesday. “But it’s not just Google that has benefited from Android’s success. The Android model has let manufacturers compete on their unique innovations.”

The EU also got a complaint last year from independent record labels that targeted Google’s YouTube online video site, alleging that Google threatened to block artists’ videos during contract talks for a streaming service.

–With assistance from Brian Womack in San Francisco and Andrew Clapham, Stephanie Bodoni and Gaspard Sebag in Brussels.

Bloomberg.com

Interpol just announced a botnet takedown that has neutralised the operation of the "Simba" malware. For now, anyway. Paul Ducklin takes a look...

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Sends a so-called statement of objections to Google, raising the prospect of fines

Sends a so-called statement of objections to Google, raising the prospect of fines

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Jeremy Zuckerman thinks his mobile-gaming startup WINR Games has a disruptive idea: Reward players with cash

An unmanned Falcon 9 from billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX blasted off on a resupply mission to the International Space Station but the company missed again in its attempt to recover the rocket’s first stage.

The rocket, carrying its Dragon cargo spacecraft and 4,300 pounds (1,950 kilograms) of supplies and payloads, rumbled aloft at 4:10 p.m. New York time Tuesday from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Weather 60% "go" for #Falcon9 launch today @ 4:10pm ET. Lightning/clouds still a concern. http://t.co/tdni5406Hi pic.twitter.com/THhVBEE3Oi

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) April 14, 2015

“Rocket landed on droneship, but too hard for survival,” Musk said in a Twitter post about 20 minutes after the launch.

Odds of rocket landing successfully today are still less than 50%. The 80% figure by end of year is only bcs many launches ahead.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 13, 2015

Space Exploration Technology Corp. wants to cut the cost of spaceflight by creating reusable rockets. The Hawthorne, California-based company attempted to guide the booster to a vertical touchdown on Just Read the Instructions, a vessel floating hundreds of miles out in the Atlantic Ocean.

SpaceX in January first tested the ability of the Falcon 9 to touch down its landing legs on a barge. In that attempt, the 14-story-tall rocket ran out of hydraulic fluid shortly before it hit the ship and broke into pieces.

“Rocket made it to drone spaceport ship, but landed hard,” said Musk on Twitter Jan. 10. “Close, but no cigar this time. Bodes well for the future tho.”

#Falcon9 first stage approaches Just Read the Instructions. pic.twitter.com/XzmnYslNlc

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) April 14, 2015

In February, another test was called off because of rough seas.

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Ottawa-based software company helps merchants manage online storefronts

On Wednesday, Activision announced Guitar Hero Live, the newest instalment of the once popular Guitar Hero franchise, slated for an autumn 2015 release date.

The game is being developed by FreeStyleGames, the same studio that worked on DJ Hero and DJ Hero 2. Instead of playing against computer-generated characters, the game now features live-action video of real people in front of a crowd.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SnIZgESm4c&w=640&h=390]

While, the series’ classic input system remains, it has been drastically overhauled, dividing its controller’s top three frets down the middle, creating one button on the inside and one button on the onside of each fret. Additionally, rather than the colour coded green, red, yellow, blue and orange buttons from other Guitar Hero games, Guitar Hero Live‘s buttons are labeled in monochrome black and white.

Past Guitar Hero songs and accessories will not be compatible with this new entry in the franchise, so those plastic instruments you’ve been hanging onto will continue to be almost useless.

The series’ popular multiplayer mode is also returning and is set to allow players to challenge both friends and random players, similar to modes featured in past Guitar Hero games. Guitar Hero Live is set to cost $99.99 and will be released on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Wii U, as well as “select mobile devices.”

The mobile version of the game will be compatible with the guitar controller and can be streamed to your television through a process Activision has not yet outlined (possibly a Google chromecast like device), so it’s possible to play the game without a home console.

ActivisionGutar Hero Live's controller is reportedly very different from its predecessors.

The confirmed tracklist for the game currently includes: The Black Keys, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Gary Clark, Jr., Green Day, Ed Sheeran, The War on Drugs, The Killers, Skrillex, The Rolling Stones, The Lumineers, Pierce the Veil and Blitz Kids.

Harmonix, the creators of competing music franchise, Rock Band, recently announced that they have plans to revive their music series with Rock Band 4, also slated for a fall release date. Rock Band 4 will feature a more traditional guitar controller, and will be backwards compatible with old songs and (possibly) instruments from old versions of the game.

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Ottawa-based Shopify Inc. announced on Wednesday it has filed documents for a proposed public offering in Canada and the United States, after months of industry speculation.

The company has filed to list its shares on the Toronto Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbols “SH” and “SHOP”, respectively.

Shopify provides companies with an online storefront, giving retailers a system that collects payments and processes mobile credit card transactions. The company’s website states its clients include 150 retailers in 150 countries that include notable companies such as Google Inc, Tesla Motors Inc and The Gatorade Company Co.

More to come…

Intel Corp., the world’s largest chipmaker, gave a forecast for second-quarter sales that was in line with analysts’ estimates, helped by demand for chips that power servers in data centres.

Revenue will be US$13.2 billion, plus or minus US$500 million, the Santa Clara, California-based company said Tuesday in a statement. Gross margin, or the percentage of sales left after deducting production costs, will be about 62%. That compares with average analysts’ projections of US$13.45 billion in sales and margin of about 61%, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

While demand for PC chips is declining as more consumers rely on tablets and smartphones to get online, the data centres needed to churn out information and services for those mobile devices are driving orders for higher-end Intel server processors. Laptop production also rebounded last month, potentially helping Intel’s sales recover after a slump early in the year led it to slash its first-quarter revenue forecast.

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“I wouldn’t say it’s all clear, but some of the most recent data points look better,” said Craig Ellis, an analyst at B. Riley & Co. in San Francisco, who recommends buying Intel shares. “There should be sequential growth in the second quarter for PCs.”

Intel shares rose 3% in extended trading following the report. They had fallen less than 1% to US$31.49 at the close in New York, leaving the stock down 13% for 2015.

The company said revenue in the first three months of the year was little changed at US$12.8 billion. First-quarter net income rose to US$1.99 billion, or 41 US cents a share, from US$1.93 billion, or 38 UScents. That compares with average analyst estimates for earnings of 41 US cents on sales of US$12.8 billion.

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OTTAWA — Smaller players — even some relatively obscure ones — in Canada’s wireless market will likely gain a little ground on the bigger telecom companies through the federal government’s latest auctioning of spectrum, says one industry expert.

But the rules for the auction, which began Tuesday, are so “ridiculous” that Ottawa likely won’t achieve its goal of creating a viable fourth major wireless carrier, said Dvai Ghose, global head of equity research and telecommunications with Canaccord Genuity.

Industry Minister James Moore announced the start of the auction — the second such bidding process so far this year — saying Canadians want the government to make decisions that will give them more choice, lower prices and better service in the wireless sector.

“Our government is working to protect the interests of consumers in the wireless sector,” he said in a statement.

“Promoting a healthy wireless industry through competition is the best way to drive results for consumers.”

The auctioning of airwaves covers the higher-frequency 2,500 megahertz spectrum used to provide not only high-bandwidth functions like streaming video to smartphones, but also for home Internet service in rural areas where wired service is unavailable.

Ottawa has placed caps on how much spectrum companies can own, a move that will almost shut out Rogers and Bell from the bidding because they already own large chunks of it in some regions.

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Telus, considered Canada’s number three telecom service provider, owns almost no spectrum in the 2,500 Mhz frequency range and is expected to buy big.

Telus was the biggest buyer in the AWS-3 auction in March, paying over $1.5 billion for 15 licences, while Bell Mobility paid nearly $500 million for 13 licences.

But companies operating in provinces where there are already four industry players are being left out because the auction “rules are so ridiculous,” said Ghose.

When the last bidding process was carried out in March, 30 of the 50 megahertz set aside for new entrants went on the block. But all four firms operating in Manitoba and Saskatchewan were eliminated from bidding because they didn’t qualify, he noted.

“How can that be in the public interest?” Ghose asked.

This latest auction is not expected to generate anywhere near the $2.11 billion raised last month.

However, it will open the door to a number of smaller, rural wireless providers, who use high-frequency spectrum to provide home Internet service.
Companies such as Xplornet Communications Inc., CCI Wireless and SSi Internet Inc. are all registered as bidders.

Wind Mobile, Quebecor Inc. and other mobile firms have also said they would participate in the auction.

Moore has said the spectrum auctions are aimed at increasing competition by giving smaller carriers preferential access to air waves.

But while those smaller firms so far have purchased about one quarter of the available spectrum, they collectively still only account for about six per cent of market share, said Ghose.

The big three companies — Bell, Rogers and Telus — continue to represent 90 per cent of the market.

The 2,500 megahertz auction is divided into three geographic regions, where each provider has a cap of 40 megahertz per region.

Results of the auction are expected to be announced within five days after the close of bidding.

The Canadian Press

CALGARY — Shaw Communications Inc. says ongoing efforts to improve its customer care operations cut into its profit in the second quarter but provided positive momentum for the longer term.

The Calgary-based telecom and media company says it recorded $38 million of expenses related to severance and employee-related costs for about 1,600 affected employees.

Shaw’s profit for the three months ended Feb. 28 was $168 million, down 24 per cent from the same period last year when it had a gain from the sale of specialty TV channels.

This year’s second quarter net income amounted to 34 cents per share, which was five cents below the Thomson Reuters analyst estimate of 39 cents per share.

Shaw said its second quarter operating income before restructuring costs and amortization was $557 million, up 5.5 per cent from $528 million a year earlier.

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It said the operating income benefitted from a more focused approach to its consumer-oriented telecom services, as announced last year, as well as growth in its two business-oriented segments.

Its media segment — which includes specialty TV channels and the Global Television network — had $58 million of operating income before items, 4.9 per cent from $61 million last year.

The consumer telecom segment had $409 million of operating income before restructuring and amortization, up from $408 million.

The business network segment increased operating income by $6 million to $65 million while the new business infrastructure segment contributed to $25 million in the most recent quarter, compared with nil last year.

Shaw’s overall revenue rose to $1.34 billion, up about five per cent from last year. Revenue from the media segment was flat, dipping to $238 million from $239 million in the second quarter of 2014.

“The positive operating momentum continues across our businesses,” chief executive Brad Shaw said in a statement.

“We are seeing the financial and operational benefits of the restructuring we started last year as part of our multi-year Focus to Deliver initiative . . . enhancing our efficiency and growth potential while better serving the needs of customers and viewers.”

Toronto-based app-maker TouchBistro has raised $6 million in Series A funding, dipping back into the purse of its top existing investors and inking a new strategic partnership with another.

In addition to fresh investments from Kensington Capital Partners, Relay Ventures and Difference Capital, the upstart also attracted financing from Just Eat, a U.K.-based online marketplace for restaurant delivery with 45,700 outlets and more than eight million users in 13 countries, the company announced Tuesday.

TouchBistro software enables restaurant waiters to take and process an order, split a bill, and email a receipt, among other features, at the table side on a handy iPad tablet. With clients ranging from food trucks to bars to coffee shops, the app can also be used at stadiums, for example, so fans can order a snack without ever leaving their seat or missing the big play.

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With his sights set on catering to the European market – and eventually to Asia – TouchBistro founder and chief executive Alex Barrotti said the new ties with Just Eat will help transplant the Canadian-made app across the pond and beyond. Now, TouchBistro can begin to realize its plan to translate the app into other languages such as French, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian.

“There’s a lot of overlap [in the customers who use TouchBistro and Just Eat] and we want better, tighter integration,” Barrotti said in a phone interview. “We wanted to partner with someone who had a presence in Europe. [Just Eat] gives us a better way to reach those people than if we just translated the app and didn’t have any feet on the street.”

The company also boasted that its mobile point-of-sale solution transacted more than $1 billion annually at both fine dining and quick service restaurants. Barrotti declined to disclose the number places currently using the TouchBistro app, but did say the total venue count has grown 110 per cent since it closed its $4.5-million seed funding round back in November 2013. Monthly recurring revenue is up 203 per cent during the same period. Clients, who pay a monthly subscription fee per connected device, average 2.5 iPads.

Roughly three-quarters of its 42 employees call the company’s Toronto office home whereas the rest are based in New York City, helping facilitate expansion in the U.S. Barrotti says TouchBistro is in the midst of a growth spurt, with as many as six new hires set to start over the next 10 days.

During the past year, TouchBistro was crowned the top-grossing food and beverage app on Apple Inc.’s App Store in 33 countries, according to a company release published Tuesday. Replacing pen and paper with the TouchBistro app can help streamline how a meal is ordered, processed and paid for, especially for big dining groups where mistakes are easily made and the time between arriving and eating is stretched.

“For the restaurant, it means they can turn over tables quicker, provider better service and, in a lot of our clients’ case, they can take payment on the device,” Barrotti added. “It saves tremendous time and cost.”

When asked if he would consider offering the TouchBistro application on other operating systems, Barrotti pledged his allegiance to Apple’s iOS. “In the Android market there’s too much fragmentation,” he said. “If someone calls us from overseas and says they have an Apple iPad 2, we know precisely what they have, what CPU, what memory, what configuration. Support is easier.”

TORONTO – Postmedia Network Canada Corp. sealed its $316 million deal to buy 173 Sun Media publications on Monday, creating the largest digital news and newspaper organization in Canada.

The closing of the acquisition is the last hurdle in Postmedia’s bid to acquire Sun Media’s English-language properties, which include dailies in major Canadian cities such as Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, Winnipeg and Vancouver.

The deal brings in 2,500 more employees into Postmedia, increasing its total headcount to more than 5,000.

“With the completion of this transaction Postmedia becomes one of Canada’s largest newsmedia companies with even more compelling, made-in-Canada offerings for marketers,” said Paul Godfrey, chief executive of Postmedia.

The deal to buy the Sun Media newspapers from Quebecor Inc. was originally announced in October. At the time, the deal involved 175 Sun Media newspapers, but one community newspaper has since closed and two publications in Fort McMurray were consolidated.

The acquisition gained regulatory approval from the Competition Bureau last month.

Ambarish Chandra, a professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management who has written academic studies on newspaper mergers, said the closing and approval of the deal sets an important precedent in Canada.

“It is clear consolidation, especially in traditional media like newspapers, is necessary if some of these publications want to remain sustainable,” he said. “Now if other media properties want to seek such large mergers in the future, there’s already been precedent set. It’s clear the Competition Bureau doesn’t see a problem, so future consolidation shouldn’t be problematic.”

The deal creates an organization that brings in 12 million unique monthly visitors to its various news websites, while also creating a new source of revenue that could potentially help Postmedia become more profitable.

The company pointed out that based on last year’s earnings, the Sun Media properties will bring in $175 million in new annual revenue. Godfrey has said the company expects annualized cost synergies in the range of $6 million to $10 million from the deal, though he stressed the newsrooms would remain separate.

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Postmedia funded the acquisition with an equity rights offering that raised $173.5 million and issued $140 million of debt, set to mature in 2017. The company also used corporate cash and money raised from the sale of the Montreal Gazette’s production facility.

The closing of a deal highlights how the media landscape in Canada has drastically changed in the past decade. In a conference call following the deal’s approval last month, Godfrey said that it was unlikely such a deal would have been approved 10 years ago.

Chandra said that the deal highlights how rapidly the media landscape continues to evolve in Canada as newspapers deal with a drop in advertising, declining circulation and increased digital competition.

“Part of the reason why there is no challenge to this merger is I think regulators realize that for a traditional industry like newspapers, there needs to be a different way of doing things to survive,” Chandra said.