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Those small amounts are usually bits and pieces of the larger trade. Unless you place an "all or None" request with your order (buy or sell), the MM can break it up however the choose thoughout the day.
I just wanted to thank all the hard working and dedicated Ediggers here for all the info and support thoughout the past 15 years. After about three months of selling, today I liquidated the last of my position today.
Wish all you God-loving folks the best with EDIG and hope they prevail in the courts and in the business world. I'll keep tabs on the company and keep some powder dry for when they do.
Best of luck to ALL
Jeff
New smart bed, smart watch will study you while you snore
Having trouble sleeping? There’s a device for that. In fact, there suddenly are quite a few.
New consumer electronics aim to analyze your sleep patterns, to learn when you enter deep, healing sleep -- and potentially help you improve the quality of your slumber.
Sleep Number, maker of the “as seen on TV” adjustable bed, has unveiled a new connected smart bed that tracks the quality and duration of your zzzs in order to optimize how you sleep.
“It knows when you’re sleeping. It knows when you’re awake. It tells you straight up, here’s a good night's sleep. Here’s a better night. And here’s an awesome night,” said Sleep Number president and CEO Shelly Ibach.
'It knows when you’re sleeping. It knows when you’re awake.'
- Shelly Ibach
And it's not alone. The Basis smart watch measures not just how many steps you take and your heart rate, but what happens to you while you sleep: It tracks when you enter REM sleep, how often you toss and turn and how long your sleep lasts.
What's the impetus behind the new gadgets?
“We're really trying to help you fully understand your work, your sleep, your life,” Basis CEO Jeff Holove told FoxNews.com. Like the wearable bands from Fitbit, Nike, Jawbone and more, the Basis device aims to improve your health through data analysis. But Basis claims to have far more sensitive technology built into its band than the competition.
"Others use accelerometers," Holove said. "The Basis band has five sensors running 24/7. We’re really trying to get true biosignal data, true physiological data."
Wear the company's watch while you sleep and it can sense when you heave and roll over, and that info combined with your skin temperature, perspiration, heart rate and more provides a remarkable picture of your sleep pattern, data that once was available only through a visit to a fancy sleep lab.
The Sleep Number bed -- it's officially called the x12, and its monitoring tech is called SleepIQ -- has goals similar to the $199 Basis watch, though it works very differently and costs dramatically more. The top-of-the-line model goes for nearly $8,000, although Pete Bils, vice president of sleep innovation and clinical research, told FoxNews.com the price is expected to drop dramatically in the near future.
Sleep Number beds have two adjustable sections (his and hers, so to speak), and an inflatable chamber in each can be precisely controlled: Lower numbers are soft and cushy; higher numbers are firm and offer more support.
Bils explained that by precisely monitoring the pressure on that air cushion, the company can sense much of the same data as the Basis watch. When you breathe, you press down on the mattress. When you toss and turn, you press down. Your very heartbeat alters the pressure. By taking 500 readings per second and passing the data through an algorithm, the company can tell what you do at night.
“We spend a third of our time in bed; it’s time to take the mystery out of that third of our life,” said Ibach.
And when you’re in bed and very deliberately not sleeping? Bils suggested that the privacy-minded might turn the feature off for the duration.
This may sound like imprecise science, but Sleep Number says the technology is rooted in real science, an algorithm from California health care company BAM Labs. The company founder was frustrated with the existing technology he was forced to use to monitor his son, who was born premature and had sleep apnea.
To be clear, neither device claims to solve your sleep problems, but both offer the ability to correlate behaviors with sleep patterns. The Basis, for example, will introduce you to simple actions you can work into a busy life to make a difference. Go to bed at a consistent time and your sleep quality goes up.
The Sleep Number x12 comes with a link to software that runs on an iPad or Android or what have you. A journaling feature (how much caffeine and exercise did you get?) lets you keep track of what you do and links it to how well you sleep.
“[It] will include tips and insights based on what you enter,” explained chief product officer Annie Bloomquist.
Neither company is collecting or storing the information. But the simple fact that they can gather it is intriguing in itself.
“Being able to see these things and find out how much sleep you're getting hasn’t been possible before. And now it is," Holove said.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/1925821-intel-moving-ahead-rapidly-in-another-multibillion-dollar-market?source=email_tech_daily_sem_bro_lin_2_17&ifp=0
Industrial Internet is a fast emerging concept and currently is one of the biggest opportunities for the companies that operate in the related field.
Industrial Internet refers to new ecosystems of machines connected through networked sensors (hardware) and software. Industrial Internet is the prime source of industrial Big-Data, which holds a lot of unique knowledge that can help industries to improve efficiency, productivity, safety, environment protection, R&D, etc. Due to this unique knowledge that can be derived from this data more and more companies are looking to collect and analyze the data.
- Market size:
Industrial Internet market is heading towards a phenomenal growth. The market is expected to touch $514 billion by the year 2020 from $20 billion in 2012 (see the chart below), representing a compounded annual growth rate of about 50%. The prime reason behind the growth is the value that Industrial Internet can deliver to the user industries like power, aviation, healthcare, transportation, etc. Industrial Internet is expected to deliver huge value to the user industries. As per the estimates, by the year 2020 Industrial Internet will be delivering $1,279 billion of value, representing a Return on investment (ROI) of 149%.
(click to enlarge)
Industrial Internet:
Industrial Internet involves Internet of things, intelligent machines, machine-to-machine communication, and data analysis.
- Internet of things ((IoT)):
IoT means the networked connection of people, data, processes and things; Where everything on a same network (person, device, application, system, etc) can anytime connect and interact with each other, not just manually, but also through the devices or applications, and can react to the particular events (mainly application generated events) that occur when something predefined happens or when an application from a connected device prompts another connected device to do something.
- Intelligent machines:
Intelligent machines are intelligent because they can create, collect and process data to work more efficiently and safely. They can do so because the parts of an intelligent machine are integrated with sensors (includes hardware and software components) that are programmed to collect data. An intelligent machine can use this data on a real time bases to make machine work more efficiently and safely. Moreover, an intelligent machine can also communicate with other networked machines in a programmed manner.
- Machine to machine communication:
Machine to machine communication is the term assigned to the capability of different machines or parts of a same machine to communicate with each other (through integrated sensors) whenever a predefined event occurs. This communication allows machines or parts of same machine to react on a real-time basis to a predefined event that too without human intervention.
- Data analysis:
Machines integrated with the sensors generate a huge amount of data. Machines use this data on real-time basics to operate in a better way. The data generated is collected and used to perform analytics. The companies use the outcome of the data analysis to make better machines by better understanding of machine mechanism and early fault detection.
Intel presence:
Intel Corporation (INTC) designs and manufactures some of the world's best microprocessors. The company is a dominant player in PC and Data-center markets, but the company has a negligible presence in Industrial Internet market. This is due to the fact that the company traditionally operates in PC and Data-center markets. Its chips considered as too power hungry too be used for Industrial Internet.
However, during the latest "Intel-developer-forum" (IDF) the company introduced a new SoC named Quark. With the introduction of new SoC, the company makes it clear that it is moving ahead in Industrial Internet space and in years to come it intends to become a major player in Industrial Internet market. The company's strategy for Quark is to develop a SoC, which is small in size, low on power, secure and customizable for Industrial Internet.
Quark SoC:
First showed at IDF 2013, Quark SoC is the company's smallest ever SoC. The SoC is designed for applications where lower power and size take priority over higher performance. The SoC can be used to develop innovative solutions for ubiquitous computing markets and Industrial Internet. Quark is truly meant for Industrial Internet as it meets most of the requirements for Industrial Internet like small size, low power, open architecture (customizable) and platform security.
- Size:
Small size is one of the key requirements for Industrial Internet market, as multiple chips needs to be integrated in one single machine and the small size allow the chips to be integrated in the machine parts without altering the machine design. The company has developed the SoC while keeping in mind this requirement of Industrial Internet. The SoC is based on the core which is one-fifth of the size of Atom chips (22-nanometer) designed by the company. Currently the SoC is manufactured on 32nm process technology, which leaves a lot of space for further size reduction for more complex requirements.
- Power:
Low power consumption is another key requirement for Industrial Internet market, as the integrated chips normally are powered by integrated batteries, and high power consumption will drain out the batteries in a quick time and will affect the overall economic and operating cost of machines (high power cost and early replacement of batteries). The SoC is based on the core which needs one-tenth of the power as compared to Atom chips (22-nanometer). The SoC is also integrated with the technology like "idle States", which is used to save power when the processor is idle.
- Open architecture (customizable):
One of the key things that is needed for the success in the market is designing flexibility because the market for Industrial Internet is extremely vast and the even a single machine may need multiple products that can perform different tasks or run different applications. The new SoC is "open architecture" product and the company termed it as "synthesizable", which means that the customers can designed and customize the SoC as per their requirement and not only can run but can also built their own IP/applications around the core.
- Security:
Security is one of the prime concerns in the IT industry. The SoC comes with "Execute Disable Bit" feature, which helps to secure the platform by reducing its exposure to viruses and malicious-code attacks.
Conclusion:
Though the company has mentioned that Quark is a SoC for Internet of things, but the features of Quark primarily met the requirements of Industrial Internet (including wearable with limited functions). A major part of Internet of things also includes the segments such as smartphones, tablets, etc., where Quark will found negligible use (unless the company scale-up the performance of the SoC).
Industrial Internet is a massive opportunity due to the rising popularity of Big-Data (reasons explained above). Unlike tablet and smartphone markets the company's entry into Industrial Internet (to some extent) is a natural extension of its data-center business as most of the data collected through the Industrial Internet will go to the data-centers and the company is a leading player in the data center market. This could work as a big advantage for the company as the better technological understanding means the better integration of Data-center and Industrial Internet architectures that will lead to better performance.
The company's presence as a developer of software products for embedded computing systems through Wind River, which develops real-time operating systems, middleware, and software design tools for a variety of embedded computing systems will further enhance the company's Industrial Internet offerings in the years to come as it will allow the company to offer Industrial Internet products as a ready to be implemented, fully developed solutions rather than just a programmable SoC.
All in all, the company is increasingly using its manufacturing and R&D capabilities to enter the new markets. There is every reason for the company to feel confidence and excited about its possibilities in the Industrial Internet market due to all the reasons and company's strategy
when the court documents stated that the defendant was writing a check.
Intel: Don't Believe Bloomberg's Google Rumor
After the market close on Dec. 12, Bloomberg had the audacity to spread one of the sleaziest rumors that I've ever seen perpetuated about Intel (INTC) and Google (GOOG). The rumor is essentially that Google is looking to design its own chips and cut Intel out of the equation. Naturally, Intel shares are now down about 3% in the after-hours session on this pure fantasy. In this article, I would like to step through this rumor and show why it's probably complete nonsense.
The rumor itself is sketchy
Here's what Bloomberg had to "report" with respect to this,
Google Inc. is considering designing its own server processors using technology from ARM Holdings Plc, a move that could threaten Intel Corp.'s market dominance, said a person with knowledge of the matter.
Oh, really? Google is going to design chips based on ARM Holdings' (ARMH) IP? OK. So let's assume that Google indeed wants to take out an ARM processor or architectural license to design its own chips. This means that Google is going to need to be hiring some chip engineers en masse, right? After all, designing and validating a chip isn't cheap.
You'd think, then, that Google would have some job openings for chip design engineers right?
Well, let's search for jobs on Google - let's figure out if they're hiring chip engineers.
(click to enlarge)
I searched for "SoC", and I got one job opening that had nothing to do with SoCs design. OK. Let's look for other common chip development type jobs. Well, after trying multiple searches including "CPU", "Validation", "SoC", "PHY", "CMOS", and many other searches, the only thing that I could find was the LONE listing that Bloomberg's "crack" team found:
(click to enlarge)
See this job posting? The one that the folks at Bloomberg thought implied that Google was going to build its own chips? Well, Google may be building its own chips, but they sure aren't microprocessors/SoCs. An "ASIC" - which is short for "Application Specific Integrated Circuit" - is a chip that is designed to do a special task. In servers, networking hardware, and storage systems (found in the job listing) there are tons of ASICs that are used to do various functions completely unrelated to what the CPU/primary SoC is responsible. Just because Google may be designing a chip doesn't mean that it's designing anything that it expects to compete with Intel in its datacenters.
Oh, one more search. Let's search Google's job boards for "ARM" and see what we find,
(click to enlarge)
Okay, so they're not really hiring all that many chip engineers. Or, really, any.
If Google Wants To Build Its Own Server Chips, It Will Probably Acquire A Chip Company
If Google were actually going to build its own server SoCs, then it would probably need to buy a pre-packaged, ready-made team. NVIDIA did it for its "Denver" CPU, Apple did it by buying PA-Semi and Intrinsity, Samsung lifted an entire team from AMD (AMD) about a year ago, and Broadcom (BRCM) did it by acquiring NetLogic.
So, if you see Google, say, buying Cavium Networks (CAVM), Applied Micro (AMCC), or another chip firm, then there would be some real credibility here. But it is naive to believe that Google can simply design a chip that offers significantly better total cost of ownership than what it can buy from Intel. I'll show you why in a minute.
Designing Chips Isn't Getting Any Cheaper
People seem to think that designing chips is cheap and easy because ARM licenses processor IP. This couldn't be further from the truth. Thanks to the increased complexity of these designs and the process nodes that they're built with, the costs to actually design and build chips is skyrocketing. I give the following slide from Broadcom's recent analyst day to illustrate this phenomenon:
(click to enlarge)
In order for Google to design chips based on a leading edge process node (and they would need to do so in order to have a prayer of having anything close to performance/watt competitive with Intel), it will have to spend about $300M. Chump change for a company as profitable as Google, but as these nodes become more complex, those design costs are going to get even worse. Google possibly has the scale to amortize the design cost that goes into these chips given its scale, but keep in mind that Google uses many different chips from Intel (which, again, has the scale to develop them all profitably).
Will Google's Chip Be Any Good? Who Will Build It?
Two questions that Google will need to ask itself if it wants to try to build its own chip(s):
- Can it design a chip with better performance/power characteristics than what Intel's own processors can provide?
- Who's gonna build it?
Well, right off the bat, I would very seriously doubt that Google could - in any reasonable timeframe - build up a team with the ability to put together a meaningfully superior SoC for datacenter applications. But, even if it could - either via magical pixie dust or via acquisition of a credible processor vendor like Cavium - would such a chip be competitive with what Intel will be able to do?
Probably not. On a performance per watt basis, Intel's low power "Avoton" easily surpasses the offerings from Calxeda or Applied Micro, and Cavium's "Project Thunder" is still deep in development with no ETA given (and by the time it arrives it will probably be built on TSMC's 28nm process and will be competing with Intel's 14nm chips).
Does Google really want to trust its datacenter fate to a custom designed chip by a team far less experienced than what Intel brings to the table and, at the same time, with a process technology (which implies performance/power) disadvantage? Especially when Intel has made it quite clear that it will do custom chips for people?
I propose a more likely scenario
There is no reason for Google to do its own ground-up custom chip, but I can certainly see the case for Google wanting to, say, design a custom IP block (say an accelerator) that doesn't come with Intel's suite of processors. Intel has made it clear on numerous occasions that it would be happy to work with such a customer to design a custom SoC that integrates whatever special IP blocks that the customer wants. This is why Intel is building SoCs based around both its "Core" processors as well as its "Atom" processors so that it can be flexible to the demands of its customers.
This is the whole basis of Intel's "semi-custom" foundry initiative:
(click to enlarge)
One More Thing
A final proof point to show how poorly thought out the Bloomberg piece was, the report cites Google joining the POWER Alliance (POWER is not ARM) as a reason that Google would want to design its own custom ARM chips. Huh? Wouldn't this be a sign that Google could potentially want to build chips around the POWER ISA and/or architectures from IBM?
Highly irresponsible journalism.
Conclusion
Intel's stock price just lost 3% in the after-hours session following this "rumor". I do not believe there is much truth to it (for the reasons outlined above), but even so, the rumor itself was so vaguely worded (i.e. to get page-views by shocking people but to cover Bloomberg's collective behinds with all of the wishy-washy disclaimers). I get that it's cool to pump ARM and bash Intel these days, but this story just smells too fishy and is too closely timed with today's upgrade from FBR of ARMH on "microserver potential" to really pass the smell test.