Category Archives: Technology

A TV commercial said, Get the car without the car salesman! It was an ad for some new car-buying app enabling people to buy cars online.

It kinda made me sick, to tell you the truth. I dont see whats so great about eliminating people and eliminating jobs, but I realize thats what technology does. Its nothing new. Its been that way since the invention of the wheel.

We can blame job loss on the global economy or on outsourcing or trade policies, but as big if not a bigger reason than any of those for the loss of jobs is technological advance.

The examples are all around us the rise in online sales resulting in a reduction of sales people, voicemail systems that eliminate the need for an actual human to answer phones, ATMs and online banking that get rid of bank tellers, self-checkout stands that replace cashiers, online travel sites that have supplanted the need for travel agents, hotel desk clerks, airlines and rental car agents, and more.

In 1962, President Kennedy said if we have the talent to invent machines that put people out of work, we also have the talent to put people back to work, but a report released earlier this year by PricewaterhouseCoopers predicts that four out of 10 U.S. jobs will be replaced by robots and artificial intelligence over the next 12 years.

The tendency is to think its only unskilled blue-collar jobs that are threatened by technology, but as Jerry Kaplan, author of Humans Need Not Apply and a longtime Silicon Valley veteran who now teaches at Stanford Law, notes that technology is blind to the color of your collar.

Medical doctors have long been regarded as one of the most specialized, highly skilled and prestigious of professions, but even they are being replaced. To date, more than 2 million surgical procedures have been performed by ultraprecise robotic surgeons, for everything from knee replacements to vision correction. Computers can now diagnose cancers more reliably than humans, an increasing number of hospitals are utilizing automated, robotics-controlled pharmacies and the FDA approved a device that delivers anesthesia automatically, no anesthesiologist required.

Other professions threatened by technology include: financial services in which 61 percent of the jobs are likely to be lost to computers, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers, the insurance industry, architecture, journalism, marketing and advertising, teaching, lawyers and paralegals, and even law enforcement.

The Boston Consulting Group predicts by 2025 a quarter of the jobs currently available in the U.S. will be replaced by software or robots, while an Oxford University study, The Future of Employment, declared 47 percent of American workers are in jobs that are at high risk of being replaced by automation and computerization.

Im not frightened by the prospect. I think it would be amazing if we could spend more of our time and energy on our lives, loved ones, health, communities, passions and our bliss. It would entail a major philosophical shift and some sort of basic means of sustenance.

Technology giants like Bill Gates, Elon Musk and Mark Cuban all agree if computers replace humans who are taxed on the work they do and the earnings they generate, the owners of those computers must also be taxed on the work they do and the earnings they generate, and that money should be distributed to people as a basic living wage.

In this country, living wage are fighting words, and it brings us to the basic division between liberals and conservatives.

Regardless of your views, its time to ask what are we going to do when the jobs go away, knowing that in any technological shift, the first generation is always left out in the cold.

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Ron Colone: A closer look at technology and jobs - Santa Ynez Valley News

U.S. stocks bounced back to record highs Tuesday as investors put an end to a two-day drop for technology companies. Energy and consumer-focused companies also made outsize gains.

In a reversal from the two previous days, investors put money into companies that stand to benefit from faster economic growth, including retailers; makers of basic materials such as paints and chemicals; energy companies; and banks. Big-dividend companies, which are usually considered safer investments, did not do as well as the rest of the market.

Tech companies reversed their losses from Monday, although they remain well below their peak from last week.

There's no question that the rally in that sector can continue as long as investors' sentiment remains positive, said Brian Rehling, co-head of global fixed income strategy at Wells Fargo Investment Institute. Rehling said he believes tech stocks are too high, but not by a huge amount.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 10.96 points, or 0.5%, to 2,440.35. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 92.80 points, or 0.4%, to 21,328.47.

The Nasdaq composite, which has a large concentration of technology companies, rose 44.90 points, or 0.7%, to 6,220.37, but did not get back to its record highs. The Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks advanced 6.77 points, or 0.5%, to 1,425.98.

Technology companies led the way. Facebook rose 1.5% to $150.68. Microsoft ticked up 1.2% to $70.65. Hard drive maker Western Digital climbed 3.9% to $90.05.

Even after their recent skid, technology companies have done much better than the rest of the market in 2017. Big tech firms such as Apple and Alphabet, Googles parent company, have been responsible for a huge portion of the stock market's gains this year.

Amazon helped retailers rise. The online giant rose 1.6% to $980.79. Best Buy climbed 1.9% to $57.85, and Home Depot advanced 1.2% to $153.99.

Among materials companies, Dow Chemical jumped 2% to $65.26 and Sherwin-Williams rose 1.5% to $353.25.

Energy companies joined the gains as the price of oil reversed an early loss. U.S. crude futures rose 38 cents to settle at $46.46 a barrel. Brent crude, used to price international oils, ticked up 43 cents to $48.72 a barrel.

Among energy stocks, Halliburton climbed 2% to $45.84 and oil refiner Tesoro increased 3.3% to $94.22.

Wholesale gasoline rose 1 cent to $1.50 a gallon. Heating oil rose 2 cents to $1.45 a gallon. Natural gas slumped 6 cents, or 1.9%, to $2.97 per 1,000 cubic feet.

The Federal Reserve began a two-day policy meeting Tuesday. On Wednesday, investors expect the central bank to raise interest rates for the third time since December. Rehling, of the Wells Fargo Investment Institute, said investors will scrutinize the Fed's views on inflation and how aggressive it will be in raising interest rates in the future.

The market's going to be looking to see if they're still on track, he said. Investors also want to know about the Fed's plan to start reducing its huge portfolio of bonds, he said. He doesn't think that will have much effect on the bond market.

Information technology company Science Applications International Corp. slumped 8.5% to $74.52 after its sales fell short of Wall Street's projections. The company said tight budgets for customers are hurting its sales, and greater costs affected its profit.

Restaurant chain Cheesecake Factory slid 9.9% to $52.58 after it said sales at established restaurants have fallen in the current quarter. Those sales, an important measure of how a retailer is doing, were down about 1%; FactSet says analysts expected growth of 1.7%.

Verizon officially bought Yahoo's Internet business for $4.5 billion, bringing an end to Yahoo's 21 years as a publicly traded company. Yahoo is being combined with AOL in a new Verizon unit called Oath, which is run by AOL Chief Executive Tim Armstrong. Verizon stock fell 1.5% to $46.46.

Bond prices edged up. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped to 2.21% from 2.22%.

Gold fell 30 cents to $1,268.60 an ounce. Silver fell 18 cents, or 1%, to $16.77 an ounce. Copper fell 2 cents to $2.60 a pound.

The dollar rose to 109.96 yen from 109.79 yen. The euro inched up to $1.1212 from $1.1208.

Germany's DAX gained 0.6% and the CAC 40 in France advanced 0.4%. In Britain the FTSE 100 index lost 0.2%. Asian markets finished mostly higher. In South Korea the Kospi rose 0.7%, the Hang Seng in Hong Kong advanced 0.6%, and Japan's Nikkei 225 slipped 0.1%.

UPDATES:

2:15 p.m.: This article was updated with closing prices, context and analyst comment.

This article was originally published at 6:55 a.m.

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Stocks bounce back to record highs as tech companies rise - Los Angeles Times

New York Times

Sudden Technology Tumble Continues as Stocks Fall Further New York Times NEW YORK U.S. stock indexes slipped again Monday as technology companies, which were near record highs last week, suffered a second day of sharp losses. Investors are changing course and selling some of the best-performing stocks of the year ... and more »

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Sudden Technology Tumble Continues as Stocks Fall Further - New York Times

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Touch-sensing technology born of CMU researchers grabs companies' interest Pittsburgh Post-Gazette It took two years for researchers at Carnegie Mellon University to develop technology that can add touch-sensing capabilities to everyday objects and surfaces like toys, steering wheels and walls, but it did not take long for companies to express ...

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Touch-sensing technology born of CMU researchers grabs companies' interest - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

DENVER, Colo. Dont be surprised if your next trip through security at DIA brings you face-to-face with a new biometric fingerprint scanner.

DIA is one of two airports in the country conducting a proof of concept demonstration with the devices, to see how well they may work in speeding up security screenings in the future. You will also find the technology in the TSA pre-check line of Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

Much like when you use your thumbprint to access an iPhone, the new biometric authentication technology would allow travelers to use their fingerprints in place of both a boarding pass and ID.

It would only work for passengers who previously provided their fingerprints by enrolling in theTSA Prescreening program.

Once your fingerprints are matched up, the machine would then obtain your boarding pass information through Secure Flight.

All participation is completely voluntary, but for the time being, any passengers who decide to participate will still have to provide the required boarding pass and identification. Thats because this is just a data collection period. Which also means pre-check passengers who havent registered their fingerprints can also volunteer to use the system, because all data collected at this time is valuable information that will be analyzed by TSA.

TSA Acting Assistant Administrator Steve Karoly of the Office of Requirements and Capabilities Analysis said, Through these and other technology demonstrations, we are looking to reinvent and enhance security effectiveness to meet the evolving threat and ensure that passengers get to their destinations safely.

TSA will analyze the data collected in Denver and Atlantas pilot programs, in hopes of potentially implementing the new technology at other U.S. airports in the future.

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TSA tests fingerprint technology at DIA - FOX31 Denver

June 13, 2017 Superconducting nanoscale memory device. The binary information is encoded in the direction of the electrical current in the loop. When the current flows clockwise, this is considered a '0' state of the memory device. When it flows counter clockwise, this is a '1' state of the memory device. Because the electrons are superconducting, the current flows indefinitely in the loops, making the memory nonvolatile. (a) A photograph of the memory device, consisting of a superconducting strip of Mo75Ge25 (yellow) with a pair of superconducting nanowires forming a closed loop (also yellow): The width of the nanowires is 24 nm and 22 nm, as marked. (b) The critical current, i.e., the maximum current which can be injected into the device without destroying superconductivity, is plotted as a function of magnetic field. To set the memory state '0', we apply positive current targeting the shaded diamond. To set the memory to the state '1', a negative current is applied (as the same external magnetic field). To read out the memory state, the current is ramped to a higher value, as shown by the red rhombus, and the current value at which voltage occurs is measured. Such value is the critical current. Its statistical distribution is shown in (c). The measured value of the critical current depends on the pre-set memory value, '0' or '1'. Thus by measuring the critical current we are able to determine the state of the memory cell. Credit: . Alexey Bezryadin and Andrew Murphey, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Developing a superconducting computer that would perform computations at high speed without heat dissipation has been the goal of several research and development initiatives since the 1950s. Such a computer would require a fraction of the energy current supercomputers consume, and would be many times faster and more powerful. Despite promising advances in this direction over the last 65 years, substantial obstacles remain, including in developing miniaturized low-dissipation memory.

Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have developed a new nanoscale memory cell that holds tremendous promise for successful integration with superconducting processors. The new technology, created by Professor of Physics Alexey Bezryadin and graduate student Andrew Murphy, in collaboration with Dmitri Averin, a professor of theoretical physics at State University of New York at Stony Brook, provides stable memory at a smaller size than other proposed memory devices.

The device comprises two superconducting nanowires, attached to two unevenly spaced electrodes that were "written" using electron-beam lithography. The nanowires and electrodes form an asymmetric, closed superconducting loop, called a nanowire 'SQUID' (superconducting quantum interference device). The direction of current flowing through the loop, either clockwise or counterclockwise, equates to the "0" or "1" of binary code.

The memory state is written by applying an oscillating current of a particular magnitude, at a specific magnetic field. To read the memory state the scientists ramp up the current and detect the current value at which superconductivity gets destroyed. It turns out that such destruction or critical current is different for the two memory states, "0" or "1". The scientists tested memory stability, delaying reading of the state, and found no instances of memory loss. The team performed these experiments on two nanowire SQUIDS, made of the superconductor Mo75Ge25, using a method called molecular templating. The results are published in the June 13, 2017 New Journal of Physics.

Bezryadin comments, "This is very exciting. Such superconducting memory cells can be scaled down in size to the range of few tens of nanometers, and are not subject to the same performance issues as other proposed solutions."

Murphy adds, "Other efforts to create a scaled-down superconducting memory cell weren't able to reach the scale we have. A superconducting memory device needs to be cheaper to manufacture than standard memory now, and it needs to be dense, small, and fast."

Up to now, the most promising supercomputing memory devices, called 'single-flux quanta' devices, rely on manipulating circuits composed of Josephson junctions and inductive elements. These are in the micrometer range, and miniaturization of these devices is limited by the size of the Josephson junctions and their geometric inductances. Some of these also require ferromagnetic barriers to encode information, where Bezryadin and Murphy's device does not require any ferromagnetic components and eliminates magnetic-field cross-talk.

"Because the kinetic inductance increases with decreasing cross-sectional dimensions of the wire, nanowire SQUID memory elements could be reduced further, into the range of tens of nanometers," Bezryadin continues.

The researchers argue that this device can operate with a very low dissipation of energy, if the energies of two binary states are equal or near equal. The theoretical model for such operations was developed in collaboration with Averin The switching between the states of equal energy will be achieved either by quantum tunneling or by adiabatic processes composed of multiple jumps between the states.

In future work, Bezryadin plans to address the measurements of the switching time and to study larger arrays of the nanowire squids in functioning as arrays of memory elements. They will also test superconductors with higher critical temperatures, with the goal of a memory circuit that would operate at 4 Kelvin. Rapid operations will be achieved by utilizing microwave pulses.

Explore further: Scientists develop a control system for rapid superconducting memory cells

More information: Andrew Murphy et al. Nanoscale superconducting memory based on the kinetic inductance of asymmetric nanowire loops, New Journal of Physics (2017). DOI: 10.1088/1367-2630/aa7331

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Superconducting nanowire memory cell, miniaturized technology - Phys.Org

Forbes

The Technology And Telecommunications Sectors And Trump's Crucial Second 100 Days Forbes Is it possible to keep federal government regulators' hands off the technology sector? We're in the middle of president Donald Trump's second "100 Days," and there were a number of executive actions aimed at rolling back "job-killing regulations ...

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The Technology And Telecommunications Sectors And Trump's Crucial Second 100 Days - Forbes

Global stock markets fell on Monday, led by technology shares, as investors look ahead to policy meetings this week by the central banks of the U.S., Britain and Japan.

KEEPING SCORE: France's CAC 40 dropped 1 percent to 5,247, while Germany's DAX dropped 0.9 percent to 12,703. Britain's FTSE 100 fell 0.1 percent to 7,518. U.S. shares were set to drift lower, with Dow futures slipping 0.2 percent and S&P 500 futures 0.3 percent lower.

TECH SELL-OFF: A drop in technology stocks in the U.S. on Friday echoed through markets on Monday. In Germany, Infineon Technologies was down 5 percent and SAP 3.5 percent. Finland's Nokia was down 2.8 percent. Investors seem spooked the prospect that tech stocks might be overpriced after months of strong gains. The Nasdaq fell 1.8 percent on Friday.

CENTRAL BANKS: Looking ahead, market players are watching central banks' meetings in Britain and the U.S. later this week. Analysts say the Fed is likely to raise interest rates, while the Bank of England is expected to keep them unchanged. The Bank of Japan is also meeting on monetary policy later this week, but little is expected to impact markets, they say.

THE QUOTE: "The start of the week may be quiet, but we'll get monetary policy decisions from the Federal Reserve, Bank of England and Bank of Japan on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, respectively. The Fed will be of particular interest with markets now fully pricing in a rate hike and instead more concerned with whether they'll signal another this year or focus more on balance sheet reduction," said Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at OANDA.

ASIA'S DAY: Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 slipped 0.5 percent to finish at 19,908.58. South Korea's Kospi slipped 1.0 percent to 2,357.87. Hong Kong's Hang Seng lost 1.3 percent to 25,703.83, while the Shanghai Composite index dipped 0.6 percent to 3,139.88. Trading was closed in Australia for a national holiday.

ENERGY: Benchmark U.S. crude added 74 cents to $46.57 a barrel. It had gained 19 cents on Friday. Brent crude, used to price international oils, added 85 cents to $49.00 a barrel in London.

CURRENCIES: The pound continued to drop after falling over 2 percent versus the dollar after the Conservatives lost their majority in Parliament. The vote's outcome is creating disarray in Britain's negotiations to leave the European Union, due to start June 19. The pound was down at $1.2680, from $1.2721 on Friday. The dollar weakened to 109.88 yen from 110.36 late Friday. The euro strengthened to $1.1221 from $1.1182.

Yuri Kageyama can be reached on Twitter at https://twitter.com/yurikageyama

Her work can be found at https://www.apnews.com/search/yuri%20kageyama

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Global markets slide, led by technology shares - ABC News

U.S. stock indexes slipped again Monday as technology companies, which were near record highs last week, suffered a second day of sharp losses. Investors are changing course and selling some of the best-performing stocks of the year while buying shares of companies that have struggled.

Technology companies have surged in recent months, and Monday almost all of the losses came from the big companies that have led the way recently: Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and Alphabet, Google's parent company. Stocks fell hard in early trading, but they gradually recovered part of their losses as the day went on.

Julian Emanuel, an equity strategist for UBS, thinks technology stocks may fall a lot further and wind up 10% lower than they were last week. He said the tech firms should continue to do well, but the stocks have done so much better than the rest of the market in recent months that they are due for a downturn.

Any time that you have that degree of extreme sector outperformance, two things happen: The overall market tends to get a bit more volatile, and the leading group tends to underperform the laggards, he said.

Investors took a new look at some groups of companies that haven't done that well in 2017, including energy, telecommunications and real estate companies. Some of the best-performing stocks fell, including consumer-focused companies, healthcare companies, utilities and basic materials makers.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index slipped 2.38 points, or 0.1%, to 2,429.39. The Dow Jones industrial average, which closed at a record high Friday, fell 36.30 points, or 0.2%, to 21,235.67. The Nasdaq composite dropped 32.45 points, or 0.5%, to 6,175.46. The Russell 2000 index of small-company stocks slid 2.50 points, or 0.2%, to 1,419.21.

Apple dropped 2.5% to $145.32, Alphabet fell 0.9% to $961.81, Facebook fell 0.8% to $148.44, and Microsoft fell 0.8% to $69.78. Other 2017 top performers also tumbled: Activision Blizzard sank 2.2% to $56.76, Netflix dived 4.2% to $151.44, and semiconductor firm Skyworks Solutions declined 3% to $103.76.

Technology stocks have done far better than the rest of the market this year and were close to all-time highs before Friday's drop. The technology component of the S&P 500 index shed 2.7% Friday, erasing a month's worth of gains.

General Electric, meanwhile, made its biggest gain in almost two years after it said Chief Executive Jeffrey Immelt will step down after 16 years at the helm. John Flannery, the head of GE's healthcare division, will take over the post in August. Immelt will remain GE's chairman until the end of this year. In recent years GE has sold or split off numerous businesses, including its financial services division, and focused on new technologies as it returned to its roots as an industrial company.

GE stock climbed 3.6% to $28.94, its largest one-day jump since October 2015.

Trovagene jumped 20% to 97 cents after the San Diego developer of diagnostic technology announced a deal to provide AstraZeneca with a urine biomarker test and services for use in a study.

Benchmark U.S. crude rose 25 cents to $46.08 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, used to price international oils, rose 14 cents to $48.29 a barrel in London. Among energy companies, Exxon Mobil rose 1% to $82.93, and Chevron ticked up 1.5% to $108.04.

Energy companies are down 12% this year and phone companies have fallen almost 9%, but both climbed Monday. Verizon rose 1% to $47.19. Real estate companies have lagged the market this year, and they rose as well.

Stocks that took a rare downturn included Amazon, which fell 1.4% to $964.83, and drug and medical device maker Baxter International, which dropped 3% to $57.15.

The Federal Reserve is scheduled to meet Tuesday and Wednesday, and investors expect the central bank to raise interest rates for the third time since December.

Emanuel, of UBS, said that if the Fed takes an upbeat view of the economy, investors probably will keep selling technology stocks and put their money into consumer-focused companies, banks, and other industries that should benefit from continued economic growth. But if the Fed is more pessimistic, investors may look for yield and safer investments and buy bonds and high-dividend stocks instead.

Bond prices wobbled and turned lower. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 2.21% from 2.20%.

In other energy trading, wholesale gasoline slipped 1 cent to $1.49 a gallon. Heating oil fell less than 1 cent to $1.43 a gallon. Natural gas fell 2 cents to $3.02 per 1,000 cubic feet.

The dollar fell to 109.79 yen from 110.20 yen. The euro inched up to $1.1208 from $1.1195. The British pound continued to fall after Britains general election, sliding to $1.2657 from $1.12724. The elections outcome could affect Britain's bargaining position in its exit talks with the European Union.

Gold slipped $2.50 to $1,268.90 an ounce. Silver fell 28 cents to $16.94 an ounce. Copper fell 3 cents to $2.62 a pound.

Overseas stock markets also stumbled. France's CAC 40 dropped 1.1% and the Germany DAX shed 1%. Britain's FTSE 100 lost 0.2%. The benchmark Nikkei 225 in Japan fell 0.5% and South Korea's Kospi declined 1%. The Hang Seng of Hong Kong dropped 1.3%.

UPDATES:

2:05 p.m.: This article was updated with closing prices, context and analyst comment.

This article was originally published at 7:55 a.m.

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Stocks fall further as technology sell-off continues - Los Angeles Times

Decline in Technology Stocks Moderates in Monday's Session Wall Street Journal (subscription) Nvidia Corp., the S&P 500's worst performer on Friday, Micron Technology Inc. and Texas Instruments Inc. were all up to start the week. The makers of computer chips used in everything from iPhones to self-driving cars have often led their larger ... and more »

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Decline in Technology Stocks Moderates in Monday's Session - Wall Street Journal (subscription)