Cyanogen Inc is close to an agreement on a new US$110 million round of financing, people with knowledge of the matter said, as the startup seeks to get its version of the Android operating system into more smartphones.
PremjiInvest, the investment vehicle of Wipro Ltd chairman Azim Premji, is to be among the investors in the new funding, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the news is not public. Microsoft Corp decided not to invest after negotiations, although it might still be interested in a commercial deal to get its software onto Cyanogen’s mobile operating system, one person said.
Cyanogen has developed an Android-based interface for smartphones that lets users customize their devices and content. Microsoft had held talks with the Palo Alto, California-based start-up to explore an investment, with the goal of putting Microsoft’s applications on Cyanogen software, one of the people said.
The round could value Cyanogen at US$500 million or more, a person with knowledge of the matter said in January. The company’s version of Android is used in phones made by China’s OnePlus and other companies.
While Microsoft and Cyanogen failed to strike an investment deal, talks between the two illustrate how Microsoft is trying to get its applications and services on rival operating systems. Microsoft has in the past complained that Google Inc, which manages Android, has blocked its programs from the operating system.
Cyanogen counts venture capital firms Benchmark, Andreessen Horowitz and Redpoint Ventures among its investors. Bloomberg LP, the parent of Bloomberg News, is an investor in Andreessen Horowitz.
The Wall Street Journal reported in January that Microsoft was investing in Cyanogen. Bloomberg reported then that the companies were engaged in talks and that no decision had been made.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained