Microsoft and the National Basketball Association have inked a multiyear deal to build a consumer-facing digital platform to debut with the 2020-2021 season. The NBA will utilize the tech company’s Azure cloud computing and artificial intelligence capabilities to customize games and experiences. The deal’s terms were not revealed, but it covers all NBA properties including the Women’s National Basketball Association and USA Basketball. To win the deal, Microsoft bested cloud competitors Amazon and Google. Continue reading Microsoft and NBA Sign Multiyear Deal for AI, Cloud Services

Amazon, Google and Microsoft are targeting “low code” and “no code” software to enable business people to develop their own apps. Microsoft’s Power platform, which offers this capability, is the company’s fastest-growing business app ever. The company predicted that 500 million such apps will be built in the next five years, more than the total built in the last 40 years. Google Cloud just purchased Seattle-based AppSheet, a big player in this software market and rumor has it that Amazon Web Services will soon debut a similar product. Continue reading Tech Leaders Focus on ‘Low Code’ and ‘No Code’ Software

Although millions of Americans are at home, the Senate did not include money for broadband infrastructure in the $3 trillion stimulus package under consideration. However, the current bill does include some funding to deploy mobile hot spots around the country. Proponents of accessible broadband will try to add that to any upcoming stimulus package. Meanwhile, the U.S. government, along with several Big Tech companies, is providing global access to 16 supercomputers to help researchers discover vaccines to combat the coronavirus. Continue reading Federal Government Considers Plans For Broadband Access

After the cancellation of the Game Developers Conference, Google went online to release information about its cloud infrastructure, Google Play and Stadia cloud gaming services. Stadia head of product John Justice reported that Google Ads campaigns have thus far resulted in 27 billion game installs, that mobile gaming is “on track” to reach $100 billion in 2021, and that Southeast Asia, India, the Middle East and North Africa will drive mobile game growth going forward. There are 2 billion daily active users on Android. Continue reading Google Unveils Details on Google Play, Stadia, Google Cloud

When Google debuted its Stadia cloud gaming service in November of last year, players had one choice: Stadia Pro, priced at $10 per month. But the company had stated it would unveil two tiers of service, and it appears to be on the verge of introducing its free tier, as well as a player limit and YouTube live streaming. Google Stadia has not revealed a launch date for the potential free tier, which was found in the code of its version 2.7 update. Also revealed in the code is a new option to sign up without a paid code. Continue reading Google Stadia Code Reveals Plans to Debut Free Tier, More

Google’s YouTube will exclusively stream Activision Blizzard’s Call of Duty League, Overwatch League, and Hearthstone Esports, which had previously been on the Twitch streaming platform. The news came just before the Call of Duty League’s inaugural match. In 2018, Twitch inked exclusive Overwatch League streaming rights for a reported $90 million. Additionally, Google Cloud will host Activision Blizzard’s library of games. YouTube Gaming head Ryan Wyatt reported that talks over the rights had been ongoing since last year. Continue reading YouTube Signs Activision Blizzard’s Major eSports Leagues

AI can enable many important tasks from manufacturing to medicine, but only if the applications are speedy and secure. Communication via the cloud adds latency and risks privacy, which is why Google worked on a solution — dubbed Coral — that avoids centralized data centers. Coral product manager Vikram Tank described Coral as a “platform of [Google] hardware and software components … that help you build devices with local AI — providing hardware acceleration for neural networks … right on the edge device.” Continue reading Google Bypasses Cloud to Offer AI to Enterprise Customers

Apple and Microsoft signed on as premier members of the Academy Software Foundation (ASWF), founded in 2018 to promote the use of open source software in the movie industry. By joining ASWF, Apple and Microsoft pushed annual funding for the organization over $1 million. Microsoft also joined ASWF’s governing board and technical advisory council. ASWF is a joint project of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Linux Foundation. ASWF executive director David Morin welcomed both companies into the fold. Continue reading Apple, Microsoft Latest to Join Academy Software Foundation

Google is looking to help developers create real-time captioning for long-form conversations in multiple languages. The company recently open-sourced the speech engine used for Live Transcribe, its Android speech-to-text transcription app designed for those who are deaf or hard of hearing, and posted the source code on GitHub. Live Transcribe, launched in February, is a tool that uses machine learning algorithms to convert audio into captions. Live Transcribe can transcribe speech in more than 70 languages and dialects into captions in real-time. Continue reading Google Open-Sources Technology For Real-Time Captions

According to market research company Newzoo, the United States is on the cusp of becoming the world’s top gaming market at $36.9 billion, the first time since 2015, and supplanting China. Newzoo said its forecast isn’t due to the 2018 freeze on gaming licenses in China, but rather is a reflection of “new console users and in general massive growth in console spending” on both Sony PlayStation and Microsoft Xbox. Newzoo senior market analyst Tom Wijman points out that about 50 percent of U.S. game revenues come from consoles. Continue reading Newzoo Forecasts U.S. Will Top Gaming Market This Year

Etsy, the online crafts marketplace, boasts more than 60 million unique items and is using Google’s machine learning technology to help boost sales. Because more than 80 percent of its search-based purchases come from the first page of results, it is crucial to provide relevant items on that page. With that in mind, Etsy started a move to Google Cloud in 2017, motivated by the platform’s artificial intelligence capabilities. About three-fourths done with the migration, it’s already seen $260 million in incremental gross sales.

Continue reading Etsy Turns to Google Cloud to Improve Search, Boost Sales

Amazon and Google have become more competitive over the years, and at the latter’s annual Google Marketing Live conference this week, the company introduced new products to target online shoppers. At the same time, many shoppers now begin their search on Amazon, which has also been making inroads into Google’s traditional bailiwick of digital advertising. Marketing analytics firm Jumpstart reported that, in 2015, about 54 percent of product searches began on Google, and 46 percent on Amazon; those numbers flipped by 2018. Continue reading Amazon, Google Overlap in E-Commerce, Digital Ads, More

Google has unveiled GPipe, an open-sourced library that makes training deep neural networks more efficient under the TensorFlow framework Lingvo for sequence modeling. According to Google AI software engineer Yanping Huang, “in GPipe … we demonstrate the use of pipeline parallelism to scale up DNN training,” noting that larger DNN models “lead to better task performance.” Huang and his colleagues published a paper on “Efficient Training of Giant Neural Networks Using Pipeline Parallelism.” Continue reading Google GPipe Library Speeds Deep Neural Network Training

Western Digital global head of M&E/telco strategy Erik Weaver led a discussion among three other experts about where the media and entertainment industry is today with its slow-burn adoption of the cloud in production and post. Avid chief technology officer Tim Claman; Google Cloud global lead, entertainment industry solutions, Buzz Hays; and Microsoft global technology strategist Marco Rota described their perspectives and activities related to the various ways that media and entertainment companies have embraced the cloud. Continue reading HPA Tech Retreat: Ways That M&E Is Embracing the Cloud

Amazon’s AWS cloud computing unit has announced its new WorkLink service that promises to provide workers with simple and secure mobile access to all of their companies’ intranet sites and web apps. Since most companies typically use virtual private networks or mobile device management software for such remote access, AWS wants to replace the often expensive and complex use of these approaches with simple one-click access that employees should find similar to basic Internet browsing on their various devices. Continue reading WorkLink From AWS Enables Secure Mobile Intranet Access