Tag: taiwan

“Bing is bigger than you think,” Microsoft boasts, at 33% of US searches

Bing is bigger than you think! #SEM #PPC #bingadswebcast pic.twitter.com/fFtEDvM634 — Bing Ads (@BingAds) August 17, 2017 We’ve known from Microsoft’s financial reports that Bing has been growing. The search engine became profitable in the third calendar quarter of 2015, and Microsoft says it has continued to grow both the market share and revenue-per-search since then. But how big is Bing? Via OnMSFT , Microsoft tweeted yesterday that it’s “bigger than you think” and provided some numbers that will probably be a surprise to many. The company claims that fully one-third of searches in the US are powered by Bing, either directly or through Yahoo or AOL (both of which provide results generated by Microsoft). Other strong markets include Taiwan, at 24 or 26 percent, and the UK, at either 23 or 25 percent (depending on which tweet you read). Globally, the company is claiming a 9-percent market share. Google is still the runaway winner, of course, but Microsoft’s numbers (using data from comScore) suggest that in at least some parts of the world, Bing is big enough to take note of. The real target for this kind of data is, of course, advertisers; by showing that Bing is actually being used by large numbers of people, Microsoft hopes that it will become more appealing to those wanting to advertise alongside search results. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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“Bing is bigger than you think,” Microsoft boasts, at 33% of US searches

TSMC plans a new factory to pump out tomorrow’s 3 nm chips

News leaked in late August that chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) and Apple were working shrinking the A11 processor set to go in next year’s iPhone down to 10nm. But to ensure it stays in business with the tech titan and other device manufacturers, TSMC is planning to build a new plant to build future chips at 5nm and 3nm sizes. According to Nikkei Asian Review , TSMC announced the new $15.7 billion facility a day after Taiwan’s minister of science and technology, Yang Hung-duen, told local media about it. His ministry might select a site in Kaohsiung for the factory, which could start production as early as 2022. That gives TSMC’s competitors a few years’ breathing room, but the race to smaller and smaller chips continues. While Intel claims it will produce a 10nm processor before its competitors, it conceded that production facilities equipped to pump out increasingly-smaller chips will only get more expensive. That’s why the company is slowing its two-year cycle “tick-tock” innovation cycle to reduce chip size every three years instead, focusing instead of improving internal architecture and performance in the interim. But even that lead might not be enough: On a conference call back in January, TSMC said it has a plan to push out 7nm chips by 2017 and 5nm by 2020. Via: 9to5Mac Source: Nikkei Asian Review

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TSMC plans a new factory to pump out tomorrow’s 3 nm chips

The Next iPhone Will Probably Have a Beautiful, Curved OLED Display

The next iPhone will reportedly have a beautiful OLED display. Sharp executive Tai Jeng-wu essentially confirmed the next iPhone’s hardware upgrade in a recent trip to his alma mater, Tatung University in Taiwan, according to Japan’s Nikkei Asian Review . Read more…

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The Next iPhone Will Probably Have a Beautiful, Curved OLED Display

Hackers Snag $2 Million From ATMs Without Using Credit Card

Earlier this week, Taiwanese hackers tricked ATMs into unloading piles of cash—more than $2 million dollars, in fact—without using a credit card. Instead of using a stolen credit card like most ATM thieves, these masked robbers used a computer program and walked away with piles of cash in a backpack. Read more…

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Hackers Snag $2 Million From ATMs Without Using Credit Card

Panasonic To Stop Making LCD Panels For TVs

AmiMoJo quotes a report from NHK WORLD: Japanese electronics maker Panasonic says it will stop making LCD panels for televisions, giving way to fierce price competition. The pullout from TV LCD manufacturing follows the company’s withdrawal from plasma TV production 3 years ago. They say they will continue to manufacture LCD panels at the plant for products other than televisions, such as medical equipment and cars. They say the company will keep making Panasonic-brand televisions, using panels supplied by other manufacturers. After Panasonic pulls out, Sharp and its Taiwanese parent firm Hon Hai will be the only producer in Japan. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Panasonic To Stop Making LCD Panels For TVs

MSI’s flagship gaming laptop gets an eye-tracking upgrade

If you’re looking for a big, powerful gaming laptop, the MSI’s GT72 Dominator has always been a solid choice — but it’s never been really interesting . The Dominator is known for a strong build, powerful internals, good speakers and a superb keyboard, but it never offered anything unexpected. Now it does. Later this month, MSI will be updating the Dominator with a fancy new gimmick: an integrated eye-tracking camera. Technically, we’ve seen this machine before: MSI showed off a prototype eye-tracking Dominator in Taiwan last year . It… sort of worked. Eye-controlled gaming can be finicky if not implemented correctly. At the time, we had trouble controlling the Assassin’s Creed in-game camera by just looking at the screen, but logging into Windows with the camera was relatively easy. The technology has potential, even if it only has limited support at the moment. Now that it’s officially available, that support could be on its way. MSI says the GT72S Tobii will be available for purchase later this month, and will ship with a Tobii-enabled copy of Tom Clancy’s The Division.

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MSI’s flagship gaming laptop gets an eye-tracking upgrade

These Huge Roman Mosaics Were Hidden Under City Streets For 1,700 Years 

Twenty years ago, construction workers in the Israeli town of Lod working under a city street came across something extraordinary: A massive mosaic, laid down almost two millennia before. Now, they’ve found another . Read more…

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These Huge Roman Mosaics Were Hidden Under City Streets For 1,700 Years 

China’s Dredging In the South China Sea Created 2,900 Acres of New Islands

We’ve known for years that China’s military is spearheading one of the biggest land reclamation projects ever in the middle of the South China Sea. But a report from the Pentagon yesterday says that the project is far larger than previously thought: 2, 900 acres of new land has been created—roughly tripling the size of the entire group of natural islands. Read more…

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China’s Dredging In the South China Sea Created 2,900 Acres of New Islands

HTC Spends Nearly $10M On A 15% Stake In Virtual Reality Platform WEVR

 HTC is planning to release its extremely well-received virtual reality headset Vive to consumers later this year, possibly in November. In the meantime, the Taiwanese company is busy building out its VR ecosystem. HTC disclosed that it spent almost $10 million for a 15 percent stake in WEVR, an open VR platform and community based in Los Angeles. Read More

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HTC Spends Nearly $10M On A 15% Stake In Virtual Reality Platform WEVR

How China Is Making Tiny Islands Inhabitable With Huge Floating Docks

The Spratly Islands are basically mounds of sand in the middle of the South China Sea, some of them barely tall enough to reach above the water. But China is hell-bent on making them inhabitable, even drawing up plans for floating energy and water plants. It has nothing to do with the islands themselves and everything to do with the water around it. Read more…

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How China Is Making Tiny Islands Inhabitable With Huge Floating Docks