Apple Hires Yves St Laurent CEO for Special Projects

(AAPL) is hiring Paul Deneve, the former chief executive officer of luxury fashion house Yves St Laurent Group (YSLG), to work on special projects for CEO Tim Cook.
Deneve returns to the iPhone maker after working for Apple in Europe during the 1990s. He was also CEO of Lanvin and Nina Ricci prior to joining Yves St Laurent.

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Paul Deneve, former chief executive officer of Yves St Laurent Group and vice president of special projects at Apple Inc., is seen in this 2008 photo. Photographer: Nick Harvey/WireImage via Getty Images

While Apple has traditionally promoted from within, the move shows that Cook is looking outside the company to fill some senior roles. Apple is also hiring Hulu LLC executive Pete Distad to help with negotiations to acquire content for Apple TV, two people familiar with the hire said yesterday.
Deneve isn’t the only fashion executive within the iPhone maker’s corporate ranks. Mickey Drexler, the chairman and CEO of J Crew Group Inc., is on Apple’s board. Cook is a director at Nike Inc. (NKE)
“We’re thrilled to welcome Paul Deneve to Apple,” the Cupertino, California-based company said in a statement yesterday. “He’ll be working on special projects as a vice president reporting directly to Tim Cook.”
The jobs in high fashion give Deneve experience selling products at a premium price. A pair of women’s shoes from Yves St Laurent cost $625 or more, while a leather jacket from its permanent collection is more than $5,000, according to its website.
Deneve won’t be filling Apple’s vacant job running its retail store operation. The position remains open since the departure last year of John Browett, who was on the job less than a year after replacing the company’s first retail chief, Ron Johnson.
The Apple-focused website AppleInsider reported yesterday that Apple had hired Deneve.
Francesca Bellettini will be Yves St Laurent’s new CEO after Deneve’s departure to “take up a new career opportunity in the high tech industry,” the company said in a statement.

SOURCE : http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-02/apple-hires-yves-st-laurent-ceo-for-special-projects.html

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Yahoo buys video app Qwiki

The app, which allows Apple iPhone users to turn photos, music and videos into slideshow videos, is the latest in a series of purchases for Yahoo.

Yahoo did not reveal how much they paid for Qwiki, but sources cited by technology blog AllThingsD said the app cost between $40m and $50m.

Yahoo has focused on expanding its mobile software since Marissa Mayer was hired as CEO a year ago. In total, Yahoo has acquired 15 companies since Mayer was hired, including three since May, when it bought blogging service Tumblr for $1.1billion.

Earlier this week, Yahoo acquired Bignoggins Productions, a mobile app for managing fantasy sports teams on iPhones.

Other purchases include social recommendation start up Jybe and news summary app Summly, which was built by a UK teenager. Yahoo also redesigned its photo sharing app, Flikr, in May to offer users more storage for free.

SOURCE : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/technology-companies/10156765/Yahoo-buys-video-app-Qwiki.html

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California judge allows yoga in public schools

SAN DIEGO (AP) — A judge ruled Monday that a public school district can teach yoga, siding with administrators who argued the practice is a secular way to promote strength, flexibility and balance and rejecting pleas of parents who said the classes are inherently religious and violate the constitutional principle of separating church and state.
Yoga is a religious practice, but not the way that it is taught by the Encinitas Union School District at its nine campuses, San Diego Superior Court Judge John S. Meyer said.
Meyer emphasized that the school district stripped classes of all cultural references, including the Sanskrit language. The lotus position was renamed the “crisscross applesauce” pose.
The judge said parents who objected relied on personal opinions, some culled from Internet searches.
“It’s almost like a trial by Wikipedia, which isn’t what this court does,” said Meyer, who took nearly two hours to explain a decision that explored yoga’s Indian roots and philosophy.
Dean Broyles, an attorney for Encinitas parents Stephen and Jennifer Sedlock, said he would likely appeal.
“It was the judge’s job to call balls and strikes and determine the facts. I think he got some of the facts wrong,” he said.
The district is believed to be the first in the country to have full-time yoga teachers at every one of its schools. The lessons are funded by a $533,720, three-year grant from the K.P. Jois Foundation, a nonprofit group based in Encinitas that promotes Ashtanga yoga.
The twice-weekly, 30-minute classes are offered to the district’s 5,600 students north of San Diego, in addition to regular physical education.
About 30 families have opted out of the classes, which were introduced in 2011 at one campus and later expanded to others, Superintendent Timothy Baird said. The superintendent hailed the ruling, calling yoga “21st century P.E.” that yielded “amazing” health benefits.
The judge said the Jois Foundation’s involvement was troubling but rejected parents’ arguments that it amounted to a stealth attempt to guide students to Eastern religion. The foundation insists that the classes are not religious.
The lawsuit did not seek monetary damages but asked the court to intervene and suspend the program.
The plaintiffs relied heavily on testimony of Candy Gunther Brown, an Indiana University religious studies professor who found the district’s program is pervasively religious, having its roots in Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist and metaphysical beliefs and practices.
Yoga is now taught at public schools from the rural mountains of West Virginia to the bustling streets of Brooklyn as a way to ease stress in today’s pressure-packed world where even kindergartners say they feel tense about keeping up with their busy schedules. But most classes are part of an after-school program, or are offered only at a few schools or by some teachers in a district.

SOURCE :  http://www.thecoastalsource.com/2013/07/02/california-judge-allows-yoga-in-public-schools/

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Unmanned Russian rocket crashes on take-off from Baikonur

An unmanned Russian rocket carrying three navigation satellites has crashed shortly after lift-off from the Russian-leased Baikonur launch base in Kazakhstan, Russian media reported. There were no reported injuries.
State-run Rossiya-24 television showed footage of the Proton-M booster rocket veering off course seconds after lift-off. It fell apart in flames in the air and crashed in a big ball of fire near the launch pad.
Personnel who were in bunkers at the site when the rocket lifted off survived, the Interfax news agency reported, citing an unnamed source.
Interfax said Kazakh emergency authorities were considering evacuating nearby towns in the sparsely populated area because of the potential health threat from toxic rocket fuel burning at the crash site.
The estimated loss from the three satellites, meant for Russia's troubled Glonass satellite navigation system, was about $200m (£130m), Rossiya-24 reported.
The state-run RIA news agency said the cause might have been a problem with the engine or the guidance system.
Russia is increasing space spending and plans to send a probe to the moon in 2015, but the pioneering programme that put the first man in space in 1961 has been plagued in recent years by setbacks, including botched satellite launches and a failed attempt to send a probe to a moon of Mars.

SOURCE : http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/02/unmanned-russian-rocket-crashes-takeoff

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RIP Google Reader

INTERNET GIANT Google's Reader is no more, with the firm having closed the doors on its popular RSS news reader on Monday.
We know, it's a tough day for all of us. As of today, 1 July, Google Reader has gone the way of services such as Google's Buzz and SMS services, and is no longer operating. Google announced the shutdown of Reader in March, saying it had seen a "deterioration of interest" in the service.
"We launched Google Reader in an effort to make it easy for people to discover and keep tabs on their favorite websites," Google SVP of Technical Infrastructure Urs Hölzle said at the time. "While the product has a loyal following, over the years usage has declined."
The news of Google Reader's closure didn't go down well with the service's loyal following, with users flocking to the web to bemoan Google's decision to shut it down.
One Twitter user said, "Killing off Wave was merciful; but killing off Google Reader? Oh my aching old bones, what are they thinking?" Others said that Google should have shut off its not so popular social network Google+ instead.
There is some light at the end of the tunnel for loyal Google Reader users, though, as other firms have been quick to launch similar services to win over users with nowhere to read news.
AOL, for example, launched AOL Reader earlier this week, which makes its full debut today. Digg has also unveiled its own RSS reader service, and Facebook apparently is next in line to roll out a Google Reader alternative.
While you make up your mind about which one is for you, you can watch how Hitler reacted to the news of Google Reader closing. We all feel it.

SOURCE  : http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2278196/rip-google-reader

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Nokia Buys Out Siemens in Equipment Venture for $2.2 Billion

Nokia Oyj (NOK1V) agreed to buy Siemens AG (SIE)’s share in a six-year venture for 1.7 billion euros ($2.2 billion), giving the Finnish company full access to the phone-equipment maker’s cashflow for a less-than-estimated price.

Nokia will pay 1.2 billion euros for Siemens’s 50 percent stake in Nokia Siemens Networks, with the remainder as a secured loan from Siemens due a year after the deal is completed, the companies said today. Nokia doesn’t plan to integrate Nokia Siemens and may still decide to seek partners, Chief Executive Officer Stephen Elop said on a conference call.
The Finnish handset maker fighting to come back in the smartphone industry jumped as much as 10 percent in Helsinki trading. The purchase price values the venture, which became profitable last year, at 3.4 billion euros, less than at least 5 billion euros projected by Hannu Rauhala, a Helsinki-based analyst at Pohjola Bank. Siemens has been seeking to exit wireless-gear manufacturing to focus on energy equipment, healthcare and infrastructure projects. Bloomberg News reported the accord late yesterday.
“With this transaction, Nokia buys itself a future, whatever happens in smartphones and feature phones,” said Pierre Ferragu, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein in London. “Nokia Siemens has a future in the network equipment world, with a streamlined operation and a No. 2 position in a now concentrated and stable market.”

Shares Jump

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is providing Nokia financing for the transaction, according to two people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified because the details are confidential. Elop declined to comment on financing details.
Nokia rose as much as 29 cents and traded 6.9 percent higher at 3.04 euros at 11:57 a.m. in Helsinki, valuing the company at 11.4 billion euros. Siemens gained 1.5 percent to 78.83 euros on the Frankfurt exchange.
Nokia Siemens’s headquarters will stay in Espoo, Finland, and Rajeev Suri will continue to lead the equipment supplier. Nokia and Munich-based Siemens expect to complete the deal in the current quarter.
Nokia Siemens, which reported 2012 revenue of 13.8 billion euros, is evaluating a sale of manufacturing plants in Finland, India and China for as much as 600 million euros and to outsource production, said a person familiar with the matter. The plan preliminary and may not result in a transaction, the person said.

Private Equities

Nokia and Siemens abandoned talks with private-equity buyers in 2011 over a sale of the business as the firms failed to come up with a compelling offer. Nokia Siemens then started a program in late 2011 to cut 17,000 jobs, or about 23 percent of the total. Competition from Asian rivals Huawei Technologies Co. and ZTE Corp. (000063) prompted Nokia Siemens and its western rivals such as Ericsson AB and Alcatel-Lucent SA to eliminate jobs. Nortel Networks Corp. went bankrupt in 2009.
Nokia Siemens had about 56,700 employees at the end of the first quarter and supplies companies such as Deutsche Telekom AG and Vodafone Group Plc. Cost cuts helped the equipment maker more than triple operating profit excluding some items to 778 million euros last year.
Nokia Siemens is the most recent technology venture in Europe to unravel. Sony Corp. last year completed a buyout of its mobile-phone partnership with Ericsson AB. Ericsson and STMicroelectronics SA this year agreed to split up their unprofitable chipmaking venture ST-Ericsson.

Handset Challenge

Nokia said today it had net cash of 3.7 billion euros to 4.2 billion euros at the end of June, down from 4.5 billion euros at the end of March. Nokia’s debt is at junk status with the three main rating companies. In January, Nokia scrapped its dividend for the first time in at least 143 years to bolster liquidity.
“There’s a range of options that could exist for NSN over time,” Elop said during the call. “All of those options remain open.”
Nokia reported in April its smallest quarterly revenue in 13 years as handset demand waned. Its first-quarter sales fell 20 percent as competition from Asian manufacturers building phones that run Google Inc.’s Android software hurt demand for Nokia’s basic handsets.
The cost to protect Nokia debt against non-payment for five years with credit-default swaps rose as much as 1.6 percent to 583 basis points, suggesting a deterioration in creditworthiness, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That insurance cost has come down by more than half from a record on July 18.

Energy Focus

Siemens, which makes products from power turbines to high-speed trains, renewed efforts to sell its stake earlier this year, holding talks with buyout firms about a potential transaction, according to two people familiar with the talks.

The deal may help CEO Peter Loescher, who this year announced the fourth profit forecast cut in his six-year tenure, to reach a target for matching profitability at General Electric Co. (GE) and ABB Ltd. (ABBN)

“With this transaction, we continue our efforts to strengthen our focus on Siemens’ core areas of energy management, industry and infrastructure as well as healthcare,” Chief Financial Officer Joe Kaeser said in today’s statement.

Loescher, an Austrian national who joined Siemens in 2007 from drugmaker Merck & Co. as the first CEO hired from outside the company, started a savings program last year after acknowledging he had been slow to react to the economic downturn. The CEO is also under pressure after some deals that he supervised soured and a push into environmentally friendly energy led to spiraling costs.

Europe’s largest engineering company this year announced the closure of its loss-making solar unit, and is also selling water technologies, parcel automation, airport logistics and air freight units, while its Osram Licht AG lighting unit will be spun off. 

SOURCE  : http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-06-30/nokia-said-to-agree-to-buy-siemens-stake-in-nsn-networks-venture

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19 firefighters killed battling fast-moving Ariz. wildfire

Homes burn as the Yarnell Hill Fire roars in Glenn Ilah on Sunday, June 30, 2013, near Yarnell, Ariz / AP

 

YARNELL, Ariz. Gusty, hot winds blew an Arizona blaze out of control Sunday in a forest northwest of Phoenix, overtaking and killing 19 members of an elite fire crew in the deadliest wildfire involving firefighters in the U.S. in decades. The "hotshot" firefighters were forced to deploy their emergency fire shelters -- tent-like structures meant to shield firefighters from flames and heat -- when they were caught near the central Arizona town of Yarnell, state forestry spokesperson Art Morrison told The Associated Press.
The fire also destroyed an estimated 200 homes, Morrison said. Dry grass near the communities of Yarnell and Glen Isla fed the fast-moving blaze, which was whipped up by wind and raced through the homes, he said.
CBS Phoenix, Ariz. Affiliate KPHO-TV reports at least eight firefighters suffered injuries and were a local hospital. The extent of their injuries wasn't known.

SOURCE : http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57591712/19-firefighters-killed-battling-fast-moving-ariz-wildfire/

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