BlackBerry, Boeing working on self-destructing phone

BlackBerry is working with Boeing on Boeing's high-security Android-based smartphone, the Canadian mobile technology company's chief executive said on Friday.

The Boeing Black phone being developed by the Chicago-based aerospace and defense contractor, which is best known for jetliners and fighter planes, can self-destruct if it is tampered with.

The Boeing Black device encrypts calls and is aimed at government agencies and others that need to keep communications and data secure.

"We're pleased to announce that Boeing is collaborating with BlackBerry to provide a secure mobile solution for Android devices utilizing our BES 12 platform," BlackBerry CEO John Chen said on a conference call held to discuss its quarterly results.

"That, by the way, is all they allow me to say."

The BlackBerry Enterprise Service, or BES 12, will allow clients such as corporations and government agencies to manage and secure not just BlackBerry devices on internal networks, but those that run on rival operating systems such as Google's Android and Apple's iOS.

The Boeing phone uses dual SIM cards to enable it to access multiple cell networks and can be configured to connect with biometric sensors and satellites. Boeing has begun offering the phone to potential customers.

Flipkart raises $700 million, files to go 'public'

India's largest e-commerce player Flipkart said it has closed a $700 million fresh financing round which saw new investors like Baillie Gifford, Greenoaks Capital, Steadview Capital, T Rowe Price Associates​ and Qatar Investment Authority get on board the seven-year-old venture. Its existing investors DST Global, GIC, ICONIQ Capital and Tiger Global, also participated in the latest fund-raise valuing Flipkart at around $11 billion, pre-money.

The new round catapults Flipkart right up into the top-tier of the world's most valued privately-held tech startups like Uber, Snapchat, Airbnb and Dropbox. With this, Flipkart has raised around $2.5 billion in funding till date.

TOI had reported in its November 24 edition that the e-tailer had raised fresh capital of around $600 million giving it ammunition to fight out rivals Snapdeal and Amazon in a fiercely competitive online commerce market.

"As with previous funds raised, these funds will be used towards long-term strategic investments in India and to build a world-class technology company, delivering superior customer experiences," a company statement said.

Significantly, Flipkart Limited, which is incorporated in Singapore, has filed with ACRA, the national regulator of business entities and public accountants in Singapore for conversion to a public company. This is a mandatory procedure for all companies where the number of shareholders exceeds 50. This filing ensures we are in compliance with the laws of Singapore and is in no way indicative of any upcoming IPO or of any corporate activity that the company is engaged in either in Singapore or any other part of the world, the statement said.

This is the third fund-raise for Flipkart this year having raised an eye-popping billion dollars in July valuing it at $7 billion then. Sources said the latest move was part of Flipkart's regular fund-raising plans till it readies itself to go public on the US bourses in the next 36 months.

As reported by this newspaper, the company could raise anywhere between $2 billion and $3 billion within this time frame. Flipkart was founded by two ex-Amazon employees Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal (not related) — who were also batch mates at IIT-Delhi — as an online bookstore in Bangalore. Since then, the company has expanded to become a horizontal e-commerce player selling electronics, fashion and baby care, among many other categories.

In October this year, Japan's SoftBank pumped $627 million into Delhi-based online retailer Snapdeal, signaling the investor exuberance around India's consumer internet story buoyed by the rapid adoption of internet-enabled smartphones.

Flipkart has already hit a $4 billion revenue run rate, as reported earlier by TOI, on the back of exclusive tie-ups with mobile handset makers Motorola and Xiaomi, and its growing market share in the fashion category post its acquisition of Myntra.

Online shopping does not always end well for users: Report

 A recent survey conducted by Kaspersky Lab and B2B International found that almost half of those respondents who lost money in fraudulent online transactions did not get all — or sometimes any — of their funds back.

The survey said that although many financial institutions show a willingness to reimburse money lost due to cybercrime, only 56% of respondents reported that they could fully recoup their losses. 16% of victims received only partial compensation, and 28% could not recover any money at all. In some regions, such as Russia, 58% of those surveyed said there was no hope of getting any money back, and 13% received only part of the stolen sum.

"Even if you are sure that the financial company or online store will refund any stolen money in the event of online fraud, you should still be cautious. You may indeed get all the money back -- although the figures suggest this only happens about half the time -- but the time and stress you will suffer are impossible to compensate. That's why it's important to pay special attention to the protection of confidential information, including your financial data," said Elena Kharchenko, head of consumer product management, Kaspersky Lab.

As the festive season approaches, people go out and buy more--this applies to online purchases just as much as in the shops — Kaspersky Lab reminded device users to make sure they always protect their transactions online. Experts said that unfortunately, internet shopping does not always end well for the buyers
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From water to women’s security, Dharavi girls create apps to lift their quality of life

                             The app is called Paani Hai Jeevan (Water is Life). It requires you to register yourself and check for notifications to know the best time to fetch water from the neighbourhood communal tap. The idea is to cut the long queues and long arguments through a well-organized system to tell someone it's their turn. The app is not live on any app store yet. The three-month-old prototype is being tested and polished by the developers who happen to be a team of three 12- to 13-year-old schoolgirls from Dharavi.

Two more app prototypes have come out of a small room in Asia's largest slum—all three from schoolgirls aged between 10 and 17. The girls, who only learned how to operate a computer in February, made the apps using the MIT App developer. It has a simple drag-and-drop interface to create mobile apps. The girls, who have also come up with a women's security app and a primary school lesson app, say they developed them after a brainstorming session with documentary filmmaker Nawneet Ranjan.

"We put up a chart paper and wrote down all the problems we face every day. Then, for the next three months, we learnt how to use the app maker and made these," says 13-year-old Sapna Krishna Telunga, who along with her friends Roshni Yasin Shaikh and Kiran Verma made the app 'Padhai Hai Mera Hak'.

The app logo was put together on MS-Paint. The app has just three screens, one that displays the English alphabet, one that displays the Hindi one, and another that has a Math sum.

"It also works on simple phones. Our moms never went to school. We can teach them with this," says Shaikh who wants to be a fashion designer when she grows up. Fauzia Aslam Ansari (12), who built the water app with her friends Sheetal Rathore and Sudha Chalwade, says she wants to improve certain features on her app, like notifying others when there's dirty water in the supply. "There are always fights over whose turn it is. This way you will know how long you have to wait, and people won't fight," says Ansari, a Class VIII student who plays football.

Ranjan, the filmmaker who works out of San Francisco and Mumbai, enlisted the help of friends from both cities when he started the project in Dharavi. He got involved when he visited the slum in 2012 for his film 'Dharavi Diaries'. Between getting the girls to meet investors, finding them mentors from the engineering staff of an internet company, and raising funds to turn the small rented room they meet in every afternoon into a full-fledged lab, Ranjan is also prepping them to participate in the 'Technovation' competition next year.

The international competition held in the US invites entries in the form of technology projects from young girls and women from across the world. A selected few make a pitch to international investors in San Francisco and the winners see their projects come to fruition. Ranjan says they initially got older women in the area visiting the "lab" where they could stitch, embroider and design bags. He would help them connect with designers over Skype, who would give them tips.

These women visit the lab even today. The room, which they call 'Technovation Design Studio' also doubles up as an informal tuition centre. Ranjan plans a regional pitch night in Dharavi to raise funds for the girls to be able to continue their app-development. Competing on an international scale, and most possibly against those from the first world with a head start in technological exposure does not weigh on the girls' mind right now. App-making is their idea of fun. "Ye banane mein bahut maza aata hai (this thing is a lot of fun)," is a line that 14-year-old Ansuja Maniwal repeats while showing you the backend program that runs her app. The one she made with her team is one for women's safety called "Women Fight Back". In the league of women's safety apps, this one also sends the user's location with an alert message. An added feature is the "distress call", which lets out a 'scream' on tapping the screen. "It's like a horror film, no?" chuckles Telunga. "When girls come back from classes or late night duty, they get harassed. No one ever calls the police. This can help," says Maniwal, whose app is in the process of going live on Google Play Store.

There are other problems. "Gutters are never clean," says Rani Shaikh. Roshni wants to build an app that can do basic medical diagnostics. "It should have something to contact the municipal doctor directly," she says. Will it? Possibly, if their imaginations run just as wild as they have so far.

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Cyberattack ‘unparalleled’ crime: Sony investigator

Forensics experts hired by Sony Corp to investigate the massive cyber attack at its Hollywood studio said the breach was unprecedented, well-planned and carried out by an "organized group," according to an email obtained by Reuters on Saturday.

Kevin Mandia, the top executive at FireEye's Mandiant forensics unit, made the comments in an email to Michael Lynton, chief executive of Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE).

They are among the first details of the investigation to be made public, yet they do not discuss what people are most interested in knowing: The extent of the damage to the studio's network or whether investigators had any leads in determining who was behind the campaign, the most destructive cyber attack reported to date against a company on U.S. soil.

People close to the investigation have told Reuters that North Korea is a principal suspect in the cyber attack, yet a North Korean diplomat has denied that Pyongyang is involved.

Lynton forwarded that message from Mandia to his employees on Saturday, saying that the note was "helpful in understanding the nature of what we are dealing with."

Mandia, whose forensics firm has probed some of the biggest and most sophisticated cyber attacks known to date, told Lynton in his email that "The scope of this attack differs from any we have responded to in the past, as its purpose was to both destroy property and release confidential information to the public."

He added in the email that "The bottom line is that this was an unparalleled and well planned crime, carried out by an organized group, for which neither SPE nor other companies could have been fully prepared."

FBI spokesman Joshua Campbell said the agency concurred with Mandiant's analysis that the attack was conducted using techniques that went undetected by standard antivirus software.

He said the agency was continuing to investigate the breach, but declined to discuss progress.

"The targeting of private-sector computer networks remains a significant threat, and the FBI will continue to identify, pursue, and defeat those who pose a threat in cyberspace," he said
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World’s ‘slimmest’ smartphone coming to India on December 15

 Chinese mobile device brand Vivo is all set to make its debut in the Indian market with the launch of X5Max, touted to be the world's slimmest smartphone. 

The company had announced the move last week and has now sent media invites for an event scheduled to be held on December 15 in New Delhi, where it will unveil the Vivo X5Max. 

The phone appeared online on Chinese certification agency TENAA's website where it's hardware specifications were also revealed. The phone measures 4.75mm, and is 0.10mm thinner than Oppo R5, believed to be the world's slimmest smartphone. 

Vivo X5Max sports a 5.5-inch full-HD (1080x1920p) display. Powered by a 1.7GHz MediaTek oct-core processor and 2GB RAM, the phone runs Android 4.4 KitKat. 

It sports a 13MP rear camera and a 5MP front-facing camera. The phone is expected to support all major connectivity options including 4G TD-LTE, offering support for Indian 4G bands. 

Earlier, Gionee, another Chinese mobile brand, had launched he Elife S5.1, its slimmest phone ever, in India at Rs 18,999. The phone measures just 5.1mm in thickness. 

Gionee's Elife S5.5 was considered the world's slimmest smartphone before the launch of Oppo R5, which measures just 4.85mm in thickness. Powered by a 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 octa core 64bit processor and 2GB RAM, the phone sports a 5.2-inch full-HD AMOLED display. It comes with 16GB internal storage. The Oppo R5 does not sport a 3.5mm headset port and uses a micro-USB adapter for audio output. The phone is expected to make its India debut later this month. 

Interestingly, both Oppo and Vivo brands are owned by BBK Electronics.

Reliance Communication's top deck set for reshuffle, as 3 execs leave

Reliance Communications (RCom) is set for a reshuffle at its top deck with three executives about to leave the nation's fourth largest telecom carrier, including one who is retiring, people familiar with the matter said. 

Chief marketing officer Nilanjan Mukherjee has resigned to set up a startup in the value-added services space, said one of the people. Along with him, Suresh Sahu, a human resources director based in Mumbai, has also quit. 

The company's regulatory and compliance chief CS Rao is retiring and scheduled to leave by the end of this month. Rao will be replaced by Punit Garg, head of its India enterprise business, the company said in an email to employees. 

RCom declined to comment, while these executives were unreachable for comment. 

The company, however, denied speculation in some quarters that chief executive Vinod Sawhny, who joined in February this year on a two-year contract, may leave before completing the term. One of the people said he in fact may even get an extension given that the company's performance has been improving steadily under the watch of Sawhny and consumer business CEO Gurdeep Singh. 

Earlier this year, RCom undertook a restructuring to separate its CDMA and GSM businesses. Mukherjee was widely believed to be in the running to head the CDMA operations. However, the company brought Sawhny on as CEO and Mukherjee continued to hold the title of chief marketing officer. At the time, RCom also inducted Amit Das from Vodafone as chief of human resources. 

Garg has been one of the longest serving presidents at RCom. He was the chief of its global operations and has been at the firm since 2001, nearly five years before the Ambani brothers split the Reliance group leaving RCom with Anil Ambani and the petroleum business with Mukesh Ambani. 

When the company in February named Bill Barney to head Reliance Globalcom as chief executive of the international unit, Garg was left with heading the India enterprise business. 

Sahu, for the bulk of his near 10 years at Reliance, has been at the company's global business. 

RCom underwent a substantial restructuring earlier in December 2011 when it inducted Shamik Das from Sistema Shyam TeleServices as chief operating officer, under Syed Safawi who was chief executive
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Telecom, finance ministries fight over spectrum price

In a war of words between two key wings of the government, the telecom secretary has snubbed his counterpart at the finance ministry for picking faults in a note to an inter-ministerial panel which will decide on the reserve price for an upcoming auction of airwaves. 

In a letter dated December 5, Rakesh Garg, the telecom ministry's top bureaucrat, cited established procedures while rejecting finance secretary Rajiv Mehrishi's views that the former needs to submit to the inter-ministerial panel the Department of Telecommunications' views — not that of its internal panel — on the reserve price suggested by the telecom regulator. 

The inter-ministerial panel — the Telecom Commission (TC), of which both officials are members — is the highest decision-making body on matters related to telecommunications. 

It is scheduled to meet on Monday to decide on spectrum pricing for auctions tentatively scheduled for February 2015. 

An agenda note for the meeting was recently sent to the TC by DoT, to which Mehrishi raised objections in a December 4 letter to Garg. ET has seen both letters and the agenda note. 

In his December 5 response, Garg said only the views of an internal DoT committee can be submitted vis-a-vis the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's (Trai) proposals to the TC, and not that of the telecom department. 

"The views of the DoT on policy matters can be crystallised only with the approval of the (telecom) minister and the minister's views would depend on the recommendations made by the Telecom Commission," Garg wrote. Garg's reasoning is that the Telecom Commission — which has the secretaries of finance, commerce, Planning Commission and telecom as members — is the highest decision-making body for the telecom department. 

That means DoT's views depend on the commission's decision. Quoting a Cabinet resolution, the telecom secretary has said: "It is the role of the Telecom Commission to make recommendations on policy matters to the minister of communications." 

In his December 4 letter to Garg, Mehrishi had pointed out that in the agenda note sent to the commission, the telecom department's views weren't mentioned. "There is a Trai recommendation and there is (a) report of the DoT committee. Where the management of the DoT stands vis-a-vis these two recommendations is not known," Mehrishi wrote. 

According to him the Telecom Commission should be asked to decide on the proposal or recommendations of DoT rather than being given only the report of a DoT committee. 

He added that the internal panel of DoT can advise the department but the TC needs the views of the department. 

According to the agenda of its meeting, the Telecom Commission has to take a call on what reserve price should the government fix for the 2G airwaves in the 800Mhz, 900Mhz and the 1800Mhz bands. 

At Rs 2,138 crore per Mhz, Trai in October suggested a 10% higher starting price for spectrum in the 1,800Mhz band compared with the last round, mostly owing to increasing mobile data consumption. It had further suggested Rs 3,004 crore per Mhz for 900Mhz, a premium band given the higher propagation characteristics thus requiring lesser capital expenditure. 

According to recent reports, the internal DoT committee has suggested a more than 10% increase in the price of both bands. For the 800Mhz band, typically used by CDMA operators, the telecom regulator had suggested a base price of Rs 3,104 crore.

The DoT committee has proposed to increase that to Rs 3,646 crore, saying that given the potential of mobile data growth in densely populated metros and category A circles, the reserve price should not be 80% of the valuation as fixed by the regulator, but the full valuation. 

"Service providers compete more fiercely for these categories given their market potential," the committee has explained
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Next version of Google Glass to be sleeker: Report

The new version of Intel-powered Google Glass may look slimmer and sleeker than its earlier version. 

The exteriors of the new device also adds a textured area to the touch-sensitive side panel where non-voice interactions are performed, media reports said. Google Glass is expected to be unveiled next year. 

The Google patent describes a sleeker version of Google Glass that should still draw plenty of public attention. The entire thing appears more like a futuristic headset and less like a modified pair of glasses. 

Google Glass is presently available for $1,500, though it is speculated that the final retail version will sell for a lot less. 

Glass displays information in a smartphone-like hands-free format. Wearers communicate with the internet via natural language voice commands.

BlackBerry, NantHealth launch cancer genome browser

BlackBerry Ltd and NantHealth, a healthcare-focused data provider, have launched a secure cancer genome browser, giving doctors the ability to access patients' genetic data on the BlackBerry Passport smartphone. 

Earlier this year, BlackBerry bought a minority stake in privately-held NantHealth. The mobile technology company sees healthcare as one of the niche sectors in which it has an advantage, due to the heightened focus on patient privacy and BlackBerry's vast networks that can manage and secure data on mobile devices. 

The company said the cancer genome browser on the BlackBerry Passport enables deep, interactive reporting on genomics data for physicians. It gives oncologists a tool to view individual genetic alternations in a disease and allows them to highlight relevant treatment options. 

BlackBerry launched the square-screened Passport device in September, the oddly shaped device was fashioned in a sense to tailor to the needs of the physicians, with a wider screen that allows for better viewing of X-rays, scans and documents. 

"Our partnership with BlackBerry has really been able to create a scalable super computer in the palm of the hands of the doctor," said Patrick Soon-Shiong, chief executive of NantHealth. 

BlackBerry chief executive John Chen said he expects this roll-out to get healthcare professionals interested in the Passport?. 

The genome browser is fully encrypted to allow deployment to enable clinicians to securely access patient data as soon as it is available, wherever they are. 

The browser will be demonstrated at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas in January and it will be pre-loaded on BlackBerry Passport devices and available to the professional community in early 2015. The browser will also be available on certain other devices running on rival platforms, but secured by BlackBerry's network. 

California-based NantHealth, whose cloud-based platform already connects thousands of medical devices in hospitals, was founded by Soon-Shiong, a surgeon and businessman, who made billions of dollars selling his two former companies, American Pharmaceutical Partners and Abraxis BioScience. 

Soon-Shiong said the BlackBerry and NantHealth will continue to collaborate on software and hardware, and he said that the two are already working on a new device that will revolutionize the transport of big data sets. Details on this will be outlined early next year. 

Bebe stores confirms card card breach

Bebe Stores Inc said it detected a hacking attack on its payment processing system that could have compromised data from cards swiped in its stores in the United States, Puerto Rico and US Virgin Islands. 

The exposed data may have included cardholder names, account numbers, expiration dates and verification codes, the women's apparel retailer said. 

Bebe, which also operates stores in Canada, said the affected transactions were made between November 8 and November 26, the day before Thanksgiving. 

Security blog KrebsOnSecurity said that hackers may have stolen credit and debit card data from bebe during Thanksgiving and Black Friday. 

Bebe is the latest retailer to fall prey to hackers. 

Previous victims included Home Depot Inc, Target Corp, Sears Holdings Corp and Michaels Stores Inc. 

Bebe said online transactions were not affected. 

"We moved quickly to block this attack and have taken steps to further enhance our security measures," chief executive Jim Wiggett said in a statement. 

Bebe operates 175 retail stores and 35 outlet stores in the United States, US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico and Canada.

Google, Microsoft and others take on ad-blockers

Imagine being able to surf the web and watch videos online without having to swat away pesky pop-up ads?

These days you can, thanks to small programs like Adblock Plus that are available free for download and that arm your browser to defend against ads.

Flashing banner ads, "pre-roll" ads (short ads that play before a video), pop-up notices that cover the whole screen — few of them make it past ad blocking software.

In the beginning, the applications acted under the radar, and were known mainly only to young people or the really tech-savvy. But now they're catching on.

Adblock Plus has nearly five million active users in France, with a further two million in the United Kingdom and 1.5 million in Spain.

Worldwide, they have amassed about 144 million active users, up 69% in a year, according to a September report from Adobe software developer and PageFair, a company that helps publishers see which ads are being blocked.

Depending on the website, the percentage of viewers equipped with ad-blocking software ranges from 10 to 60%.

Internet users may dream about ad-free surfing, but for advertisers and web publishers, who rely on ads to fund content, ad-blocking applications are the stuff of nightmares.

"This is no small matter; it affects all publishers. Our members have lost an estimated 20-40% of their advertising revenue," Laure de Lataillade, CEO of GESTE, an association of web publishers in gaming, media, music and other domains, told AFP.

The growing popularity of ad blockers comes as companies plough more and more money into internet advertising. A quarter of the 545 billion dollars spent on global advertising this year went on digital ads.

To protect that investment, a group of publishers in France, including Google, Microsoft and Le Figaro newspaper, have threatened legal action against the developers of ad blocking software.
In Germany, too, publishers are alarmed at the success of the anti-ad workarounds. "There have already been some companies that have lodged a formal complaint," Oliver von Wersche, head of digital marketing at Gruner + Jahr, publishers of Stern news magazine and several other leading titles, told AFP.

Websites, meanwhile, are experimenting with a range of strategies to placate ad-addled audiences. French sports daily l'Equipe's website is using a carrot-and-stick approach.

Users with ad-blocking software who attempt to watch videos receive the message: "Unauthorized access. L'Equipe.fr is funded by advertising, which allows us to offer you free content."

Once they deactivate the software they can gain access to the video. "We have to find a viable economic model. Either the user pays for a premium model or he accepts advertising," said Xavier Spender, deputy managing director of L'Equipe group.

Sean Blanchfield, CEO of PageFair, compared the campaign against ad blockers to the music industry's takedown of the file-sharing program Napster a decade ago.

"They should instead learn from the Napster story that the users will ultimately get what they want," said Blanchfield, whose company works with publishers to devise ads that "respect users' privacy".

For Helene Chartier, head of French web developers' union SRI, the big mistake was to let users believe the internet was free in the first place, considering "there was never a problem with ads on television or radio."

Industry professionals said the growing rejection of ads — and the shrinking space for them on mobile devices — should spur advertisers to come up with less intrusive messages.

In a sign of how seriously the problem is being taken in the industry, Google has launched an alternative to web advertising.

Called Google Contributor it charges users between 1 and 3 dollars a month to be spared ads, with the fee going to the affected websites.

In levying the fee Google urges users to "support" their favourite websites. The idea is currently being tested on around a dozen US websites, including The Onion, Science Daily and Mashable.

Great Google mystery: The missing Nexus

Nexus 6 is launched but, as ever, legions of Indian fans won't get their hands on one.

 This tale from a technology sector CEO illustrates an unusual thing about an iconic global technology giant. Vijay Shekhar Sharma, CEO of Paytm, is a devoted fan of Google's Nexus smartphone. Sharma is waiting to upgrade to Nexus 6 and has to wait patiently till it's available online on Flipkart, which is the only Indian outlet, online or offline, for the phone. 

The Paytm CEO's frustrating experience is shared by many, many Nexus smartphone fans. Google, as formidable a marketing machine as any globally, has put its weight behind low-cost Android One phones in India, spending Rs 100 crore in the project. Nexus, on the other hand, is not marketed by Google and is rarely marketed by its hardware partners LG, Motorola and HTC either. 

Even as Android One had a tepid start, market analysts and retailers say Google is missing a trick by not promoting the pricier Nexus phone more. "Instead of focusing on Android One, it would be a good call for Google to sell Nexus offline as it is a flagship product that has a good pull," says Satish Babu, founder of Chennai-based retail store chain UniverCell Mobiles, one of several large format chains willing to stock Nexus 6.

"There are takers for Nexus even at the high price," Babu said. He compared this with cheaper Android One phones, which have had a not-so-impressive run since their launch a few weeks back. 

Other mobile brick and mortar retailers — for example, Himangshu Chakravarti of MobileStore — agree with UniverCell Mobiles' Babu. They say there's a lot of latent demand for the high performing Nexus phone but supply is a problem, and Google can tap that by selling offline. 

Some Nexus fans are switching loyalty, not wanting to wait long for an upgrade to arrive. Paytm CEO Sharma says Xiaomi is one of the favourite options of those abandoning Nexus. "I've been waiting for it for some time now, but many Nexus 5 users waiting to upgrade to Nexus 6 have moved to Xiaomi's Mi 3 which offers almost the same specifications at roughly half the cost," Sharma says. 

Xiaomi's Mi 3 was launched in July at Rs 14,999. Nexus phones are in the Rs 20,000 to Rs 30,000 price band. The LG-made 4.95-inch Nexus 5 was launched in November last year, the fifth successor to Nexus 1 introduced in 2010. Nexus 5 is priced between Rs 22,000 and Rs 33,000 on e-commerce sites. Nexus 6, powered by Google's Android Lollipop operating system, has been made by Motorola. 

Nexus 6 was listed for pre-orders in the US late in October and all variants were reported to be sold out within a few hours. 

The story was the same in the UK. In India, initial stocks were pre-booked within a day or two. When asked by ET, Flipkart did not share the number of pre-orders. Nexus 6 may be available in Google's 3-day online sale beginning December 10. 

Hong Kong-based research firm Counterpoint Technologies estimates that around 2,00,000 Nexus 5 phones were shipped to India this year. Compare that with the 1.6-1.8 million Android-based smartphones that were sold in India this year in the same Rs 20,000-Rs 30,000 price band. Clearly, say analysts and retail traders, Google can sell far more Nexus phones than it is selling now — if it wants to. 

On the other hand, in just two and a half months since mid-September, a little under 500,000 Android One phones have been shipped to India, more than double the year-long total for Nexus 5 phones. 

But despite this, Android One hasn't quite taken off. In all 7 million smartphones in the Rs 6,000-Rs 8,000 price band, the range in which Android One phones are available, were sold in four months till October. With less than a half a million shipments, Google's low-cost smartphone was obviously a slow seller in this category. 

That Nexus is a story of untapped potential in India is also clear from the fact that India accounts for just 3,00,000 of the 9.9 million Nexus phones sold globally since 2010, according to data from Counterpoint Technologies. 

Android, both technology and mobile retail experts say, is a hugely popular operating system in India and Google's Nexus phones are ideally situated to exploit that popularity. Nexus, experts say, is the benchmark setting Android-based smartphone. 

Just a showpiece? 

Google responded to ET's query on undermarketing Nexus by saying: "We always introduce Nexus devices alongside our platform releases (such as Lollipop), as advances in computing are always driven at the intersection of hardware and software." 

Other explanations from analysts and experts were more detailed. Google works with hardware partners to build Nexus devices, and the idea is to help push boundaries of what's possible, say analysts tracking the sector. Nexus serves as a reference for the Android ecosystem. 

"Ideally, it would have been a good business case had Google entered into devices," said a Bangalore-based analyst who did not want to be named. He added that Google perhaps wants Nexus to simply serve as a reference point, a showcase for the power of hardware. 

Counterpoint's telecom analyst Tarun Pathak says Google may not want to scale up Nexus distribution to "avoid stepping into its manufacturing partners' toes" and that Nexus phones "may be mostly a showcase that's meant for developers first and then consumers."

Snapdeal, Ola investors turn down SoftBank buyout offer

As SoftBank was finalizing deals to infuse capital in Snapdeal and Ola last month, it also made an offer to buyout shares of angels and some venture-capital investors in both companies.

 As SoftBank was finalizing deals to infuse capital in online retailer Snapdeal and taxi aggregator Ola last month, the Japanese internet and telecom giant also made an offer to buyout shares of angels and some early venture-capital investors in both companies, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. Most of them said no. 

It may not have been an easy offer to refuse as some of these early investors are sitting on returns of 100 times their investment on paper. They, however, see the value multiplying further. 

"I haven't sold any shares so far. If someone is offering a valuation which I expect the company to reach in the next one-two years, then I can think about it," said People Group founder Anupam Mittal, one of the early backers of Ola. Investments like Ola come once in a lifetime, he added. 

Mittal's decision underlines what has become a norm, of early capital investors holding on to their winners in risk capital business where returns come from a few portfolio companies. According to data from financial research platform VCCEdge, Indian e-commerce and online businesses have seen 694 investments totaling $5.56 billion since 2011. But there have only been 45 exits worth $295 million in that time. 

Ola, which is competing with global giant Uber and others in India, has seen its valuation increasing more than 10 times in the last 12 months. When the company announced its second round of funding in November 2013, it was valued at $40-50 million, according to sources. In July this year, it was valued at around $180 million when Hong Kong-based hedge fund Steadview Capital led a funding round. The latest investment from SoftBank gave the four-yearold startup post money valuation of nearly $650 million, perhaps underlining why the early investors are holding on to their bets. 

Besides Mittal, Ola's early backers include investor Rehan Yar Khan, Powai Lake Ventures and Snapdeal co-founders Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal. These angels had together pumped in Rs 2 crore in a few months after the company was founded in 2011. These investors are said to be sitting on more than 100 times their investment, which was primarily a bet on IIT Bombay alumni Bhavish Aggarwal and Ankit Bhati's ability to execute their vision. 

"There was an offer from SoftBank to the angel investors but none of them sold. They feel that it's a multi-billion-dollar opportunity now and why should I sell even a single share today," said another person involved in Ola's fundraising. 

A SoftBank spokesperson said: "We are not able to comment on investment details beyond what has been announced." Snapdeal and Ola declined to comment. 

Sources indicated that early VC investors in Snapdeal, which had a post money valuation of nearly $2 billion in the latest round, are sitting on at least 8-10 times returns on the capital invested. These investors see potential for the company's valuation reaching $5-10 billion in the coming years. 

While none of the investors in Snapdeal is completely exiting, Bessemer Venture Partners, who invested in the company three years ago, has made a partial exit in this round. The VC firm sold less than a third of its holding. 

Bessemer had invested in the company in 2011 at a valuation of $170-180 million and could make a profit of around five-six times the investment, said sources. Bessemer managing director Vishal Gupta didn't respond to an email seeking comment. 

Sources familiar with SoftBank's deal making said it typically looks to buy 30-35% in a startup, and usually makes a secondary offer after an initial investment to meet the target. 

"Kunal (Bahl, Snapdeal co-founder) made a request to all the existing shareholders to sell some part of their shares to help SoftBank meet their shareholding requirement," said a Snapdeal investor on condition of anonymity. 

Some of the largest shareholders like Kalaari Capital are holding on to their investment."We believe in the long-term potential of Snapdeal. We are not sellers at the current valuation," said Vani Kola, managing director of Kalaari Capital. Her firm had invested in when Jasper Infotech, Snapdeal's holding company, was still in its early avatar of discount coupon startup Moneysaver in 2009. 

Limited partners, or investors in VC funds, say the venture market is just finishing its first cycle."Indian venture capital is still at the earlier stages of its evolution, with the first 10 venture-backed $1-billion-plus companies just created in India. Therefore, there are a few more years to go for us from now, before we see very good cash returns," said Anand Prasanna, managing director at Morgan Creek Capital. "This is not dissimilar to what we saw in other markets like China.
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Behind Google's Europe woes, American accents

When EU politicians call for the break-up of Google, it can sound like sour grapes, the anti-American backlash of an aging Europe envious, and fearful, of the wealth and growing power of young US tech giants.

But should any American take time on Thanksgiving to scoff at Thursday's non-binding vote in the European Parliament, when lawmakers may urge EU regulators to get tough with the search engine Goliath, they should know that behind the EU antitrust probe of Google stand not only Europeans but US competitors.

Indeed, to many in Brussels it is Google's fellow Americans — such as Microsoft, Expedia and TripAdvisor — whose complaints and big-money lobbying have driven a four-year-old investigation by the powerful European Commission into whether Google abuses its dominance of internet searches to push favored web sites.

"The American companies are using the European Commission as a battleground among themselves," a senior EU official told Reuters. "They are the ones coming to us with complaints.

"They are the ones who are not happy when rivals present concessions and say these are not enough."

US companies like Microsoft, hit by a $700-million fine last year for foisting its flagging Explorer browser on PC buyers, are well aware of the Commission's power in the world's biggest economic bloc. It also may seem more aggressive than its counterpart in Washington, which last year dropped its own case inquiry into Google, concluding the firm had not broken rules.

Three attempts it made to reach a settlement were turned down by EU competition commissioner Joaquin Almunia, who agreed with Google's rivals that concessions it offered to avoid a fine of up to $5 billion were not enough. The case is now in the hands of Margrethe Vestager, who succeeded Almunia this month.

US tech firms "are all playing on a little playing field", said Bert Foer, head of Washington thinktank the American Antitrust Institute. "Naturally they're going to move fastest and farthest in jurisdictions that have more favorable laws.

"While there's not a whole lot of difference between American antitrust law and European antitrust law, there is a difference in enforcement style and aggressiveness right now. So it's not surprising that a lot of the fight is over there. And it's not surprising that a lot of the companies are American."

"It's simply not about one side of the ocean against the other," said Thomas Vinje, a partner in the Brussels office of London law firm Clifford Chance. He is advising FairSearch, a group of firms including Microsoft, Oracle and Twenga in their complaint against Google with the European Commission.


"Never has a competition case brought together such a geographical or industrial breadth of concerned parties. There's just never been anything like it," said Vinje. "Probably never has any company exerted so much power on so many key markets."

Transatlantic suspicion
That is not to say that there is no anti-US animus in Europe, among the public and some politicians. It is a fact Google, which declined comment for this article, highlights in portraying itself at times as caught in Transatlantic crossfire.

Last year's revelations of US spying on the digital doings of Europeans, including even German Chancellor Angela Merkel, heightened mistrust of US power in the digital world — though Europeans still use Google overwhelmingly to search the web.

Google suffered a setback this year when the EU supreme court upheld a "right to be forgotten", ordering it to block links to information if people request it. It also faces legal challenges over copyright fees, led notably by German publishers, and over a variety of privacy concerns.

READ ALSO: US voices concern over EU's proposed plan to breakup Google

Underscoring a sense of siege following the drafting of the resolution in the European Parliament, the US mission to the EU in Brussels issued a statement appealing for objectivity so that the antitrust case was not "politicized".

Vinje, however, said talk of anti-Americanism was overdone and accused Google executives of "pushing the line that its troubles are driven by anti-US sentiments in Europe" to gloss over what he said were real concerns about its business.

Antitrust lawyer Alfonso Lamadrid at the Brussels office of Spanish firm Garrigues said the legal troubles of Google, and other US firms, simply reflected their global success: "It is mainly because in most cases US firms are the allegedly dominant players worldwide. I wish more European firms were in a position to be subject to similar investigations in the US."

Michael Marelus, at the Brussels office of Anglo-American law firm DLA Piper which is not directly involved in the Google case, also played down the political elements of the EU inquiry:

"Politics is clearly and heavily involved in any statement made by the European Parliament and very much so in the parliament's call to consider unbundling Google," he said.

"It would however be unfair to say that US companies are being targeted as such ... It seems that parliament is taking an aggressive stand in considering unbundling Google in the hope of ultimately obtaining a more realistic commitment from it."

The resolution, being debated in parliament, was proposed by a German conservative and Spanish liberal. While the legislature has no power in the matter, and it does not single out Google by name, the call for the Commission to consider separating searches from other services is intended to increase pressure on antitrust chief Vestager to act quickly.

A Danish liberal, she has sole power to decide and has kept her own counsel. Fellow commissioners with roles in the digital market have given mixed signals, voicing concern about monopoly but also rejecting a break-up.

Backed by members of the main center-right and center-left parties, the resolution was expected to pass on Thursday in a vote scheduled after noon (6 am EST)
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