Nokia’s shareholders approve sale of devices and services business to Microsoft

As expected, the sale of Nokia’s devices and services business to Microsoft has been given the stamp of approval from the Finnish handset maker’s shareholders. The group met this morning in Helsinki to give its official vote of confidence on the $7.35 billion transaction includes not only devices, but also Nokia’s mapping service too. It remains to be seen if CEO Stephen Elop will be tasked with the same job at Microsoft after Ballmer’s departure, or if the company will decide to take another road toward its future.

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Source: AllThingsD

Target also selling the iPhone 5c for $79.99 on-contract, now accepting pre-orders

Target also selling the iPhone 5c for $7999 oncontract, now accepting preorders

We’ve already seen Walmart undercut Apple by selling the iPhone 5c for less than the MSRP right out of the gate, but it turns out it’s not the only retailer offering a deal. Target’s also selling the 16GB version for $79.99 on a two-year contract from your choice of carrier, offering a savings of $20. You’ll still pay the same $199.99 for the 32GB model, though, and there’s no similar discount to be found on the iPhone 5s, either (Walmart has knocked it down ten bucks to $189). You’ll find that price in store tomorrow, or you can get your pre-order in on Target’s website now.

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Via: 9 to 5 Mac, The Verge

Source: Target

Verizon ices Canadian expansion after acquiring Vodafone stake

Verizon shelves Canadian travel plans after acquiring Vodafone stake

After flying into Canada and making noise about acquiring spectrum or buying operators Wind Mobile and Mobilicity, Verizon is taking its ball and going home. You might expect that’s because it just dropped $130 billion buying Vodafone’s 45 percent stake in Verizon Wireless — the largest US corporate acquisition in over a decade. But Verizon said it had more to do with “what kind of value we could get for shareholders,” and that “if we thought it had great value creation we would do it.” That might be a boost to Rogers, Telus and BCE in Canada, but Verizon’s withdrawal doesn’t change one fact: all three are still bidding for a single block of 700MHz spectrum in next year’s wireless auction.

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Source: Bloomberg

CBS and Time Warner Cable end blackout, programming to resume at 6PM ET today

Well folks, it looks like Time Warner Cable customers will soon get CBS stations back in their living rooms. The two sides have reached an agreement after dropping channels back in July and programming is set to resume at 6PM ET this evening. TWC says that all customers should have channels back in 24 hours at the latest. In a press release announcing the deal, specific terms were not disclosed but they do include retransmission consent alongside Showtime Anytime for VOD and CBS stations in New York, Los Angeles and Dallas. Of course, this means CBS will be up and running on TWC when the NFL regular season kicks off in less than a week’s time. For a look at the full statement, venture on past the break.

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Source: CBS

GenShock electricity-generating active suspension is coming to passenger cars, eventually

ZF to produce Levant Power's regenerative car suspension

Levant Power’s energy-producing GenShock suspension has been stuck in limbo for a while, but the company has just announced a deal that could finally put the technology in passenger cars. Automotive component firm ZF has agreed to help develop a GenShock-based active suspension that will both convert road bumps to electricity and smooth out its host vehicle’s ride. The system will theoretically offer the comfort of a luxury sedan, the power efficiency of a hybrid and the nimble handling of a sports car. It might even simplify repairs — since GenShock recovers energy through pumps, it can raise each wheel without needing a jack. ZF doesn’t yet know when we’ll be driving cars with the new suspension, but the technology is reportedly inexpensive enough that buyers won’t require a supercar-level budget.

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Via: Autoblog

Source: ZF Friedrichshafen

Netflix adds The Weinstein Company to its 2016 pay-TV exclusivity roster

2016 is shaping up to be huge for Netflix. That’s when the streaming juggernaut’s Disney deal starts bearing fruit and it also marks the start of a multi-year pay-TV exclusivity agreement with The Weinstein Company (TWC). This means the first stop for TWC’s flicks after home video will no longer be Showtime, but (almost) everybody’s favorite place to watch movies instantly instead. While the studio has a pretty impressive back catalog — Django Unchained, Silver Linings Playbook, The Road and … Scary Movie 5 — it isn’t in the class of, say, Universal or Fox in terms of sheer blockbusters. With the rate ‘flix is signing contracts though, who knows what could happen within the next three years.

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Telefonica pens deal with Evernote, gives global customers one year’s free premium access

Telefonica pens deal with Evernote to give over 250 million customers one year's free Premium access

You’ve got to hand it to Evernote, it’s taking the initiative when it comes to getting its popular productivity tools into as many hands as possible. We’ve already seen Deutsche Telekom customers score access to it’s premium services for free, now over 247 million Telefonica customers are getting the same — a $45 saving. The partnership kicks off in Brazil via the Vivo brand, whose customers can get a year’s access to the top-tier features starting today. Unlike the German deal, it’s unclear whether existing customers of the premium service still qualify, but like the versatile tool’s logo, if they don’t, those customers may never forget.

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NetZero strikes deals to use Sprint LTE and Verizon 3G

NetZero strikes deals to use Sprint LTE and Verizon 3G

We like the idea of NetZero’s budget-friendly mobile broadband — just not its use of Clearwire’s small, aging WiMAX network. The provider should soon take care of that problem through new MVNO agreements with Sprint and Verizon. The five-year Sprint pact gives NetZero both LTE and EV-DO; the Verizon deal serves more as a safety net, supplying EV-DO alone for three years. Both agreements only take effect in the second quarter of 2014, but they should finally give the NetZero broad coverage and higher peak speeds that it needs to compete with more expensive rivals.

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Via: FierceBroadband Wireless

Source: United Online, Seeking Alpha

B&N cuts Nook HD, HD+ prices this week, hopes you’ll gift mom poetry and prose May 12

As if bringing the Nook HD and HD+ access to Google Play this week wasn’t already a sweet deal, Barnes & Noble is temporarily slashing the prices for its two reading-focused tablets. The reductions will last until the end of Mother’s Day, putting the 7-inch Nook HD 8GB at $149 and the 16GB at $179 (a $50 discount), with the 9-inch HD+ set at $179 for 16GB and $209 for 32GB (with $90 off). Compared to other options like the Kindle Fire and Nexus 7 tablets, the deal may be enough to make up for lack of cameras and UI shortcomings on the Nooks. If your interest is piqued, you check out our reviews of both the HD and HD+, and hit up the source link if you’d like to snag one.

Update: We’d also like to remind our UK readers that a similar limited-time offer was put in place a few days ago, dropping the price of the Nook HD from £159 to £129 and the Nook HD+ from £229 to £179.

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Source: Barnes & Noble

Stephen Wolfram says he almost had a deal with Google, but it ‘blew up’

Stephen Wolfram says he almost had a deal with Google, but it 'blew up'

As you may recall, Wolfram Research signed a deal with Microsoft a few years back that saw some Wolfram Alpha functionality integrated into Bing. As it turns out, it very nearly found its way into a certain other search engine as well. In an interview at The Next Web conference in Amsterdam today, Stephen Wolfram revealed that his company had tried to work with Google and “almost had a deal,” but it “blew up.” Unfortunately, he didn’t provide any further details about when those talks took place or exactly what the potential deal entailed, and it doesn’t sound like we can expect that deal to be revived anytime soon — especially considering Google’s own efforts that are increasingly overlapping with Wolfram Alpha. As Wolfram himself notes, though, the two companies do have something of a longstanding connection: Google co-founder Sergey Brin was actually an intern at Wolfram way back in 1993.

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Source: The Next Web