Why An Amazon-Oracle Merger Is A Very Real Possibility - Forbes

Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, speaks at a press conference at Comdex Fall 2000 in Las Vegas, Nevada ... [+] on Monday, November 13, 2000. Photographer: Larry Burton. Bloomberg News.

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Per Trefis analysis, a merger of Amazon and Oracle could unlock significant value. While the idea may sound very ambitious, in order to keep itself at the top of the cloud technology food-chain, Oracle may be the best acquisition Amazon could ever make. We detail why Amazon could acquire Oracle, and also estimate how much a potential deal could be worth in an interactive dashboard. Our estimate is based on Oracle’s standalone value as well as its value as a part of the combined entity with Amazon. You can modify any of the key drivers to visualize the impact of changes on the potential acquisition price. Additionally, you can see more Trefis technology company data here.

Why we think Amazon can acquire Oracle

Overview of the Two Companies:

• Amazon was possibly the first vendor to have created the public cloud ecosystem in mid-2000s, but Oracle has been in the database business for nearly 40 years.
• The idea of Amazon Web Services was to have infrastructure that could be rent out to customers who wanted lower bills for their storage and compute requirements. Per Trefis estimates, AWS commands an enterprise value of $199 billion at an EV/EBITDA of 11x (2020 EBITDA of $18 billion).
• Oracle was late to the game with its first generation of cloud offerings failing and the company subsequently investing heavily in development to bring to market its Gen 2 cloud. Per Trefis estimates, Oracle should have an enterprise value of $251 billion at an EV/EBITDA of 12.7x (2020 EBITDA of $20 billion).
• AWS’s approach was creating a product and then have users adopt it. Oracle has had that user base for a long time and was unable to service the need that AWS was able to cater to. The result was AWS today commands over 40% in the public cloud market with Oracle not even in the top 5, despite Oracle running nearly 50% of the world’s databases.

Rationale #1: Customers will get the security of Gen 2’s architecture and AWS’s customer service, leading to a differentiated product versus competition

• AWS’s early mover advantage may now be waning on account of competition in the market from Microsoft Azure (which has become the underlying fabric of Microsoft’s B2B and B2C offerings), Google Cloud (under its new chief) and IBM’s cloud offerings (post the Red Hat deal).
• Another factor weighing against the incumbent cloud leaders is the drying up of the low hanging workloads that could have been migrated to the cloud. The remaining workloads are mostly mission critical and have high security requirements.
• Another factor that goes against AWS in this contest are the list of data breaches that have occurred at AWS customers such as Capital One, Malido Air etc. During Oracle’s annual analyst meet, Larry Ellison was vocal about how Gen 2’s architecture could have avoided such breaches.

Rationale #2: AWS is yet to create a credible database alternative to Oracle. Bringing Oracle’s database on AWS could make the combination the de facto choice for start-ups and enterprises alike

• Oracle has been trying to move its databases to the Oracle cloud, the company’s software growth has not been able to offset declines in its other businesses.
• On the other hand, AWS has had a preferred partnership with VMware to bring AWS to on-premise systems (where Oracle and Microsoft have a leadership position).
• Considering that Oracle wants customers to move to a cloud and AWS wants on-premise customers to expand into, we think Oracle and AWS represent a good complementary pair.

Based on our revenue and EBITDA forecasts for Amazon and Oracle, and our estimates for potential gains as a combined entity, we believe that there Amazon can profitably acquire Oracle for a figure that is at a substantial premium to its current market cap.

Trefis

What are the risks and hurdles to a potential combination?

A merger between the two tech giants comes with its own set of risks and hurdles though, including:

1. History of rivalry:

• AWS’s Andy Jassy and Oracle’s Larry Ellison have been embroiled in a war of words about each other’s products and operational strategies for years.
• However, during Oracle’s 2019 analyst day event Ellison appeared to be more respectful of AWS

2. Technology stack combination considerations:

• Oracle’s Gen 2 cloud separates the client and cloud control computers, while AWS runs a huge distributed system.
• The cost of integrating the two system and applying Oracle’s autonomous database capabilities to AWS’s offerings could pose a technology challenge due to the size of the combined customer base and their diverse requirements.

3. Anti-competitive concerns:

• With a share of well over 40% in the public cloud market and over 50% in the database market, the combined entity is likely to attract a lot of regulatory scrutiny in terms of how it will affect competition.

4. The sheer size of the deal:

• We value Amazon’s AWS division at $200 billion and Oracle at $250 billion.
• Considering Amazon’s retail business (valued at $71 billion), Amazon is the larger company
• Also keeping Amazon’s growing presence in several nascent industries, a merger will essentially bring Oracle under AWS’s fold.
• Amazon will have to cough up a significant premium to Oracle’s current market value in order to finalize a deal.

What’s behind Trefis? See How It’s Powering New Collaboration and What-Ifs For CFOs and Finance Teams| Product, R&D, and Marketing Teams More Trefis Data Like our charts? Explore example interactive dashboards and create your own

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https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2019/10/25/why-an-amazon-oracle-merger-is-a-very-real-possibility/

2019-10-25 10:12:13Z
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Lawyers for the family of a man who died in a fiery Tesla Model S crash are calling the vehicle a 'death trap' in a lawsuit against the company - Business Insider

The Tesla Model S fire that killed Omar Awan in February.Local 10 News

• The family of Omar Awan, a Tesla lessee who died in February after his Model S sedan caught fire, is suing the electric-car maker, alleging that "the Model S' design was defective and unreasonably dangerous."
• A policeman and other bystanders were not able to attempt to rescue Awan because the design of the Model S' door handles prevented them from opening the vehicle's doors, the family's attorneys claim in the lawsuit.
• The Model S has distinctive door handles that are flush with the vehicle's sheet metal unless the key fob is nearby, at which point they can extend outward, allowing the driver or passenger to grab them and open the door.
• The door handles on Awan's car would not extend for the policeman and other bystanders on the scene of the fire who tried to rescue him, according to the lawsuit.
• The attorneys representing Awan's family allege that Awan did not die from the collision's impact. Instead, they claim he was killed by the smoke that filled the car after its battery caught fire.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The family of Omar Awan, a Tesla lessee who died after his Model S sedan caught fire, is suing the electric-car maker, alleging that "the Model S' design was defective and unreasonably dangerous."

Awan died in February after his Model S veered off a parkway, hit a palm tree, and caught fire. A policeman and other bystanders on the scene of the fire were not able to attempt to rescue Awan because the design of the Model S' door handles prevented them from opening the vehicle's doors, the family's attorneys claim in the lawsuit.

The Model S has distinctive door handles that lie flush with the vehicle's sheet metal unless the key fob is nearby, at which point they can extend outward, allowing the driver or passenger to grab them and open the door. The door handles on Awan's car would not extend for the policeman and other bystanders who tried to rescue him, according to the lawsuit.

In February, a Tesla representative directed Business Insider to its emergency-response guide for the Model S, which says the vehicle must be opened from the inside if the exterior door handles are not working.

The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit on Thursday.

The attorneys representing Awan's family allege that Awan did not die from the collision's impact. Instead, they claim he was killed by the smoke that filled the car after its battery caught fire.

"The Model S's design precluded those on the scene of the crash from getting Dr. Awan out of the cabin because the door handles failed," the lawsuit claims. "The Model S had an unreasonably dangerous fire risk that was not addressed through proper design. And Tesla failed to give any appropriate, adequate, full or fair warnings about the risks relating to the door handles or the smoke and fire."

Are you a current or former Tesla employee? Do you have an opinion about what it's like to work there? Contact this reporter at mmatousek@businessinsider.com. You can ask for more secure methods of communication, like Signal or ProtonMail, by email or Twitter direct message.

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https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-sued-by-family-of-man-died-model-s-fire-2019-10

2019-10-25 08:30:58Z
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Lawyers for the family of a man who died in a fiery Tesla Model S crash are calling the vehicle a 'death trap' in a lawsuit against the company - Business Insider

The Tesla Model S fire that killed Omar Awan in February.Local 10 News

• The family of Omar Awan, a Tesla lessee who died in February after his Model S sedan caught fire, is suing the electric-car maker, alleging that "the Model S' design was defective and unreasonably dangerous."
• A policeman and other bystanders were not able to attempt to rescue Awan because the design of the Model S' door handles prevented them from opening the vehicle's doors, the family's attorneys claim in the lawsuit.
• The Model S has distinctive door handles that are flush with the vehicle's sheet metal unless the key fob is nearby, at which point they can extend outward, allowing the driver or passenger to grab them and open the door.
• The door handles on Awan's car would not extend for the policeman and other bystanders on the scene of the fire who tried to rescue him, according to the lawsuit.
• The attorneys representing Awan's family allege that Awan did not die from the collision's impact. Instead, they claim he was killed by the smoke that filled the car after its battery caught fire.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The family of Omar Awan, a Tesla lessee who died after his Model S sedan caught fire, is suing the electric-car maker, alleging that "the Model S' design was defective and unreasonably dangerous."

Awan died in February after his Model S veered off a parkway, hit a palm tree, and caught fire. A policeman and other bystanders on the scene of the fire were not able to attempt to rescue Awan because the design of the Model S' door handles prevented them from opening the vehicle's doors, the family's attorneys claim in the lawsuit.

The Model S has distinctive door handles that lie flush with the vehicle's sheet metal unless the key fob is nearby, at which point they can extend outward, allowing the driver or passenger to grab them and open the door. The door handles on Awan's car would not extend for the policeman and other bystanders who tried to rescue him, according to the lawsuit.

In February, a Tesla representative directed Business Insider to its emergency-response guide for the Model S, which says the vehicle must be opened from the inside if the exterior door handles are not working.

The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit on Thursday.

The attorneys representing Awan's family allege that Awan did not die from the collision's impact. Instead, they claim he was killed by the smoke that filled the car after its battery caught fire.

"The Model S's design precluded those on the scene of the crash from getting Dr. Awan out of the cabin because the door handles failed," the lawsuit claims. "The Model S had an unreasonably dangerous fire risk that was not addressed through proper design. And Tesla failed to give any appropriate, adequate, full or fair warnings about the risks relating to the door handles or the smoke and fire."

Are you a current or former Tesla employee? Do you have an opinion about what it's like to work there? Contact this reporter at mmatousek@businessinsider.com. You can ask for more secure methods of communication, like Signal or ProtonMail, by email or Twitter direct message.

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https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-sued-by-family-of-man-died-model-s-fire-2019-10

2019-10-25 08:26:15Z
52780418678329

Google Just Made The Biggest Change In Five Years To How It Calculates Search Results - BuzzFeed News

1. tech

Meet BERT, the machine-powered language processing technology, that Google executives said will better understand the context of search queries.

By Nicole Nguyen

Reporting From

Mountain View, CA

Nicole Nguyen BuzzFeed News Reporter

Reporting From

Mountain View, CA

Posted on October 25, 2019, at 3:02 a.m. ET

Tarik Kizilkaya / Getty Images

MOUNTAIN VIEW, California — Google is making a big change in the way it presents search results. Most people won’t notice, but, Google executives said, the new technology represents a leap forward in the company’s ability to understand what people are asking for when they search.

Google’s search engine uses natural language processing to analyze queries. For example, for the entry “get medicine at pharmacy,” Google will home in on the words “medicine” and “pharmacy” and look for pages related to those two keywords.

Starting today, the company is rolling out a new machine learning–powered language processing method called Bidirectional Encoder Representations From Transformers, or BERT for short. BERT looks at the sequences of words in searches — not just the words themselves — to glean more information on the intent behind them.

For example, results for “can you get medicine for someone pharmacy” would previously have served a link to a 2017 MedlinePlus article about getting a prescription filled, and missed the point that the search was looking for information on how to pick up a prescription for someone else. Using BERT, Google’s search engine now shows a 2002 article from the Department of Health and Human Services about how to have a friend or family member pick up the medicine on your behalf.

Pandu Nayak, Google’s vice president of search, gave another example at a press event yesterday, using the query “How old was Taylor Swift when Kanye went on stage?” Before BERT, Google surfaced videos of the 2009 event during which the rapper interrupted the pop star’s acceptance speech at the MTV Video Music Awards. After BERT, Google presents as its first result a snippet from a BBC article, which states: “A 19-year-old Swift had just defeated Beyoncé to win Best Female Video for her country-pop teen anthem You Belong With Me.” Google's search returns automatically highlighted “19-year-old” for emphasis.

"On the ranking front, this is the single biggest change we’ve had in the last five years — and one of the biggest from the beginning," said Nayak.

While most people will probably not realize a new natural language processing technology is at work, behind the scenes, the change will most likely impact websites that rely on Google for traffic. The tech giant controls 90.8% of the search market across all its products, including YouTube and Google Maps. Google, through its Search and News tools, drives the majority of traffic to articles on news sites, especially those related to politics and technology.

In response to a reporter’s question on whether Google saw significant changes in the traffic it sent to any particular websites in tests of BERT, Ben Gomes, vice president of core search, said, “We did not see any particular pattern there. But if you have niche questions, then a niche publisher might be surfaced for that.”

The Google executives didn’t say whether websites should expect to see more or less traffic. Gomes did add, however, that he expected improving the feature for users would lead to more searches, which would bring more traffic to all websites. “As we answer more exotic questions, hopefully that will lead to people asking more and more exotic questions,” he said.

BERT, Nayak said, was released to improve more complex searches, and would affect just 1 in 10 searches in the United States. Still, with billions of searches a day, that’s hundreds of millions of results that have changed overnight.

There are areas that BERT doesn’t handle well, Nayak said. In one example, for the search “tartan,” BERT promoted dictionary results because it’s a technology that focuses solely on text. Pre-BERT searches showed images of tartan fabric, which is a more compelling result.

In another case, when one searches for “What state is south of Nebraska?” BERT surfaces the Wikipedia page for South Nebraska, as opposed to the ideal result, which would be the Wikipedia page for Kansas.

People who use Google won’t know whether their results are powered by BERT, and can’t revert to non-BERT results. Moving forward, BERT will be applied to all US searches. Nayak said he is confident that, in general, BERT will improve results for more complicated queries: “We’re playing a statistical game here. In aggregate, we know that any change will have some gains and some losses. ... I think the payoff [of BERT] is very much there.”

Initially, BERT will only be applied to searches in English in the US.

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https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/nicolenguyen/google-search-bert-natural-language-processing

2019-10-25 07:02:00Z
52780418815896

Tesla plans to increase vehicle power, range, and charging through new software update - Electrek

Tesla has announced plans to increase vehicle power and range through a new software update coming in the next few weeks.

When Tesla launched the $35,000 Model 3 earlier this year, the automaker surprised many by announcing that it will increase the range of all existing Long-Range Model 3 vehicle delivered to date.

CEO Elon Musk said at the time:

“There’s also some things we’ve been able to do for existing customers that are pretty cool. Tesla is as much a software company as a hardware company and we’ve been able to via firmware improve the range of the long-range rear wheel drive car from 310 miles to 325 miles. This will affect all customers including those that were all long range cars shipped to date and new cars. So both existing and new customers will get a 15 mile range increase from 310 to 325.”

Tesla ended up pushing the update in March – although it didn’t affect all the Model 3 Long Range vehicles the same way.

During a conference call with analysts after Tesla’s Q3 2019 earnings, Musk said that they have more improvements coming through software updates:

“I forgot to mention, we’re also expecting there’s going to be an over-the-air improvement that will improve the power of the Model S, X, and 3. That’s, by the way coming in a few weeks. It should be in the order of 5% power improvement due to improved firmware.”

Tesla VP of technology, Drew Baglino, said that they have found ways to optimize the motor control and it should result in about “5% improvement for all Model 3 customers and 3% for Model S and Model X” customers.

Musk also said that the upcoming update will also bring improvements to the range, single-pedal driving, Supercharging speed, comfort and feel.

They didn’t specify which variants of each model will get the improvements beyond the fact Supercharging speed is going to improve for Model 3 Standard Range and Standard Range Plus.

As for the motor optimizations, if they are going to affect both Model S/X and Model 3, it’s likely for the more recent ‘Raven’ Model S and X, which have a similar motor as Model 3.

Electrek’s Take

The idea of a car receiving performance improvements through software updates is impressive, but we weren’t particularly impressed by the range increase for Model 3 Long Range RWD.

We previously reported on how Tesla played with EPA ratings to advertise all Model 3 versions with 310-mile range even though the Long Range version was able to get more.

So they probably could have always advertised the car with more range.

However, this is a lot more impressive.

It sounds like Tesla has found ways to safely push their electric motors higher and even make them more efficient.

I am looking forward to seeing exactly how it’s going to affect the vehicles.

---

Subscribe to Electrek on YouTube for exclusive videos and subscribe to the podcast.

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https://electrek.co/2019/10/24/tesla-increase-vehicle-power-range-software-update/

2019-10-24 09:44:00Z
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Nokia shares drop 24% after cutting 2019, 2020 outlooks - MarketWatch

Shares of Nokia Corp. NOK, -1.35% NOKIA, -19.76% slid 23% in early trading Thursday after the Finnish telecom equipment maker lowered its guidance for this year and next. Nokia said the cuts were "primarily due to margin pressure, additional 5G investments and additional digitalization investments." The company also cited high costs linked to first generation 5G products, profitability challenges in China and pricing pressure in early 5G deals. Underlying earnings in the third quarter fell to 0.05 euros from 0.06 euros in the year-earlier period. Net sales rose to EUR5.686 billion ($6.34 billion), compared to EUR5.458 billion in the same period a year ago.

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https://www.marketwatch.com/story/nokia-shares-drop-24-after-cutting-2019-2020-outlooks-2019-10-24

2019-10-24 07:39:00Z
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Germany's Factory Recession Sends Industry Employment Plunging - Bloomberg

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1. Germany's Factory Recession Sends Industry Employment Plunging  Bloomberg
2. Euro-Area Economy Remains Close to Stagnation in October  Investing.com
3. German economy continues to struggle with manufacturing troubles spreading to services  MarketWatch
4. French business activity firmer than expected in October: PMI  Reuters
5. EUR/USD eases from tops on softer German Flash Manufacturing/Services PMI  FXStreet
6. View full coverage on Google News

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-24/germany-s-economic-downturn-worsens-as-job-engine-falters

2019-10-24 07:30:00Z
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