Category: Tech News

• The Power of Networks – Answer

  What can a network learn that an individual cannot?

  We asked this question because we believe that society is on the verge of an unprecedented era of learning. Humanity has always been hard-wired to accumulate knowledge, but while there have been pockets of accelerated learning over the course of history, nothing can compare to the potential of digital networks (both social and business) combined with data analytics.

• Lurking Inside the iPad Is the Future of High-Def Displays

  The appearance of indium gallium zinc oxide transistors in iPads shows that the display industry is poised to begin churning out a new breed of high-performance screens.

  One of the most important innovations in Apple’s latest iPads lies behind the screen. In many of the tablets, the pixels in the display are controlled by transistors made of a material called indium gallium zinc oxide (IGZO), a promising replacement for the conventional amorphous silicon.

• Three Questions for Computing Pioneer Carver Mead

  Carver Mead christened Moore’s Law and helped make it come true. Now he says engineers should experiment with quantum mechanics to advance computing.

  Computer scientist Carver Mead gave Moore’s Law its name in around 1970 and played a crucial role in making sure it’s held true in the decades since. He pioneered an approach to designing complex silicon chips, called very large scale integration (VLSI), that’s still influential today. Mead was responsible for a string of firsts in the semiconductor industry, and as a professor at the California Institute of Technology he taught many of Silicon Valley’s most famous technologists. In the 1980s, frustration with the limitations of standard computers led him to begin building chips modeled on mammalian brains—creating a field known as neuromorphic computing, which is now gaining new momentum. Now 79, Mead retains an office at Caltech, where he told MIT Technology Review why computer engineers should be investigating new forms of computing.

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• Jawbone’s New Wristband Adds You to the Internet of Things

  Jawbone’s new activity-tracking wristband can be used to start your coffeemaker when you get up.

   

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• Stores Sniff Out Smartphones to Follow Shoppers

  Indoor location technology brings Internet-style tracking to physical spaces.

  You’ve just tossed a jar of peanut butter in your grocery cart when your smartphone buzzes. You glance down at the screen to see a message that seems downright clairvoyant: Buy some jelly. Get $1 off.

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• Sound Off on The Power of Networks

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• Ads Could Soon Know If You’re an Introvert (on Twitter)

  Technology that derives personality traits from Twitter updates is being tested to help target promotions and personalize customer service.

  Trying to derive a person’s wants and needs—conscious or otherwise—from online browsing and buying habits has become crucial to companies of all kinds.

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• Insight-Driven Innovation – Answer

  What are the roles of instinct, experience, and gut in a data-driven innovation culture?

  This Conversation on the Future of Business is brought to you by SAP & MIT Technology Review Custom

• No Stores? No Salesmen? No Profit? No Problem for Amazon.

  Amazon’s massive investments in technology shape the future for retailers everywhere.

  Why do some stores succeed while others fail? Retailers constantly struggle with this question, battling one another in ways that change with each generation. In the late 1800s, architects ruled. Successful merchants like Marshall Field created palaces of commerce that were so gorgeous shoppers rushed to come inside. In the early 1900s, mail order became the “killer app,” with Sears Roebuck leading the way. Toward the end of the 20th century, ultra-efficient suburban discounters like Target and Walmart conquered all.

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• E Ink Looks Beyond E-Readers

  Facing a declining market for e-readers, E Ink’s new R&D facility is trying out some different ideas.

  When Amazon launched its Kindle e-reader shortly before Christmas in 2007, it was a breakout moment for E Ink, the company that made the device’s black-and-white display. E Ink’s technology—based on microcapsules containing black and white flecks that flip back and forth with the application of an electric current—made the displays readable in bright sunlight and used very little power. It was perfect for a suddenly popular product category.

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• Fast and Spacious Helium-Filled Hard Drives Ready for Liftoff

  Hard-drive maker HGST has tamed the manufacturing challenges to bringing high-capacity, energy-efficient helium-filled drives to market.

  Data-storage company HGST has begun making a six-terabyte helium hard drive that has a 50 percent greater storage capacity and uses about 20 percent less power than conventional hard drives. The secret to this leap forward in performance? Pumping the drives full of helium.

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• Sound Off on Insight-Driven Innovation
• It's All E-Commerce Now

  E-commerce is an idea whose time has come and gone. Here’s why.

  When you think of Macy’s, you probably picture Santa Claus, a Thanksgiving Day parade, or its eleven-story, 2.2-million-square-foot flagship location in Manhattan, once known as the world’s largest store.

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• A Gestural Interface for Smart Watches

  A 3-D gesture-recognition chip could make it a lot easier to use smart watches and head-mounted computers.

  If just thinking about using a tiny touch screen on a smart watch has your fingers cramping up, researchers at the University of California at Berkeley and Davis may soon offer some relief: they’re developing a tiny chip that uses ultrasound waves to detect a slew of gestures in three dimensions. The chip could be implanted in wearable gadgets.

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