Applications are due May 14 for the Nokia Bell Labs Prize 2021, a “competition for researchers with disruptive innovations that have the potential to change the way we live, work and communicate,” said the company Wednesday. Finalists will be given access to Bell Labs software, hardware and collaborators to bring their ideas closer to commercial fruition, it said. The competition fetches a $100,000 grand prize, plus $50,000 and $25,000 prizes for the second- and third-place finishers, said Nokia. “Up to 25 of the top submissions will be invited to work with Bell Labs researchers to turn their ideas into compelling proposals.”
The FCC alerted China Unicom (Americas) Wednesday that it’s reclaiming three international signaling point codes (ISPCs) held by the company. Two ISPCs (3-194-2 and 3-195-0) haven't been used since May 1, 2020, and the third (3-199-2) since 2009, said an International Bureau letter. The company “simply cannot on its own decide to ‘reserve’ unused ISPCs for possible service that may never be offered and would similarly be considered warehousing of ISPC codes,” the bureau said. The company didn’t comment. Also Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal reported that “due to ongoing concerns from the U.S. government about direct communications links,” a Facebook-led consortium withdrew its bid to build a California-Hong Kong fiber cable to provide internet connection. Facebook didn’t comment.
Alibaba emailed customers Tuesday an offer for special access to guaranteed shipping container space through March 31, with the first 100 full container load orders receiving a $500 freight price. “Shipping rates are higher than ever right now, up 140% to the US alone,” said the e-commerce company, saying disruptions led to cargo space scarcity. It partnered with ZIM Integrated Shipping Services, saying the carrier’s services are “customizable.”
The global esports and games streaming industry will grow 70% over the next four years, to $3.5 billion by 2025, Juniper Research forecast Monday. It defined esports as livestreaming games, often featuring professional gamers, along with streaming of gameplay content to casual audiences. Market value will be driven by paid subscriptions on streaming platforms and advertising spending. Stakeholders should invest in revenue-generating areas, including broadcasting rights, live event ticket sales and sponsorship deals to realize the category's potential value, it said. Juniper predicts over 1 billion viewers by 2025, up from 800 million at the end of 2021. It expects the Asia Pacific region to have over half of viewers by 2025. Rising viewership will create more competition between content streaming platforms, including Twitch and YouTube, it said.
Samsung’s LSI and credit card businesses agreed with Mastercard to develop a “biometric” card with built-in fingerprint scanner to authorize transactions securely at in-store payment terminals, they said Thursday. The card’s biometric authentication capability will enable safer transactions with “reduced physical contact points” by eliminating the need to enter a PIN on a keypad, they said. “It also adds an extra layer of security to currently available credit cards by verifying the cardholder’s identity via a unique fingerprint.” The card will be rolled out in South Korea later this year in a “gradual process, starting from corporate credit cards that have more frequent international transactions,” it said. The companies didn’t respond to questions about U.S. plans.
The Senate Finance Committee approved by unanimous voice vote Wednesday the nomination of Katherine Tai as U.S. trade representative. Tai appeared to have broad bipartisan backing at her Feb. 25 confirmation hearing (see 2102250043).
A Bowie, Maryland, man pleaded guilty Friday to copyright infringement for online sales of nearly $316,000 worth of counterfeit DVDs and Blu-rays of popular movies, TV shows and fitness videos, said DOJ. Authorities charged Olayinka Wahab, 45, with selling more than 18,000 Chinese-sourced discs or boxed sets online for nine years beginning in 2009. He was caught in an undercover sting when MPA representatives tipped off federal agents after buying sample counterfeit discs from Wahab and finding their packaging and labeling “were substantially indistinguishable” from the legitimate product, said DOJ. His plea deal requires him to pay restitution, plus forfeit more than $20,000 seized from several bank accounts. He faces up to five years in federal prison. Sentencing is scheduled for May 18 before U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis in Greenbelt, Maryland. Efforts to reach Wahab’s attorneys for comment were unsuccessful. MPA is "grateful that justice has been served in a case that once again highlights the need to protect the creative community from those who seek to profit illegally from their hard work," said a spokesperson Monday. Copyright infringement costs up to $71 billion annually in lost domestic revenue, he said, citing a U.S. Chamber of Commerce study.
By 2025 streaming will surpass total music industry peak revenue reached at the turn of the century, said Dawn Ostroff, Spotify chief content and advertising business officer. “The music industry is growing again.” Much streaming revenue is from subscriptions, she said, but as audiences continue to migrate from linear listening to on-demand consumption, “that revenue will also come from advertising,” she told the company's virtual event Monday. U.S. consumers spend about the same amount of time listening to digital audio as they do streaming video -- about nine hours weekly, Ostroff said. Digital audio advertising hasn't had that expansion, she said, citing an opportunity to steal share from the $30 billion ad market for terrestrial and satellite radio. Spotify HiFi will roll out later this year for Premium subscribers, said the company. The music service is expanding further internationally, it also announced.
After ending pandemic-ridden 2020 82% lower year on year, North American box office is trending down 94% year to date, and Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter doesn’t expect attendance levels to normalize until at least July, he wrote investors Monday. “Many tent-pole releases shifted to 2021 from 2020 as theatres closed, and titles are increasingly spilling into 2022 as the timing for full re-opening remains unclear.” Many smaller films shifted to streaming so studios could more quickly recoup production budgets, a trend Pachter expects to continue into next year. “Many streaming services will face a dearth of content with increased consumption over the past year coupled with halted productions,” he said. Wedbush predicts the box office will “return to full swing” in Q4, eyeing “massive pent-up demand for seeing movies with friends or dates out of the home.” Wedbush forecasts 2021 domestic box office to end 123% higher but down 59% from 2019. The China box office, meanwhile, “bodes well for IMAX, global theatres post-COVID,” said Pachter, citing pent-up demand that led audiences to return “en masse” in Q3. He noted Q4 Imax box office was down only 4% year on year in the region.
It’s too early to say what will “formally define” 6G wireless, but Qualcomm Technologies “will be there just like we’ve been for every mobile technology leap as we continue to drive longer-term research across core wireless disciplines and a growing mix of adjacent technologies,” blogged Vice President-Engineering John Smee Monday. It’s working to enable 5G for “a broader set of industries” beyond mobile broadband, he said. Qualcomm R&D teams expanded their over-the-air test beds to “support enhanced and new features” in industrial and automotive applications,” he said. It continues to “optimize” 5G for industrial IoT, such as supporting ultra-high reliability communication and time-sensitive networking, he said. Qualcomm will show at this week’s MWC Shanghai for the first time “how sidelink communications between devices can deliver broader coverage and higher capacity for IIoT applications,” he said: It’s showcasing how sidelink can complement “wide-area 5G” for advanced automotive applications, such as navigation based on high-resolution 3D maps.