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Jan 11
Worldwide spending on robotics will reach $188 billion...

Worldwide spending on robotics and related services will more than double by 2020, growing from $91.5 billion in 2016 to more than $188 billion in 2020, according to the newly updated “Worldwide Commercial Robotics Spending Guide” from International Data Corporation (IDC).

In addition to spending data on robotic systems, system hardware, software, robotics-related services, and after-market robotics hardware, the robotics spending guide now includes data on commercial purchase of drones and after-market drone hardware.

"The market for robotics continues to experience tremendous growth," said John Santagate, research manager, Supply Chain at IDC Manufacturing Insights. "This growth is really fueled by a combination of technology improvements, expanded use cases, and acceptance in the market. Innovators in the field of robotics are delivering robots that can be used to perform a broader range of tasks, which is helping to drive the adoption of robotics into a wider...

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Jan 11
Smart home hardware, services to exceed $190 billion...

New data from Juniper Research (www.junipereesearch.com) shows that revenues from smart home hardware and services will reach US$83 billion this year, rising to $195 billion by 2021. This will be generated through entertainment, automation, healthcare and connected devices, according to the research group.
 
The new research found that home automation and smart appliances will be the two fastest growing segments over the next five years, driven by established manufacturers such as Samsung, Bosch and GE Appliances. The research found that market leaders Alphabet, Amazon, Apple and Samsung will further solidify their position by building on current assets such their cloud services and incumbent device bases. Juniper has ranked these companies on product development, breadth of partnerships in the industry, success of their adopted business model, and level of innovation.

Juniper believes...

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Jan 10
Spending on 3D printing to grow at 22.3% CAGR

Worldwide purchases of 3D printers, materials, software, and related services are expected to total $13.2 billion in 2016. According to a recent report by International Data Corporation (IDC), global spending on 3D printing will experience a five-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22.3% with revenues reaching $28.9 billion in 2020.

The United States will deliver roughly a quarter of worldwide 3D printing revenues throughout the 2015-2020 forecast period while the next three largest regions – Western Europe, Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan), and Japan – combined will deliver more than 50% of total revenues, according to IDC (www.idc.com). While the fastest growth will come from the Middle East and Africa (MEA) and Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) regions, Western Europe's strong growth will significantly close the revenue gap with the United States by 2020. In fact, five of the eight geographic regions covered in the...

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Jan 06
Enterprises prefer Microsoft Azure; SMBs favor Google...

 A new survey by Clutch (https://clutch.co), a B2B IT ratings and reviews firm, found that enterprises strongly prefer Microsoft Azure, while small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) gravitate toward Google Cloud Platform. The survey was conducted in order to gain more knowledge on the "Big Three" cloud providers: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and Microsoft Azure.

Nearly 40% of Azure users surveyed identified as enterprises. In comparison, only 25% identified as SMBs and 22% identified as startups/sole proprietorships. Conversely, 41% of GCP users surveyed identified as SMBs.

The trends among enterprises and SMBs reflect the strengths of each platform. "It goes back to the trust and familiarity issues," said Nicholas Martin, principal applications development consultant at Cardinal Solutions, an IT solutions provider. "Windows Server and other Microsoft technologies are prevalent in...

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Jan 05
Internet of Things spending grew 17.9% in 2016

Internet of Things spending grew 17.9% in 2016
Worldwide spending on the Internet of Things (IoT) is forecast to have reached US$737 billion in 2016 as organizations invest in the hardware, software, services, and connectivity that enable the IoT. According to a new update by International Data Corporation (IDC), global IoT spending will experience a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 15.6% over the 2015-2020 forecast period, reaching $1.29 trillion in 2020.

According to the research group, the industries forecast to make the largest IoT investments in 2016 are manufacturing ($178 billion), transportation ($78 billion), and utilities ($69 billion). Consumer IoT purchases, the fourth largest market segment in 2016, will become the third largest segment by 2020. Meanwhile, Cross-Industry IoT investments, which represent use cases common to all industries, such as connected vehicles and smart buildings, will rank among the top segments throughout the five-year forecast...

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Jan 04
Wearable devices market continues to be driven by...

The wearable devices industry is now one of the fastest growing segments of the technology sector. According to a research report by CCS Insight (www.cssinsight.com), an industry analyst firm, 411 million smart wearable devices, worth $34 billion, will be sold in 2020, this comparing to 84 million units in 2015.

The wearables market is projected to be worth over US$25 billion by 2019. The industry includes smartwatches, fitness trackers, medical wearables, augmented and virtual reality headsets as well as wearable cameras.

Fitness trackers and smartwatches remain the most popular products in the wearable devices industry. Innovations in technology however may push other products into the mainstream, according to CCS Insight. The wearable medical device market, for example, is getting attention.

Apple might soon enter into the healthcare sector later this year with CEO Tim Cook seeking to...

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Dec 29
Worldwide HPC server revenue grows 3.9% in third...

Worldwide factory revenue for the high performance computing (HPC) technical server market grew by 3.9% to $2.8 billion in the third quarter of 2016 (3Q16), compared with $2.7 billion in the prior-year third quarter, according to IDC (www.idc.com).

Revenue for the first three quarters of 2016 totaled $8.1 billion, up 3.4% from the $7.8 billion total for the same period last year, according to new data from the research group. In 3Q16, strong revenue growth in higher-end HPC server systems was partially offset by revenue declines in lower-priced systems.

Revenue for supercomputer systems priced at $500,000 and up jumped 22.3% to $985.3 million compared with $805.7 million in the 2015 third quarter. For divisional systems priced from $250,000 to $499,000, revenue grew by a similarly robust 22.4% to $568.4 million in the quarter, up from $464.5 million in the prior-year third quarter.

Departmental revenue for...

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Dec 27
Will Internet privacy suffer in 2017?

t’s clear that 2016 was probably the worst year ever in online privacy - considering increasingly restrictive surveillance laws of governments around the world, major online hacks - such as compromised accounts of over a million Yahoo users - and authoritarian regimes blocking Internet to restrict the freedom of speech.

So, what can we expect in 2017? Will the trend continue, and will we have to face more Internet freedom restrictions and hacks by criminals? Following are the predictions for 2017 by NordVPN (www.nordvpn.com), a VPN service provider, and some advice on how to protect oneself.

Increased mobile ransomware. With ransomware, a malicious program is installed on a computer that blocks the user’s access to the system or certain files. This block is removed when the user pays the creator of the ransomware, usually in Bitcoins.

Although it is predicted that general ransomware will decrease as...

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Dec 27
By 2027, tens of billions of smart objects will be...

Research and Markets (www.researchandmarkets.com( has announced the addition of the "Internet of Things (IoT) 2017-2027" report to their offering. It’s intended to assist investors, participants and intending participants in the value chain including developers and academics, interested government officials and users seeking the truth based on new investigation. The focus is on identifying genuine capabilities and needs from a commercial point of view.

The largest potential applications will be multi-sensor so, for many reasons, component count will increase making cost reduction more difficult. Research and Markets looks at expenditure on IoT enabling technology which currently runs to billions of dollars yearly, mainly coming from governments and aspiring suppliers. However, the research market reveals how most of those reporting these and other IoT figures are puffing their data with things that may never be a part of the IoT scene such as sensor research in general....

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Dec 23
Global mobile wallet market to grow at CAGR of over 35...

According to the latest study released by Technavio (www.technavio.com), the global mobile wallet market is expected to grow at a CAGR of more than 35% during the forecast period.

The application of mobile wallets in retail stores increased rapidly in 2015-2016 as they reduce the operational costs for retailers and increase their revenue. The processing fee for transacting via mobile wallets is much lower than card-based transactions. In addition, mobile wallets used in retail stores offer customers with benefits such as coupons and loyalty points. They allow vendors to easily track and analyze consumer data. Retailers use this information to understand consumers’ demands and give consumers a better shopping experience.

Mobile wallets act as a bridge between the online and physical world. It helps users to improve their purchase decision-making process by giving them an opportunity to compare various...

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Dec 22
IHS Markit offers Top Seven Technology Trends for 2017

From artificial intelligence to the Internet of Things (IoT), far-reaching innovations are unfolding in virtually every technology sector around the globe, continuing to change the way consumers, businesses and machines interact while also spurring the next revolution in tech market growth, according to a new white paper from IHS Markit (www.ihsmarkit.com), which specializes in critical information, analytics and solutions for the major industries and markets that drive economies worldwide.

For the white paper, IHS Markit surveyed its leading technology experts, who represent various industry segments including advertising, automotive, connected networks, consumer devices, entertainment, displays, media, semiconductors, telecommunications and others. These analysts were asked to provide their informed predictions for the global technology market in the New Year.

The Top Seven Technology Trends for 2017,...

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Dec 22
20% of user interactions with smartphones will soon...

Advances in various technologies will drive users to interact with their smartphones in more intuitive ways, said Gartner, Inc. (www.gartner.com). The research group predicts that, by 2019, 20% of all user interactions with the smartphone will take place via virtual personal assistants (VPAs).
"The role of interactions will intensify through the growing popularity of VPAs among smartphone users and conversations made with smart machines," said Annette Zimmermann, research director at Gartner.

Gartner's annual mobile apps survey conducted in the fourth quarter of 2016 among 3,021 consumers across three countries (U.S., U.K. and China) found that 42% of respondents in the U.S. and 32% in the U.K. used VPAs on their smartphones in the last three months. More than 37% of respondents (average across U.S. and U.K.) used a VPA at least one or more times a day.

Apple's Siri and Google Now are currently the...

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Dec 20
IT spending in Western European SMBs will exceed $130...

A new study from International Data Corporation (IDC) highlights IT spending trends by size class in Western Europe. The study shows that IT spending in Western European SMBs will exceed $130 billion by 2020.

The SMB segment represents a third of the total IT market, despite the relative fragility of smaller companies and their relatively small IT budgets. There will be a downward trend at the start of the forecast period that will bottom out in 2017, but then IT spending will start to increase, albeit slowly.

The study segments IT spending forecasts into three main company size bands: micro-enterprises (1–9 employees), small businesses (10–99 employees), and midmarket companies (100–499 employees). Large enterprises (employing 500 employees or more) are only considered in the study to allow comparisons with the large enterprise segment and with the total IT market.

Small businesses are the most dynamic in terms of growth among the three main size classes,...

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Dec 20
Over 100,000 smartphones get damaged by liquids every...

Smartphones offering resistance against water damage (and other liquids) grew 45.2% year on year in the first nine months of 2016 in Western Europe, while shipments of non-water–resistant smartphones declined 17% in the same period, acc. Water resistant smartphones reached 22.5 million units in the period to represent 23% of the total number of smartphones shipped in 2016 to date, according to IDC (www.idc.com).

The strong growth in this segment was supported by the success of Samsung and Huawei devices offering this feature and by the recently launched iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, both offering IP67.

Liquid damage is the second-largest cause of damaged smartphones in the world, representing 35% of all devices repaired, according to IDC. This results in significant costs to end users, phone manufacturers, carriers, retailers, and the environment in general. IDC estimates that over 100,000 smartphones get damaged by...

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Dec 20
50% of citizens in large cities will share personal...

The rapid pace of technological and societal change has given government CIOs a new sense of urgency and a willingness to experiment with smart city and open data initiatives, according to Gartner, Inc. (www.gartner.com). If managed effectively, this shift will position governments at the core of technological innovation in society, adds the research group.

"As citizens increasingly use personal technology and social networks to organize their lives, governments and businesses are growing their investments in technology infrastructure and governance," said Anthony Mullen, research director at Gartner. "This creates open platforms that enable citizens, communities and businesses to innovate and collaborate, and ultimately provide useful solutions that address civic needs.”

As a result, Gartner predicts that by 2019, 50% of citizens in million-people cities will benefit from smart city programs by voluntarily...

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Dec 19
Gartner: smart machines will enter mainstream adoption...

Smart machines will enter mainstream adoption by 2021, with 30% adoption by large companies, according to Gartner, Inc. (www.gartner.com). Technologies including cognitive computing, artificial intelligence (AI), intelligent automation, machine learning and deep learning fall under the umbrella term for smart machines.)

"The use of smart machines by enterprises can be transformative and disruptive. Smart machines will profoundly change the way work is done and how value is created. From dynamic pricing models and fraud detection, to predictive policing and robotics, smart machines have broad applicability in all industries," said Susan Tan, research vice president at Gartner. "For service providers, smart machines represent opportunities to help enterprises assess, select, implement, change and adapt talent, and for IT and business processes, the opportunity to successfully adopt smart machines for business...

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Dec 16
CareerCast identifies the most endangered jobs

Mail carrier, word processor and meter reader are among the jobs that are fading into obscurity, according to CareerCast's (CareerCast.com) “2016 Most Endangered Jobs Report.”

Disc jockey, jeweler, computer programmer, broadcaster and newspaper reporter, have felt the squeeze of labor market changes in recent years, and face unfavorable hiring forecasts for the years to come. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects a 28% decline in employment of Mail Carriers by 2024, or a total 136,000-employee loss in the field over the next eight years.
"The field began changing in the early part of the 2000s, as more Americans began communicating through email and text messaging, abandoning the traditional letter when reaching out to friends, family and colleagues," says Kyle Kensing, online content editor, CareerCast. "However, the bigger impact on the postal field's hiring outlook for the future is the automation of sorting and processing.”

Automation will be a...

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Dec 15
IoT devices to triple by 2021

New data from Juniper Research (www.juniperresearch.com) has found that the number of connected IoT (Internet of Things) devices, sensors and actuators will reach over 46 billion in 2021. This 200% increase, from 2016, will be driven in large part by a reduction in the unit costs of hardware. Juniper forecasts that it will average close to the “magic” $1 throughout the period.

Juniper’s latest research found that industrial and public services will post the highest growth over the forecast period, averaging over 24% annually. However, the research group cautioned that both providers and end-users will face tremendous challenges when considering IoT deployments at scale.

“The platform landscape is flourishing,” said research author Steffen Sorrell. “However, analytics and database systems are, for the most part, not architected to handle the Big Data 2.0 era that the IoT brings. To that end,...

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Dec 15
Linio.com compares the cost of tech products in 71...

Latin America’s leading eCommerce platform Linio.com, has released the “2016-17 Technology Price Index” (http://tinyurl.com/zu3xuyl) comparing the cost of 14 popular electronic devices and brands, across 71 countries.

With Christmas shopping season already in full swing, Linio undertook the research to better understand the global economic trends in the price of electronics. The Technology Price Index takes into account the cost of smartphones, laptops, games consoles, tablets, smart devices, and other gadgets, ranking the countries on the average cost of all products researched.
 
To conduct the research Linio looked at the costs of all products in the study from several brick and mortar chain stores and smaller retailers in all major cities in each country. The study also took into account average costs from at least three reputable online outlets in each country. Taxes and other...

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Dec 14
IHS: flexible display shipments to increase sharply in...

As more smartphone manufacturers build designs using flexible display technology, shipments of flexible displays are expected to reach 139 million units in 2017, an increase of 135% compared to 2016. According to IHS Markit (www.ihsmarkit.com), which specializes in critical information, analytics and solutions, flexible displays are expected to comprise 3.8 percent of total display unit shipments in 2017.

Vivo and Xiaomi launched their first smartphones with flexible active-matrix organic light-emitting diode (AMOLED) displays in 2016, while many other manufacturers have plans to develop their own foldable (or bendable, dual-edge curved) smartphone designs. In particular, Apple is expected to launch its new iPhone using flexible AMOLED display in 2017, which would dramatically drive up expected demand for flexible AMOLED panels. Flexible AMOLEDs are expected to comprise 20% of total OLED display unit shipments...

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Dec 13
Some organization mistakingly equate IT spending with...

Organizations spend an average of 5.6% of the overall IT budget on IT security and risk management, according to the most recent IT Key Metrics Data from Gartner, Inc. However, IT security spending ranges from approximately 1% to 13% of the IT budget and is potentially a misleading indicator of program success, analysts said.

"Clients want to know if what they are spending on information security is equivalent to others in their industry, geography and size of business in order to evaluate whether they are practicing due diligence in security and related programs," said Rob McMillan, research director at Gartner.  "But general comparisons to generic industry averages don't tell you much about your state of security. You could be spending at the same level as your peer group, but you could be spending on the wrong things and be extremely vulnerable. Alternatively, you may be spending appropriately but have a different risk appetite from your peers.”

According to...

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Dec 12
Wireless backhaul will grow ten-fold by 2020

Mobile Experts (www.mobile-experts.net) has released fresh numbers and analysis that explain why the wireless backhaul market has started out slow, then how it will rise over the next four years. Fixed Wireless Access is also covered in the annual Mobile Experts breakdown of backhaul, fronthaul, and midhaul for small cells.

To create estimates and forecasts for the Small Cell market, the Mobile Experts analysts rely on direct input from more than 55 industry sources, with an array of mobile operators contributing to the overall analysis. The goal achieved in this latest report is a detailed, global view of the market. Mobile Experts has built a "top down" forecast based on this direct input from mobile operators and based on trends in end-user demand for mobile services, and a "bottom up" forecast through discussions with OEMs and semiconductor suppliers in the supply chain.

"We don't rely on...

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Dec 09
Survey: wearables need to be more useful

The abandonment rate of smartwatches is 29% and 30 percent for fitness trackers, because people don’t find them useful, they get bored of them or they break, according to a survey by Gartner, Inc. (www.gartner.com).

"Dropout from device usage is a serious problem for the industry," said Angela McIntyre, research director at Gartner. "The abandonment rate is quite high relative to the usage rate. To offer a compelling enough value proposition, the uses for wearable devices need to be distinct from what smartphones typically provide. Wearables makers need to engage users with incentives and gamification." 

The 2016 Gartner Personal Technologies Study surveyed 9,592 online respondents from Australia, the U.S. and the U.K. between June and August 2016, to gain a better understanding of consumers' attitudes toward wearables, particularly their buying behavior for smartwatches, fitness trackers and virtual reality...

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Dec 08
Digital video software to exceed $9 billion by 2021

The video software market is expected to exceed US$9 billion in revenue by 2021, according to new data IHS Markit (www.ihs.com). The atomization of media distribution and the switch from hardware-based technology solutions to cloud implementations are key drivers for the $3 billion in revenue growth over the next five years, according to the research group.

“Taken together, these two forces have created a market where value is shifting towards the front end,” said Cecilia Zhu, analyst at IHS Technology. “A superior user-experience has become fundamental to securing increased consumer spend.”
Content security was the largest segment in 2015

Globally, content security accounts for 32% of the digital video software market.

“While demand for robust security solutions is unlikely to deteriorate,  particularly in the presence of high-value UHD and HDR content,  the segment is effectively saturated,” Zhu said....

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Dec 07
Study: ITSM professionals see future growth in the...

A new study examining how the IT service management (ITSM) industry will look in 2030 shows a high level of optimism for the future as service management frameworks become applied across organizations in support of a wider adoption of technology.
 
The report by AXELOS (www.AXELOS.com) reveals that ITSM professionals see future growth in the industry with 77% agreeing that non-technical business units will be more involved in service governance, service strategy and service design, and the same number believe end user interactions with IT will become simpler, lighter-touch and less complex.
 
They welcome developments such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning; 77% said they believed these trends would have a profound impact on the IT workforce, liberating ITSM professionals from routine tasks and free up time for responding to demands for more creativity and “human” input.
 ...

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Dec 06
Men vs. women: gift buying study reveals holiday...

FatWallet.com, a savings resource for online deal hunters, has announced results of its 2016 Holiday Gift Buying Survey.

The study reports that 70% of parents plan to spend the same or more buying gifts for their children this year (men will outspend women), and 70% said getting the best deals is the most important factor when buying holiday gifts online (59% said. free shipping).

Parents said their kids want gift cards or money more than anything else, followed by toys, video games and laptops. More than four in 10 (43%) of women and men equally want quality time with family as a holiday gift this year, 32% want gift cards, 22% want apparel and 18% would settle for a vacation.

2016 Holiday Gift Buying Survey results include:

Online Gift Buying Factors: Overall, 70% said "getting the best price" was most important, 59% said free shipping (63% of women and 55% of men), 30% return policy, 24% customer service, 23% price matching, 14% rewards, 6% layaway...

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Dec 06
eCoupon redemption values set to double

A new study from Juniper Research (www.juniperresearch.com) has found that eCoupon redemptions will double over the next five years, reaching US$81 billion in 2021, increasing from an estimated $40 billion in 2016. Juniper’s latest research, found that growth in digital coupon redemptions is to be driven by emerging channels and new partnerships.

The research group says that coupon redemption levels will grow as a result of the opportunities that new technologies offer, such as connected cars. Juniper believes that current partnerships including those between OnStar, Groupon, Exxon Mobil and RetailMeNot which provide in-vehicle offers tailored to location, will see rapid expansion.

Juniper found significant opportunity exists via location-based promotions, which target consumers on the go, similar to the concept seen with in-store beacons, and expects more retailers to join this movement in...

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Dec 05
Gartner: mobile device adoption in the workplace not...

Mobile device adoption in the workplace isn’t yet mature, according to a survey from Gartner, Inc. (www.gartner.com). Although 80% of workers surveyed received one or more corporate-issued devices, desktops are still the most popular corporate device among businesses, with more than half of workers receiving corporate-issued desktop PCs.

The survey findings are based on the 2016 Gartner Personal Technologies Study, which was conducted from June to August 2016 among 9,592 respondents in the U.S., the U.K. and Australia. Thirty-six percent of workers received laptops, including convertible laptops. Adoption of convertible laptops as a corporate-issued device is still very low, but has been gradually increasing.

Gartner analysts expect that more employees will receive convertible laptops in the next three years, driven by the Windows 10 refresh that can enhance the user experience with touch-based input....

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Dec 02
Report looks at the development auto IoT market

Mobile Experts (http://mobile-experts.net) has released a style that “unapologetically draws a line between fact and myth in the developing automotive IoT [Internet of Things] market.”

The report investigates connectivity for telematics, vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure  (V2I) applications using DSRC and LTE, as well as TPMS and other wireless applications related to cars. New business models for insurance and 5G technology prospects are explored in detail.

"A political battle is raging in the United States, with the auto industry pushing for the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Transportation to adopt DSRC using 802.11p," commented Mobile Experts Principal Analyst Joe Madden. "However, the wireless industry—led by Qualcomm--is pushing for extension of Wi-Fi into the 5.8 GHz band and LTE for V2V communications. The outcome of this politicized decision...

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Dec 01
The Northern Spy: a less than stellar report card

By Rick Sutcliffe

Sierra's problems continue, as the Spy receives other reports of programs not functioning besides the ones cited here last month. To be fair, the Olive Tree folk managed to get their Bible Study program working on Sierra, reducing the number of fails by one.

On the other hand, he now has multiple reports of Sierra installs killing off or corrupting the keychain, and some of SSH, ITunes, and other apps failing, or running very slow. There are also compatibility issues with Apple's own Mail program, certain sound file types, and fast battery drain.

Safari is quirky too, but that was a problem in El Capitan as well--so much so the Spy has given up on the product for now and will use the ultra-reliable Firefox as his default browser.

Sometimes the upgrade process itself fails or hangs. Advice: don’t sidegrade, continue to use El Capitan, which is much more stable. But if you really want to take the leap...

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Dec 01
4G smartphones to surpass one billion in shipments for...

Worldwide smartphone shipments are expected to reach 1.45 billion units with a year-over-year growth rate of 0.6% in 2016 according to the latest forecast from the International Data Corporation (IDC). Although growth remains positive, it is down significantly from the 10.4% growth in 2015.

However, 4G smartphones are still expected to show double-digit uptake at 21.3% year-over-year growth globally for 2016, reaching 1.17 billion units, up from 967 million in 2015. Much of this growth is coming from emerging markets (Asia/Pacific excluding Japan, Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe, and Middle East and Africa), where only 61% of 2015 smartphone shipments were 4G-enabled compared to IDC's 2016 projection of 77%, according to IDC. Mature markets (USA, Canada, Japan, and Western Europe) are further along the 4G adoption curve with 85% in 2015 and a projected 94% in 2016, respectively.

"It's been a long slog for 4G uptake in many emerging markets as 4G data tariffs...

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Nov 30
Voice, facial recognition to be in over 600 mobile...

A new report from Juniper Research (www.juniperresearch.com) has found that biometric authentication is now ready to move beyond fingerprints alone and use a range of identifiers, from facial recognition to voiceprints.

These methods will become part of many more consumers’ lives, installed on an estimated 190 million mobile devices, including smartphones and wearables, in 2016, before exceeding 600 million devices by 2021, according to the research group. Juniper has found that demand from businesses for methods that rely less on hardware will raise the profile of newer biometrics over the next five years, in particular voiceprints and facial recognition.

These technologies are easier to deploy than fingerprinting, as they do not require dedicated hardware, bringing biometric security to a whole new audience in markets with lower-tier smartphones, with fingerprinting remaining common in...

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Nov 29
Mobile drives €18.6 billion online ad revenue in 2016

IHS Markit (www.ihs.com) — which specializes in critical information, analytics and solutions -- in collaboration with IAB Europe -- announced updated findings from its annual European online advertising report, “AdEx Benchmark H1 Study.” The online advertising market grew 13.4% year-on-year from €16.4 billion to €18.6 billion in the first six months of 2016.

“Strong economic growth in all the European Big Five for the first time since 2010 underpinned the surge in online advertising in the first six months of 2016,” said Eleni Marouli, principal analyst at IHS Technology and report author. “We saw an uplift across all formats from 2015.”

Mobile advertising amounted to €3.8 billion in the first six months of 2016, split evenly between search and display. Mobile’s share of search was 32% and mobile’s share of display was 32.8%, the report said.

“Mobile accounted for one in three euros spent in Europe,”...

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Nov 28
Taxi sector to lead self-driving market

New findings from Juniper Research (www.juniperresearch.com) reveal that the annual production of self-driving cars will reach 14.5 million in 2025, up significantly from only a few thousands in 2020, to give a global installed base of more than 22 million consumer vehicles by 2025.

The new research found that the market adoption of AV (Autonomous Vehicle) technology is set to accelerate over the next few years, driven by:

° Increasingly stringent vehicle safety specifications;

° Environmental pressures;
° Rapid technological developments.

Juniper Research found that driverless vehicles will have a disruptive impact on transportation around the world and will ultimately lead to millions of professional drivers being made redundant. The research group predicts that city-based taxi services will be one of the key early adopters of driverless vehicles.

“The...

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Nov 23
Study: women prefer to shop in store, men online

Indix (www.indix.com), a cloud catalog company that provides structured product information via Data-as-a-Service, has released a new data report titled, "A Look Into Consumer Shopping Behavior." This study on the trends taking place both online and in-store provides brands and retailers insights into how factors like price, discovery, and availability influence whether or not a purchase is made.

The independent survey was conducted in partnership with Research Now, a digital data collection company and market research firm. The report examined several aspects of consumer shopping behavior, of which the following key findings were identified:
° Women prefer to purchase products in store (43% vs. 36%), whereas men prefer to shop online (31% vs. 24 %).

° Women are less likely to purchase products online if shipping and handling is expensive, and men are less likely to purchase products online if they aren't...

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Nov 22
Black Friday shoppers should look for smartphone, 4K...

When the holiday stocking-stuffing season officially kicks off this Friday, tech-savvy U.S. shoppers are in for a treat, as smartphone competitors figure to begin offering special package deals and discounts on those devices.

As they head to retail outlets and shop online on Black Friday, Nov. 25, and through the holidays, American shoppers may also want to add 4K televisions, tablets and notebooks to their wish lists. Due to a variety of market factors, it’s a great time to shop for deals specifically on those types of electronics, according to new analysis from IHS Markit (ihsmarket.com), an information, analytics and solutions firm.

Ever since mid-October, when Samsung Electronics recalled its Galaxy Note 7 smartphones due to their overheating, competitors such as Apple, Sony, Google and LG Electronics have not yet been able to capitalize on Samsung’s perceived weakness with their own offers. However, things may soon be different, bringing good tidings to...

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Nov 21
Chinese smartphone vendors only one to increase sales...

Huawei, Oppo and BBK Communication Equipment together accounted for 21% of the smartphones sold to end users worldwide in the third quarter of 2016, according to Gartner (www.gartner.com). They were the only smartphone vendors in the global top five to increase their sales and market share during the quarter, the research group adds.

"China led the growth in the smartphone market in the third quarter of 2016," said Anshul Gupta, research director at Gartner. "Sales of smartphones in China grew by 12.4%, and the vendors who most successfully exploited the sales opportunities there were Oppo and BBK Communication Equipment. In Oppo's case, 81% of its smartphone sales came from China, while BBK accounted for 89% of smartphones sales in China. These two vendors also grew strongly in India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Russia," he added.

Global sales of smartphones to end users totaled 373 million units in...

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Nov 18
Email newsletters are now the norm for most large...

Sending email newsletters is a routine business practice for more than 80% of large organizations in the US, surpassing standalone (79%), lead nurturing (71%), and transactional (62%) emails, according to an email marketing survey from Clutch (www.clutch.co), a ratings and reviews platform for businesses.

Most organizations send out their newsletter multiple times a week, the survey found, with Monday and Friday, between 9 and 11 a.m., being the most popular periods. However, no universal rule governs when to distribute a newsletter, according to email marketing experts.

"We need to send [emails] when they will be at the top of the inbox. If the email gets buried, it is less likely to be opened and read," said Michael Barber, Founder of barber&hewitt , a strategy and planning firm focused on business-to-business (B2B) organizations.

Nearly 90% of email marketers said that email personalization is...

| Read more »
Nov 17
Home networking tips for the holiday season

‘Tis the season for family and friends to slow down your home network. In today’s connected world, holiday visitors bring a collection of gadgets that require Internet – likely resulting in extremely slow Wi-Fi and unhappy guests.

Many homes are plagued by slow speeds, bad reception and other Wi-Fi issues. Additionally, more US consumers than ever – about 68% or 170 million – plan to purchase tech gifts this year. To spread holiday cheer and increase Wi-Fi speeds, D-Link is gifting tech tips and home networking gear to ensure Wi-Fi performance is up to speed during the holidays and through the new year.
 
“New innovative gadgets, from smart home devices to gaming consoles, will likely result in the biggest holiday season yet for the tech sector,” said Oscar Reyes, vice president of marketing, D-Link. “Considering many households haven’t upgraded their routers in years, and the majority of gifts rely on a wireless network, now is the time to enhance home networks...

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Nov 16
Marketers: single customer view is a myth

Two thirds of marketers don’t believe they can accurately calculate the value of their customers, according to research from international marketing company BlueVenn (www.bluevenn.com).

The survey of 202 US and UK senior marketing professionals reveals a wide range of stats that shed light on marketers’ attitudes towards available tools and the most challenging elements of their roles. Data analysis tops the list of today’s challenges, with 99.5% of marketers attempting to analyze their customer data. One third of marketers, however, admits to the lack of relevant knowledge and tools to fully undertake a task that now requires more than 50% of their time.

Unsurprisingly, 72% of respondents consider data analysis to be the most important skill-set to acquire over the next two years, placing it at the top of their core marketing skills’ list above SEO and social media.

“More than ever, marketers...

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Nov 15
How to avoid identity theft and fraud

For the first time in history, online shopping has outweighed shopping in stores this year: consumers are now making 51% of their shopping online, compared to 48% in 2015. When people start shopping for their Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals, kicking off the Christmas shopping season, online hackers start their busy season, too.
 
Nearly half (48%) of consumers who shopped online in the past year have experienced payment fraud - which is nearly 80 million people. Many online shops and their clients are still not aware of simple safety protocols as we are entering deeper into all-digital age.
 
Online stores are huge sites of targeted attacks by hackers who try to steal users’ financial details and then use it for money laundering or other schemes. There have been too many cases where an innocent user was tricked into believing that they were entering the credit card details on a secure online store while in reality the user was providing their details to...

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Nov 14
Small businesses' sensitive data at risk in free...

Small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) risk data security if they use free cloud storage, but nearly 25% still do, despite warnings from industry experts. In addition, new findings reveal that 11% of SMBs are storing banking information and 14% are storing medical records in free cloud storage. The data comes from a new survey by Clutch (clutch.co), a B2B ratings and reviews firm.

Storing sensitive data in free cloud storage is an ill-advised and irresponsible business practice since necessary security measures are often lacking, according to cloud experts interviewed for the report. Businesses that store banking or medical information are required to comply with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI) or Health Insurance Accountability and Portability Act (HIPAA).
"If you need to be HIPAA compliant or PCI compliant, you should be using the highest level of security that you can obtain, and usually that's not present on most free cloud storage accounts...

| Read more »
Nov 11
Here’s why pre-5G deployment will be highly targeted

Mobile Experts (www.mobile-experts.com) has released a new case study on 5G Ultra-Broadband that explores the future return on investment (ROI) for Fixed-Broadband 5G Networks. The study calculates the potential ROI for a mobile operator to invest in a 28GHz pre-5G network by comparing to LTE costs and potential costs for a sub-6GHz network using 5G technology.

The 23-page study identifies three main factors that analyze spectrum cost, link distance, and traffic density. At historical prices, 5G won’t be successful. According to Mobile Experts, inexpensive access is absolutely necessary to large spectrum blocks.

"The business case for 5G Fixed Broadband is not a slam-dunk," commented Principal Analyst Joe Madden. "We expect pre-5G deployment to be a very targeted investment by mobile operators, addressing very specific neighborhoods instead of nationwide deployment.”

Short mm-wave links...

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Nov 10
Wearable tech to focus more on health

As technology becomes more advanced and costs of production falling, wearable devices become more mainstream. While the fitness trackers and wearable cameras were the most popular wearable devices, a stronger emphasis on health and a bigger demand for home care are expected drive up demand for medical wearables.

According to a recent research by Global Market Insights (www.gminsight.com), a market research and management consulting company, the wearable devices market size is anticipated to exceed $12 billion by 2023, which represents growth of about 24% CAGR [compound annual growth rate] from 2016 to 2023.

A rising demand for sophisticated devices, combined with innovative features is what expected to drive demand. Also according to the research electronic wearable medical devices that offer monitoring solutions on numerous health parameters such as glucose, blood sugar, chronic diseases, namely...

| Read more »
Nov 10
The global mobile cloud market will be worth $39...

According to new data from Research and Markets (www.researchandmarkets.com), the global mobile cloud market will be worth $38.48 billion by 2020.

The mobile cloud market includes a combination of cloud computing, mobile computing and wireless technologies and networks to enhance the computational power. The beneficiaries of the technology are the mobile/smartphone users, network operators and cloud service providers, since the smartphone, tablet and cloud computing technologies are converging into the new mobile cloud market, notes Research and Markets. The mobile cloud market is projected to grow from US$9.46 billion in 2015 to $38.48 billion in 2020, at an estimated compound annual growth rate of 26.34%.

Mobile cloud technology is broadly four types: Immobile Clouds, Proximate Immobile Computing, Proximate Mobile Computing and Hybrid Computing. At a time when mobile technologies have...

| Read more »
Nov 09
66.2% of financial organizations faced a cybersecurity...

MetricStream Research (www.metricstream.com) has released a new report, "The State of Cybersecurity in the Financial Services Industry," which reveals that 66.2% of financial organizations faced at least one cybersecurity attack in the last year.

The report, based on a survey conducted in July 2016, features the perspectives of C-level information security professionals in over 60 banking and financial services firms across the globe. The respondents represented financial enterprises of multiple sizes, as well as various segments, including banking, insurance, asset management, diversified financials, investment services, and foreign exchange services.

A spate of recent cyberattacks on financial institutions, including the Bangladesh Bank heist and the Banco del Austro hack, have propelled cybersecurity to the top of the corporate agenda, and prompted boards and executive teams to question the...

| Read more »
Nov 08
Worldwide services revenues to pass $1 trillion for...

According to a new forecast from the International Data Corporation (IDC) “Worldwide Semiannual Services Tracker, IT Services and Business Services,” revenues are poised to pass the $1 trillion mark for the first time in 2018. Worldwide services spending totals for 2016 are expected to stay within the $900 billion range and by 2020 expected to near $1.1 trillion.

On a geographic basis, the United States is expected to generate the largest percentage of services spending throughout the forecast period, followed by Western Europe. The fastest growing regions will be Latin America, then the Middle East and Africa (MEA), which is poised to surpass Canada's services spending by 2017. Among the major global regions, Asia/Pacific (including Japan) is forecast to have the highest overall growth rate.

With more than $100 million worth of spending each this year, the largest services markets will be Key Horizontal Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and Systems Integration...

| Read more »
Nov 07
Voice control the new breakout star in smart home...

Voice control became a standout, new category for smart home devices over the past 18 months, finds ABI Research (www.abirseearch.com).

But its future is even brighter due to its solid marketing efforts, as well as its ability to leverage digital assistant adoption on smartphones and deliver genuine consumer value. Voice control smart home devices, typified by the Amazon Echo, will represent almost 30% of smart home device spending by 2021, despite being a device category that barely existed two years ago.

"Voice control will not only draw in new consumers to smart home functionality, but it will help transform a wide variety of new and emerging smart home services and devices into more attractive investments," says Jonathan Collins, research director at ABI Research. "The stage is set for voice control to become the heart of any smart home system." 

Amazon's market leadership with its Alexa...

| Read more »
Nov 04
IDC reveals CIO agenda 2017 predictions

Today's IT organizations are divided into two camps: those that thrive by effectively leveraging digital technologies, new business models, and entrepreneurial cultures; and those that are saddled by technical debt, plodding business processes, and lack of a digitally-fueled vision for the future.

To help CIOs and IT executives successfully lead their organizations through accelerating digital transformation, International Data Corporation (IDC) has unveiled "IDC FutureScape: Worldwide CIO Agenda 2017 Predictions." These predictions lay out the ten most important shifts that will happen in IT organizations over the next 36 months and will guide senior IT executives in the formation of their three-year strategic IT plan.

In a Web conference held Nov. 2, IDC analysts Joe Pucciarelli, Serge Findling, and Mike Jennett offered guidance for managing the impact of these 10 predictions on IT investment priorities and implementation strategies. Those predictions are:

... | Read more »
Nov 03
Residential smart light bulb market to approach a...

The market for connected LED or “smart” light bulbs is in its embryonic stage of development, with shipments totaling fewer than 2.5 million units in 2013.

However, falling LED prices and the endorsement of ZigBee Light Link as the preferred connectivity solution by a number of leading lighting manufacturers means that annual smart bulb shipments are set to increase to 223 million by 2020, achieving a total installed base of over 400 million, according to ABI Research (www.abiresearch.com).

"Because of the additional dimensions smart lighting brings to the consumer lifestyle, including lighting automation, and because of its carbon footprint efficiency, this industry will rapidly become one of the key technologies that could bring IoE closer to consumers," Malik Saadi, practice director at the research company. "Because of the additional dimensions smart lighting brings to the consumer lifestyle,...

| Read more »
 

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Dropbox 193.4.5594 - Cloud backup and sy...
Dropbox is a file hosting service that provides cloud storage, file synchronization, personal cloud, and client software. It is a modern workspace that allows you to get to all of your files, manage... Read more
Google Chrome 122.0.6261.57 - Modern and...
Google Chrome is a Web browser by Google, created to be a modern platform for Web pages and applications. It utilizes very fast loading of Web pages and has a V8 engine, which is a custom built... Read more
Skype 8.113.0.210 - Voice-over-internet...
Skype is a telecommunications app that provides HD video calls, instant messaging, calling to any phone number or landline, and Skype for Business for productive cooperation on the projects. This... Read more
Tor Browser 13.0.10 - Anonymize Web brow...
Using Tor Browser you can protect yourself against tracking, surveillance, and censorship. Tor was originally designed, implemented, and deployed as a third-generation onion-routing project of the U.... Read more
Deeper 3.0.4 - Enable hidden features in...
Deeper is a personalization utility for macOS which allows you to enable and disable the hidden functions of the Finder, Dock, QuickTime, Safari, iTunes, login window, Spotlight, and many of Apple's... Read more
OnyX 4.5.5 - Maintenance and optimizatio...
OnyX is a multifunction utility that you can use to verify the startup disk and the structure of its system files, to run miscellaneous maintenance and cleaning tasks, to configure parameters in the... Read more

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Zenless Zone Zero opens entries for its...
miHoYo, aka HoYoverse, has become such a big name in mobile gaming that it's hard to believe that arguably their flagship title, Genshin Impact, is only three and a half years old. Now, they continue the road to the next title in their world, with... | Read more »
Live, Playdate, Live! – The TouchArcade...
In this week’s episode of The TouchArcade Show we kick things off by talking about all the games I splurged on during the recent Playdate Catalog one-year anniversary sale, including the new Lucas Pope jam Mars After Midnight. We haven’t played any... | Read more »
TouchArcade Game of the Week: ‘Vroomies’
So here’s a thing: Vroomies from developer Alex Taber aka Unordered Games is the Game of the Week! Except… Vroomies came out an entire month ago. It wasn’t on my radar until this week, which is why I included it in our weekly new games round-up, but... | Read more »
SwitchArcade Round-Up: ‘MLB The Show 24’...
Hello gentle readers, and welcome to the SwitchArcade Round-Up for March 15th, 2024. We’re closing out the week with a bunch of new games, with Sony’s baseball franchise MLB The Show up to bat yet again. There are several other interesting games to... | Read more »
Steam Deck Weekly: WWE 2K24 and Summerho...
Welcome to this week’s edition of the Steam Deck Weekly. The busy season has begun with games we’ve been looking forward to playing including Dragon’s Dogma 2, Horizon Forbidden West Complete Edition, and also console exclusives like Rise of the... | Read more »
Steam Spring Sale 2024 – The 10 Best Ste...
The Steam Spring Sale 2024 began last night, and while it isn’t as big of a deal as say the Steam Winter Sale, you may as well take advantage of it to save money on some games you were planning to buy. I obviously recommend checking out your own... | Read more »
New ‘SaGa Emerald Beyond’ Gameplay Showc...
Last month, Square Enix posted a Let’s Play video featuring SaGa Localization Director Neil Broadley who showcased the worlds, companions, and more from the upcoming and highly-anticipated RPG SaGa Emerald Beyond. | Read more »
Choose Your Side in the Latest ‘Marvel S...
Last month, Marvel Snap (Free) held its very first “imbalance" event in honor of Valentine’s Day. For a limited time, certain well-known couples were given special boosts when conditions were right. It must have gone over well, because we’ve got a... | Read more »
Warframe welcomes the arrival of a new s...
As a Warframe player one of the best things about it launching on iOS, despite it being arguably the best way to play the game if you have a controller, is that I can now be paid to talk about it. To whit, we are gearing up to receive the first... | Read more »
Apple Arcade Weekly Round-Up: Updates an...
Following the new releases earlier in the month and April 2024’s games being revealed by Apple, this week has seen some notable game updates and events go live for Apple Arcade. What The Golf? has an April Fool’s Day celebration event going live “... | Read more »

Price Scanner via MacPrices.net

Apple Education is offering $100 discounts on...
If you’re a student, teacher, or staff member at any educational institution, you can use your .edu email address when ordering at Apple Education to take $100 off the price of a new M3 MacBook Air.... Read more
Apple Watch Ultra 2 with Blood Oxygen feature...
Best Buy is offering Apple Watch Ultra 2 models for $50 off MSRP on their online store this week. Sale prices available for online orders only, in-store prices may vary. Order online, and choose... Read more
New promo at Sams Club: Apple HomePods for $2...
Sams Club has Apple HomePods on sale for $259 through March 31, 2024. Their price is $40 off Apple’s MSRP, and both Space Gray and White colors are available. Sale price is for online orders only, in... Read more
Get Apple’s 2nd generation Apple Pencil for $...
Apple’s Pencil (2nd generation) works with the 12″ iPad Pro (3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th generation), 11″ iPad Pro (1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th generation), iPad Air (4th and 5th generation), and iPad mini (... Read more
10th generation Apple iPads on sale for $100...
Best Buy has Apple’s 10th-generation WiFi iPads back on sale for $100 off MSRP on their online store, starting at only $349. With the discount, Best Buy’s prices are the lowest currently available... Read more
iPad Airs on sale again starting at $449 on B...
Best Buy has 10.9″ M1 WiFi iPad Airs on record-low sale prices again for $150 off Apple’s MSRP, starting at $449. Sale prices for online orders only, in-store price may vary. Order online, and choose... Read more
Best Buy is blowing out clearance 13-inch M1...
Best Buy is blowing out clearance Apple 13″ M1 MacBook Airs this weekend for only $649.99, or $350 off Apple’s original MSRP. Sale prices for online orders only, in-store prices may vary. Order... Read more
Low price alert! You can now get a 13-inch M1...
Walmart has, for the first time, begun offering new Apple MacBooks for sale on their online store, albeit clearance previous-generation models. They now have the 13″ M1 MacBook Air (8GB RAM, 256GB... Read more
Best Apple MacBook deal this weekend: Get the...
Apple has 13″ M2 MacBook Airs available for only $849 today in their Certified Refurbished store. These are the cheapest M2-powered MacBooks for sale at Apple. Apple’s one-year warranty is included,... Read more
New 15-inch M3 MacBook Air (Midnight) on sale...
Amazon has the new 15″ M3 MacBook Air (8GB RAM/256GB SSD/Midnight) in stock and on sale today for $1249.99 including free shipping. Their price is $50 off MSRP, and it’s the lowest price currently... Read more

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