microsoft-corp

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(Reuters) – Microsoft Corp reported higher quarterly adjusted revenue, driven mainly by growth in the company's cloud business. The company's shares jumped 3.5 percent to $54.91 in extended trading on Tuesday. Revenue in the cloud business, which includes the Azure cloud platform as well as products related to server software, rose 7 percent to $6.7 billion. Under the leadership of Satya Nadella, the software behemoth has focused on the building the company's expertise in cloud-based services amid slowing PC sales. …

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China's industry and commerce regulator has asked Microsoft Corp to explain “major issues” that it says have come to light from digital data obtained as part of an anti-trust investigation. The State Administration of Industry and Commerce, or SAIC, did not say exactly what issues it was querying but the request appeared to be part of an investigation into the U.S. software titan over its Windows operating system launched in mid-2014. The company must submit a complete explanation following the inquiry, the SAIC said in a statement posted on its website.

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Google parent Alphabet Inc , Microsoft Corp and Amazon.com Inc made headway in the latest quarter in the areas that will be their main engines of growth for years to come, driving up shares across the tech sector on Friday. For Alphabet, search traffic on mobiles surpassed desktop traffic worldwide for the first time, while Amazon was able to boost margins, an area of concern, as its cloud business boomed. Microsoft's growing emphasis on cloud computing under Chief Executive Satya Nadella also put the company on track successfully transition away from its slowing business that relies on sales of personal computers.

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(Reuters) – Skype, Microsoft Corp's online telephone and video service, said some users are unable to make calls on Monday because their settings show that they and their contacts are off line, even when they are logged in. In an updated blog post, Skype also said some messages to group chats are not being delivered and that users who are not already signed in may face difficulty while accessing their accounts. Users may also face difficulty loading web pages on the Skype Community, the company said in a blog post.

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By Yasmeen Abutaleb SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Facebook Inc is testing a personal digital assistant called “M” within its Messenger service that can answer questions with live human help and perform tasks such as buying gifts online and booking restaurants. M is “powered by artificial intelligence that's trained and supervised by people,” David Marcus, vice president of Messaging products, wrote on his Facebook page on Wednesday. Rival services like Apple Inc's Siri, Google Inc's Google Now and Microsoft Corp's Cortana rely entirely on technology to answer questions.

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By Richard Cowan WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Top U.S. tech companies are warning the Obama administration against imposing new policies that the companies say would weaken increasingly sophisticated encryption systems designed to protect consumers' privacy. In a strongly worded letter to President Barack Obama on Monday, two industry associations representing major software and hardware companies said, “We are opposed to any policy actions or measures that would undermine encryption as an available and effective tool.” The Information Technology Industry Council and the Software and Information Industry Association, representing tech giants, including Apple Inc, Google Inc, Facebook Inc, IBM and Microsoft Corp, fired the latest salvo in what could be a long fight over government access into smart phones and other digital devices.

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By Dan Levine SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – A U.S. appeals court appeared skeptical on Wednesday toward Google Inc's bid to charge Microsoft Corp a high royalty rate to use some of the Internet search provider's Motorola Mobility patents. Microsoft sued Motorola in 2010, alleging Motorola breached its commitment to license some of its industry standard patents on fair terms. After a 2012 trial, a Seattle federal judge found that the appropriate rate for Motorola to license certain wireless and video technology used in the Xbox game console was only a fraction of what Motorola had asked for. Google sold the Motorola handset business to Lenovo last year, but kept its patents.

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(Reuters) – Plaintiffs in an antitrust lawsuit against Google Inc on Friday withdrew their case accusing the search engine company of harming smartphone buyers by forcing handset makers using Android operating system to make Google's own applications the default option. The class action lawsuit, filed by two smartphone customers in May 2014, was dismissed on Feb. 20 by U.S. District Judge Beth Labson Freeman in San Jose, California. The lawsuit argued that Google requires Android handset manufacturers such as Samsung Electronics Co Ltd favor Google's apps such as YouTube and restrict competing apps like Microsoft Corp's Bing search.

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Microsoft Corp said on Monday fiscal second-quarter profit fell, in line with Wall Street's forecasts, as sluggish personal computer sales dampened demand for Windows software and the company struggled with unfavorable currency moves against the strong U.S. dollar. “While currency is a headwind for Microsoft and other large international companies, we would characterize the headline numbers as good enough, although some bulls may have been hoping for a bigger beat,” said Daniel Ives, an analyst at FBR Capital Markets. Microsoft reported profit of $5.86 billion, or 71 cents per share for the latest quarter, compared with $6.56 billion, or 78 cents per share, in the year-ago quarter.

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(Reuters) – Microsoft Corp's Xbox Live and Sony Corp's PlayStation Networks experienced user connection problems on Christmas Day, for which a hacker group claimed responsibility. The group, called Lizard Squad, could not be reached for comment, and the companies did not give a reason for the connectivity issues. Both companies expected heavy use as people who received Microsoft Xbox players or Sony PlayStations on Christmas tried to hook up. …