Technology News in Brief

Monday, May 12, 2014

Dolly's clones deemed unpatentable

The Scottish scientists famous for concocting "Dolly" the sheep lost a bid to get U.S. patent protection for a method of cloning as a court said their animal creations are just genetic copies of naturally occurring beings.

The Roslin Institute in Edinburgh had argued that, while the sheep used to create Dolly in 1996 could not be patented, the resultant clones are eligible because they are the "product of human ingenuity." The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington on Friday disagreed.

The court, in an opinion posted on its website, upheld the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's rejection of an application by Roslin, with Circuit Judge Timothy Dyk writing that "Dolly's genetic identity to her donor parent renders her unpatentable."

"This is a very important and fascinating opinion," said Arthur Caplan, head of the division of medical ethics at NYU Langone Medical School. "They've just ruled one of the most novel, innovative ways to create new living things is nothing more than copying."

To produce clones, scientists grow copies of cells from the original animal in a lab dish, then extract genetic material. The DNA from the animal to be cloned is inserted into an egg whose nucleus has been removed, and the resulting embryo is implanted in an animal that will serve as the clone's surrogate mother.

The court rejected Roslin's arguments that the cloned animal was different because it might have mitochondrial DNA from the host egg, and may look or act differently from the original animal through environmental factors that would alter its shape, size, color and behavior. None of those issues were raised in the application, the court said.

There's nothing "that suggests that the clones are distinct in any relevant way from the donor animals of which they are copies," Dyk wrote for the three-judge panel. "The clones are defined in terms of the identity of their nuclear DNA to that of the donor mammals."

-- Bloomberg News

Star Wars-inspired prosthesis OK'd

A prosthetic arm made by a company founded by Segway inventor Dean Kamen was approved for sale by U.S. regulators, who called it the first artificial arm on the market able to respond to multiple simultaneous commands from a wearer's brain.

Electrodes attached to the arm detect muscle contractions close to the prosthesis, and a computer translates them into movement, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said Friday in a statement. As many as 10 movements can be detected by the limb, which is the same weight and shape as a natural human arm.

The company, closely held DEKA Research and Development Corp. of Manchester, N.H., developed the arm with financing from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and the U.S. Army Research Office, according to DEKA's website. The company nicknamed the arm "Luke," after the Star Wars movie character Luke Skywalker, who receives a bionic hand after losing his natural one in a lightsaber battle with his father, Darth Vader.

"This innovative prosthesis provides a new option for people with certain kinds of arm amputations," said Christy Foreman, director of the Office of Device Evaluation at the FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health. "The DEKA Arm System may allow some people to perform more complex tasks than they can with current prostheses in a way that more closely resembles the natural motion of the arm."

DEKA officials couldn't be reached immediately to comment on Friday's FDA approval.

-- Bloomberg News

Google buys cloud startup Stackdriver

Google Inc. is acquiring Stackdriver Inc., a startup that specializes in helping companies that use online computing services from Amazon.com Inc. and Rackspace Hosting Inc., ramping up competition for cloud customers.

The deal will help Google's customers get more information about how the search provider's cloud services are performing, Tom Kershaw, a product manager at Google, wrote in a blog post Wednesday. Terms of the deal weren't disclosed.

Google, which has trailed Amazon in Web services that store data and deliver software online for other companies, is aiming to woo customers by offering more tools that help startups and businesses seeking to cut costs. Google, which recently cut prices, competes with Amazon, Rackspace and Microsoft Corp. in cloud computing.

"The teams are going to be working to integrate Stackdriver's great functionality so that Google Cloud Platform customers can take advantage of these new advanced monitoring capabilities," Kershaw said.

Stackdriver provides data, via tools such as dashboards and menus, that show how an application is performing that uses cloud-based services. For example, a customer can sniff out quickly what might have gone wrong if a piece of software has a glitch. Stackdriver, which started in 2012, will continue to help customers using platforms outside of Google, the companies said.

-- Bloomberg News

Samsung replaces exec as sales stall

Samsung Electronics Co. replaced the leader of its mobile-device design team as the world's largest smartphone maker struggles with falling sales and a protracted U.S. court battle with Apple Inc. over patent infringements.

Chang Dong Hoon was replaced by Lee Min Hyouk from May 1, Samsung said in an email Thursday without giving a reason for the switch. Chang will continue to oversee the companywide design strategy, while Lee will focus on mobile devices, including the marquee Galaxy S and Note series.

The shuffle comes about a week after Samsung posted the lowest sales at its mobile-phone business in five quarters as Chinese producers gain in emerging markets with cheaper, feature-packed devices. The Suwon, South Korea-based company's share of the global smartphone market fell for the first time in four years, and its stock is down 1.6 percent this year.

"The latest replacement shows how much Samsung wants to give a significant makeover on its handset strategy," said Nam Dae Jong, an analyst at Hana Daetoo Securities Co. in Seoul. "The hardware innovation and function upgrades are failing to stir consumer excitement."

Revenue at the mobile division, the company's biggest business, fell to $32 billion in the three months ended March, the lowest since the quarter ended Dec. 31, 2012. Samsung has become more dependent on its mobile-phone business for earnings, as it now accounts for 76 percent of operating income.

-- Bloomberg News

Demand for SolarCity panels jumps 78%

SolarCity Corp., the biggest U.S. solar power provider by market value, raised its installation forecast for the year after demand for its rooftop systems jumped 78 percent in the first quarter.

The company installed 82 megawatts of solar panels in the quarter, up from 46 megawatts a year earlier, San Mateo, Calif.-based SolarCity said Wednesday. It boosted its 2014 forecast by 25 megawatts, to 500 megawatts to 550 megawatts.

SolarCity installs rooftop solar panels at little to no upfront cost to customers who sign long-term contracts to buy the power. This model is propelling the fastest-growing part of the U.S. solar market. The company also issued a 2015 forecast for the first time, expecting as much as 1 gigawatt of installations.

Installation in the quarter slipped 20 percent from the previous quarter. That may be due in part to winter weather in the Northeast, Philip Shen, an analyst at Roth Capital Partners LLC in Newport Beach, Calif., said in a research note before the results were announced.

The decline was offset by stronger bookings, which climbed 34 percent to 136 megawatts.

SolarCity's net loss was $24.1 million, or 26 cents a share, compared with a loss of $40.9 million, or 54 cents, a year earlier.

-- Bloomberg News

Court OKs reviving Java-copying claims

Oracle Corp. won a U.S. appeals court bid to revive claims that Google Inc. copied its Java programming language to develop the Android operating system, in a case that split Silicon Valley.

The shortcuts created by Java to perform basic functions such as connecting to the Internet are eligible for copyright protection, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington ruled Friday. The court reinstated a jury's 2012 finding that Google infringed the copyrights and remanded the case to let Google argue that it had fair use of the technology.

Oracle, the largest database-software maker, had sought damages, claiming Google used Java code without paying because it was in a rush to create Android, which has become the world's most popular smartphone platform. The case divided the industry between companies that write interface code and those that rely on it to develop software programs.

The decision "is a win for Oracle and the entire software industry that relies on copyright protection to fuel innovation and ensure that developers are rewarded for their breakthroughs," Oracle General Counsel Dorian Daley said in a statement.

Software makers Microsoft Corp., NetApp Inc. and EMC Corp. filed arguments supporting Oracle. Rackspace Hosting Inc., a group of computer scientists, and the Application Developers Alliance sided with Google, saying the specific tools in the case are little more than directions without creativity.

Matt Kallman, a spokesman for Google, had no immediate comment.

-- Bloomberg News

Monday Business on 05/12/2014