Fourth quarter results by Sprint Nextel

“Our strong fourth quarter performance illustrates the power of matching iconic devices like the iPhone with our simple, unlimited plans and industry-leading customer experience,” said Dan Hesse, Sprint CEO, who is hopeful about the future of the company. “During the past year, Sprint added more than 5 million net new customers and grew wireless service revenue by more than 5 percent, including 17 percent for the Sprint platform. This momentum gives us confidence as we execute our Network Vision upgrade and 4G LTE roll-out.”

From Saypeople,

Sprint Nextel reported, on Wednesday, $1.3 billion of net losses or 43 cents of downfall in share. This loss is more than the previous year’s same quarter, which was $929 million. However, according to the company the revenue went up 5% to $8.7 billion i.e. slightly higher than The Wall Street Expectations of $8.69 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. 

Sprint reported to serve the highest number of customers, i.e. 55 million customers, in its history. Moreover, 1.6 million total net subscribers were added in the quarter i.e. best since 2005.

Further Reading:

SayPeople

DDoS attacks on the rise

According to DDoS mitigation companies, Prolexic and Arbor Networks, distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks are on the rise. According to the reports by the companies, so-called layer-7 DDoS attacks have been increased especially targeting Internet facing applications.


From SayPeople,

Prolexic has reported 45% increased DDoS attacks in Q4 of the last year. That is double than the number of attacks in the third quarter of the year 2011. 

Paul Sop, Prolexic's chief technology officer, reported that there is shorter attack duration with bigger packer-per-second attack volume. Average attack bandwidth in Q4 2011 was 5.2Gbps (bits per second), 148 percent higher as compared to the third quarter. This is 136% increase on annual basis.

“We have seen a trend toward shorter overall attack duration, but with unprecedented high packet-per-second volume and lethal attack signatures,” said Sop. “This is a devastating cocktail that can quickly bring down even well protected sites and their mitigation providers. We are starting to see packet-per-second attack volumes that are simply off the charts.”

Further Reading:
SayPeople 

Atlas of the Qur’an

 

“Atlas of the Qur'an” is an authentic and informative book by “Shawqi Abu Khalil”. This book gives information from Holy Qur’an in the form of Tables, Colored Maps and Pictures.

This book has been published by Dar-us-Salam Publications and its first edition came in 2004. It contains 392 pages.

Further Reading:
SayPeople

Very much clear Carina Nebula

European Southern Observatory has released very much clear picture of Carina Nebula i.e. massive star formation. Carina Nebula is located 7500 light years away from Earth.

You can see the picture below.

Carina Nebula (Credit: T. Preibisch/ESO)

In the center of the image, bright star is Trumpler 14. In the center at the right side, black dots with dark tails contain newly-forming stars.


At the bottom left corner, glowing light shows Eta Carinae i.e. an unstable star expected to explode soon with a supernova.


Further Reading:
SayPeople

Nokia's new plans for the production of phones

Nokia has announced that by the end of the year, it will transfer the production of phones to the continent of Asia, where it can get components from the suppliers in a faster manner.

This strategy by the company has been announced in order to compete in this smartphone era of fast technological advancements and financial pressure.

"With the planned changes, our factories at Komarom, Reynosa and Salo will continue to play an important role serving our smartphone customers. They give us a unique ability to both provide customization and be more responsive to customer needs," said Niklas Savander, Nokia executive vice president, Markets.

"Shifting device assembly to Asia is targeted at improving our time to market. By working more closely with our suppliers, we believe that we will be able to introduce innovations into the market more quickly and ultimately be more competitive," said Savander. "We recognize the planned changes are difficult for our employees and we are committed to supporting our personnel and their local communities during the transition."

Further Reading:

SayPeople

UBS AG has faced second consecutive quarterly loss

UBS AG, Swiss bank, has announced a second consecutive quarterly loss. 

From UBS,

Pre-tax profit was CHF 471 million in the fourth quarter of 2011 compared with CHF 888 million in the previous quarter, which included a gain of CHF 433 million from the sale of our strategic investment portfolio and CHF 85 million of restructuring charges. Excluding this gain, the gross margin on invested assets declined by 6 basis points to 91 basis points, as a result of lower client activity and lower interest income. Net new money inflows of CHF 3.1 billion were recorded in the fourth quarter.

The bank is expecting poor performance in the first quarter of the new year.

Further Reading:
SayPeople

Canon's six new PowerShot cameras

Canon has announced six PowerShot A-series digital cameras on February 7, Tuesday.

These cameras are PowerShot A4000 IS ($200), PowerShot A3400 IS Cameras ($180), PowerShot A2400 IS ($150), PowerShot A2300 Cameras , PowerShot A1300 ($120) and PowerShot A810 ($110) Cameras.

All these cameras have some things common such as 16-megapixel sensor, 28mm wide angle lens and can take 720p video.

These cameras are available in a wide range of specifications, colors and prices.

"The new additions to Canon's new PowerShot A-series lineup will provide entry-level users with many options to unlock their creativity and capture high-quality images at a budget-friendly price," said Yuichi Ishizuka, executive vice president and general manager, Imaging Technologies & Communications Group, Canon U.S.A.

Further Reading:
SayPeople