Edition 93 of my email newsletter, Newley’s Notes, went out yesterday.
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Hi, I’m Newley Purnell – welcome to the latest issue of Newley’s Notes, where I share my Wall Street Journal stories, posts from by blog, and various links about technology, business and life.
📝 What I Wrote in The WSJ
- Apple Assembles First iPhones in India – A scoop with my colleagues that was followed by many other news outlets. Taiwanese manufacturer Wistron has completed a trial run of the SE – Apple’s least expensive iPhone – at a plant in Bangalore. The first-ever “assembled in India” devices could hit stores soon.
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As Allegations Swirl Around SoftBank, It Calls Them ‘Sabotage’ – A story with colleagues that begins:
A contentious back-and-forth between SoftBank Group Corp. and attorneys who say they represent anonymous, disgruntled shareholders is riling the Japanese telecommunications titan.
The difficulties for SoftBank come as it is poised to begin investing $100 billion in technology startups around the world, and they have drawn concern from a Saudi Arabian investment vehicle that is set to commit $45 billion to the SoftBank technology fund.
The allegations from the attorneys have lingered over the past year about the conduct of top SoftBank executives, especially in India…
Click through to read the whole thing.
- India’s Paytm Secures $1.4 Billion Investment From SoftBank – The mobile payments firm is getting additional firepower to expand its services here.
💬 What I Wrote at Newley.com
- Why I’m Excited about Manton Reece’s Microblogging Effort – TLDR: A new tool makes it easier to control content I create.
📲 5 Must-Reads in Tech
1. A round-up of everything “WannaCry.” This comprehensive post from Troy Hunt explains what we know about the ransomware that hit computers around the world. There’s also a Wikipedia page about the attack.
2. The biggest news from Google’s annual developer conference, Google I/O, involved Google Lens (image recognition), a standalone virtual reality headset, new photo tools, and more. Here’s the BBC on the gathering’s 5 biggest announcements. And The Verge has a more comprehensive rundown.
3. The 20th anniversary of Amazon’s IPO. When the company when public in May 1997, it was worth $438 million. Now its worth almost $460 billion. Recode has some charts illustrating its rise. (Related: My notes from “The Everything Store,” Brad Stone’s excellent 2013 book on Jeff Bezos and the company he created.)
4. How tech titans rake it in. Speaking of charts, here’s a breakdown of how the likes of Facebook, Google, Apple, Amazon and Microsoft make their money. (Don’t forget: Google and Facebook are enormously successful at attracting advertising bucks; they get comparatively little revenue from other sources.)
5. Bill Gates tweeted some advice for new college grads. While most were inspirational tips, he also mentioned one big regret: “When I left school, I knew little about the world’s worst inequities. Took me decades to learn.”
💫 1 Fun Thing
1. The Bluths are coming back. The entire cast of hit TV show “Arrested Development” is returning to to Netflix for a fifth season next year.
As creator Mitchell Hurwitz said in a statement, “…we all felt that stories about a narcissistic, erratically behaving family in the building business — and their desperate abuses of power — are really underrepresented on TV these days.”
What’d I miss? Just hit reply to send me links, rants, raves, juicy news scoops and anything else.
Thanks for reading.
Love,
Newley