Techno Tube...

‘People have spoken’, both Britain, EU ‘indispensable partners’: Obama President Barack Obama said on Friday the US relationship with both Britain and the European Union would endure in the wake of British voters’ decision to leave the EU. “The people of the United Kingdom have spoken, and we respect their decision,” Obama said in a statement. “The United Kingdom and the European Union will remain indispensable partners of the United States even as they begin negotiating their ongoing relationship,” Obama added. Britain’s decision at a referendum on Thursday forced the resignation of Prime Minister David Cameron and dealt the biggest blow to the European project of greater unity since World War Two. Obama, during a visit to London in April, had argued passionately against Brexit, or Britain’s exit from the EU, in an unusually strong intervention into British politics. He had warned that close NATO ally Britain would be “in the back of the queue” for a trade deal with th...

Coolpad VR 1x Virtual Reality Headset Launched at Rs. 999 Coolpad has launched a virtual reality headset for smartphones in India. Available from Friday via Amazon India, the Coolpad VR 1x has been priced at Rs. 999. While the company says the headset is meant for Coolpad devices, it adds the headset will work with any smartphone with screen sizes between 4.7 and 5.7 inches with am HD resolution. For it to work properly, the smartphone must also be equipped with a gyroscope. Coolpad devices the headset is officially compatible with include the Note 3, Note 3 Lite, Note 3 Plus, and Max. The Chinese company says its VR headset comes with 'customisable lenses' that adjust focal length, something it says makes it comfortable to use for long durations.  Syed Tajuddin, CEO, Coolpad India said, "With visual reality being the new fun gadget for the Y generation and fast catching up with youth, we are eager to enter this space and offer t...

Make in India: Coolpad to invest Rs 30 crore for making smartphones here Chinese handset-maker Coolpad will invest over Rs. 30 crores in the country in manufacturing, research and development (R&D) and design as it launched a new smartphone – Coolpad Note 3 – priced at Rs. 8,999 on Friday. The company also said it will partner with Videocon to manufacture smartphones in the country and will roll out nearly half a million devices from its facility in Maharashtra. “The first Made-in-India Coolpad phone will be available in the first quarter of 2016,” Coolpad vice president Johnson Luo said. “India is very crucial market for Coolpad and we believe we will learn a lot from our investments here. We are here to bring affordable smartphones to the users,” Luo added. Coolpad, which produces nearly 34 million smartphones every year and has $3 billion (roughly Rs. 19,430 crores) revenue, had earlier launched in India with the Dazen brand name which was a partnership between Co...

China Completes Construction of Lighthouses in Disputed South China Sea SHANGHAI, CHINA:   China has completed the construction of two lighthouses in the disputed South China Sea, the official Xinhua news agency reported, as tensions in the region mount over Beijing's maritime ambitions. A completion ceremony was held for the lighthouses on Huayang Reef and Chigua Reef in the Spratly islands, Xinhua said late on Friday. The United States and the Philippines have opposed the construction. China claims most of the energy-rich South China Sea, through which $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes every year, and the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Taiwan and Brunei have overlapping claims. China said on Friday it would not stand for violations of its territorial waters in the name of freedom of navigation, as the United States considers sailing warships to waters inside the 12-nautical-mile zones around islands it has built in the Spratly chain. Washington has signalled i...

On Its First Birthday, Mangalyaan Flaunts Stunning Images of Mars NEW DELHI:   Mangalyaan, India's maiden mission to Mars, completed a year in space today and as part of the first anniversary celebrations, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has launched a  'Mars Atlas'  in Bengaluru.   The Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) has sent back some stunning images of the Red Planet including the best collection of the full disc of Mars and charted the highest volcanoes and deepest valleys of the Solar System. Over 100 images from a collection of 350 acquired by the Mars Colour Camera on the spacecraft have been compiled in a form of a scientific atlas. These images and the data sent by the mission will help to unlock the mystery of the Red Planet. According to the ISRO, "the knowledge acquired by the analysis of the data suggests enhanced possibility of the presence of life on this now dry and dusty planet." This possibly refers to the ...

Supermoon plus eclipse equals rare sky show Sunday night Cape Canaveral, Florida:  Get ready for a rare double feature this weekend, starring our very own moon. A total lunar eclipse will share the stage with a so-called supermoon on Sunday night or early Monday, depending where you are. That combination hasn’t been seen since 1982 and won’t happen again until 2033. When a full or new moon makes its closest approach to Earth, that’s a supermoon. Although still about 220,000 miles away, this full moon will look bigger and brighter than usual. In fact, it will be the closest full moon of the year, about 30,000 miles closer than the average distance. (The moon’s orbit is far from a perfect circle.) Nasa planetary scientist Noah Petro is hoping the celestial event will ignite more interest in the moon. He is deputy project for the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, which has been studying the moon from lunar orbit since 2009. “The moon’s a dynamic place,” Petro said...

Instagram overtakes Twitter with 400 million active users Instagram now has more than 400 million active users, the company announced Tuesday, making it far larger than rival Twitter Inc with around 80 million more users. The photo-sharing app has grown rapidly over the past three years, faster than many of its social app competitors, including Twitter and Snapchat. The Facebook unit has rolled out a number of products and features this year aimed at getting users to spend more time in the app. More than 75% of Instagram's users are outside the United States, the company wrote in a blog post. More than half of the 100 million newest users living in Europe and Asia with Brazil, Japan and Indonesia adding the most users. Facebook bought Instagram in 2012 for $1 billion and has been slow to monetize the app. It recently expanded its platform to all advertisers, rather than a select few, and is expected to make up to $2.8 billion in advertising revenue in 2017, according to e...

Ford Figo hatchback re-launched at a starting price of Rs 4.29 lakh NEW DELHI: Introducing the revamped version of its  hatchback,  Ford  India on Wednesday launched the  Ford Figo hatchback  at a starting price of Rs 4.29 lakh (ex-showroom Delhi). While the petrol version prices go up to Rs 6.40 lakh that of the diesel go up to Rs 7.40 lakh. The Base variant of the 2015 Figo gets a driver airbag, whereas other trims get dual front airbags, or 6 airbags in case of the top-end Titanium+ variant. The new Figo is available in 7 colors. The new Figo measures 3,886 mm in length, 1,695 mm in width, 1,525 mm in height and 2,491 mm in wheelbase. It has a ground clearance of 174 mm and boot space of 257 litres. The new Figo is available with three engine options. The 1.2-litre Ti-VCT petrol, the 1.5-litre Ti-VCT petrol exclusively paired to the 6-speed Powershift automatic and the 1.5-litre TDCi diesel engine. The ARAI-rated fuel economy for the 1.2 petrol stand...

Salman Khan's 'Bajrangi Bhaijaan' roaring success overseas Salman Khan's `Bajrangi Bhaijaan` (BB) is breaking all records since it released on July 17 and is continuing to strike gold at box-office even after 7 weeks in India as well as overseas. The movie has minted crores abroad and is a roaring success collecting over Rs 193.39 crores overseas.

Bose launches new wireless headphones Sound systems pioneer Bose on Friday launched the new SoundLink around-ear wireless headphones II at a price of Rs.21,150. The company says that the headset has a battery life of 15 hours and comes with multi-point for connecting two devices along with quick pairing with near-field communication (NFC) technology. "We believe when you give up wires, you shouldn't have to compromise audio performance or convenience," said Bose wireless headphones general manager Bernice Cramer. "So, we did more than make the SoundLink II the best-sounding wireless headphones out there. We made them the most hassle-free wireless headphones too. You'll notice how great your music sounds first, and then you'll notice that we solved all the little and big problems that no one else has. That's the power of great engineering - it makes the entire streaming music experience that much better," he added.