ATimes — Fitbit Blaze will have features such as PurePulse continuous, wrist-based heart rate trackin, SmartTrack automatic exercise recognition and automatic sleep tracking. As part of ‘China is Getting Fit’ campaign, Fitbit and Alibaba joined hands to organize a major health and fitness event, educating consumers about how technology can help them stay healthy.
http://atimes.com/2016/05/technology-now-you-can-order-fitbit-bands-from-alibaba/
MIS Asia — IBM and Deloitte Financial Crime Strategy and Response Network have teamed on mitigating financial crime in Asia. Deloitte will use the IBM Counter Fraud Management (CFM) platform to deliver advanced financial crime data analytics services across the region. IBM CFM is an integrated set of solutions that are designed to address all phases of enterprise financial crime measures.
http://www.mis-asia.com/resource/industries/deloitte-ibm-mitigate-financial-crime-in-asia/
Enterprise Innovation — IBM said it plans to collaborate with eight universities to expand the collection of security data for IBM Watson. The company unveiled on Tuesday Watson for Cyber Security, a new cloud-based version of its cognitive technology trained on the language of security as part of a year-long research project.
Nikkei — HONG KONG — Tencent Holdings reported strong first-quarter earnings that beat analyst forecasts as the Chinese tech giant drew in more users and advertisers to its gaming and social media platforms. However, some advertisers are growing cautious in their spending amid the country’s economic slowdown.
Deal Street Asia — Chinese dating app Tantan has raised a $32 million Series C round of financing from a group of investors led by DST Global, Vision Plus Capital and LB Investment. “After this round of funding, we plan to continue focusing on [user] pain points, improving daily usage, and consolidating our position in the social application industry,” PR spokesperson from Tantan told TechNode.
Telecom Asia — Singapore’s MyRepublic has been found to provide the fastest average streaming speeds among ISPs in 12 APAC countries in Netflix’s first ISP speed index for the region. MyRepublic provided average streaming speeds of 3.78Mbps under Netflix’s calculations, narrowly beating out StarHub Fiber at 3.71Mbps.
http://www.telecomasia.net/content/myrepublic-tops-first-netflix-apac-isp-speed-index
Mobile World Live — Australia’s third largest operator Vodafone partnered with Chinese equipment vendor Huawei to conduct pre-standard trials of Narrow Band-IoT (NB-IoT), which is designed to boost coverage at lower power compared with existing mobile technologies. The operator held trials at several sites in Melbourne last month and is planning more trials in other cities in the coming months.
Asia Briefs: Vodafone trials NB-IoT in Melbourne, New iPhone to feature Intel modem chips & more
Enterprise Innovation — Facebook reported more government requests for user data and content restrictions pursuant to local law in the second half of 2015. The report posted in the Facebook newsroom by Chris Sonderby, Deputy General Counsel, stated that government requests for account data increased by 13 percent, from 41,214 requests to 46,763.
Nikkei — CHIBA, Japan — For Peter Vesterbacka, the startup convention he helped to create is not just a place to network and pitch ideas. “It’s more like a movement,” he said, dressed in a red hoodie emblazoned with the face of a large and decidedly displeased bird.
http://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Trends/Tech-stars-at-Slush-Asia-Now-s-the-ideal-time-for-startups
Telecom Asia — Ooredoo Maldives has selected Alepo to provide a fixed broadband charging and customer care solution for its nationwide fixed broadband network. The introduction of fixed broadband services — realized by a new fiber optic submarine cable — is expected to strengthen Ooredoo Maldives’ positioning as the most advanced fixed mobile service provider in the SAARC region.
http://www.telecomasia.net/content/ooredoo-maldives-readies-fixed-broadband-services-alepo
PRNewswire — NEW YORK: Across Asia a total of around 3.8 billion mobile subscribers were being served by a large number of mobile operators heading into 2016. The operators are continuing to drive the market, expanding it by between 5% and 10% annually at the moment. Whilst the overall growth rate in the region has moderated the sheer numbers are impressive. This market report presents a wide-ranging review, providing details on around almost 200 of the mobile operators to be found in Asia in 2015.
RC Wireless — SoftBank and Chinese online and mobile commerce company Alibaba Group formed a joint venture dubbed SB Cloud Corporation to provide cloud computing services in Japan. The company said it will use technologies and solutions from Alibaba Cloud, the cloud computing arm of Alibaba Group.
SoftBank, Alibaba create JV to offer cloud computing services
Enterprise Innovation — Singapore jumped five places in the 2016 A.T. Kearney Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) Confidence Index to make it to the 10th spot in the list. The Index is an analysis of how political, economic, and regulatory changes will likely affect FDI inflows into countries in the coming years.
Enterprise Innovation — A Forrester study commissioned by Microsoft revealed vastly different levels of maturity in cloud understanding and adoption among financial services institutions (FSIs) in Hong Kong and across Asia Pacific. The report titled ‘Cloud is Critical to Digital Transformation in the Asia Pacific Financial Sector’ analyzed the impact of regulatory compliance, security and privacy, and reliability concerns on current and future cloud initiatives.
Cloud News Asia 