By Heekyong Yang and Joyce Lee SEOUL (Reuters) -South Korean battery firm LG Energy Solution (LGES) on Wednesday posted a

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 22, 2023--

Microsoft’s attempt to buy the developer of Call of Duty in the biggest tech deal ever may be pressing ahead. A judge ruled that Microsoft could go ahead with its purchase of Activision, despite objections from its rival PlayStation. The US Federal Trade Commission had attempted to block the deal amid fears that it could limit competition in gaming. But the court said that it would not stop the deal. Now the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority, which originally blocked the deal earlier this year, said that it would consider new proposals from Microsoft that might make the deal reach approval in the UK, too. “After today’s court decision in the US, our focus now turns back to the UK,” said Brad Smith, vice chair and president at Microsoft. “While we ultimately disagree with the CMA’s concerns, we are considering how the transaction might be modified in order to address those concerns in a way that is acceptable to the CMA. “In order to prioritize work on these proposals, Microsoft and Activision have agreed with the CMA that a stay of the litigation in the UK would be in the public interest and the parties have made a joint submission to the Competition Appeal Tribunal to this effect.” The deal would be the largest for Microsoft and the biggest in the history of the videogame business. In its arguments, the FTC has said Microsoft would be able to use the Activision games to leave rival console makers like Nintendo and market-leader Sony Group out in the cold. Microsoft President Brad Smith tweeted that the company was “grateful” for the “quick and thorough” decision. “Our merger will benefit consumers and workers. It will enable competition rather than allow entrenched market leaders to continue to dominate our rapidly growing industry,â€Â Bobby Kotick, Activision Blizzard CEO, said in a statement. The FTC’s complaint had cited concerns about loss of competition in console gaming, as well as subscriptions and cloud gaming. To address the FTC’s concerns, Microsoft agreed to license “Call of Duty” to rivals, including a 10-year contract with Nintendo, contingent on the merger closing. During the five-day trial in June, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella argued the company would have no incentive to shut out Sony’s PlayStation or other rivals in order to sell more Microsoft Xbox consoles. At issue in the Microsoft-Activision deal is leadership in a gaming market whose sales are expected to increase by 36% over the next four years to $321 billion, according to a PwC estimate. And while much of the testimony in the recent trial focused on “Call of Duty,” Activision produces other bestsellers like “World of Warcraft,” “Diablo” and the mobile game “Candy Crush Saga.” Additional reporting by Reuters Read More Microsoft Teams stops working in the middle of the working day Scientists invent cloak inspired by Roman god that could help us live on Mars Record-breaking sugar battery could supercharge transition to renewable energy Scientists invent cloak inspired by Roman god that could help us live on Mars Record-breaking sugar battery could supercharge transition to renewable energy Why the Battle of the Boyne has made its way into your iPhone

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A white dwarf star is undergoing the process of turning into a “cosmic diamond” as it begins to crystalise. The lullaby “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” talks about stars in the sky looking like diamonds, but for one specific type of star, that observation is truer than for others. Astronomers have observed that when a specific type of dead star starts to cool, it begins to crystalise and harden. An international team of astronomers, led by Alexander Venner of the University of Southern Queensland in Australia, have explained in a new paper Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society how a white dwarf star around 104 light-years away is doing just that. They noticed that the star, composed primarily of carbon and metallic oxygen, has a temperature-mass profile that suggests its centre is hardening into a dense “cosmic diamond” made of crystallised carbon and oxygen. The study explained: "In this work we present the discovery of a new Sirius-like quadruple system at 32 parsecs distance, composed of a crystallizing white dwarf companion to the previously known triple HD 190412.” Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter It continued: “By virtue of its association with these main sequence companions, this is the first crystallizing white dwarf whose total age can be externally constrained, a fact that we make use of by attempting to empirically measure a cooling delay caused by core crystallization in the white dwarf.” All stars eventually die out when they run out of energy. Of those that have a mass of less than around eight times that of the Sun, the vast majority will form a white dwarf star. The matter of a white dwarf star is highly compressed and as they gradually cool, they evolve into a black dwarf star when they lose heat and crystalise. Scientists’ calculations estimate the process takes around a quadrillion years (one million billion years) to complete, though the signs that the process is occurring can be identified by experts. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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Peloton has apologised to its customers after technical issues kept them from joining its special Thanksgiving ride. The rides had been held to break the Guinness World Records for the largest live streamed cycling and running classes. But they also had the effect of breaking Peloton’s systems, with riders unable to join the “Turkey Burn” class with instructor Robin Arzón for the first 20 minutes. Peloton’s relatively new chief executive, Barry McCarthy, apologised for the experience on the company’s official Facebook page. “We set out to create an amazing annual Turkey Burn Ride experience, and we let you down,” he wrote on the page. The number of riders “overwhelmed our technical infrastructure”, he said. “I know for many of you, this has become an annual tradition, and we owe you the best possible Member experience,” he wrote. “On behalf of the team, we apologise.” Despite the issues, Peloton was able to set the records for the largest live streamed cycling and running class. The company brought in Guinness World Records officials to verify the count, and were given the record for the ”Most viewers of a static cycling lesson live stream on a Bespoke platform”, as well as for running. The cycling class had 27,550 live participants, a spokesperson said. That was lower than the number that had been seen on the leaderboard, though it is not clear whether the discrepancy was the result of the technical problems. Despite the official recognition, the ride and run is not actually Peloton’s biggest live ride: 2021 and 2020 saw more, with the latter seemingly setting the record at more than 50,000 people, according to Peloton news website Pelobuddy. Peloton saw rapid growth through 2020 and 2021, spurred in large part by the move to work out at home during lockdowns. But it has experienced a number of issues since, including recalls of its bikes and seemingly lower interest as people head back to gyms. It has lost around 80 per cent of its share price value since it was listed towards the end of 2019. And its stock has fallen almost 97 per cent since its record highs in late 2020. Read More Nasa has received a signal from 10 million miles away Nvidia sued over ‘stolen’ data revealed in video conferencing mishap AI breakthrough could help us build solar panels out of ‘miracle material’

GDANSK (Reuters) -"Phantom Liberty", the long-awaited expansion to Polish video game developer CD Projekt's flagship game "Cyberpunk 2077", had received

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 19, 2023--

By David Shepardson WASHINGTON A U.S. government committee on foreign investments reviewed a record number of proposed transactions