An anonymous reader quotes USA Today: What if you could pay for your groceries using your veins? Amazon filed a patent for technology that could identify you by scanning the wrinkles in the palm of your hand and by using a light to see beneath your skin to your blood vessels. The resulting images could be used to identify you as…
Tag: patent
Tesla Patents New Chemistry For Better, Longer-Lasting and Cheaper Batteries
Tesla is closing the year by filing a patent on a new chemistry for better, longer-lasting and cheaper batteries. The new patent is related to the new battery cell that Tesla’s battery research partner, Jeff Dahn, and his team at Dalhousie University unveiled earlier this year. The new cell “should be able to power an electric vehicle for over [1 million…
Tesla Wants To Clean Windshields With Laser Beams
Tesla “may be keen on replacing the humble windshield wiper with lasers,” reports CNET. In a patent application filed this past May and published with the United States Patent and Trademark Office on Nov. 21, Tesla describes a “pulsed laser cleaning” for “debris accumulated” on glass, specifically for automotive application. It also mentions this could be used for “photo-voltaic” applications. That’s…
Wild Silkworms Produce Proteins Primed for Bioprinting
A mix of silkworms’ proteins acts as a scaffold for 3-D-printed tissues and organs. From a report: Many research groups are testing “ink” made from silk proteins to print human tissues, implants and perhaps even organs. The process is a less costly alternative to conventional 3-D printing with collagen, a key protein in the body’s natural scaffolding. Researchers in Assam, a…
Intel Says It Sold Its Modem Chip Business To Apple at ‘a Multi-Billion Dollar Loss’ Because Qualcomm Tactics Left It With No Other Choice
Intel sold its smartphone modem chip business to Apple at “a multi-billion dollar loss,” the U.S. chipmaker said in a court filing on Friday, alleging that rival Qualcomm forced it out of the market. From a report: Intel made the claims in a brief filed with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where Qualcomm is seeking to overturn a sweeping…
Chinese Online Streaming Service iQiyi Says AI Has Enhanced Efficiency Throughout Its Business
Wang Xuepu, vice president of Chinese online video streaming company iQiyi, says that artificial intelligence has enhanced the company’s efficiency in all aspects of the business. From a report: “Now we can cut thousands of hours of work to just hours,” Wang said in Mandarin at CNBC’s East Tech West conference in the Nansha district of Guangzhou, China. He said that…
Court Rules Apple Doesn’t Owe Patent Troll $503 Million
An appeals court ruled that Apple doesn’t have to pay $503 million to VirnetX, a company often accused of being a patent troll. The court didn’t reverse the original patent-infringement decision though, it just said the amount must be recalculated or a new trial held. Cult of Mac reports: VirnetX Holding Corp is sometimes referred to as a patent troll because…
How Cloudflare Stood up to a Patent Troll — and Won
Cloudflare was sued by a notorious patent troll Blackbird Technologies in 2016. Instead of giving up to its demands, Cloudflare employed a different strategy. From a blog post: In October 2016, Blackbird was looking to acquire additional patents for their portfolio when they found an incredibly broad software patent with the ambiguous title, “PROVIDING AN INTERNET THIRD PARTY DATA CHANNEL.” They…
Buying Fitbit Won’t Save Google’s Failing Wear OS
David Ruddock of AndroidPolice technology blog tries to make sense of last week’s $2.1 billion acquisition of Fitbit by Google. He argues that Fitbit’s offerings — hardware, software, engineering talent, or even patent wall — can’t save Google’s wearable operating system Wear OS. From his column: Hardware is what Google is after, with a blog post cleatly stating its acquisition of…
‘Hyperstealth’ Invisibility Cloak Developed For Military Use
Freshly Exhumed shares a report from Futurism: Canada’s Hyperstealth Biotechnology already manufactures camouflage uniforms for militaries across the globe. But now, the company has patented a new “Quantum Stealth” material that disguises a military’s soldiers — or even its tanks, aircraft, and ships — by making anything behind it seem invisible. Earlier in October, Hyperstealth filed a patent for the material,…