Techmeme
October 11, 2012, 7:30 PM

Top News

Daisuke Wakabayashi / Wall Street Journal:
Softbank in Advanced Talks to Acquire Sprint Nextel  —  TOKYO—Japanese mobile carrier Softbank Corp. is in advanced talks to buy U.S. operator Sprint Nextel Corp. in a deal expected to exceed ¥1 trillion ($12.81 billion) in value, a person with knowledge of the negotiations said Thursday.
Ina Fried / AllThingsD:
Sprint Confirms Talks With Softbank Over “Substantial Investment”  —  Sprint confirmed Thursday that it is in talks with Japan's Softbank about a possible deal.  —  The No. 3 U.S. wireless carrier said the discussions are about a “substantial investment by Softbank” but offered few other details.
Reuters:
Japan's Softbank in talks for $12.8 billion Sprint stake - source  —  (Reuters) - Japanese mobile carrier Softbank Corp may buy a majority stake in Sprint Nextel Corp to establish a foothold in the U.S. wireless market, in what could be the largest Japanese acquisition ever in America.
Don Clark / Digits:
Chip Design Luminary Leaves Samsung for Apple  —  Samsung recently raised eyebrows by beefing up its team of Texas-based chip designers, including those whose backgrounds pointed to an interest in chips for server systems.  Now one of the most prominent of those recruits has left the South Korean company for Apple .
Russell Holly / Geek.com:
Uncovered: Google creating a “Nexus Call Center” for device support  —  One of the big complaints surrounding the Nexus 7 launch was the lack of customer support when dealing with the device.  Google was not initially prepared to handle the volume of users that required support …
Steve Dent / Engadget:
Samsung Galaxy S III mini pops up, we go hands-on (video)  —  When word first started trickling out that Samsung planned to make a mini version of the Galaxy S III, it had the air of plausibility — we've heard from many a person about the too-large size of that phone for their hands.
Glenn Peoples / Billboard.Biz:
Business Matters: The Truth About Pandora's Payments to Artists  —  Pandora mounted an effective publicity campaign Tuesday by revealing the amounts of royalties some artists' songs generate on its service (as opposed to how much money those artists are actually collecting).
Matthew Panzarino / The Next Web:
Apple's US injunction on Samsung Galaxy Nexus reversed by appeals court  —  The US injunction on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus that Apple earned by way of a patent judge earlier this year has been reversed by an appeals court, reports Reuters.  The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit …
Adi Robertson / The Verge:
Motorola Droid RAZR HD and RAZR Maxx HD launching October 18th in US  —  Motorola's Droid RAZR HD and RAZR Maxx HD phones have finally gotten a US launch date.  A day after going on sale in Canada, the 4.7-inch Android 4.0 phones are officially set to arrive on Verizon October 18th.
Jamillah Knowles / The Next Web:
Skyfire raises $10 million series D to fuel expansion in Europe and Asia  —  Skyfire, the mobile video and cloud solutions company, has raised $10 million in series D financing to help it expand into Europe and Asia.  —  The round was led by Panorama Capital, a new investor in the company …
More: TechCrunch
Ken Yeung / The Next Web:
How an intern created Facebook's slick new mobile ad interface  —  Earlier this month, Facebook launched a significant update to its Page Manager app.  One of the things within the app was the ability for businesses to manage their pages — for brands, this is incredibly important …
Drew Olanoff / TechCrunch:
Tumblr Puts More Focus On Photos With Photoset, Its New Standalone iOS App  —  Tumblr is a company that has built a platform that seemingly morphs into something new every single time I visit it.  One of the most popular features of the service is its ability to share photos, in sets …
Luke Timmerman / Xconomy:
Exclusive: OVP Venture Partners, NW's Oldest VC Firm, To Shut Down  —  OVP Venture Partners, the Kirkland, WA-based venture firm that has invested $750 million in more than 125 high tech, biotech and clean energy companies in its history, won't raise any new funds and is gradually winding …
Matthew Panzarino / The Next Web:
Twitter open-sources its recently acquired iOS A/B testing library Clutch  —  Twitter acquired the IP and staff of iOS A/B testing company Clutch.IO for its Growth and International team back in August of this year.  Now, it has announced that it is open-sourcing the Clutch library on GitHub under Apache Public License 2.0.

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