Software giant&nbsp;Oracle&nbsp;is weighing a bid to join Microsoft in the race to acquire part of TikTok, Bloomberg reported on&nbsp;Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter.

It has preliminarily approached companies including Sequoia Capital to join a bid for the app's operations in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the report said.

The move would represent a strategic departure for Oracle, which caters mostly to corporate customers and generates the bulk of its sales from cloud offerings and software licensing.

US&nbsp;President Donald Trump said&nbsp;that Oracle Corp is a good company and could take over popular Chinese-owned social media app TikTok in the United States, after he issued an order mandating its sale in 90 days.

Oracle's co-founder and Chairman Larry Ellison is one of the few top technology executive to openly support Trump, who has ordered ByteDance to divest&nbsp;TikTok&nbsp;amid concerns over the safety of the personal data of US&nbsp;consumers.

Oracle is working with some of ByteDance's investors, including General Atlantic and Sequoia Capital, on making an offer for the&nbsp;TikTok&nbsp;assets that would challenge a rival bid from Microsoft Corp, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Also read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/science-tech/microsoft-to-bid-goodbye-to-internet-explorer-and-legacy-edge-after-25-years-321569">Microsoft to bid goodbye to Internet Explorer and legacy edge after 25 years</a>

TikTok has stepped up its defense against US accusations that the popular video app is a national security threat, denouncing what it called "rumors and misinformation" about its links to the Chinese government.

As tensions soar between the world's two biggest economies, Trump has claimed TikTok could be used by China to track the locations of federal employees, build dossiers on people for blackmail, and conduct corporate espionage.

Also read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/setting-the-record-straight-tiktok-denies-trumps-accusations-321440">Setting the record straight: TikTok denies Trump's accusations</a>

The US leader early this month also ordered a ban on the messaging app WeChat, which is used extensively in China.

On Friday, Trump signed a separate executive order for ByteDance to sell its interest in Musical.ly, the app it bought and merged with TikTok in 2017, citing national security.

TikTok said the US action "risks undermining global businesses' trust in the United States' commitment to the rule of law, which has served as a magnet for investment and spurred decades of American economic growth."

TikTok also repeated its intention to "pursue all remedies available to us in order to ensure that the rule of law is not discarded."

China meanwhile on Monday slammed Washington for using "digital gunboat diplomacy" in the TikTok case.

Software giant Oracle is weighing a bid to join Microsoft in the race to acquire part of TikTok, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter.

Software giant Oracle is weighing a bid to join Microsoft in the race to acquire part of TikTok, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter. It has preliminarily approached companies including Sequoia Capital to join a bid for the app's operations in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the report said. The move would represent a strategic departure for Oracle, which caters mostly to corporate customers and generates the bulk of its sales from cloud offerings and software licensing. US President Donald Trump said that Oracle Corp is a good company and could take over popular Chinese-owned social media app TikTok in the United States, after he issued an order mandating its sale in 90 days. Oracle's co-founder and Chairman Larry Ellison is one of the few top technology executive to openly support Trump, who has ordered ByteDance to divest TikTok amid concerns over the safety of the personal data of US consumers. Oracle is working with some of ByteDance's investors, including General Atlantic and Sequoia Capital, on making an offer for the TikTok assets that would challenge a rival bid from Microsoft Corp, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Also read: Microsoft to bid goodbye to Internet Explorer and legacy edge after 25 years TikTok has stepped up its defense against US accusations that the popular video app is a national security threat, denouncing what it called "rumors and misinformation" about its links to the Chinese government. As tensions soar between the world's two biggest economies, Trump has claimed TikTok could be used by China to track the locations of federal employees, build dossiers on people for blackmail, and conduct corporate espionage. Also read: Setting the record straight: TikTok denies Trump's accusations The US leader early this month also ordered a ban on the messaging app WeChat, which is used extensively in China. On Friday, Trump signed a separate executive order for ByteDance to sell its interest in Musical.ly, the app it bought and merged with TikTok in 2017, citing national security. TikTok said the US action "risks undermining global businesses' trust in the United States' commitment to the rule of law, which has served as a magnet for investment and spurred decades of American economic growth." TikTok also repeated its intention to "pursue all remedies available to us in order to ensure that the rule of law is not discarded." China meanwhile on Monday slammed Washington for using "digital gunboat diplomacy" in the TikTok case.

Oracle joins bid to acquire TikTok's US operations: Report

Backing the latest bid of US-tech giant Oracle for Chinese shot video app TikTok. President of US Donald Trump has said that oracle is a good company and could take over TikTok.

Oracle's co-founder is Trump's supporter: Oracle could take over TikTok

It seems that the dark clouds of controversies are hovering over Google relentlessly. After recently being slapped with a fine of record 2.7 billion US dollars by European antitrust regulators for favouring its own shopping service, Google has now been accused of funding academic research in the US and Europe - with the intention to influence decisions on matters of public policy.

US-based Campaign for Accountability (CfA) has come out with a <a href="http://googletransparencyproject.org/articles/google-academics-inc">report called &ldquo;Google Academics&rdquo;</a>, alleging the US tech giant of funding 329 research papers (with 179 directly-funded and 150 indirectly-funded) since 2005 on issues related to antitrust, net neutrality, copyright and anti-piracy, to protect its business interests.

CfA executive director Daniel Stevens has even gone on to state that the company has used its position and wealth to influence policy makers. &ldquo;Google uses its immense wealth and power to attempt to influence policy makers at every level.&rdquo; Because the fact of the matter is that policy makers and regulators often rely on research papers and academic work for a lot of policy decisions. And if the report was true - in entirety or in parts, this could mean that most of the decisions by policy makers must have inadvertently been taken in favour of Google.

Calling the report &ldquo;highly misleading&rdquo;, Google, however, has outrightly rejected all the allegations, but there are a few observations that can&rsquo;t go unnoticed. Take a look at the graph below to understand some interesting insights.

<div class="ui-state-default" contenteditable="false"><img alt="" draggable="false" src="http://s.wionews.com/photos/1-antitrust-papers-screenshot-20170714110138.jpg" />
<div class="media-description">
Year-wise representation of Google-funded studies on antitrust issues. (Others)
</div>
<a class="close-mark close-div" href="javascript:void(0)" id="jqclosemark">&times;</a></div>

This is an year-wise representation of Google-funded studies on antitrust cases. As you see, the largest number of Google-funded studies were published in 2012, which coincided with the time when a plethora of antitrust investigations were made to scrutinise the company&rsquo;s practices by the Federal Trade Commission and European regulators. And as the CfA&rsquo;s report claims, 50 Google-funded studies on antitrust issues were published between 2011 and 2013.

But that spike came down by 2013 - which happened to be the same time during which the Federal Trade Commission shut its investigation. But interestingly, the studies on antitrust issues saw an upward shift in 2015. And it was the time when the European Commission pressed Google with formal antitrust charges. If the data is to be believed, more than a third (113) of the Google-funded studies centre around antitrust issues.

Another graph here highlights that it was just not antitrust, but research papers around copyright issues were also properly timed by Google.

<div class="ui-state-default" contenteditable="false"><img alt="" draggable="false" src="http://s.wionews.com/photos/2-copyright-20170714110538.jpg" />
<div class="media-description">
Google-funded copyright papers surged as the company battled anti-piracy bills. (Reuters)
</div>
<a class="close-mark close-div" href="javascript:void(0)" id="jqclosemark">&times;</a></div>

&quot;Google-funded studies on copyright issues also surged in 2012, as the company fought anti-piracy bills in Congress. They peaked the following year amid continuing battles over whether it could be held responsible for distributing pirated books, music or movies,&quot; says the report.

And as the data from the report highlights, 329 Google-funded research papers identified have been cited nearly 6,000 times in over 4,700 unique articles.

It has been further reported that all these Google-funded studies in question were authored by academics and economic consultants from some of the prominent schools and universities, including Stanford, MIT, Harvard, and University of California Berkeley.

While Google may not be the only company to have engaged in such unfair practices to advance policy goals, but insights from the report and antitrust charges slapped in the past hint at the company&rsquo;s involvement in unscrupulous business practices.

Google retorts to CfA&rsquo;s report

Responding to allegations made by the CfA, Google has called the report &ldquo;highly misleading.&rdquo; Expressing disappointment, Google mentions that the CfA has even attributed Google for the work supported by organisations to which Google donated money to.

Google further points out that many of the academics listed by the Campaign for Accountability have condemned the company, their approach and policy positions on a wide range of topics.

But what is ironic here is that Google in return goes on to ask the CfA to reveal their funders. Taking potshots at the CfA in its snooty <a href="https://www.blog.google/topics/public-policy/responding-campaign-accountability-report-academic-research/">blog post</a>, Google highlights that this group has consistently refused to name its corporate funders. And without mincing its words, Google has directly named Oracle as one of the CfA&rsquo;s funders - something it says the world already knows about.

As Google claims, Oracle &quot;is running a well-documented lobbying campaign against us. In its own name and through proxies, Oracle has funded many hundreds of articles, research papers, symposia and reports.&quot;

While Google has clearly dismissed the report, the data and statistics listed in the CfA report put forth a scenario, which, if proven true, could be damaging to the industry and the academic world at large.

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

?Google uses its immense wealth and power to attempt to influence policy makers at every level,? says CfA executive director Daniel Stevens

It seems that the dark clouds of controversies are hovering over Google relentlessly. After recently being slapped with a fine of record 2.7 billion US dollars by European antitrust regulators for favouring its own shopping service, Google has now been accused of funding academic research in the US and Europe - with the intention to influence decisions on matters of public policy. US-based Campaign for Accountability (CfA) has come out with a report called “Google Academics”, alleging the US tech giant of funding 329 research papers (with 179 directly-funded and 150 indirectly-funded) since 2005 on issues related to antitrust, net neutrality, copyright and anti-piracy, to protect its business interests. CfA executive director Daniel Stevens has even gone on to state that the company has used its position and wealth to influence policy makers. “Google uses its immense wealth and power to attempt to influence policy makers at every level.” Because the fact of the matter is that policy makers and regulators often rely on research papers and academic work for a lot of policy decisions. And if the report was true - in entirety or in parts, this could mean that most of the decisions by policy makers must have inadvertently been taken in favour of Google. Calling the report “highly misleading”, Google, however, has outrightly rejected all the allegations, but there are a few observations that can’t go unnoticed. Take a look at the graph below to understand some interesting insights. Year-wise representation of Google-funded studies on antitrust issues. (Others) × This is an year-wise representation of Google-funded studies on antitrust cases. As you see, the largest number of Google-funded studies were published in 2012, which coincided with the time when a plethora of antitrust investigations were made to scrutinise the company’s practices by the Federal Trade Commission and European regulators. And as the CfA’s report claims, 50 Google-funded studies on antitrust issues were published between 2011 and 2013. But that spike came down by 2013 - which happened to be the same time during which the Federal Trade Commission shut its investigation. But interestingly, the studies on antitrust issues saw an upward shift in 2015. And it was the time when the European Commission pressed Google with formal antitrust charges. If the data is to be believed, more than a third (113) of the Google-funded studies centre around antitrust issues. Another graph here highlights that it was just not antitrust, but research papers around copyright issues were also properly timed by Google. Google-funded copyright papers surged as the company battled anti-piracy bills. (Reuters) × "Google-funded studies on copyright issues also surged in 2012, as the company fought anti-piracy bills in Congress. They peaked the following year amid continuing battles over whether it could be held responsible for distributing pirated books, music or movies," says the report. And as the data from the report highlights, 329 Google-funded research papers identified have been cited nearly 6,000 times in over 4,700 unique articles. It has been further reported that all these Google-funded studies in question were authored by academics and economic consultants from some of the prominent schools and universities, including Stanford, MIT, Harvard, and University of California Berkeley. While Google may not be the only company to have engaged in such unfair practices to advance policy goals, but insights from the report and antitrust charges slapped in the past hint at the company’s involvement in unscrupulous business practices. Google retorts to CfA’s report Responding to allegations made by the CfA, Google has called the report “highly misleading.” Expressing disappointment, Google mentions that the CfA has even attributed Google for the work supported by organisations to which Google donated money to. Google further points out that many of the academics listed by the Campaign for Accountability have condemned the company, their approach and policy positions on a wide range of topics. But what is ironic here is that Google in return goes on to ask the CfA to reveal their funders. Taking potshots at the CfA in its snooty blog post, Google highlights that this group has consistently refused to name its corporate funders. And without mincing its words, Google has directly named Oracle as one of the CfA’s funders - something it says the world already knows about. As Google claims, Oracle "is running a well-documented lobbying campaign against us. In its own name and through proxies, Oracle has funded many hundreds of articles, research papers, symposia and reports." While Google has clearly dismissed the report, the data and statistics listed in the CfA report put forth a scenario, which, if proven true, could be damaging to the industry and the academic world at large.

Is Google funding academics to protect its business interests?

In a move to improve the government&#39;s computing system, President Donald Trump met with the heads of 18 US technology companies including Apple, Amazon.com&nbsp;and Microsoft on Monday.&nbsp;

Others who attended the meeting included Alphabet executive chairman Eric Schmidt, venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins chairman John Doerr and the CEOs of Microsoft International Business Machines, Intel,&nbsp;Qualcomm, Oracle and Adobe Systems. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was invited, but he could not attend because of a conflict, the company said.&nbsp;

The White House wants to update government information technology systems, cut costs, eliminate waste and improve service. Trump on Monday cited estimates that the government could save up to $1 trillion over 10 years through such measures.&nbsp;

&quot;Our goal is to lead a sweeping transformation of the federal government&rsquo;s technology that will deliver dramatically better services for citizens,&quot; Trump said. &quot;Government needs to catch up with the technology revolution.&quot;

The executives are part of the so-called American Technology Council that Trump formed in May to support efforts to modernize the US government.

&ldquo;The US&nbsp;should have the most modern government in the world. Today it doesn&rsquo;t,&rdquo; Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook said. Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos said he wanted the Trump administration to make use of commercially available technologies, worker retraining, machine learning and artificial intelligence. 
 
Before meeting with Trump, the CEOs met in 10 small group sessions with Vice President Mike Pence, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, along with the presidents of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Ohio State University.

Jared Kushner, Trump&#39;s son-in-law and adviser, said the administration wanted to &quot;unleash the creativity of the private sector to provide citizen services in a way that has never happened before.&quot;

He said the administration was scrapping unneeded regulations for government computing systems, such as a rule on preventing Y2K issues. Most of the government&#39;s 6,100 data centers can be consolidated and moved to a cloud-based storage system.

The White House is seeking to shrink government, reduce the federal workforce and eliminate regulations. Trump in March signed an order to overhaul the federal government and tapped Kushner to lead a White House Office of American Innovation to leverage business ideas and potentially privatise some government functions. Many of the tech executives are eager to get White House help in dealing with regulatory and other policy issues such as visas for highly skilled workers.

A 2016 US&nbsp;Government Accountability Office report estimated that the U.S. government spent more than $80 billion on IT annually, excluding classified operations. In 2015, the US&nbsp;government made at least 7,000 separate IT investments and some agencies were using systems that had components at least 50 years old. &quot;This structure is unsustainable,&quot; Kushner said.

Visa programme

The CEOs and White House also planned to discuss Trump&#39;s review announced in April of the US&nbsp;visa program for bringing high-skilled foreign workers into the country.&nbsp; 
 
The council also seeks to boost the security of US&nbsp;government IT systems and wants to learn from private-sector practices. In 2015, hackers exposed the personal information of 22 million people from US&nbsp;government databases. 
 
The White House thinks it can learn from credit card companies about significantly reducing fraud. A 2016 government audit found that in Medicaid alone there was $29 billion in fraud in a single year.

Following Trump&#39;s June 1 decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accords, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Walt Disney&nbsp;CEO Robert Iger stepped down from White House advisory panels. White House officials said the dispute had little impact and that they had to turn away tech leaders from Monday&#39;s event because of lack of space.

President Donald Trump met with the heads of 18 US technology companies

In a move to improve the government's computing system, President Donald Trump met with the heads of 18 US technology companies including Apple, Amazon.com and Microsoft on Monday. Others who attended the meeting included Alphabet executive chairman Eric Schmidt, venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins chairman John Doerr and the CEOs of Microsoft International Business Machines, Intel, Qualcomm, Oracle and Adobe Systems. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was invited, but he could not attend because of a conflict, the company said. The White House wants to update government information technology systems, cut costs, eliminate waste and improve service. Trump on Monday cited estimates that the government could save up to $1 trillion over 10 years through such measures. "Our goal is to lead a sweeping transformation of the federal government’s technology that will deliver dramatically better services for citizens," Trump said. "Government needs to catch up with the technology revolution." The executives are part of the so-called American Technology Council that Trump formed in May to support efforts to modernize the US government. “The US should have the most modern government in the world. Today it doesn’t,” Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook said. Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos said he wanted the Trump administration to make use of commercially available technologies, worker retraining, machine learning and artificial intelligence. Before meeting with Trump, the CEOs met in 10 small group sessions with Vice President Mike Pence, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, along with the presidents of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Ohio State University. Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and adviser, said the administration wanted to "unleash the creativity of the private sector to provide citizen services in a way that has never happened before." He said the administration was scrapping unneeded regulations for government computing systems, such as a rule on preventing Y2K issues. Most of the government's 6,100 data centers can be consolidated and moved to a cloud-based storage system. The White House is seeking to shrink government, reduce the federal workforce and eliminate regulations. Trump in March signed an order to overhaul the federal government and tapped Kushner to lead a White House Office of American Innovation to leverage business ideas and potentially privatise some government functions. Many of the tech executives are eager to get White House help in dealing with regulatory and other policy issues such as visas for highly skilled workers. A 2016 US Government Accountability Office report estimated that the U.S. government spent more than $80 billion on IT annually, excluding classified operations. In 2015, the US government made at least 7,000 separate IT investments and some agencies were using systems that had components at least 50 years old. "This structure is unsustainable," Kushner said. Visa programme The CEOs and White House also planned to discuss Trump's review announced in April of the US visa program for bringing high-skilled foreign workers into the country. The council also seeks to boost the security of US government IT systems and wants to learn from private-sector practices. In 2015, hackers exposed the personal information of 22 million people from US government databases. The White House thinks it can learn from credit card companies about significantly reducing fraud. A 2016 government audit found that in Medicaid alone there was $29 billion in fraud in a single year. Following Trump's June 1 decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accords, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Walt Disney CEO Robert Iger stepped down from White House advisory panels. White House officials said the dispute had little impact and that they had to turn away tech leaders from Monday's event because of lack of space.

Trump seeks help from tech CEOs to improve government's IT services

Oracle Corp said it would buy NetSuite Inc in a deal valued at about $9.3 billion to expand into the fast-growing cloud market. 
 
Netsuite shares rose 18.6 per cent to $108.64 in premarket trading, just shy of the offer price of $109 per share. 
 
Like rivals SAP SE and Microsoft Corp, Oracle has focused on moving its business to the cloud-based model, essentially providing services remotely via data centers rather than selling installed software. 
 
NetSuite, founded in 1998, pioneered the cloud computing revolution, by creating the first company dedicated to providing business applications over the internet. 
 
Oracle has also acquired companies such as Textura and Opower to increase its competitiveness in the cloud market. 
 
The company expects the deal to immediately add to its adjusted earnings in the first full fiscal year after the transaction closes. 
 
Oracle shares were up 1.6 per cent at $41.6 in premarket trading. 
 
(Reuters)

NetSuite pioneered cloud computing revolution by creating the first company dedicated to providing business application over the internet

Oracle Corp said it would buy NetSuite Inc in a deal valued at about $9.3 billion to expand into the fast-growing cloud market. Netsuite shares rose 18.6 per cent to $108.64 in premarket trading, just shy of the offer price of $109 per share. Like rivals SAP SE and Microsoft Corp, Oracle has focused on moving its business to the cloud-based model, essentially providing services remotely via data centers rather than selling installed software. NetSuite, founded in 1998, pioneered the cloud computing revolution, by creating the first company dedicated to providing business applications over the internet. Oracle has also acquired companies such as Textura and Opower to increase its competitiveness in the cloud market. The company expects the deal to immediately add to its adjusted earnings in the first full fiscal year after the transaction closes. Oracle shares were up 1.6 per cent at $41.6 in premarket trading. (Reuters)

Tech giant Oracle to buy cloud computing pioneer in $9.3 billion deal

A California jury on Thursday ordered business software giant Oracle to pay Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) $3 billion for backing off a promise to support data servers powered by Itanium chips. 
 
Oracle said it had acted properly in the situation and that it planned to appeal to a higher court. 
 
&quot;Two trials have now demonstrated clearly that the Itanium chip was nearing end of life, HP knew it, and was actively hiding that fact from its customers,&quot; Oracle general counsel Dorian Daley said in a released statement. 
 
&quot;Five years ago, Oracle made a software development announcement which accurately reflected the future of the Itanium microprocessor.&quot; 
 
Hewlett Packard Enterprise&nbsp;argued that Oracle breached a contract when it decided in 2011 to stop offering products running on HP servers powered by Itanium chips made by Intel. 
 
Oracle contended it never believed it had a contract to indefinitely make its software work on Itanium servers, noting that HP and Intel stopped developing the systems years ago. 
 
An initial trial four years ago ended with a state court judge ruling that there had been a contract. The jury decision on Thursday in a California state court in Silicon Valley focused on damages in the case. 
 
Daley said that Oracle has been making its software available on Itanium servers since that judge`s ruling. 
 
HPE general counsel John Schultz was quoted in media reports as saying that it was a &quot;clear breach of contract&quot; for Oracle to stop future software development for Itanium servers and that serious damage was done to HP and its customers. 
 
HP has since been split off its enterprise division.&nbsp; 
 
HPE maintained at trial that Oracle was out to get customers to switch to servers from Sun Microsystems, which Oracle bought in 2010 in a move that added hardware to its software offerings. 
 
HPE did not initially respond to an AFP request for comment. 
 
(AFP)

HPE argued that Oracle breached a contract when it stopped offering products running on HP servers powered by Itanium

A California jury on Thursday ordered business software giant Oracle to pay Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) $3 billion for backing off a promise to support data servers powered by Itanium chips. Oracle said it had acted properly in the situation and that it planned to appeal to a higher court. "Two trials have now demonstrated clearly that the Itanium chip was nearing end of life, HP knew it, and was actively hiding that fact from its customers," Oracle general counsel Dorian Daley said in a released statement. "Five years ago, Oracle made a software development announcement which accurately reflected the future of the Itanium microprocessor." Hewlett Packard Enterprise argued that Oracle breached a contract when it decided in 2011 to stop offering products running on HP servers powered by Itanium chips made by Intel. Oracle contended it never believed it had a contract to indefinitely make its software work on Itanium servers, noting that HP and Intel stopped developing the systems years ago. An initial trial four years ago ended with a state court judge ruling that there had been a contract. The jury decision on Thursday in a California state court in Silicon Valley focused on damages in the case. Daley said that Oracle has been making its software available on Itanium servers since that judge`s ruling. HPE general counsel John Schultz was quoted in media reports as saying that it was a "clear breach of contract" for Oracle to stop future software development for Itanium servers and that serious damage was done to HP and its customers. HP has since been split off its enterprise division. HPE maintained at trial that Oracle was out to get customers to switch to servers from Sun Microsystems, which Oracle bought in 2010 in a move that added hardware to its software offerings. HPE did not initially respond to an AFP request for comment. (AFP)

Oracle told to pay Hewlett Packard $3 billion in Itanium chip dispute

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