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In what he’s calling “the single biggest infrastructure decision” in the country’s history,” Australia Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s announced an A$43 billion (US $30.6 billion) project to create a nationwide high speed broadband network. The goal’s to get 90 percent of homes and business up to 100Mbps speeds with fiber optic connection, with a less impressive 12Mbps wireless / satellite for the rest. Up to 49 percent of the funds will be from the private sector; the government will initially invest A$4.7b, while A$20b will come from a national infrastructure fund and the sale of bonds. The venture’s expected to take seven to eight years, and Rudd said the government intends to sell off its stake after five years. Sure, it’s not 1Gbps by 2012, but hey, they might end up beating us at the “nationwide broadband” game.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Read – Sydney Morning Herald
Read – Reuters

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In what he’s calling “the single biggest infrastructure decision” in the country’s history,” Australia Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s announced an A$43 billion (US $30.6 billion) project to create a nationwide high speed broadband network. The goal’s to get 90 percent of homes and business up to 100Mbps speeds with fiber optic connection, with a less impressive 12Mbps wireless / satellite for the rest. Up to 49 percent of the funds will be from the private sector; the government will initially invest A$4.7b, while A$20b will come from a national infrastructure fund and the sale of bonds. The venture’s expected to take seven to eight years, and Rudd said the government intends to sell off its stake after five years. Sure, it’s not 1Gbps by 2012, but hey, they might end up beating us at the “nationwide broadband” game.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Read – Sydney Morning Herald
Read – Reuters

Related posts

• Australia’s A$43 billion broadband project: up to 100Mbps in 90% of homes and businesses (0)
• New Zealander buys used MP3 player, finds classified US Army files in like-new condition (0)
• China telcos gain the most with approval of 3G licenses (0)
• [CES 2010] On The Ground At CES 2010 – What’s Buzzin’ ? (0)
• [CES 2009] Casio Pocket-Size High Speed Digicams (0)

This isn’t fully official just yet, but a recently leaked Car and Driver interview with Tesla CEO Elon Musk looks to have all but confirmed that the company received some funding from GE Capital as part of its current $40 million haul. While the exact amount GE has invested isn’t clear, the company is apparently the second-largest investor in this round of financing, behind only Musk himself. As you’re no doubt aware, this is on top of the $350 million in loans that Tesla is apparently close to securing from the U.S. government, which isn’t exactly enough for it to rest easy given its ambitions, but is at least slightly encouraging for folks itching to get behind the wheel of a Model S. Musk even goes one step further in an attempt to assure potential customers in the interview, saying that “even in the worst case of an Armageddon scenario, I’ll personally refund people [their money] if need be,” adding quickly that he thinks there’s “very little danger of that.”

Update: According to Earth2Tech, this deal is off the table… and may have never been on it to begin with. GE Capital was apparently “closely watching” Tesla, but there had been no official deal. When the site reached out to Tesla, here’s what they had to say:

GE had committed to invest in Tesla and sent an e-mail confirming the investment, but GE backed out on the day it was supposed to wire funds to Tesla. The decision came after GE went into company-wide capital conservation mode.

So, really, no kind of investment at all. If you were a Tesla shareholder, you’d probably be thinking about putting a tighter leash on Elon Musk right around now.

Update 2: Here’s a statement directly from Tesla:

GE has not invested in Tesla.

When Car & Driver interviewed Elon Musk a couple months ago, GE had committed to invest in Tesla and had sent an e-mail confirming the investment. But GE backed out on the day it was supposed to wire funds to Tesla. The decision came after GE went into company-wide capital conservation mode.

In any case, GE’s investment allocation was taken up by venture capital firms Westly Group, Technology Partners and Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Tesla closed the $40 million round without a problem earlier this year.

Read – GE Invests In Tesla
Read – GE “Watching” Tesla, Does Not (Yet) Invest

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Is it a portable media player, or just a media player? Should it be worn around the neck, or simply left on the living room table? These questions and more become yours to answer should you choose to invest in mobiBLU’s A10 UFO. All we’re told is that it’s available in glossy red or glossy black and that it features Bluetooth, support for a multitude of file formats, a built-in battery, headphone jack and 2/4/8GB of internal storage. If you look carefully, you’ll notice that the red version is actually already starting to float upwards upon the strumming of the first chords in “White Rabbit.” Far out, man.

[Via AnythingButiPod]
Source

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By Luke Anderson

I have a problem that recurs almost every winter. No one can get through to me cell when I’m driving, since I just toss my phone in my coat pocket. I usually have my music loud enough that I don’t hear the ringer, and the vibrating is useless. I’ve been better about it since I picked up my iPhone as I tend to plug it into my stereo (and thus my music is muted when a call comes in). Well if you tend to run into a similar issue of missing calls in the car, you might invest a few bucks in one of these Mathmos Badges.

These are actually meant for attaching to a bag or piece of clothing, however, I think with a bit of work you could affix it somewhere in your car. Sure, it might be a bit cheesy looking, but if your calls are important it just might be worth it. You can pick one up for about $9, the only catch is that they don’t work with 3G phones.

[ FindMeAGift ] VIA [ UberReview ]

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