Briefcase: Fiber and data company adds region to network
Colorado company Level 3 Communications recently expanded its network to Spokane and Coeur d’Alene.
The Fortune 500 company offers communication services such as fiber networks, voice, data, and data-center and cloud-based services.
Level 3 has 276 “on-net” buildings in the area, which means it offers fiber services there.
It currently offers services on its own fiber networks in more than 60 countries and 500 markets, according to a news release.
AT&T’s DirecTV bid endorsed
NEW YORK – The head of the Federal Communications Commission has recommended approving AT&T’s $48.5 billion purchase of DirecTV. The deal would create the country’s largest provider of cable or satellite TV.
The other four commissioners still have to vote on the proposal.
The company would have 26.4 million TV subscribers in the U.S., topping Comcast as well as a possible new giant, Charter, which wants to buy Time Warner Cable. It would also include AT&T’s nationwide network of tens of millions of wireless customers, its Internet and landline phone services and DirecTV’s millions of customers in Latin America.
Phones deal blow to Microsoft
LOS ANGELES – Microsoft booked an $8.4 billion charge in the fourth quarter, swallowing a bitter pill by writing off the Nokia phone business it bought just over a year ago. It narrowly beat analysts’ depressed expectations for a quarter that also saw a steep decline in personal computer sales even as it prepares to launch its latest operating system, Windows 10.
The software giant posted a net loss of $3.20 billion, or 40 cents per share, reversing a profit of $4.61 billion, or 55 cents per share, a year ago.
Adjusted to exclude the charges, the company posted a quarterly profit of 62 cents per share, beating the average estimate of 15 analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research of 31 cents per share.
The write-down was expected after CEO Satya Nadella announced 7,800 job cuts two weeks ago. The company will continue to make phones on a smaller scale.
Facebook loses data fight
NEW YORK – Facebook can’t block nearly 400 search warrants seeking users’ postings for a criminal fraud investigation, an appeals court said Tuesday, but the judges said they understand the social networking site’s unease about prosecutors’ extensive request.
The state Supreme Court Appellate Division ruling won’t put any new information in prosecutors’ hands. Facebook had lost earlier rulings and already turned the data over. But the case has been closely watched by social media companies, civil libertarians and prosecutors.
“We continue to believe that overly broad search warrants – granting the government the ability to keep hundreds of people’s account information indefinitely – are unconstitutional and raise important concerns about the privacy of people’s online information,” Facebook said in a statement.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office noted the unanimous decision from the Appellate Division’s First Department about the warrants, which a lower-court judge had approved at the outset. The 381 warrants helped build a disabilities benefits fraud case against police and fire department retirees.
“Our holding today does not mean that we do not appreciate Facebook’s concerns about the scope of the bulk warrants issued here or about the district attorney’s alleged right to indefinitely retain the seized accounts of the uncharged Facebook users,” the five-judge panel wrote.