Google Container Engine for Docker Now Generally Available

Today’s topics include the general release of Google’s Container Engine, Intel is investing $60 million in a Drone manufacturer, Yahoo says browsers are a thing of the past, and Fujitsu is recalling its Lifebook battery pack over fire concerns.

Google’s Container Engine service for managing Docker containers on its cloud platform has become generally available. That means it is now fully backed by the company’s service-level agreements and other policies.

Starting today, businesses seeking to run Docker containers on Google will be able to fully manage and orchestrate their container clusters using Container Engine.

Google announced Container Engine last year as a cluster management and orchestration tool for Docker containers.

Intel is investing more than $60 million into a Chinese-based drone manufacturer, the latest move by company executives to push the chip maker’s technology into emerging technologies and to reduce its reliance on the shrinking global PC market.

The vendor is investing the money in Yuneec, one of a growing number of drone makers that include not only smaller startups but also top-tier vendors such as Sony, which has partnered with Japanese firm ZMP to create a new drone company called Aerosense and this week showed off videos of a drone that reportedly can travel at 106 mph.

When it comes to mobile, the browser has been sidelined, at least according to Yahoo. Developers instead ought to focus on enhancing the in-app experience and making apps more compelling, as users are spending more time than ever on their mobile devices, according to a Yahoo executive.

Simon Khalaf, senior vice president of Publishing Products at Yahoo, in the opening keynote at the Yahoo Mobile Developer Conference in New York, said 90 percent of the time consumers spend in mobile is in apps, and the remaining 10 percent is spent in browsers.

This figure is up from the first quarter of this year when consumers spent 88 percent of the time on mobile devices in apps.

Fujitsu is recalling as many as 70,000 battery packs for some of its Lifebook notebook PCs that were sold worldwide between 2011 and 2012.

According to the notice posted on the company’s Website, the recall comes among concerns that some of the battery packs, which were manufactured by Panasonic, could ignite and cause a fire, officials said.

According to the Japan Times, Fujitsu officials confirmed three cases of fires that have been linked to the battery, but that there are no reports of anyone being injured.