TechFlash: Seattle's Technology News

Seattle is the nation's No. 13 most "well-read" city, according to Amazon.com Inc., and Bellevue ranks No. 16.

The Seattle online retailer ranked cities by sales data of all book, magazine and newspaper sales in both print and Kindle format since June 1, 2011, on a per capita basis in cities with more than 100,000 residents.

So readers don't have to buy an external light to use their Kindle at night, Amazon.com Inc. is planning to introduce a Kindle e-reader with front lighting this July, according to a new report.

Reuters reports Amazon also plans to introduce a Kindle Fire tablet with a larger 8.9-inch screen in time for the holiday shopping season.

Competition for Seattle’s best tech minds just got even tougher.

Amazon announced Monday it is hiring more than 1,000 new people for its Seattle offices.

The company is looking for technical developers to work on software engineering, management of software development, user interface and user experience design, and technical program management.

Amazon will be competing with Microsoft, which is hiring more than 1,500 new tech workers in the same geographic area.

Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates saw his wealth rise $35.5 million to $61.8 billion last week on Bloomberg's "Billionaire Index" while Amazon.com Inc. CEO Jeff Bezos saw his wealth fall $87.1 million to $21.3 billion.

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Another view of the bi-level aerial walkway and the dedicated bike entrance on the right at Amazon's proposed Seattle campus.

The City of Seattle’s Department of Planning and Development has posted the latest renderings of Amazon’s proposed Denny Triangle campus.

The new images give a much better idea of what the 3-million-square-foot project will look like when it’s completed.

Reaction to the revised design was generally favorable at a public design review board meeting earlier this week. Attendees liked proposed amenities that include outdoor artwork, a playing field, a dog park and space for food trucks.

BUSINESS JOURNAL PHOTO | Anthony Bolante

Tanesha Tekola (left) and Sera Day demonstrate in front of Amazon.com's corporate headquarters in Seattle on Thursday.

There were more Amazon.com employees waiting in line at nearby food trucks Thursday than there were noon-time protesters outside Amazon's headquarters in South Lake Union.

Approximately 35 people from the SEIU, Teamsters and Working Washington unions were protesting working conditions at Amazon’s Pennsylvania warehouse. Two former workers from Pennsylvania warehouses were on hand to share stories of what they said were extremely hot conditions, long hours, and an unfair points system for workers.

Jim Herbold, who worked in an Amazon warehouse for five months when he was 61 years old, said the company expected older workers to work at the same pace as younger workers, and that the company responded to complaints about hot conditions in the warehouse by parking paramedics outside in case anyone passed out.

“Very few people work there past three months,” he said.

Karen Salasky, who worked in the Pennsylvania warehouse for nine months, said she also experienced extremely hot conditions, up to 115 degrees.

Amazon.com Inc. will make J.K. Rowling's series of "Harry Potter" e-books available in its Kindle Owners' Lending Library on June 19.

In a statement, Amazon said it will offer all seven Harry Potter books through its Kindle Owners’ Lending Library, which Amazon's Prime members will have access for free. Previously, "Harry Potter" e-book buyers and Amazon Kindle users had to go directly to Rowling's own Pottermore.com web site to download the e-books. Amazon sells its Prime membership for $79 a year.

Amazon.com Inc. said it plans to open a new 70,000-square-foot customer service facility in Winchester, Ky., near Lexington in the central part of the state.

Amazon said it will invest more than $20.7 million and create more than 550 full-time and 600 seasonal jobs by 2017 at the Lexington facility, which will provide customer service and technical support. Amazon currently operates distribution facilities in Louisville, Lexington, Campbellsville and Hebron, Ky.

Shipments of Amazon.com Inc.'s Kindle Fire tablet dropped to less than 750,000 units in the lastest quarter from 4.8 million units shipped in the fourth quarter of 2011.

Why the big drop in shipments in one quarter? The Wall Street Journal's All Things D surmises that the drop from a 16.8 percent worldwide market share to about 4 percent in one quarter could be because some consumers are waiting for the newest versions of the Fire to come onto the market. Or it could be that consumers are responding to Apple Inc.'s discounting of its iPad 2.

An aerial view of Amazon.com's proposed campus in the Denny Triangle. This rendering was submitted to the City of Seattle before design tweaks were made May 8.

A dog park, a playing field, space for food trucks and a large public plaza protected by a vast glass canopy — those are the latest tweaks to the design of Amazon’s proposed Denny Triangle campus.

The reaction to these and other changes was generally favorable at a public meeting Tuesday night. During the meeting, held at City Hall, members of Seattle’s Design Review Board and the public got to comment on the proposed 3-million-square-foot project.

It was clear that the sheer scale of the project, the years it will take before it is completed, and the importance of getting it right are weighing heavily on the Design Review Board.

“The pace of the approval, the tremendous list of ‘more is coming’ – I want to help,” said board member Brian Scott, “but I don’t want to be sick to my stomach ten years from now.”

Amazon.com Inc., king of the book and electronics-selling universe, is targeting a new industry to dominate — high fashion.

The New York Times reports Seattle-based Amazon is making a huge, multi-million-dollar effort to make a splash in the world of high fashion, and since it costs the same amount of money to ship a $1,000 dress as it does to ship a $10 DVD, “gross profit dollars per unit will be much higher on a fashion item,” CEO Jeff Bezos told the Times.

Amazon.com Inc. is ramping up its hiring of former members of the U.S. military, especially to run and operate its many distribution centers across the country.

Fortune reports that last year a quarter of the new salaried employees Amazon hired at its warehouses were military veterans; making it one of the most military-friendly companies in the country.

Both Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. moved up on the 2012 Fortune 500 list, which came out Monday. Amazon moved up 22 spots and Microsoft moved up one.

Washington state has eight companies on this year's Fortune 500 list; Exxon Mobil regained the top spot in the country with nation-leading revenues of $453 billion last year.

BUSINESS JOURNAL PHOTO | Marcus R. Donner

Developers of bill payment system Rail gather at Boom Noodle cafe, a beta test site. They are, from left, Taylor McCrosson of Kirkland-based Viableware; and Craig Hummel and Ron Dicklin of Seattle-based Synapse Product Development.

If you had lunch recently at Boom Noodle at Seattle’s University Village, the server handed you your check in a folder, like at any restaurant. But this folder was different. This was Rail.

Rail is a wireless device that integrates with point-of-sale systems to let diners swipe credit cards and pay their bills at the table, eliminating the need for servers to deal with payment processing at all.

It’s also designed for a future when patrons dispense with the card and just use their phones to pay.

“These digital wallets will be coming down the road,” said Ron Dicklin, project manager for Rail.

Tech companies large and small are moving into the nation’s $110 billion payment business in a big way, putting pressure on the traditional processors — banks and credit-card companies — to innovate or step aside.

Bankers are mindful of how Apple’s iPhone and Amazon’s online wizardry disrupted once-dominant companies — from newspapers to retailers — sending them reeling from broken business models and dried-up revenue streams.

BUSINESS JOURNAL PHOTO | Anthony Bolante

A recent survey called Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google the “Gang of Four” innovators when it comes to mobile banking and payment processing. There was no mention of Microsoft.

Nearly two decades ago, banks considered Microsoft Corp.’s software a threat to their traditional business models. These days, finding the Redmond software giant in a crowded field of technology innovators is more like a game of “Where’s Waldo?”

Nowhere is that more obvious than in the business of mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, particularly in the growing niche market of using those devices to buy things online and in retail stores.

Using a smartphone or tablet as a sort of digital wallet, replacing cash or credit cards, is known as mobile payment processing, and is emerging as a trend likely to sweep through the industry. However, Microsoft, feared by banks in the late 1990s for its potential as a banking software powerhouse, has been notably absent from the mobile payment technology race.

Some technology companies have found that they can significantly grow their revenue by collecting fees for processing the payments people make with smartphones or online. Facebook made $557 million from online payments last year.

A recent survey by consulting firm Javelin Strategy & Research called Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google the “Gang of Four” innovators when it comes to mobile banking and payment processing. There was no mention of Microsoft.