TECHNOLOGY NEWS:

MARY, CROSSRAIL'S TBM REACHES WOOLWICH by Benson Agoha

* Mary at Woolwich Station Box.

Crossrail has announced that it's second Tunnelling Boring Machine (TBM), named Mary, has now reached Woolwich Station Box, on its half-way journey to North Woolwich. The machine left Crossrail's Plumstead yard in May.

Her sister machine Sophia, arrived Woolwich in May and was undergoing maintenance at the same place. Mary is due to continue its journey southwards of the river after maintenance.

According to Crossrail, during the three months of its journey from Plumstead, Mary excavated over a 100,000 tones of material and installed 811 concrete rings to line inside of the tunnel, a major miles stone because "passengers in southeast London will benefit from some of Crossrail’s most significant time savings".

The message released on their website said that "With Crossrail, the journey from Abbey Wood and Woolwich to Bond Street will be at least 15 minutes quicker and passengers travelling to Heathrow will be able to shave around 40 minutes off their journey."

Crossrail said that "Sophia and Mary are constructing the Thames tunnel, which will run from Plumstead, via Woolwich and underneath the Thames to North Woolwich."

* Twitter: @bensonagoha.


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APPLE SHOPS FOR NEW CEO AS TIM COOK PREPARES TO LEAVE by Benson Agoha

Tim Cook, Chief Executive of Apple may be set to leave the company after two years at the helm. And this may be as early as next month, after the management review set to hold in September.

The CEO was Apple's Operating Officer before his appointment in August 2011.

As Chief Operating Officer, he was said to have done extremely well, being responsible for Apple's worldwide sales and operations, including end-to-end management of its supply chain. But in the space of that time, Apple has faced stiff compeition mounted by Samsung.

Apple's iphone 5(pictured) was seriously challenged in the market by Samsung's Galaxy S4, and Samsung continues to give the `impression' of a vibrant company full of initiative and unbeatable foresight. It's hardly surprising because for the past twenty years, Samsung has proven they possess the capacity to continually innovate through research. Rumours has it of a possible release of its Galaxy S5 in 2013. Tech analysts believe that Samsung might bring the release date nearer because of declining sales of its Galaxy 4S range.

But Apple (worth about $600bn against Samsung's $200bn - going by 2012 estimates for both firms) remains a highly valuable company even though the CEO is worried.

His departure is surprising, coming only a month, after the CEO talked about Apple's attempt to change the way the television is viewed when he wrote “We are laser-focused and working hard on some amazing new products that we will introduce in the fall and across 2014,”

Nick Bilton and Brian X. Chen for the New York Times hinted that rumours from people close to the company is that although it “was not actively being built, but Apple would eventually make a television.”, They wrote "..speaking at the D: All Things Digital technology conference, (in March), Mr. Cook said Apple had ”a very grand vision” for the television".

The technology community are eargerly waiting for the next hot news to come out of the Apple's headquarters in Cupertino, California. But whoever emerges as his replacement in September, the new CEO would need to be as visionary as expected - and some love.

* Twitter: @bensonagoha.

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GOOGLE CHROME PIPS INTERNET EXPLORER IN POPULARIT Y AMONG INTERNET SURFERS by Benson Agoha

Chrome, Google’s internet browser has officially overtaken Microsoft’s Internet Explorer in popularity among web surfers around the world, as the competition for the browser market gets keener.

According to Social Network Mashable, Google Chrome is now the world's most popular web browser, claiming 43% of the global market. However, "Only 36% of Internet users in North America are Chrome users, one of the world's lowest rates".

The study monitored for Africa, North America, Europe, Asia, South America and the Oceania shows that the Chrome took 36% of popularity stake in North America, 35% in Europe, 49% in Asia, 63% in South America, 43% in Africa and 35% in the Oceania.

Following the Chrome in global stake is Internet Explorer 25% and Firefox with 20%.

* Twitter: @bensonagoha.