Daily Tech Snippet: Friday, March 20

• Amazon scores US regulators’ nod to test fly its autonomous drones:  The Federal Aviation Administration on Thursday gave Amazon permission to conduct test flights of its drones outdoors, as long as the company obeys a host of rules like flying below 400 feet and only during daylight hours.  Amazon has envisioned its drone-delivery service, which it calls Amazon Prime Air, to be autonomous.  While the F.A.A. has announced plans to allow more commercial uses of manned drones in American skies, it has not said when it will permit the use of autonomous drones by companies like Amazon. The company’s drones for now will have to be operated by a pilot with a certificate to fly a private manned aircraft. The agency’s main concern is making sure that drones, which everyone from farmers to cinematographers have shown interest in using for business purposes, can be operated safely. Still, even getting permission to test drones outdoors with a pilot counts as progress for Amazon, which has been lobbying the F.A.A. for approval to do so for months. The company has previously been forced to test drones indoors near its headquarters in Seattle. It has also started outdoor tests outside the United States and has warned federal regulators that jobs and investment dollars will leave the country if they do not relax their current drone restrictions.

• Taking on Apple Inc, Google and Intel to Team Up with TAG Heuer on a Luxury Smartwatch: On Thursday, TAG Heuer, the Swiss watch company, announced that it was building a new smartwatch — a wrist computer, in essence — as part of a collaboration with Intel and Google. The companies made a joint announcement at Baselworld, an annual show in Basel, Switzerland, for high-priced watches and jewelry. The watch will be released later this year, but aside from that the announcement was light on specifics. No exact release date. Nothing about what it will do. No price. The forthcoming TAG Heuer watch will be designed and manufactured by the Swiss watchmaker. The technology bits will come from Intel’s chip technology and Google’s Android software.

• Smartstraps may be the solution to wearables: Pebble seeds $1M to encourage smartstrap startups: Pebble is announcing a $1 million fund to support the development of smartstraps, the add-on accessories that are open to hardware makers and that will add functionality to Pebble Time via add-on sensors, batteries and more. Pebble says it’ll be combing crowdfunding platforms to find out about smartstrap projects, and will back those it deems worthy. The company is also soliciting pitches via Twitter and email for anyone  who might be planning a smartstrap, and isn’t pinning itself down with specifics on the terms of how it will actually allocate cash just yet. It’s also promising promotion to worthwhile projects, to raise awareness among the Pebble community. Pebble points to some ideas that have already sprung from the community regarding prototypes  Seeed Studio: include a modular strap with individual links that contain separate features or sensors, like an NFC link, a heart rate sensor link a GPS link and so on. Spark Electron is hardware design that would offer independent cellular connectivity via a smartstrap featuring its Electron SIM-enabled dev kit, letting you use the wearable independently of a connected smartphone.spark-smartstrap-concept.

• Facebook turning Messenger into a Platform : Inspired By Asia’s Monolithic Chat Apps: Next week at its F8 developer conference, Facebook will announce new ways for third parties to offer experiences through its Messenger app, according to multiple sources. Facebook hopes to make Messenger more useful, after seeing Asia’s chat apps WeChat and Line succeed as platforms that go beyond just texting with friends. At first, Facebook will focus on how third parties can build ways for content and information to flow through Messenger. Depending on the success of the early experiments, Facebook may then mull bringing more utilities to Messenger. For Messenger’s platform, Facebook is said to have eyed Line and WeChat. They were pioneers in using their frequently used instant messaging apps as the centers of mobile interfaces that act as monolithic portals. Snapchat is another messaging app that’s recently explored a platform approach. 

• Tesla to have Autopilot on its cars by summer:  Elon Musk, chief executive of Tesla, took a big step when he announced that the maker of high-end electric cars would introduce autonomous technology by this summer. The technology would allow drivers to have their cars take control on what he called “major roads” like highways. Mr. Musk said that a software update — not a repair performed by a mechanic — would give Tesla’s Model S sedans the ability to start driving themselves, at least part of the time, in a hands-free mode that the company refers to as autopilot. Also to be added are tools to help drivers monitor the status of charging stations and plot routes to ensure the ability to complete a trip without running out of battery power. The move is intended to help reduce so-called range anxiety, the fear drivers have that their battery will run out, prompting them to constantly calculate distances and worry about being stranded.

• GoDaddy's IPO to value web-hosting company at up to $2.87 billion: Web-hosting company GoDaddy Inc's initial public offering is expected to value the company at up to $2.87 billion, and comes at a time when there has been a steep fall in the number of companies going public in the United States. Including debt, the company could be valued at $4 billion. The IPO market has had a slow start this year compared with 2014 when U.S. IPOs raised about $93 billion, the highest since 2000. Only two technology companies have gone public this year including online data storage provider Box Inc, whose shares have dropped about 27 percent since the company's market debut in January. GoDaddy was acquired in 2011  by a private equity consortium led by KKR & Co LP and Silver Lake Partners LP for $2.25 billion, including debt. It has since expanded from its roots in Internet domains to provide services to small and medium-sized businesses such as website building and web hosting. The company, which serves 12.7 million customers, is led by Blake Irving, who was Yahoo Inc's chief product officer from 2010 to 2012. GoDaddy's revenue rose 22.7 percent to $1.4 billion in the year ended Dec. 31 from a year earlier. Net loss narrowed to $143.3 million from $200 million.