text: Atlassian To Acquire Project Management Firm Trello for $425M - Cloud Computing on Top Tech News
  A self-driving car company founded by tech giant Google is colliding with ride-haling service Uber in a court battle revolving around allegations of betrayal, high-tech espionage and greed.
  Amazon Announces Plans To Expand US Operations
  Updated January 9, 2017 9:34AM SHARE
  AtlassianTrelloCloud ComputingCollaborationMarketingEnterprise ITAcquisitionTechnology News
  By acquiring the fast-growing project management firm Trello for $425 million, collaboration software provider Atlassian said today that it expects to fill a gap in its own offerings for workplace teams. The deal also brings together two companies with a shared goal: to put their tools into the hands of 100 million users, according to Atlassian. Atlassian co-founder and co-CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes said Trello's visually based system for managing everything from family projects to Red Cross emergency responses fills a gap between two of Atlassian's tools: JIRA for structured workflows and Confluence for "free-form" collaboration. Trello's key strength is its system for "capturing and adding structure to fluid, fast-forming work," he added.
  Launched five years ago, the customer base for Trello's cloud-based collaboration tools nearly doubled over the past year to 19 million users. Atlassian, meanwhile, has also grown rapidly via a series of 18 acquisitions since its founding, with six new additions, including Trello, which is the largest, in a little over two years. Trello Users Include Google, UN
  "Trello will become an important part of the Atlassian portfolio, offering a fun new way for teams to organize the often messy range of information that feeds into great teamwork," Cannon-Brookes wrote in a company blog post today. "Its card system is intuitive, easy to use, and instantly familiar, which has made it extremely popular with teams across marketing, legal, HR, sales and beyond." Among Trello's wide-ranging customer base are users that include Google, Kickstarter, National Geographic, PayPal, Pixar, the Red Cross, the U.K. government and the United Nations. Developed by Fog Creek Software in 2010, Trello spun out as an independent company in 2014 backed by $10.3 million in venture capital funding. "As part of Atlassian, Trello will be able to leverage investments in R&D that will enhance the product in meaningful ways," Trello CEO Michael Pryor said today in a post on his company's blog. "Our team will be able to focus on improving the core experience of Trello for all users." Continuing as Standalone Service
  Expected to close by late March, the Atlassian acquisition of Trello is being paid for with around $360 million in cash, with the rest covered through the exchange of shares and share units. Atlassian said Trello will likely continue operating as a "standalone service" after the deal is completed. Cannon-Brookes said Atlassian will begin working with Trello's product team to help the company speed up its development efforts. Pryor added that Trello's service will also continue integrating its offering with other collaboration tools, including Atlassian's Confluence, JIRA and HipChat. Acquired by Atlassian in 2012, HipChat is a Web-based service for team chats and instant messaging. The new Trello integrations for Atlassian's services will be available to users through Atlassian's enterprise software marketplace in the near future, according to Cannon-Brookes. Atlassian said it expects to provide additional details about the Trello acquisition when it releases its next quarterly report on Jan. 19.
  By Jef Cozza / Top Tech News. Updated January 12, 2017.
  Online retailer Amazon today announced plans for a major expansion of its U.S. operations. The company, which currently employs about 180,000 full-time workers, said it will add another 100,000 full-time positions over the next 18 months, an increase of more than 55 percent. The new jobs will include positions based throughout the country and encompass all experience levels, education and skill sets, according to an Amazon statement. The company said it will be hiring new engineers and software developers and plans to expand the number of entry-level positions as well, with opportunities for on-the-job training. Hiring More Workers, Building More Robots
  Amazon has recently started construction on a number of new fulfillment centers around the U.S., and announced plans for even more in a number of states, including Texas, California, Florida, and New Jersey. Many of the new positions will be based at these new facilities, the company said. "Innovation is one of our guiding principles at Amazon, and it's created hundreds of thousands of American jobs. These jobs are not just in our Seattle headquarters or in Silicon Valley -- they're in our customer service network, fulfillment centers and other facilities in local communities throughout the country," said Jeff Bezos (pictured above), Amazon founder and CEO, in the statement. In addition to the new jobs and fulfillment centers, Bezos said the company also plans to expand its role in its more high-tech products and services such as cloud technology, machine learning and advanced logistics.
  Human labor isn't the only way that Amazon is expanding. The company also increased the number of robots it uses in its fulfillment centers as part of its efforts to drive costs down. The company reportedly increased the number of robots used in those centers by 50 percent last year, for a grand total of 45,000. A New Credit Card
  The company also said this week that it's launching a new credit card for members of its Prime program. The card, called the Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card, will include features such as 5 percent cash back for all Amazon purchases, 2 percent back for purchases made at restaurants, gas stations, and drug stores and 1 percent back for all other purchases. Non-Prime members can also apply for the card, but they will only receive 3 percent cash back from their Amazon purchases. The credit card will also come with a $70 Amazon gift card, which would cover almost all of the $99 annual fee for Prime membership. Additionally, there is no membership fee (excluding the Prime membership fee) and no foreign transaction fee for the card. The company is issuing the card in collaboration with JP Morgan Chase bank. The new credit card adds yet another perk to the retailer's Prime program, which helps captivate shoppers by offering unlimited video and music content, along with free two-day shipping.
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