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Vincent Padois, head tutor at the Pierre and Marie Curie University who teaches robotics and is babysitting the Paris ICub, makes a demonstration with ICub robot, a ?hybrid embodied cognitive system for a humanoid robot" about 1 metre (3.2 feet) high, at the Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris September 4, 2009. Six versions of ICub exist in laboratories across Europe, where scientists are painstakingly tweaking its electronic brain to make it capable of learning, just like a human child and hoping it will learn how to adapt its behaviour to changing circumstances, offering new insights into the development of human consciousness. REUTERS/Philippe Wojazer

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    Loopt signs licensing deal with Qualcomm

    NEW YORK
    Wed Nov 5, 2008 8:02pm EST

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    NEW YORK (Reuters) - Privately held, location-based service provider Loopt signed a technology licensing agreement with Qualcomm Inc (QCOM.O) that it plans to use to expand its services and win more business with service providers.

    Loopt's service uses global positioning technology embedded in cell phones to let consumers automatically broadcast their location to friends or find out the whereabouts of their friends.

    Companies including Verizon Wireless, owned by Verizon Communications (VZ.N) and Vodafone Group Plc (VOD.L), already offer Loopt's service, which also works on iPhone from Apple Inc (AAPL.O) .

    But Loopt Chief Executive Sam Altman said he hoped the integration of its service with No. 1 mobile phone chip maker Qualcomm's technology would give the company additional access to more than a dozen more service providers.

    "I would like to see us become partners with every major Qualcomm partner in the world as a result," of the licensing agreement said Altman in a telephone interview.

    The executive also said that using Qualcomm's technology would allow Loopt to help enable services such as the delivery of mobile phone ads that are relevant to a mobile phone user's location as well and Web search services.


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