title: Total War (video game series)

text: On 25 September 2014, Creative Assembly announced "Total War: Attila" at the Eurogamer Expo. Using the same engine as "Total War: Rome II", the game followed the life of Attila the Hun during the Dark Ages of Europe, much like "Napoleon: Total War" did with Napoleon's life after "Empire: Total War". According to Creative Assembly, "Total War: Attila" would implement an "apocalyptic" atmosphere, with hostile weather and darker lighting. "Total War: Attila" was released on 17 February 2015.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: Announced on 22 April 2015, "Total War: Warhammer" changes the rules of the series as it takes place in a setting of high fantasy. The setting comes from Games Workshop's "Warhammer Fantasy". The real-time battles and turn-based sandbox campaigns, a staple of the series, return. Races include the men of the Empire and Bretonnia, Orcs and Goblins (Greenskins), Dwarves, Vampire Counts, the Warriors of Chaos, Beastmen, Wood Elves, and the Norscan Tribes. Sega revealed this is the first in what will be a trilogy of titles. "Total War: Warhammer" was released on 24 May 2016.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: Announced on 31 March 2017 at EGX Rezzed. It was released on 28 September 2017. It focuses on the conflicts in the New World and Ulthuan between the High Elves, Dark Elves, Skaven, and Lizardmen as they seek to control the Vortex. Later, the Tomb Kings (an Ancient Egyptian themed faction of skeletons, mummies etc) and Vampire Coast (an undead pirate faction) were released as paid DLC. A grand campaign combining the map from the first game and the second was also released called "Mortal Empires."


title: Total War (video game series)

text: "Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia" was released on 3 May 2018. The game is set in 878 AD, after the death of Ragnar Lodbrok and subsequent by the Great Heathen Army. The game focuses on the kingdoms vying for power of the Isles. The playable factions are English, Welsh, Gaelic, part of the Great Viking army, and the Viking sea kings. The game received generally favourable reviews from critics but a mixed response from users. The game holds a Critic Score of 75 and a User Score of 54 on Metacritic.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: Released on 23 May 2019, " Three Kingdoms" brings the "Total War" series to China during the rule of the Han dynasty in 190 AD where the child Emperor Xian of Han is placed on the throne as a puppet ruler by his regent Dong Zhuo. The game centres on heroes who fight tyranny but whose ambitions may break their fragile alliance and divide China leading up to the rise of the Three Kingdoms period. The game is based on the ancient Chinese novel "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". Players can play warlords such as Cao Cao and Liu Bei. The graphics are different. There is a new battle system enabling the player to select Records, a more realistic mode, or Romance, seen by some to be a more fun and creative way to play. In Romance, players can control their warlords who now have special abilities. The campaign has also changed. There are three DLCs available: "Eight Princes", set almost a hundred years after the original campaign; "Yellow Turban Rebellion", which allows the player to play as the Yellow Turban Faction within the original campaign; "Reign of Blood", similar to the other DLCs available in "Total War: Rome II" and "Total War: Attila" called "Blood and Gore" and "Blood and Burning" respectively. "Reign of Blood" adds a new variety of combat animations and blood on the battlefield.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: While in development "Total War Saga: Troy" used the "Saga" moniker, as did "Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia" and as has retroactively been applied to "The Fall of the Samurai" standalone expansion for "Total War: Shogun 2". It is to be the first "Total War" game set in the Bronze Age and was released on August 13, 2020. The game was free to claim for the first 24 hours after its release. On September 24, "Amazons" was released as a free DLC for Total War Access account holders alongside Epic Games Store Mod Support, while multiplayer and "Blood & Glory" DLC was added October 29, 2020.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: Announced on 3 February 2021, the conclusion to the "Total War: Warhammer" trilogy introduces factions based on each of the four Chaos Gods (Khorne, Tzeentch, Nurgle, and Slaanesh), as well as the human civilisations of Kislev and Grand Cathay. The Ogre Kingdoms were included as a pre-order bonus. The game was released on 17 February 2022.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: "Spartan: Total Warrior" was developed by Creative Assembly and released in 2005 for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and GameCube. "Spartan: Total Warrior" is a hack-and-slash action title that was to bring "Total War"s hallmark large-scale battles to the console market. Rather than adhering to historical accuracy, Creative Assembly took inspiration from Greek and Roman mythology to craft a setting that allows for more fantastical set pieces and foes. The player takes the role of a Spartan warrior guided by Ares, tasked with defeating the invading Roman Empire. The game features both a "campaign mode" and an "arena battle" mode. The campaign mode takes place over 14 levels, while the arena battle mode tasks the players with surviving enemy assaults of increasing difficulty. An indirect follow-up called "" was released in 2008, dropping the "Total Warrior" moniker.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: An upcoming free-to-play strategy Digital collectible card game where the player controls generals from across history in head-to-head battles against other players.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: "Total War Battles: Shogun" was released on 20 April 2012 for iOS. This game was also released for Android devices and Microsoft Windows. Set in medieval Japan, the game utilises real-time strategy and, like other Total War games, combines troop organisation and management, combat, and building management. Available troops include samurai, archers, ninja, and cavalry. The battle system uses hexagon tiles for movement and placement, and a new key feature to this game enforces the "Bushido" code of conduct where, once units are moved forward, they can no longer move backward. 1 vs 1 local multiplayer is available.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: From the team behind "Total War Battles: Shogun", "Total War Battles: Kingdom" entered open beta on PC on 9 March 2015, following a limited closed beta. Set in medieval England, the game combines realm building and management with real-time battles and has been released for PC, Android, and iOS.


title: Total War (video game series)

text: "Total War Battles: Warhammer" is the upcoming third release of the Total War: Battles Series. Developed by NetEase, Total War Battles: WARHAMMER is officially licensed by Creative Assembly and Games Workshop. It aims to bring deep strategic gameplay in the epic Warhammer Fantasy Battles world to millions of mobile devices worldwide. The game will support Android and iOS Platforms.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Kirby is an action-platform video game series developed by HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo. The series centers around the adventures of a pink hero named Kirby as he fights to protect and save his home on the distant Planet Popstar from a variety of threats. The majority of the games in the series are side-scrolling platformers with puzzle-solving and beat 'em up elements. Kirby has the ability to inhale enemies and objects into his mouth, spitting them out as a projectile or eating them. If he inhales certain enemies, he can gain the powers or properties of that enemy manifesting as a new weapon or power-up called a Copy Ability. The series is intended to be easy to pick up and play even for people unfamiliar with action games, while at the same time offering additional challenge and depth for more experienced players to come back to.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The "Kirby" series includes a total of over thirty games, and has sold over 40 million units worldwide, making it one of Nintendo’s best-selling franchises and putting it in the top 50 best-selling video game franchises of all time.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The series' main protagonist is Kirby, a spherical pink creature. Kirby resides on a distant five-point-star-shaped planet called Popstar in Dream Land. Much of Dream Land is peaceful, and its people lead laid-back, carefree lives. However, when the peace in Dream Land is shattered by threats both terrestrial and alien, it is up to Kirby to become a brave warrior and save his home. Despite his young and carefree personality, Kirby possesses many incredible abilities, such as the power to inhale objects and enemies, suck them into his stretchy mouth with the choice of spitting them out forcefully, or taking their properties while he ingests his enemies to copy their abilities, transform into new forms, and gain new powers like breathing fire, wielding a sword, throwing sparks in all directions, or attacking enemies in melee.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Many recurring characters appear throughout the series as both allies and enemies, the most common being King Dedede: a gluttonous bird resembling a blue penguin and self-proclaimed ruler of Dream Land. King Dedede has appeared in all Kirby games except "Kirby & the Amazing Mirror". King Dedede's selfish nature often leads him to clash with Kirby, but he sometimes teams up with Kirby when a greater threat emerges. Another major character in the series is the enigmatic Meta Knight, a chivalrous masked man who one day wishes to fight the strongest warrior in the galaxy and leads a group of like-minded warriors. Whenever he and Kirby fight, he will always offer Kirby a sword in advance so that the fight is fair. While his true face resembles Kirby's, his exact relationship with Kirby remains a mystery.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The main Kirby games are side-scrolling action platforms. Kirby has to run, jump, and attack enemies while traversing a number of areas, solving puzzles, and battling bosses along the way. One of the things that sets Kirby apart is Kirby's ability to inflate himself with a sip of air and fly. In most games, he can do this for as long as he wants, however, his attack options are limited.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Kirby games often contain a number of hidden items that unlock more parts of the game or are simple incentives to collect, and are usually required to reach 100% in-game completion. These special items are usually related to the plot of the game, most often used to create a special weapon needed to defeat the final boss. In some games, the special weapon is optional and can be used regularly in the game after defeating the final boss with it. These elements have remained constant in most series, with each game having its own unique twist to affect gameplay.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The fantasy world of Popstar includes many regions of different climates and terrains which are home to many different creatures. Each game features uniquely-named areas, but all games feature typical locations such as flaming mountains, open grasslands, water-filled or submerged areas, frozen snowfields, and similar natural locations.


title: Kirby (series)

text: There are also several spin-off games in the series, which involve a variety of different video game genres such as pinball, puzzle, racing, and motion-sensor-technology-based games. A number of these spin-off titles take advantage of Kirby's round, ball-shaped appearance.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The first game in the "Kirby" series, "Kirby's Dream Land" for the original Game Boy, was released in Japan on April 27, 1992 and later in North America, Europe and Australasia in August that year. A simple game, consisting of five levels, it introduced Kirby's ability to inhale enemies and objects. The game contains an unlockable hard mode, known as the "Extra Game", which features stronger enemies and more difficult bosses. The North American box art showed a white Kirby, although the Japanese box art had the correct pink coloring.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The second game, "Kirby's Adventure", was released in Japan on March 23, 1993, in North America on May 1, 1993, and Europe on September 12, 1993. "Kirby's Adventure" gave Kirby the ability to gain special powers when he ate certain enemies, called Copy Abilities; the game contained a total of 25 different ones to use. These powers replaced Kirby's inhale and could be used until Kirby sustained damage causing him to drop the ability, or the player voluntarily discarded it to obtain another one. As one of the last games created for the Nintendo Entertainment System, "Kirby's Adventure" featured advanced graphics and sound that pushed the hardware's capabilities to the limit, including pseudo 3D effects on some stages. It was remade in 2002 on the Game Boy Advance, retitled "", featuring updated graphics and sound, multiplayer support, and the ability to play as Meta Knight.


title: Kirby (series)

text: After "Kirby's Adventure", the "Kirby" series received a number of spin-off games. "Kirby's Pinball Land", released in November 1993 for the Game Boy, is a pinball game featuring Kirby as the pinball. "Kirby's Dream Course", released in Japan on September 21, 1994, North America on February 1, 1995, and Europe on August 24, 1995 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, is a golf-based game which features an isometric graphic design. "Kirby's Avalanche", released in Europe on February 1, 1995 and in North America on April 25, 1995 also for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, is a puzzle game, a westernized version of the Japanese game "Puyo Puyo".


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby's Dream Land 2", released in Japan on March 21, 1995, in North America on May 1, 1995, in Europe on July 31, 1995 and Australasia on November 22, 1995 for the Game Boy, brought the Copy Abilities from "Kirby's Adventure" to a handheld system, but due to system limitations lowered the number of abilities to seven. The game introduced three rideable animal companions: Rick the hamster, Coo the owl, and Kine the ocean sunfish. Pairing up with any of these three alters how Kirby's abilities work.


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby's Block Ball", released for the Game Boy on December 14, 1995 in Japan, on March 13, 1996 in North America and on August 29, 1996 in Europe, is a variation of the game "Breakout", featuring multiple levels, some of Kirby's Copy Abilities, and various enemies in unique boss battles.


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby Super Star", known as "Hoshi no Kirby Super Deluxe" in Japan and "Kirby's Fun Pak" in Europe, was released for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in Japan on March 21, 1996, in North America on September 20, 1996, and in Europe on January 23, 1997. "Kirby Super Star" is composed of eight separate games, and features several characters and abilities which have not appeared since in the series. The game features "Helpers", which can be created by sacrificing the ability in use, to help the player dispatch enemies.


title: Kirby (series)

text: In 1996, a "Kirby" mini-game series, was released via the St.GIGA satellite broadcasting system for the Satellaview. These mini-games were given a unique broadcast date. Mini-game games included "Arrange Ball", "Ball Rally", "Baseball", "Cannonball", "Guru Guru Ball", "Hoshi Kuzushi", "Pachinko", and "Pinball".


title: Kirby (series)

text: Released for the Game Boy in 1997, "Kirby's Star Stacker" is a puzzle game which involves touching two or more similar blocks together that have Kirby's animal friends on them. The game received a sequel on the Super Famicom in 1998 in Japan titled "Kirby no Kirakira Kizzu" (known in English as "Kirby's Super Star Stacker").


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby's Dream Land 3", released for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System on November 27, 1997 in North America and on March 27, 1998 in Japan, is a direct sequel to "Kirby's Dream Land 2", as it featured the return of Kirby's animal friends. Similar to "Kirby's Dream Land 2", "Kirby's Dream Land 3" features a few Copy Abilities which were modified when Kirby paired up with one of his six animal friends. The game had a multiplayer option with the second player controlling Gooey, a recurring character. The antagonist is Dark Matter, and if certain conditions are met, Zero was fought as the true final boss. The game had a unique pastel-drawing art style and used dithering to improve visual performance.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The first game to have 3D graphics in the "Kirby" series, "", was released on the Nintendo 64 in Japan on March 24, 2000, in North America on June 26, 2000 and in Europe on June 22, 2001. The game features a compound ability system that allows two of the seven abilities in the game to be merged, making a new compound ability. It also marked the first playable instance of King Dedede, where sections of some stages had Kirby riding piggyback while King Dedede attacked enemies and obstacles with his hammer. It is considered a direct follow-up to "Kirby's Dream Land 3" due to the reemergence of Dark Matter and the final boss, albeit in a different form, called 0 (Zero Two). It also included three four-player minigames.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The next game in the "Kirby" series, "Kirby Tilt 'n' Tumble" became one of Nintendo's first motion-sensor-based games on August 23, 2000. Players are instructed to tilt the Game Boy Color to move Kirby on the screen. Quickly flicking the Game Boy Color upwards would make Kirby jump into the air. "Kirby Tilt 'n' Tumble" is the only "Kirby" game to have a special cartridge color (transparent pink) in North America.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The only "Kirby" game for the GameCube, "Kirby Air Ride", was released in North America on October 13, 2003. It is a racing game which deviates greatly from other "Kirby" games, although still featuring series staples including enemies and Copy Abilities.


title: Kirby (series)

text: During the 2003 Holiday season, a Kirby e-Reader card for the Game Boy Advance was released. The card was released under two names, "Kirby Slide" and "Kirby Puzzle". Swiping the card would allow for a sliding puzzle game starring Kirby to be played. Cards were given out at Toys "R" Us stores and in the 2003 December issues of "Nintendo Power" and "Tips & Tricks". The game was released to advertise the English dub of ""


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby & the Amazing Mirror" was released on October 18, 2004 on the Game Boy Advance. It is the second game released on that system, following "". It features Kirby in a Metroidvania format, with all the levels being interconnected and able to be completed in any order. Also unique was the in-game phone, which can be used to summon up to three additional copies of Kirby to fight enemies and solve puzzles.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The next game in the series is "", released on the Nintendo DS in Japan on March 24, 2005, North America on June 13, 2005, Europe on November 25, 2005 and Australia on April 6, 2006 under the name "Kirby Power Paintbrush". Unlike most previous "Kirby" games, the player does not directly control Kirby with a directional pad, analog stick, face buttons, or shoulder buttons. Instead, Kirby is a helpless ball, and can only move when he gains momentum, the player painting paths with the stylus to direct his movement.


title: Kirby (series)

text: This was followed by "" (titled "Kirby: Mouse Attack" in Europe) in late 2006, also on the Nintendo DS, which revived traditional "Kirby" gameplay and dabbled in the use of the touch screen to store several items and Copy Abilities in Kirby's stomach. Ability scrolls could be found that served as upgrades for each ability, giving them additional moves and/or enhanced functionality. An unlockable Copy Ability was also introduced.


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby Super Star Ultra", announced for the Nintendo DS in early fall 2007 and released on September 22, 2008 in North America, is a remake of "Kirby Super Star". In addition to the nine games from "Kirby Super Star", seven new games have been added. It features updated graphics, pre-rendered cutscenes, and a map on the touch screen.


title: Kirby (series)

text: An untitled "Kirby" platform game originally planned to be released on the GameCube was thought to be canceled for some time before being re-announced for the Wii. Although "Kirby's Epic Yarn" was announced and released for the Wii in North America on April 5, 2010, it was a different project from the untitled game, which, in January 2011, resurfaced with an altered design and motif. "Kirby's Epic Yarn" began development as an original game by Good-Feel called "Fluff of Yarn", but was given the "Kirby" license at Nintendo's proposal. The game got a remake/port on the Nintendo 3DS on March 8, 2019 entitled, "Kirby's Extra Epic Yarn".


title: Kirby (series)

text: A fourth game for the Nintendo DS was released in North America on September 19, 2011, "Kirby Mass Attack". The game features multiple copies of Kirby in touch screen-based gameplay reminiscent of games such as "Lemmings".


title: Kirby (series)

text: The aforementioned Wii game, "Kirby's Return to Dream Land" (titled "Kirby's Adventure Wii" in PAL regions) was released on the Wii in North America on October 24, 2011, returning to the traditional Kirby gameplay and allowing up to four players to play simultaneously. Players 2–4 could choose to play as Meta Knight, King Dedede and/or Waddle Dee, each with dedicated abilities; they could also play as different-colored Kirbys which offered power copying abilities, or as a mixture of the options.


title: Kirby (series)

text: An anthology disc for the Wii called "Kirby's Dream Collection" was released on July 19, 2012, in Japan and on September 16, 2012, in North America to celebrate Kirby's 20th Anniversary. It includes six games from the early history of the series, which are "Kirby's Dream Land", "Kirby's Adventure", "Kirby's Dream Land 2", "Kirby Super Star", "Kirby's Dream Land 3", and "". It also has new Challenge Stages that run on the engine of "Kirby's Return to Dream Land" (titled "Kirby's Adventure Wii" in PAL regions), and a Kirby history section, which includes three episodes from "Hoshi no Kirby" ("" in North America). Similar to the Super Mario 25th Anniversary packaging in 2010, a booklet and a soundtrack containing music from the various games in the series are released alongside the disc.


title: Kirby (series)

text: On October 1, 2013, during a Nintendo Direct presentation, a new untitled "Kirby" game for the Nintendo 3DS was announced, later named "". The game was released in Japan on January 11, 2014, in North America on May 2, 2014, in Europe on May 16, 2014, and in Australasia on May 17, 2014. It incorporated action spanning varied depths, where Kirby could swap between the foreground and background areas. It included a multiplayer fighting mode called "Kirby Fighters", where players could choose one of ten available abilities and fight on themed stages, with the winner being the last Kirby standing. It also included a rhythm-based action game starring King Dedede titled "Dedede's Drum Dash". There were also over 250 in-game "keychains" to collect that featured sprites from previous Kirby games as well some original sprites based on characters from "Triple Deluxe". In August 2014, "Kirby Fighters Deluxe" and "Dedede's Drum Dash Deluxe" (enhanced versions of the mini-games in "Kirby: Triple Deluxe") were released.


title: Kirby (series)

text: At E3 2014, a new game for the Wii U was announced. Titled "Kirby and the Rainbow Curse" in North America and "Kirby and the Rainbow Paintbrush" in PAL regions, the game is a direct sequel to "" and features a similar gameplay style. It was released by Nintendo on January 22, 2015, in Japan, February 20, 2015, in North America, May 8, 2015, in Europe and May 9, 2015, in Australasia.


title: Kirby (series)

text: On March 3, 2016, during a Nintendo Direct presentation, Nintendo unveiled a new game based on the context of "" called "". This game is the second "Kirby" game released on the Nintendo 3DS. It was released alongside a set of Amiibo figures made for the Kirby franchise, including a newly announced Amiibo, Waddle Dee, on April 28, 2016, in Japan, June 10, 2016, in North America and Europe, and June 11, 2016, in Australasia. The game is compatible with other Amiibo. It also includes 2 new minigames, called "Kirby 3D Rumble" and "Team Kirby Clash", the former being an arena based, 3D action game where Kirby uses his inhale to defeat large groups of baddies to rack up points and achieve a high score, and the latter being a mix of fighting, platform, and role-playing. Players can level up to level 10, and can play with AI or other friends.


title: Kirby (series)

text: In a Nintendo Direct presentation on April 12, 2017, three new "Kirby" games were announced for Kirby's 25th Anniversary. The first game was "Team Kirby Clash Deluxe", an enhanced version of the "Kirby: Planet Robobot" mini-game "Team Kirby Clash" which was released the same day it was announced. The second game was "Kirby's Blowout Blast", an enhanced version of the "Kirby: Planet Robobot" mini-game "Kirby 3D Rumble" which was released on July 4, 2017, in Japan, and on July 6, 2017, in North America, Europe and Australasia. The third game was "Kirby Battle Royale", an action-multiplayer fighting game which was released on November 3, 2017, in Europe and Australasia, November 30, 2017, in Japan, and January 19, 2018, in North America.


title: Kirby (series)

text: At E3 2017, Nintendo unveiled a new untitled installment for the Nintendo Switch, later named "Kirby Star Allies". The game was released on March 16, 2018. Kirby can throw Friend Hearts to turn enemies into computer- or player-controlled allies, a variation of the "Helper System" from "Kirby Super Star". "Power Combinations" return from "Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards" and "Kirby: Squeak Squad". Kirby can also summon "Dream Friends", consisting of major Kirby characters acting as Helpers, which includes King Dedede, Meta Knight, Bandana Waddle Dee, Rick, Kine, & Coo, Marx, Gooey, , Dark Meta Knight, , Magolor, , , and The Three Mage-Sisters (Francisca, Flamberge, and Zan Partizanne).


title: Kirby (series)

text: On September 4, 2019, Nintendo released a new Nintendo Switch game, "Super Kirby Clash", on the Nintendo eShop, as the successor to "Team Kirby Clash Deluxe". The game expands on the previous installment with new quests.


title: Kirby (series)

text: On September 23, 2020, Nintendo released a new Nintendo Switch game, "Kirby Fighters 2", on the Nintendo eShop, as the successor to "Kirby Fighters Deluxe". Before its official reveal, the game was leaked on the Play Nintendo website, but was later taken down. The game expands on the previous installment with new gamemodes and an exclusive ability, Wrestler.


title: Kirby (series)

text: During the Nintendo Direct event held on September 23, 2021, a new Nintendo Switch title in the "Kirby" series was revealed, titled "Kirby and the Forgotten Land". It is the first true 3D entry in the mainline series (fourth overall since the spin-offs "Kirby Air Ride", "Kirby's Blowout Blast", and "Kirby Battle Royale") and was released on March 25, 2022.


title: Kirby (series)

text: On July 12, 2022, a new Nintendo Switch title in the "Kirby" series was announced, titled "Kirby's Dream Buffet". It is a multiplayer party game, and was released on the Nintendo eShop on August 17, 2022.


title: Kirby (series)

text: A remake of "Kirby's Return to Dream Land" for the Nintendo Switch, titled "Kirby's Return to Dream Land Deluxe" was revealed during the Nintendo Direct event held on September 13, 2022 and is scheduled to be released on February 24, 2023.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The setting of the games is Dream Land, a country on Planet Popstar. Popstar resembles a five-pointed star encircled by two diagonal rings.


title: Kirby (series)

text: While most of Kirby's adventures take place on Popstar, his journeys occasionally take place on an interplanetary scale; such as in "", "Milky Way Wishes" from "Kirby Super Star", "Kirby's Return to Dream Land", "Kirby Star Allies", and "Kirby and the Forgotten Land".


title: Kirby (series)

text: Kirby is a small, pink, spherical creature with red feet, stubby flap-like arms and pink cheek-blushes. He is referred to as male in the animated series, and described as a young boy in the instruction manual for "Kirby's Dream Land". His body is soft and malleable, allowing him to stretch his mouth to inhale foes or inflate himself with air and float. According to "Super Smash Bros." instruction manual, he is 8 inches tall; this is contradicted in "Kirby's Dream Land 3" and "Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards", the former of which shows Kirby to be at about knee height compared to Samus Aran and the latter of which showing him to be a few inches shorter than the human girl Adeleine.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Kirby hails from the country of Dream Land on Planet Popstar, where he lives in a domed house. His appearance has changed subtly over the years, becoming more rounded and defined, mainly in his face and larger eyes. The new design has been used in all subsequent games.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Kirby does not commonly speak, mainly limited to grunts, shouts, and monosyllables in such games as "Super Smash Bros" and "Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards". However he does speak in the stories written in some games' instruction manuals. He rarely speaks in-game, the only exception being "Kirby's Avalanche". He narrates the functions of Copy Abilities on the start menu in "Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land", "Kirby & the Amazing Mirror" and "Kirby: Squeak Squad". Most in-game talking Kirby does is in "Kirby's Star Stacker", where Kirby explains the game's rules and gameplay. Kirby has dialogue in "Kirby's Epic Yarn", but it is all spoken through the game's narrator.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The "Kirby" series was made into an anime on October 6, 2001, "Hoshi no Kaabii". It was produced by Warpstar Inc., a company formed between a joint investment between Nintendo and HAL Laboratory, Inc. It was licensed in North America by 4Kids Entertainment, under the title "Kirby: Right Back at Ya!", on 4Kids TV, and was distributed by 4Kids Entertainment in North America and Nelvana Limited in Canada, with VHS and DVD distributions in North America by FUNimation Entertainment and DVD distributions in Australia by Magna Pacific. It ended in Japan in 2003 with 100 episodes.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The show is about the adventures Kirby has with his friends Tiff and Tuff after he crash lands in Dream Land (this is known as "Pupu Village" in the Japanese version and "Cappy Town" in the English dub), on Popstar. Here, he is a legendary Star Warrior destined to save the universe from the intergalactic conqueror known as Nightmare. However, because he was awakened 200 years too early he arrived in a childlike state and his powers haven't fully developed. The ruler of Dream Land, King Dedede, is jealous of the attention Kirby receives from its inhabitants and frequently orders monsters from Nightmare's company, Nightmare Enterprises, in an attempt to do away with Kirby. Nightmare Enterprises at first appears to be an intergalactic delivery company, but is really a front for Nightmare's intergalactic conquest that dupes unsuspecting customers into funding Nightmare's armies. Not yet ready to achieve his destiny, Kirby must learn how to use his incredible abilities with the help of his friends, and sometimes with the help of the enigmatic Meta Knight, who while he claims to be loyal to King Dedede, will often work behind the scenes in order to aid Kirby or train him in the use of his abilities.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The show is based on the game series, but rather than being a direct adaptation of any of the games it uses characters and concepts from the games (especially "Kirby's Dream Land", "Kirby's Adventure", and "Kirby Super Star") to tell its own story.


title: Kirby (series)

text: The longest running "Kirby" manga, "", was serialized in "CoroCoro Comic" from 1994 to 2006, and released 25 tankōbon volumes with over 10 million copies being printed. The series was written and illustrated by Hirokazu Hikawa. The series was later published as a "best-of" collection, which featured the series' first new chapter in 11 years, as well as bonus comics. It was published in English as "Kirby Manga Mania" by Viz Media.


title: Kirby (series)

text: In the lifetime of the "Kirby" series, several video games have been in development that, for various reasons, were ultimately abandoned. These include "Kirby's Air Ride 64" (also known as "Kirby Bowl 64" and "Kirby Ball 64") on the Nintendo 64, which was eventually released on the GameCube as "Kirby Air Ride".


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby Tilt 'n' Tumble 2" on the GameCube, which was supposed to use a combination of motion-sensor technology and connectivity to the Game Boy Advance via the Nintendo GameCube Game Boy Advance Cable, was presented during the Nintendo Space World 2001 and scheduled for a May 2002 release in Japan. The "Kirby" theme was eventually scrapped and Kirby was replaced with a generic marble, and the game was shown again at E3 2002 as "Roll-O-Rama", but eventually canceled completely.


title: Kirby (series)

text: "Kirby Family" was a Game Boy Color piece of software developed by Natsume that would connect to a compatible Jaguar JN-100 or JN-2000 sewing machine and embroider cloth with a "Kirby" pattern of choice. The game was also shown during Nintendo Space World 2001 and scheduled for September 10, 2001, but presumably canceled due to poor sales of "Mario Family" which released two weeks prior. The game was leaked on September 9, 2020, as part of the Game Boy Color lotcheck leak.


title: Kirby (series)

text: There was also a planned game called "Kid Kirby" that was to be released on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. The game would have served as a prequel to the series and would have utilized the SNES Mouse. The game was canceled due to the declining sales of the mouse; however, early screenshots of the canceled game have been posted online. This unreleased game was developed by DMA Design for Nintendo and was scheduled for 1995.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Though resurfaced as "Kirby's Return to Dream Land", the GameCube was initially going to have its own original Kirby game, simply titled "Kirby for Nintendo GameCube" at the time. It was nearly complete and featured at E3 2005, but was canceled due to troubles incorporating a unique multiplayer mechanic, which became the special attack in "Kirby's Return to Dream Land" (where all players stack on each other, hold A and release at the same time). At a later point, the game was concepted as a full 3D platformer visually similar to "Kirby Air Ride", but also canceled because it did not achieve HAL Laboratory's quality standards. Several concepts from the game would be revitalized in "Kirby Star Allies" and "Kirby and the Forgotten Land" for the Nintendo Switch.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Kirby appears as a character in Nintendo's crossover fighting game series "Super Smash Bros." (also developed by series creator Masahiro Sakurai), appearing in all installments of the franchise. Starting with "Super Smash Bros. Brawl" onwards, he's joined by Meta Knight and King Dedede. Many items from the Kirby series also appear in "Super Smash Bros" such as the Maxim Tomato (all games), Warp Star (since "Melee"), Dragoon (since "Brawl") and Star Rod (all games) as items, and Knuckle Joe (since "Brawl"), Nightmare (since "3DS/Wii U") and Chef Kawasaki ("Ultimate") appear as characters summoned by the Assist Trophy. All playable Kirby characters in "Smash Bros." have the ability to jump more than twice. Kirby has also made cameo appearances in other games as well, such as "", "EarthBound", "" and "Stunt Race FX".


title: Kirby (series)

text: The "Kirby" games have received reception that ranges from mixed to very favourable reviews by players and critics. "" and "Kirby's Epic Yarn" are the most acclaimed games in the series, while "Kirby Battle Royale" and "Team Kirby Clash Deluxe" are the lowest-rated.


title: Kirby (series)

text: Many "Kirby" games have performed commercially well, selling at least one million or more copies worldwide. Only games that have sold at least one million are included in this list. "Kirby and the Forgotten Land" is currently the best-selling game in the series, whereas "Kirby Mass Attack" is the lowest-selling in millions.


title: Bob Odenkirk filmography

text: Robert John Odenkirk (born October 22, 1962) is an American actor, comedian and filmmaker, best known for his role as Saul Goodman on the AMC crime drama series "Breaking Bad" and its spin-off "Better Call Saul". He directed three films, "Melvin Goes to Dinner" (2003), "Let's Go to Prison" (2006), and "The Brothers Solomon" (2007). He was also an executive producer of the sketch comedy show "The Birthday Boys".


title: Bob Odenkirk filmography

text: From the late 1980s to 1990s, Odenkirk wrote for television shows "Saturday Night Live" and "The Ben Stiller Show".


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm () is an American multinational corporation headquartered in San Diego, California, and incorporated in Delaware. It creates semiconductors, software, and services related to wireless technology. It owns patents critical to the 5G, 4G, CDMA2000, TD-SCDMA and WCDMA mobile communications standards.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm was established in 1985 by Irwin M. Jacobs and six other co-founders. Its early research into CDMA wireless cell phone technology was funded by selling a two-way mobile digital satellite communications system known as Omnitracs. After a heated debate in the wireless industry, the 2G standard was adopted with Qualcomm's CDMA patents incorporated. Afterwards there was a series of legal disputes about pricing for licensing patents required by the standard.


title: Qualcomm

text: Over the years, Qualcomm has expanded into selling semiconductor products in a predominantly fabless manufacturing model. It also developed semiconductor components or software for vehicles, watches, laptops, wi-fi, smartphones, and other devices.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm was created in July 1985 by seven former Linkabit employees led by Irwin Jacobs. The company was named Qualcomm for "QUALity COMMunications". It started as a contract research and development center largely for government and defense projects.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm merged with Omninet in 1988 and raised $3.5 million in funding in order to produce the Omnitracs satellite communications system for trucking companies. Qualcomm grew from eight employees in 1986 to 620 employees in 1991, due to demand for Omnitracs. By 1989, Qualcomm had $32 million in revenue, 50 percent of which was from an Omnitracs contract with Schneider National. Omnitracs profits helped fund Qualcomm's research and development into code-division multiple access (CDMA) technologies for cell phone networks.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm was operating at a loss in the 1990s due to its investment in CDMA research. To obtain funding, the company filed an initial public offering in September 1991 raising . An additional was raised in 1995 through the sale of 11.5 million more shares. The second funding round was done to raise money for the mass manufacturing of CDMA-based phones, base-stations, and equipment, after most US-based cellular networks announced they would adopt the CDMA standard. The company had in annual revenue in 1995 and by 1996.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 1998, Qualcomm was restructured, leading to a 700-employee layoff. Its base station and cell-phone manufacturing businesses were spun-off in order to focus on its higher-margin patents and chipset businesses. Since the base station division was losing a year (having never sold another base station after making its 10th sale), profits skyrocketed in the following year, and Qualcomm was the fastest growing stock on the market with a 2,621 percent growth over one year. By 2000, Qualcomm had grown to 6,300 employees, in revenues, and in profit. 39 percent of its sales were from CDMA technology, followed by licensing (22%), wireless (22%), and other products (17%). Around this time, Qualcomm established offices in Europe, Asia Pacific, and Latin America. By 2001, 65 percent of Qualcomm's revenues originated from outside the United States with 35 percent coming from South Korea.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2005, Paul E. Jacobs, son of Qualcomm founder Irwin Jacobs, was appointed as Qualcomm's new CEO. Whereas Irwin Jacobs focused on CDMA patents, Paul Jacobs refocused much of Qualcomm's new research and development on projects related to the Internet of things. In the same year they have acquired Flarion Technologies, a developer of wireless broadband Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplex Access (OFDMA) technology.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm announced Steven Mollenkopf would succeed Paul Jacobs as CEO in December 2013. Mollenkopf said he would expand Qualcomm's focus to wireless technology for cars, wearable devices, and other new markets.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm announced its intent to acquire NXP Semiconductors for $47 billion in October 2016. The deal was approved by U.S. antitrust regulators in April 2017 with some standard-essential patents excluded to get the deal approved by antitrust regulators.


title: Qualcomm

text: As the NXP acquisition was ongoing, Broadcom made a $103 billion offer to acquire Qualcomm, and Qualcomm rejected the offer. Broadcom attempted a hostile takeover, and raised its offer, eventually to $121 billion. The potential Broadcom acquisition was investigated by the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment and blocked by an executive order from former U.S. President Donald Trump, citing national security concerns.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm's NXP acquisition then became a part of the 2018 China–United States trade war. U.S. President Donald Trump blocked China-based ZTE Corporation from buying American-made components, such as those from Qualcomm. The ZTE restriction was lifted after the two countries reached an agreement, but then Trump raised tariffs against Chinese goods. Qualcomm extended a tender offer to NXP at least 29 times pending Chinese approval, before abandoning the deal in July 2018.


title: Qualcomm

text: On January 6, 2021, Qualcomm appointed its president and chip division head Cristiano Amon as its new chief executive.


title: Qualcomm

text: On January 13, 2021, Qualcomm announced it would acquire NUVIA, a server CPU startup founded in early 2019 by ex-Apple and ex-Google architects, for approximately $1.4 billion. The acquisition was completed in March 2021, and it was announced that its first products would be laptop CPUs, sampling in the second half of 2022.


title: Qualcomm

text: In March 2022, Qualcomm acquired the advanced driver-assistance systems and autonomous driving software brand Arriver from the investment company SSW Partners.


title: Qualcomm

text: In June 2022, Qualcomm acquired Israeli startup Cellwize through its investment arm Qualcomm Ventures.


title: Qualcomm

text: In August 2022, "Bloomberg News" reported that Qualcomm was planning to return to server CPU market based on NUVIA's product. Later that month, Arm Ltd. announced that it sued Qualcomm and NUVIA for breaching license agreements and trademark violations. Arm cited that the chip designs using Arm licenses developed by NUVIA could not be transferred to its parent Qualcomm without permission. Qualcomm indicated that its licenses with Arm cover custom-designed processors.


title: Qualcomm

text: In mid-1985, Qualcomm was hired by Hughes Aircraft to provide research and testing for a satellite network proposal to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The following year, Qualcomm filed its first CDMA patent (No. 4,901,307). This patent established Qualcomm's overall approach to CDMA and later became one of the most frequently cited technical documents in history. The project with the FCC was scrapped in 1988, when the FCC told all twelve vendors that submitted proposals to form a joint venture to create a single proposal.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm further developed the CDMA techniques for commercial use and submitted them to the Cellular Telephone Industries Association (CTIA) in 1989 as an alternative to the time-division multiple access (TDMA) standard for second-generation cell-phone networks. A few months later, CTIA officially rejected Qualcomm's CDMA standard in favor of the more established TDMA standard developed by Ericsson.


title: Qualcomm

text: At the time, CDMA wasn't considered viable in high-volume commercial applications due to the near-far field effect, whereby phones closer to a cell tower with a stronger signal drown out callers that are further away and have a weaker signal. Qualcomm filed three additional patents in 1989. They were for: a power management system that adjusts the signal strength of each call to adjust for the near-far field effect; a "soft handoff" methodology for transferring callers from one cell-tower to the next; and a variable rate encoder, which reduces bandwidth usage when a caller isn't speaking.


title: Qualcomm

text: After the FCC said carriers were allowed to implement standards not approved by the CTIA, Qualcomm began pitching its CDMA technology directly to carriers. This started what is often referred to as "the Holy Wars of Wireless", an often heated debate about whether TDMA or CDMA was better suited for 2G networks. Qualcomm-supported CDMA standards eventually unseated TDMA as the more popular 2G standard in North America, due to its network capacity.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm conducted CDMA test demonstrations in 1989 in San Diego and in 1990 in New York City. In 1990, Nynex Mobile Communications and Ameritech Mobile Communications were the first carriers to implement CDMA networks instead of TDMA. Motorola, a prior TDMA advocate, conducted CDMA test implementations in Hong Kong and Los Angeles. This was followed by a $2 million trial network in San Diego for Airtouch Communications. In November 1991, 14 carriers and manufacturers conducted large-scale CDMA field tests.


title: Qualcomm

text: Results from the test implementations convinced CTIA to re-open discussions regarding CDMA and the 2G standard. CTIA changed its position and supported CDMA in 1993, adopting Qualcomm's CDMA as the IS-95A standard, also known as cdmaOne. This prompted widespread criticism in forums, trade press, and conventions from businesses that had already invested heavily in the TDMA standard and from TDMA's developer, Ericsson.


title: Qualcomm

text: The first commercial-scale CDMA cellular network was created in Hong Kong in 1995. On July 21, 1995, Primeco, which represented a joint venture of Bell Atlantic, Nynex, US West and AirTouch Communications, announced it was going to implement CDMA-based services on networks in 15 states. By this time, 11 out of 14 of the world's largest networks supported CDMA. By 1997 CDMA had 57 percent of the US market, whereas 14 percent of the market was on TDMA.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 1991, Qualcomm and the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) agreed to jointly develop CDMA technologies for the Korean telecommunications infrastructure. A CDMA standard was adopted as the national wireless standard in Korea in May 1993 with commercial CDMA networks being launched in 1996. CDMA networks were also launched in Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, India, and Venezuela. Qualcomm entered the Russian and Latin American markets in 2005. By 2007, Qualcomm's technology was in cell phone networks in more than 105 countries. Qualcomm also formed licensing agreements with Nokia in Europe, Nortel in Canada, and with Matsushita and Mitsubishi in Japan.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm entered the Chinese market through a partnership with China Unicom in 2000, which launched the first CDMA-based network in China in 2003. China became a major market for Qualcomm's semiconductor products, representing more than fifty percent of its revenues, but also the source of many legal disputes regarding Qualcomm's intellectual property. By 2007, $500 million of Qualcomm's annual revenues were coming from Korean manufacturers.


title: Qualcomm

text: Initially, Qualcomm's manufacturing operations were limited to a small ASIC design and manufacturing team to support the Omnitracs system. Qualcomm was forced to expand into manufacturing in the 1990s in order to produce the hardware carriers needed to implement CDMA networks that used Qualcomm's intellectual property. Qualcomm's first large manufacturing project was in May 1993, in a deal to provide 36,000 CDMA phones to US West.


title: Qualcomm

text: For a time, Qualcomm experienced delays and other manufacturing problems, because it was in-experienced with mass manufacturing. In 1994, Qualcomm partnered with Northern Telecom and formed a joint partnership with Sony, in order to leverage their manufacturing expertise. Nokia, Samsung and Motorola introduced their own CDMA phones in 1997. Qualcomm's manufacturing business was losing money due to large capital equipment costs and declining prices caused by competition. Also, in March 1997, after Qualcomm introduced its Q phone, Motorola initiated a lawsuit (settled out of court in 2000) for allegedly copying the design of its Startac phone.


title: Qualcomm

text: In December 1999, Qualcomm sold its manufacturing interests to Kyocera Corporation, a Japanese CDMA manufacturer and Qualcomm licensee. Qualcomm's infrastructure division was sold to competitor Ericsson in 1999 as part of an out-of-court agreement for a CDMA patent dispute that started in 1996. The sale of the infrastructure division marked the beginning of an increase in Qualcomm's stock price and stronger financial performance, but many of the 1,200 employees involved were discontented working for a competitor and losing their stock options. This led to a protracted legal dispute regarding employee stock options, resulting in $74 million in settlements by 2005.


title: Qualcomm

text: 3G standards were expected to force prior TDMA carriers onto CDMA, in order to meet 3G bandwidth goals. The two largest GSM manufacturers, Nokia and Ericsson, advocated for a greater role for GSM, in order to negotiate lower royalty prices from Qualcomm. In 1998, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) voted in support of the WCDMA standard, which relied less on Qualcomm's CDMA patents. Qualcomm responded by refusing to license its intellectual property for the standard.


title: Qualcomm

text: The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) and the Third Generation Partnership Program 2, advocated for a competing CDMA-2000 standard developed primarily by Qualcomm. American and European politicians advocated for the CDMA-2000 and WCDMA standards respectively. The ITU said it would exclude Qualcomm's CDMA technology from the 3G standards entirely if a patent dispute over the technology with Ericsson was not resolved. The two reached an agreement out-of-court in 1999, one month before a deadline set by the ITU. Both companies agreed to cross-license their technology to each other and to work together on 3G standards.


title: Qualcomm

text: A compromise was eventually reached whereby the ITU would initially endorse three standards: CDMA2000 1X, WCDMA and TD-SCDMA. Qualcomm agreed to license its CDMA patents for variants such as WCDMA. There were 240 million CDMA 3G subscribers by 2004 and 143 carriers in 67 countries by 2005. Qualcomm claimed to own 38 percent of WCDMA's essential patents, whereas European GSM interests sponsored a research paper alleging Qualcomm only owned 19 percent.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm consolidated its interests in telecommunications carriers, such as Cricket Communications and Pegaso into a holding company, Leap Wireless, in 1998. Leap was spun-off later that year and sold to AT&T in 2014.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm initially advocated for the CDMA-based Ultra Mobile Broadband (UMB) standard for fourth generation wireless networks. UMB wasn't backwards compatible with prior CDMA networks and didn't operate as well in narrow bandwidths as the LTE (long-term evolution) standard. No cellular networks adopted UMB. Qualcomm halted development of UMB in 2005 and decided to support the LTE standard, even though it didn't rely as heavily on Qualcomm patents. Then, Qualcomm purchased LTE-related patents through acquisitions. By 2012, Qualcomm held 81 seminal patents used in 4G LTE standards, or 12.46 percent.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm also became more focused on using its intellectual property to manufacture semiconductors in a fabless manufacturing model. A VLSI Technology Organization division was founded in 2004, followed by a DFX group in 2006, which did more of the manufacturing design in-house. Qualcomm announced it was developing the Scorpion central processing unit (CPU) for mobile devices in November 2005. This was followed by the first shipments of the Snapdragon system-on-chip product, which includes a CPU, GPS, graphics processing unit, camera support and other software and semiconductors, in November 2007. The Gobi family of modems for portable devices was released in 2008. Gobi modems were embedded in many laptop brands and Snapdragon system on chips were embedded into most Android devices.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm won a government auction in India in 2010 for $1 billion in spectrum and licenses from which to offer broadband services. It formed four joint ventures with Indian holding companies for this purpose. A 49 percent stake in the holding companies was acquired by Bharti in May 2012 and the remaining was acquired in October 2012 by AT&T.


title: Qualcomm

text: According to "Fortune Magazine", Qualcomm has been developing technologies for future 5G standards in three areas: radios that would use bandwidth from any network it has access to, creating larger ranges of spectrum by combining smaller pieces, and a set of services for Internet of things applications. Qualcomm's first 5G modem chip was announced in October 2016 and a prototype was demonstrated in October 2017. Qualcomm's first 5G antennas were announced in July 2018. As of 2018, Qualcomm has partnerships with 19 mobile device manufacturers and 18 carriers to commercialize 5G technology. By late 2019, several phones were being sold with Qualcomm's 5G technology incorporated.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm acquired an email application called Eudora in 1991. By 1996, Eudora was installed on 63 percent of PCs. Microsoft Outlook eclipsed Eudora, since it was provided for free by default on Windows-based machines. By 2003 Qualcomm's Eudora was the most popular alternative to Microsoft Outlook, but still had only a five percent share of the market. Software development for Eudora was retired in 2006.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2001, Qualcomm introduced Brew, a smartphone app development service with APIs to access contacts, billing, app-stores, or multimedia on the phone. South Korean carrier KTFreeTel was the first to adopt the Brew system in November 2001, followed by Verizon in March 2002 for its "Get it Now" program. There were 2.5 million Brew users by the end of 2002 and 73 million in 2003.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2004, Qualcomm created a MediaFLO subsidiary to bring its FLO (forward link only) specification to market. Qualcomm built an $800 million MediaFLO network of cell towers to supplement carrier networks with one that is designed for multimedia. In comparison to cellular towers that provide two-way communications with each cell phone individually, MediaFLO towers would broadcast multimedia content to mobile phones in a one-way broadcast. Qualcomm also sold FLO-based semiconductors and licenses.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm created the FLO Forum standards group with 15 industry participants in July 2005. Verizon was the first carrier to partner with MediaFlo in December 2005 for its Verizon Wireless' V Cast TV, which was followed by the AT&T Mobile TV service a couple months later. The MediaFlo service was launched on Super Bowl Sunday in 2007. Despite the interest the service got among carriers, it was unpopular among consumers. The service required users to pay for a subscription and have phones that were equipped with special semiconductors. The service was discontinued in 2011 and its spectrum was sold to AT&T for $1.93 billion. Qualcomm rebooted the effort in 2013 with LTE Broadcast, which uses pre-existing cell towers to broadcast select content locally on a dedicated spectrum, such as during major sporting events.


title: Qualcomm

text: Based on technology acquired from Iridigm in 2004 for $170 million, Qualcomm began commercializing Mirasol displays in 2007, which was expanded into eight products in 2008. Mirasol uses natural light shining on a screen to provide lighting for the display, rather a backlight, in order to reduce power consumption. The amount of space between the surface of the display and a mirror within a 10 micron-wide "interferometric modulator" determines the color of the reflected light. Mirasol was eventually closed down after an attempt to revive it in 2013 in Toq watches.


title: Qualcomm

text: In June 2011, Qualcomm introduced AllJoyn, a wireless standard for communicating between devices like cell phones, televisions, air-conditioners, and refrigerators. The Alljoyn technology was donated to the Linux Foundation in December 2013. Qualcomm and the Linux Foundation then formed the Allseen Alliance to administer the standard and Qualcomm developed products that used the AllJoyn standard In December 2011, Qualcomm formed a healthcare subsidiary called Qualcomm Life. Simultaneously, the subsidiary released a cloud-based service for managing clinical data called 2net and the Qualcomm Life Fund, which invests in wireless healthcare technology companies. The subsidiary doubled its employee-count by acquiring HealthyCircles Inc., a healthcare IT company, the following May. Qualcomm life was later sold to a private equity firm, Francisco Partners, in 2019.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2016, Qualcomm developed its first beta processor chip for servers and PCs called "Server Development Platform" and sent samples for testing. In January 2017, a second generation data center and PC server chip called Centriq 2400 was released. "PC Magazine" said the release was "historic" for Qualcomm, because it was a new market segment for the company. Qualcomm also created a Qualcomm Datacenter Technologies subsidiary to focus on the PCs and servers market. In 2017, Qualcomm introduced embedded technology for 3D cameras intended for augmented reality apps, and also developed and demonstrated laptop processors.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2000, Qualcomm formed a joint venture with Ford called Wingcast, which created telematics equipment for cars, but was unsuccessful and closed down two years later. Qualcomm acquired the wireless electric car charging company, HaloIPT, in November 2011 and later sold the company to WiTricity in February 2019. Qualcomm also started introducing Snapdragon system-on-chips and Gobi modems and other software or semiconductor products for self-driving cars and modern in-car computers.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2021, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)’s annual World Intellectual Property Indicators report ranked Qualcomm's number of patent applications published under the PCT System as 5th in the world, with 2,173 patent applications being published during 2020. This position is down from their previous ranking as 4th in 2019 with 2,127 applications.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2017, Qualcomm owned more than 130,000 current or pending patents. An increase from the early 2000s when Qualcomm had more than 1,000 patents. As the sole early investor in CDMA research and development, Qualcomm's patent portfolio contains much of the intellectual property that is essential to CDMA technologies.


title: Qualcomm

text: Since many of Qualcomm's patents are part of an industry standard, the company has agreed to license those patents under "fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory" terms. Qualcomm's royalties come out to about 5% or $30 per mobile device. According to Fortune Magazine, this is about 5–10 times more than what is typically charged by other patent-holders. Qualcomm says its patents are more expensive because they are more important and its pricing is within the range of common licensing practices. However, competitors, clients, and regulators often allege Qualcomm charges unreasonable rates or engages in unfair competition for mandatory patents.


title: Qualcomm

text: In 2005, Broadcom and Qualcomm were unable to reach an agreement on cross-licensing their intellectual property, and Broadcom sued Qualcomm alleging it was breaching ten Broadcom patents. Broadcom asked the International Trade Commission to prohibit importing the affected technology. A separate lawsuit alleged Qualcomm was threatening to withhold UMTS patent licenses against manufacturers that bought their semiconductors from competitors, in violation of the standards agreement.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm alleged Broadcom was using litigation as a negotiation tactic and that it would respond with its own lawsuits. Qualcomm sued Broadcom, alleging it was using seven Qualcomm patents without permission. By late 2006, more than 20 lawsuits had been filed between the two parties and both sides claimed to be winning.


title: Qualcomm

text: In September 2006, a New Jersey court judge ruled that Qualcomm's patent monopoly was an inherent aspect of creating industry standards and that Qualcomm's pricing practices were lawful. In May 2007, a jury ordered Qualcomm to pay Broadcom $19.6 million for infringing on three Broadcom patents. In June 2007, the ITC ruled that Qualcomm had infringed on at least one Broadcom patent and banned corresponding imports. Qualcomm and Broadcom reached a settlement in April 2009, resulting in a cross-licensing agreement, a dismissal of all litigation and Qualcomm paying $891 million over four years.


title: Qualcomm

text: During the litigation, Qualcomm claimed it had never participated in the JVT standards-setting process. However, an engineer's testimony led to discovery of 21 JVT-related emails Qualcomm lawyers had withheld from the court, and 200,000 pages of JVT-related documents. Qualcomm's lawyers said the evidence was overlooked by accident, whereas the judge said it was gross misconduct. Qualcomm was fined $8.5 million for legal misconduct. On appeal, the court held that Qualcomm could only enforce the related patents against non-JVT members, based on the agreements signed to participate in JVT.


title: Qualcomm

text: Six large telecommunications companies led by Nokia filed a complaint against Qualcomm with the European Commission's antitrust division in October 2005. They alleged Qualcomm was abusing its market position to charge unreasonable rates for its patents. Qualcomm alleged the six companies were colluding together under the code name Project Stockholm in a legal strategy to negotiate lower rates. These events led to a protracted legal dispute.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm filed a series of patent-infringement lawsuits against Nokia in Europe, Asia, the US, and with the ITC. The parties initiated more than one dozen lawsuits against one another. Several companies filed antitrust complaints against Qualcomm with the Korean Fair Trade Commission, who initiated an investigation into Qualcomm's practices in December 2006. The dispute between Qualcomm and Nokia escalated, when their licensing agreement ended in April 2007.


title: Qualcomm

text: In February 2008, the two parties agreed to halt any new litigation until an initial ruling is made on the first lawsuit in Delaware. Nokia won three consecutive court rulings with the German Federal Patent Court, the High Court in the United Kingdom, and the International Trade Commission respectively. Each found that Nokia was not infringing on Qualcomm's patents. In July 2008, Nokia and Qualcomm reached an out-of-court settlement that ended the dispute and created a 15-year cross-licensing agreement.


title: Qualcomm

text: ParkerVision filed a lawsuit against Qualcomm in July 2011 alleging that it infringed on seven ParkerVision patents related to converting electromagnetic radio signals to lower frequencies. A jury verdict against Qualcomm was overturned by a judge.


title: Qualcomm

text: In November 2013, the China National Development and Reform Commission initiated an anti-trust investigation into Qualcomm's licensing division. The Securities and Exchange Commission also started an investigation into whether Qualcomm breached antibribery laws through its activities in China. The Chinese regulator raided Qualcomm's Chinese offices in August 2013. The dispute was settled in 2015 for $975 million.


title: Qualcomm

text: In late 2016 The Korea Fair Trade Commission alleged Qualcomm abused a "dominant market position" to charge cell phone manufacturers excessive royalties for patents and limit sales to companies selling competing semiconductor products. The regulator gave Qualcomm a fine of $854 million, which the company said it will appeal.


title: Qualcomm

text: In October 2017, Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission fined Qualcomm another . In late 2018 Qualcomm paid a settlement to Taiwan for in fines and a promise to spend in the local Taiwan economy.


title: Qualcomm

text: In January 2017, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) initiated an investigation into allegations that Qualcomm charged excessive royalties for patents that are "essential to industry standards". That same year, Apple initiated a lawsuit against Qualcomm in the U.S. alleging Qualcomm overcharged for semiconductors and failed to pay in rebates. Apple also filed lawsuits in China and the United Kingdom.


title: Qualcomm

text: Apple alleged Qualcomm was engaging in unfair competition by selling industry-standard patents at a discount rate in exchange for an exclusivity agreement for its semiconductor products. An FTC report reached similar conclusions. Qualcomm filed counter-claims alleging Apple made false and misleading statements to induce regulators to sue Qualcomm. Qualcomm also sued Apple's suppliers for allegedly not paying Qualcomm's patent royalties, after Apple stopped reimbursing them for patent fees. Qualcomm petitioned the International Trade Commission to prohibit imports of iPhones, on the premise that they contain stolen Qualcomm patents after Apple's suppliers stopped paying.


title: Qualcomm

text: In August 2017, the International Trade Commission responded to Qualcomm's complaints by starting an investigation of Apple's use of Qualcomm patents without royalties. Qualcomm also filed suit against Apple in China for alleged patent infringement in October 2017. The following month, Apple counter-sued, alleging Qualcomm was using patented Apple technology in its Android components.


title: Qualcomm

text: In December 2018, Chinese and German courts held that Apple infringed on Qualcomm patents and banned sales of certain iPhones. Some patents were held to be invalid, while others were infringed by Apple.


title: Qualcomm

text: In April 2019, Apple and Qualcomm reached an agreement to cease all litigation and sign a six-year licensing agreement. The settlement included a one-time payment from Apple of about . Terms of the six-year licensing agreement were not disclosed, but the licensing fees were expected to increase revenues by per-share.


title: Qualcomm

text: In January 2018, the European Competition Commission fined Qualcomm for an arrangement to use Qualcomm chips exclusively in Apple's mobile products. Qualcomm is appealing the decision. In June 2022, Qualcomm announced the company had won its appeal against $1+ billion European Union antitrust fine. The appeal highlighted that Apple as a company had no technical alternative other than to use Qualcomm's LTE chipsets.


title: Qualcomm

text: Stemming from the investigation that led to the Apple lawsuit actions, the FTC filed suit against Qualcomm in 2017 alleging it engaged in antitrust behavior due to its monopoly on wireless broadband technology. The complaints filed by the FTC included that Qualcomm charged "disproportionately high" patent royalty rates to phone manufacturers and refused to sell them broadband chips if they did not license the patents, a policy referred to as "no license, no chips", that Qualcomm refused to license the patent to other chip manufacturers as to maintain their monopoly, and that Qualcomm purposely offered Apple a lower license cost to use their chips exclusively, locking other competitors as well as wireless service providers out of Apple's lucrative market. The trial starting in January 2019, heard by Judge Lucy Koh of the federal Northern District Court that also oversaw the Apple case. Judge Koh ruled in May 2019 against Qualcomm, asserting that Qualcomm's practices did violate antitrust. As part of the ruling, Qualcomm was forced to stop its "no license, no chips" bundling with phone manufacturers, and was required to license its patents to other chip manufacturers. As Qualcomm had expressed its intent to appeal, a panel of judges on the 9th circuit of appeals stayed the orders pending the litigation action.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm appealed to the Ninth Circuit, which reversed the decision in August 2020. The Ninth Circuit determined that Judge Koh's decision strayed beyond the scope of antitrust law and that whether Qualcomm's patent licensing may be considered reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing does not fall within the scope of antitrust law, but rather is a matter of contract and patent law. The court concluded that the FTC failed to meet its burden of proof and that Qualcomm's business practices were better characterized as "hypercompetitive" rather than "anticompetitive".


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm develops software, semiconductor designs, patented intellectual property, development tools and services, but does not manufacture physical products like phones or infrastructure equipment. The company's revenues are derived from licensing fees for use of its intellectual property, sales of semiconductor products that are based on its designs, and from other wireless hardware, software or services.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm is a predominantly fabless provider of semiconductor products for wireless communications and data transfer in portable devices. According to the analyst firm Strategy Analytics, Qualcomm has a 39 percent market-share for smartphone application processors and a 50 percent market-share of baseband processors. Its share of the market for application processors on tablets is 18 percent. According to analyst firm ABI Research, Qualcomm has a 65 percent market-share in LTE baseband. Qualcomm also provides licenses to use its patents, many of which are critical to the CDMA2000, TD-SCDMA and WCDMA wireless standards. The company is estimated to earn $20 for every smartphone sold.


title: Qualcomm

text: Qualcomm is the largest public company in San Diego. It has a philanthropic arm called The Qualcomm Foundation. A January 2013 lawsuit resulted in Qualcomm voluntarily adopting a policy of disclosing its political contributions. According to "The New York Times", Qualcomm's new disclosure policy was praised by transparency advocates.


title: Greg Norman

text: Gregory John Norman AO (born 10 February 1955) is an Australian entrepreneur and retired professional golfer who spent 331 weeks as world number one in the 1980s and 1990s. He won 89 professional tournaments, including 20 PGA Tour tournaments and two majors: The Open Championship in 1986 and 1993. Norman also earned thirty top-10 finishes and was the runner-up eight times in majors throughout his career. In a reference to his blond hair, size, aggressive golf style and his birthplace's native coastal animal, Norman's nickname is "The Great White Shark" (often shortened to just "The Shark"), which he earned after his play at the 1981 Masters.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman's business interests began during his playing career. He is the chairman and CEO of the Greg Norman Company, a global corporation with a portfolio of companies in fields including apparel, interior design, real estate, wine production, private equity and golf course design. In 2021, he was named CEO of LIV Golf Investments, a start-up company financed by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund; the LIV Golf Invitational Series of golf tournaments began in 2022.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman has donated to and established numerous charities and charity events, like the QBE Shootout which benefits the CureSearch for Children's Cancer fund. He became a Trustee of the Environmental Institute for Golf in 2004 and received the Golf Writers Association of America's Bartlett Award in 2008 for his charitable work.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman was born in Mount Isa, Queensland, Australia to Mervin and Toini Norman. His mother was the daughter of a Finnish carpenter, and his father an electrical engineer. As a youth, he played rugby and cricket and aspired to be a professional surfer. His mother Toini, who had a single-figure handicap, taught the 15-year-old Norman how to golf and allowed him to caddy for her at the Virginia Golf Club in Brisbane. Within about eighteen months, Norman went from a 27 handicap to a scratch handicap. In Townsville, Queensland, Norman attended Townsville Central State School (enrolled 1964) and then Townsville Grammar School then moved on to Aspley State High School on the north side of Brisbane.


title: Greg Norman

text: In June 1974, at the age of 19, Norman received media attention at the Queensland Open. "The Canberra Times" reported that "the young amateur Greg Norman" was one shot off the lead after the first round.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 1975, at the age of 20, Norman served as assistant professional under Billy McWilliam OAM at Beverley Park Golf Club in Sydney, New South Wales. Shortly thereafter, in the same year, Norman started work as Charlie Earp's trainee in the Royal Queensland Golf Club pro shop, earning A$38 a week. In 1976, six years after he first began to golf, Norman turned professional as a tournament player. That year he earned his first victory at the West Lakes Classic at The Grange Golf Club in Adelaide, South Australia. He joined the European Tour in 1977, and had his first victory in a European event that same season, the Martini International, at the Blairgowrie Club in Scotland.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 1980, Norman earned a sizable victory in the French Open, winning the tournament by ten shots. He won the Scandinavian Enterprise Open in Sweden with a course record of 64 in the final round. Later in 1980, Norman won the Suntory World Match Play Championship. Norman also won his first Australian Open that year, his first of five wins in that event.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 1981, Norman finished in 4th place on his debut at the Masters in Augusta, finishing just three strokes behind the winner Tom Watson. Norman had a victory in the 1981 British Masters and he won his third Martini International tournament that year as well. In 1982, Norman was the leading money winner on the European Tour. He won three European events that year, including successfully defending his British Masters title. The following year, Norman joined the U.S. PGA Tour.


title: Greg Norman

text: In June 1984, Norman won his maiden PGA Tour victory at the Kemper Open, winning by five strokes. He gained worldwide prominence a week later at the 1984 U.S. Open. Norman holed a dramatic 45-foot putt on the 72nd hole to force a playoff with former Masters champion Fuzzy Zoeller. At the next day's 18-hole playoff, Zoeller would earn a 67–75 victory over Norman. He was able to put the defeat behind him with a victory at the Canadian Open the next month in July for his second win of the year.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 1985, Norman won the Toshiba Australian PGA Championship and the National Panasonic Australian Open. He had two runner-up finishes in the U.S. PGA Tour that year, finishing tied for second place at the Canadian Open and at the Bank of Boston Classic.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 1986, Norman's 11 worldwide victories that year included four wins in Australia and two regular PGA Tour events; the Panasonic Las Vegas Invitational and the Kemper Open (for the second time) but 1986 is remembered for the "Norman Slam" or the "Saturday Slam." Norman held the lead for all four majors through 54 holes. This meant he played in the final group for every major and had perhaps the best chance in history of winning the single-season Grand Slam. However, the only major victory Norman earned that year was in the 1986 Open Championship at Turnberry.


title: Greg Norman

text: At the 1986 Masters, Norman began the final round with a one-stroke lead which he maintained until he double-bogeyed the 10th. After making four consecutive birdies on holes 14 to 17, Norman was tied with Jack Nicklaus going to the 18th. Norman missed a par putt on the 18th that would have sent the two into a sudden-death playoff. At the 1986 U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills, Norman again led after 54 holes. However, Norman faltered on the final day, finishing with a final round 75 placing him six strokes behind the winner, Raymond Floyd.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman finally broke through at the 1986 Open Championship for his first major title. Norman shot a second round of 63 on Friday at Turnberry, tying the record for the lowest ever round at the Open. Only 15 players broke par in the second round. Tom Watson described Norman's feat as "the greatest round ever played in a tournament in which I was a competitor." Norman survived the weekend's brutal conditions at Turnberry, with a final round of 69 to win The Open by five shots. After being presented with the Claret Jug trophy, Norman said: "Outside of Australia, Britain was the first place that accepted me as a professional golfer. To win my first Open in front of the British public is the greatest feeling ever." Norman was again in contention at the 1986 PGA Championship. He was in the lead on the final day, but shot a final-round 76 to finish 2 strokes behind the eventual winner, Bob Tway.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman's four wins in Australia in 1986 helped him to finish top of the Australian Order of Merit for the fifth time. He also topped the U.S. PGA Tour money list for the first time that year. In September 1986, Norman won the Panasonic European Open at Sunningdale Golf Club and the following month he had another victory in England, winning his third World Match Play Championship at Wentworth. Norman ended 1986 with eleven worldwide victories and was officially ranked number 1 in the brand new Official World Golf Rankings.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman endured another setback at the 1987 Masters. In his final round on the 18th green, Norman had a 20-foot putt for a birdie that would win the tournament. The ball trickled over the left lip of the cup, missing by millimetres. After Norman's par on the 72nd hole at Augusta, he found himself in a sudden-death playoff with Larry Mize and Seve Ballesteros. On the second playoff hole, with Ballesteros eliminated, Mize holed a 47-yard (140-foot) chip to win the tournament. Norman did, however, win the Australian Masters in February 1987 and the Australian Open later in the year by a record ten shots at Royal Melbourne Golf Club, beating the previous Australian Open record winning margin of eight strokes by Jack Nicklaus in 1971. Norman's 1987 victory at the Australian Open lifted him back above Seve Ballesteros to the top of the Official World Golf Ranking.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman had another four wins in Australia in 1988. In the U.S., Norman won the MCI Heritage Golf Classic at Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, in April 1988, inspired by a leukemia-stricken teenager who got his wish to meet Norman and watch him play. The teenage boy was only supposed to watch the golfer for two rounds, but Norman arranged for him to stay until the tournament's completion. After the tournament, Norman awarded the teenager with the trophy. He was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in that year.


title: Greg Norman

text: At the 1989 Masters, Norman missed a 12-foot par putt on the 72nd hole, which would have put him into a playoff with Nick Faldo and Scott Hoch. Norman had another chance at a major in 1989, this time at the Open Championship at Royal Troon. He played a final round of 64, starting his round with six straight birdies, forcing his way into a playoff with Mark Calcavecchia and Wayne Grady. Going into the final playoff hole, Norman and Calcavecchia were tied, but two successive bunker shots by Norman gave Calcavecchia the victory.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman won the Doral-Ryder Open and Memorial Tournament in 1990. He also missed the cut for the first time at Augusta National in the 1990 Masters. In the 1990 Open Championship at St Andrews, Norman began with two rounds of 66, leaving himself sharing the lead with Nick Faldo after 36 holes and the pair four shots ahead of the rest of the field. Faldo then shot a third round of 67, but Norman could only manage 76. Norman finished the tournament tied for sixth place, while Faldo won by five shots. Although 1990 was not Norman's strongest majors year, he finished at the top of the PGA Tour money list for the second time in his career and won the Vardon Trophy and Byron Nelson Award. Later that year, he won the Australian Masters in his home country for a final and record sixth time.


title: Greg Norman

text: After a career slump in the early 1990s, Norman turned to renowned coach Butch Harmon for help. Together, the two rebuilt Norman's game by solving mechanical problems that had crept into his swing. As a result of this training, Norman earned his second major at Royal St George's in the 1993 Open Championship. There, in ideal conditions, Norman defeated a leaderboard consisting of Nick Faldo, Bernhard Langer and Corey Pavin. Norman's final round 64 was the lowest score by a winner in Open history until Henrik Stenson's 63 at the 2016 Open Championship.


title: Greg Norman

text: During the following year, 1994, Norman easily beat records for the lowest 18-, 54-, and 72-hole scores at The Players Championship. After opening with a course record-tying 63, he followed with three 67s to give him a final total of 264 strokes, or 24 under par—six strokes better than any previous winner.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman finished third at the 1995 Masters and was the runner-up at the 1995 U.S. Open. In June, Norman won his second Memorial Tournament, a victory that marked the beginning of one of his best years on the PGA Tour. After his win at the Canon Greater Hartford Open, aided by a chip-in in for eagle on No. 14 in the final round, Norman overtook Nick Price as the number one golfer in the world. Later, he won the NEC World Series of Golf, holing a 70-foot birdie chip shot to defeat Billy Mayfair and Nick Price in a playoff on the first hole. He ultimately held the No. 1 ranking for 331 weeks in his career. He also topped the money list for the third time and was named PGA Player of the Year.


title: Greg Norman

text: The following year, Norman opened the 1996 Masters Tournament with a course record-tying 63 which put him at the top of the leaderboard. He held the lead through three days of play. Norman took a six-stroke lead into the final round and lost the tournament to Nick Faldo by five strokes, shooting a Sunday 78 to Faldo's 67. In January 1997, Norman won his largest winner's check to date, one million dollars, when he won the Andersen Consulting World Championship of Golf. Norman then won two tournaments in 1997, but they were his final victories on the PGA Tour. In 1998, Norman missed part of the season after suffering hip and shoulder injuries. He contended in the 1999 Masters tournament, tying for the lead with five holes remaining before finishing third, three strokes behind, and again in the 1999 Open Championship, eventually finishing 6th, three strokes behind.


title: Greg Norman

text: In July 2008, despite not playing in a major for three years, Norman finished nine over par in a tie for third at The Open Championship after being the 54-hole leader by two strokes. At 53, he set the record in becoming the oldest 54-hole leader in a major championship; a record that would last for just one year, until 59-year-old Tom Watson led the 2009 Open Championship after three rounds.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman turned 50 in February 2005, but has kept his distance from the senior golf circuit. This is due, in part, because of his focus on business, but also because of lingering hip and back issues. In 2003, Norman said: "Hitting about four million golf balls has created unfortunate wear and tear." He had knee surgery in October 2005 and February 2006. Norman believes his back injuries could have been averted had he been introduced to the concept of golf fitness early in his career.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman has earned more than $1 million five times on the U.S. PGA Tour, including three Arnold Palmer Awards as the Tour's leading money winner in 1986, 1990 and 1995. He was also the first person in Tour history to surpass $10 million in career earnings. He has 30 top-10 finishes in majors, or more than 38% of those he has entered. His 20 PGA Tour wins in the 1980s and 1990s ranks second behind Tom Watson (21 total) during this span. He had the lowest total four round score in the history of The Open Championship 267, in 1993, (since broken by Henrik Stenson in 2016), and The Players Championship (264, in 1994).


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman's dominance over his peers (despite his comparative lack of success in the majors) was probably best expressed in the Official World Golf Rankings: Norman finished the year on top of the ranking list on seven occasions, in 1986, 1987, 1989, 1990, 1995, 1996 and 1997, and was second at the end of 1988, 1993 and 1994. Norman won the PGA Tour of Australia's Order of Merit six times: 1978, 1980, 1983, 1984, 1986 and 1988. He won the European Tour's Order of Merit in 1982, and topped the PGA Tour's money list in 1986, 1990, and 1995. He won the Vardon Trophy for lowest scoring average on the PGA Tour three times: 1989, 1990 and 1994; and was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2001.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 1986, Norman was awarded the BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year Award, a feat he replicated in 1993 to join Muhammad Ali as a multiple winner of the award (now also joined by Roger Federer and Usain Bolt). In 2007, Norman was elevated to "Legend" status in the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He received the 2008 Old Tom Morris Award from the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America, GCSAA's highest honour, at the 2008 Golf Industry Show in Orlando. Norman is a member of The Environmental Institute for Golf's board of trustees and also chairs The institute's advisory council. He was also the recipient of the Golf Writers Association of America's 2008 Charlie Bartlett Award. In 2009 Norman was inducted into the Queensland Sport Hall of Fame.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 2009, as part of the Q150 celebrations, Greg Norman was announced as one of the Q150 Icons of Queensland for his role as a "sports legend".


title: Greg Norman

text: In 2015, the PGA of Australia established the Greg Norman Medal, which is awarded to the best Australian male or female golfer in a given year. He also received the Australian Global Icon Award and the National Golf Course Owner's Association Award of Merit both in 2015.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman had a bold and aggressive style of play. He is widely regarded as one of the best drivers of the golf ball in his era. In the fourteen seasons between 1984 and 1997, Norman finished in the top 20 in total driving on the PGA Tour twelve times and in the top 6 nine times (including first in 1988, 1989 and 1993). When driving long and straight off the tee with a persimmon (wood) clubhead in his prime, Norman intimidated many of his fellow professionals. His high ball flight enabled him to carry the ball very long distances. In 2009, Nick Price said: "The best driver I ever saw was Greg Norman."


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman founded the Greg Norman Company (originally known as Great White Shark Enterprises (GWSE)) in 1993 after leaving his previous management group, IMG. The now multinational corporation is headquartered in West Palm Beach, Florida. He initially used the Reebok-licensed shark logo for his line of apparel; it now represents over a dozen different businesses. The company reports hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue annually. In 2016, the company changed its branding to become the "Greg Norman Company."


title: Greg Norman

text: First established in 1987, Greg Norman Golf Course Design (GNGCD) has been responsible for the creation of over 100 golf courses across the world.


title: Greg Norman

text: The Greg Norman Collection began in 1992 after Reebok gave Norman his own line of clothing. It reached $100 million in annual sales in 2005. The collection is composed largely of golf-inspired activewear for men and women.


title: Greg Norman

text: Greg Norman Estates is a wine company that produces 14 different varietals from Australia, California, and Argentina. The brand is known for attracting attention from "Wine Spectator", having earned the number 8 spot in the world with a 1998 Reserve Shiraz.


title: Greg Norman

text: The real estate division of the company is responsible for a variety of developments and projects including the Medalist Village in Hobe Sound, Florida. The Greg Norman Design Group is a separate wing of the real estate division that deals in interior design.


title: Greg Norman

text: The Great White Shark Opportunity Fund is an asset-based, debt-lending fund that invests in public and private small- to mid-cap growth companies throughout the world. The platform offers alternative lending and flex capital.


title: Greg Norman

text: A joint venture between Norman and his son, Greg Norman, Jr., Shark Wake Park is a brand of wakeboarding complexes. The first park opened in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina in June 2016, and a second, larger park opened in June 2019 in West Palm Beach, Florida.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman launched a connected golf cart in 2017 with partners Verizon, GPSi and Club Car. The cart is equipped with touchscreen display for music and GPS while playing a course.


title: Greg Norman

text: Debuting in 2011, Greg Norman Eyewear provides sunglasses that are designed for use on the golf course. The brand has a partnership with Aspex Eyewear and is distributed in the United States by Aspex.


title: Greg Norman

text: Located in Barefoot Landing in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Greg Norman Australian Grille offers fine dining with an Australian theme.


title: Greg Norman

text: In addition to the wholly owned companies under the company umbrella, there are also numerous partially owned companies and partnerships. For instance, Norman invested in and became the ambassador for Vancouver-based GPS Industries in 2004. GWSE partnered with Kohlberg & Company to acquire Troon Golf, one of the world's largest golf management companies with over 250 golf courses in its portfolio. Norman is also a leading investment partner in Alchemy Global, a firm that seeks investors for sports startups.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman is also the brand ambassador and partner to numerous companies including Qantas (a partnership he's been in since 1976), Cobra Golf, OMEGA, and others.


title: Greg Norman

text: In 2017, Authentic Brands Group become a controlling partner for the consumer products division of The Greg Norman Company.


title: Greg Norman

text: LIV Golf Investments is led by Greg Norman as CEO. The LIV Golf Invitational Series began in 2022 and consist of seven regular-season events where players compete both individually for points and as part of a team. The series provoked strong resistance from the established PGA Tour and European Tour organisations, including suspensions of players who joined the series, and criticism of its financial backing by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund.


title: Greg Norman

text: In May 2022 when asked on Sky Sports News about Saudi Arabia's extensive human rights violations and how Norman felt about working for such people he stated: "No they're not my bosses. We're independent, I do not answer to Saudi Arabia, I do not answer to MBS." LIV Golf Investments is on the public record as being under the majority ownership of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF). This fund has been controlled by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler since 2015.


title: Greg Norman

text: The QBE Shootout, formerly known as the Shark Shootout, is a PGA Tour team golf event hosted by Greg Norman. The event is played at the Tiburón Golf Club in Naples, Florida. The Shootout benefits CureSearch National Childhood Cancer Foundation. The Greg Norman Golf Foundation was formed by Greg Norman and his father Merv Norman in 1987. The foundation provides professional guidance and instruction throughout Queensland to school students and those in other educational establishments, children with specific physical disabilities, and junior members of golf clubs. The Environmental Institute for Golf the philanthropic arm of the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America (GCSAA), is a collaborative effort of the environmental and golf communities, dedicated to strengthening the compatibility of golf with the natural environment. Norman became a Trustee of the Institute and a member of its advisory council in 2004.


title: Greg Norman

text: On 23 April 2014, Fox Sports announced that Norman would join Joe Buck as its lead commentary team for its coverage of the USGA's championships beginning in 2015. However, following criticism of his performance at the 2015 U.S. Open, it was announced in January 2016 that Paul Azinger would replace Norman as the lead golf analyst for Fox Sports.


title: Greg Norman

text: Norman had a brief romance with British tennis player Sue Barker before he met Laura Andrassy, an American flight attendant. Norman married Andrassy in July 1981. They had two children—Greg Norman, Jr. and Morgan-Leigh. They divorced in 2006, with Andrassy receiving a $105 million settlement. He married former World No. 1 tennis player Chris Evert on Paradise Island in the Bahamas in June 2008, but they separated after only 15 months and were subsequently divorced. In November 2010, Norman married interior designer Kirsten Kutner on Necker Island in the British Virgin Islands, with Greg Jr. as his best man. Norman has two grandchildren—Harrison and Hendrix.


title: Greg Norman

text: In December 2020, Norman was hospitalized with COVID-19. While in hospital, he shared an update on Instagram saying, "It's been an ugly one. I for one am looking forward to getting out of this quarantine and looking forward to building whatever the great future is for 2021 and beyond."


title: Corey Stoll

text: Corey Stoll (born March 14, 1976) is an American actor. He is best known for his roles as Congressman Peter Russo on the Netflix political thriller series "House of Cards" (2013–2016), for which he received a Golden Globe nomination in 2013, and Dr. Ephraim Goodweather on the FX horror drama series "The Strain" (2014–2017). Since 2020, he has portrayed Michael Prince, a business rival to protagonist Bobby Axelrod, in the Showtime series "Billions". He was also a regular cast member on the NBC drama series "" (2010–2011) and portrayed Darren Cross / Yellowjacket in the Marvel Cinematic Universe film "Ant-Man" (2015). Other notable roles include an off-Broadway performance of "Intimate Apparel" (2004), Ernest Hemingway in the romantic comedy film "Midnight in Paris" (2011) a performance for which he was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male, bulldog prosecutor Fred Wyshak in "Black Mass" (2015), astronaut Buzz Aldrin in the biopic "First Man" (2018), and Junior Soprano in "The Many Saints of Newark".


title: Corey Stoll

text: Corey Stoll was born on the Upper West Side of New York City's Manhattan borough, the son of Judith and Stephen Stoll. His father co-founded The Beacon School. Stoll was raised Jewish. He studied drama at Long Lake Camp for the Arts from 1988 to 1992, and is a drama graduate of Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. He graduated from Oberlin College in 1998 and enrolled in the Graduate Acting Program at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, graduating in 2003.


title: Corey Stoll

text: In 2004, Stoll received a Drama Desk Award nomination as Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play for "Intimate Apparel", opposite Tony winner and Oscar winner Viola Davis. He went on to appear in several films, including "North Country", "Lucky Number Slevin", the television film "", "Brief Interviews with Hideous Men", and "Push". In 2010, he appeared in "Helena from the Wedding" and "Salt".


title: Corey Stoll

text: Stoll starred as LAPD Detective on the NBC police drama "". He played Ernest Hemingway in Woody Allen's 2011 film "Midnight in Paris". Stoll, who is mostly bald, wore a custom wig for the role. In 2013, Stoll received a Golden Globe Award nomination for his performance in the Netflix series "House of Cards". After "House of Cards", he joined the FX horror television series "The Strain", which is based on a series of novels written by Chuck Hogan and film director Guillermo del Toro.


title: Corey Stoll

text: In 2014, Stoll also played Austin Reilly, an NYPD police officer, in the action film "Non-Stop", and Paul Altman in the comedy-drama "This Is Where I Leave You". In 2015, Stoll played Ben Day in the film "Dark Places", based on the novel by Gillian Flynn, and had a major role as the villain in the superhero film "Ant-Man", playing Darren Cross, later reimagined as the supervillain Yellowjacket. The following year, he reunited with Woody Allen, playing gangster Ben Dorfman in his 2016 film "Café Society". Also in the summer of 2016, he played the wily Greek warrior Ulysses in the Public Theater production of "Troilus and Cressida" by William Shakespeare, in Central Park.