NASA spacecraft is orbiting massive asteroid

PASADENA, Calif.—NASA's Dawn spacecraft was captured into orbit around the massive asteroid Vesta after a 1.7 billion-mile journey and is preparing to begin a study of a surface that may date to the earliest era of the solar system, the space agency said Monday.

The entry into orbit occurred while the spacecraft's antenna was pointed away from Earth, so mission controllers had to wait for Dawn to re-establish contact to confirm its success.

The capture was estimated to have occurred at 10 p.m. PDT Friday, when Dawn was 9,900 miles from Vesta and 117 million miles from Earth in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, according to a statement from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

"We are beginning the study of arguably the oldest extant primordial surface in the solar system," the mission's principal investigator, Christopher Russell from the University of California, Los Angeles, said in the statement.

NASA said that after the orbital capture, Dawn sent an initial close-up image taken for navigation purposes. Before the Dawn mission, images of Vesta were obtained by ground- and space-based telescopes but did not show much surface detail.

Vesta, 330 miles in diameter, is the second-most massive object in the asteroid belt and is believed to be the source of many meteorites that fall to Earth.

Dawn will continue to approach Vesta over the next three weeks, search for possible moons and make more navigation images. It begins

Minnesota grinds budget details to end shutdown

(Reuters) - Minnesota political leaders on Monday were grinding toward reaching agreements on budget details needed to end a now 18-day-old state government shutdown that has left thousands of state workers furloughed.

Minnesota's Democratic Governor Mark Dayton has yet to call for the special session needed to approve spending bills and end the shutdown, but ordered the Capitol and state office buildings in St. Paul reopened on Tuesday morning.

The buildings have been closed to the public since the shutdown began on July 1 and Dayton said the reopening would "allow public access and transparency as the legislature prepares to reconvene to pass a budget."

Final versions of four proposed spending bills were posted publicly on state House and Senate websites by Monday evening. Dayton has said he would call a special session once all of the nine spending bills were prepared and reviewed.

Dayton, House Speaker Kurt Zellers and Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch on Thursday said they had reached the framework of a budget agreement to end the shutdown and hoped to complete the detailed bills for a special session early this week.

The governor and legislative leaders, state commissioners, committee leaders and staff members have been working since Friday to craft the details of spending bills needed for the two-year general fund budget of about $35.4 billion.

Dayton and the Republican leaders have all said they were unhappy with their proposed budget plan but believed it was a compromise they must support to eliminate a $5 billion budget deficit and end the government shutdown.

The debate in Minnesota has mirrored those in the nation's capital over the debt ceiling.

The budget framework does not include any of the income tax increases Dayton sought and it has higher spending levels than Republicans wanted. Republican leaders also agreed to give up on some social policy changes they had sought.

'SIGNIFICANT DAMAGE'

The deal proposes to close a $1.4 billion difference between the Dayton and Republican spending plans by delaying $700 million in school payments and issuing $700 million in state debt with revenue from a tobacco industry settlement.

Economists have said the proposed budget fixes would not resolve Minnesota's longer term fiscal problems, but only push them forward two years into the next fiscal biennium in 2014 and 2015 and make them slightly worse.

The resolution could not come sooner for hundreds of Minnesota bars, liquor stores and restaurants running low on alcohol because their state buyer's permits have expired.

The shutdown has forced closure of state parks, historic sites, rest stops, two horse-racing tracks and the suspension of about 100 road construction projects -- but the threat of beer taps running dry has generated broad attention.

A state judge ruled on Monday that the renewal of those permits was not a critical state function and clerks needed to do so would not be returned to work until the shutdown ends.

About 300 liquor retailers across the state have been unable to buy more inventory because buyer's identification cards have expired. Another 400 or so businesses could face dwindling inventory if the shutdown continues past August 1.

The buyer's cards must be renewed annually for a $20 fee and most businesses renewed them before the shutdown began.

While the bars and restaurants cannot buy any alcohol stronger than 3.2 percent without the cards, the impact is strongest on beer because it is perishable and most businesses keep only about a one or two week supply in inventory.

The Minnesota Licensed Beverage Association had asked state court Judge Kathleen Gearin to require the state to process the permits, arguing in part that the businesses would suffer permanent and significant damage.

Former Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Kathleen Blatz, appointed by Gearin to hear appeals for relief from the shutdown, recommended denial of the association's request and Gearin adopted that position.

Blatz wrote that the businesses could be harmed if not crippled, but the "solution to this problem does not rest with the judicial branch but rather those branches charged with enacting the state's budget."

Adobe Buys EchoSign--Makes Digital Signatures Mainstream

Adobe announced that it has acquired EchoSign--a provider of electronic signature and signature automation tools. Adobe is almost a decade late getting into this game, but the strength and recognition of the Adobe brand may help drive more mainstream adoption of the technology.


I hate faxing. When a business wants to send me a fax, or asks me to fax something to them, I am compelled to remind them that this is 2011. I am happy to print, sign, scan, and email something--but I don't do faxing. What's even better, though, is to cut out the printing and scanning steps, and just sign documents electronically and send them on their way.

For many, the Adobe announcement signals a new era--a step forward in the quest for paperless workflow and contracts. But, the concept is not new. DocuSign has been providing electronic signing services since 2004, and EchoSign itself has been around for a number of years as well.

Regardless of the timing, Adobe has grand plans for EchoSign. "We see the majority of contracts being signed on the web in four to five years--up from one percent today," said Kevin Lynch, Vice President and General Manager of Acrobat Solutions, and Digital Enterprise Solutions for Adobe, adding, "Printing out paper, signing with a pen, and faxing or sending it in an overnight envelope will not be the way of the future and in the coming years will feel as antiquated as using film for photos."

EchoSign is an established player in the field with over 35,000 paid subscribers, and more than 3 million users. EchoSign customers include Groupon, Facebook, Dell, Pandora, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Aetna, BT, and many other globally recognized names.

Jason Lemkin, CEO of EchoSign elaborates, "We intend to accelerate EchoSign's growth through broader awareness and integration with Adobe's existing document technology, including the more than 500 million users of Adobe Reader." Lemkin also believes that there will be benefits to existing EchoSign customers with the integration of Adobe tools and resources.

For some, though, tying digital signatures to Adobe's proprietary tools may be an issue. The diverse product portfolio at Adobe may get in the way of maximizing the potential for digital document signing as well.

DocuSign is a leader in digital document signing--and the primary competitor for Adobe and EchoSign. DocuSign Founder and Chief Strategy Officer, Tom Gonser, says, "We feel that as a neutral best-of-class provider of electronic contracting we are more able to span the market than an electronic signature component tied only to one technology."

As established as EchoSign is, DocuSign essentially created the market in the first place. It has been doing electronic signatures since 2003, and--according to Compete.com--eight out of ten documents that are signed electronically today are managed through DocuSign. DocuSign claims that more than 8 million DocuSigners have signed more than 70 million documents in more than 50 countries--and new DocuSign users are being added at the brisk pace of 30,000 per weekday.

Gonser explains, "DocuSign provides full forms management, signer authentication, data collection, signature capture, workflow automation and document storage--all in the cloud. EchoSign has not developed a complete solution for large business, severely limiting their market opportunities to small simple business applications."

Hopefully with both Adobe and DocuSign driving things, we will see much wider adoption of electronic signatures. Adobe is a trusted brand that lends some street cred to the concept of digital document signing, and should help bring it into more mainstream use.

Japan, Australia Stock Futures Fall on U.S., Europe Debt Crisis

Japanese and Australian stock futures fell on concern U.S. lawmakers will fail to reach a deal on the country’s debt limit two weeks before a deadline and Europe’s worsening crisis will slow the global economic recovery.

American depositary receipts of Nissan Motor Co., a Japanese automaker that gets one third of its revenue in North America, declined 1.1 percent from the closing share price in Tokyo on July 15 after stress tests on European banks failed to alleviate investor concern over the region’s debt woes. Those of Canon Inc., which counts Europe as its largest market, declined 1.2 percent. ADRs of BHP Billiton Ltd. (BHP), the world’s biggest mining company and Australia’s No. 1 oil producer, retreated 1.4 percent in Sydney after oil pricesdeclined.

Futures on Japan’s Nikkei 225 (NKY) Stock Average expiring in September closed at 9,870 in Chicago yesterday, compared with 9,970 in Osaka, Japan, on July 15. They were bid in the pre- market at 9,900 in Osaka at 8:05 a.m. local time. Markets were closed in Japan yesterday for a holiday. Futures on Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index slid 0.5 percent today. New Zealand’s NZX 50 Index declined 0.5 percent in Wellington.

“On top of uncertainty about the U.S. economy, there can only be negativity if the U.S. governments’ functionality becomes paralyzed,” said Fumiyuki Nakanishi, senior strategist at SMBC Friend Securities Co. in Tokyo. “In Europe, the stress tests are being seen as too soft, and it’s just postponing the potential for problems.”

Global Decline

Futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index were little changed today. In New York, the index slipped 0.8 percent to 1,305.44 yesterday, pushing the measure to its worst seven-day period in more than a month, amid concern U.S. lawmakers will fail to reach a deal on the nation’s debt limit two weeks before an Aug. 2 deadline.

Global stocks declined amid President Barack Obama’s efforts to get lawmakers to agree to a deficit-cutting deal as the deadline for raising the debt ceiling nears. U.S. equities have been under pressure amid growing concern lawmakers will fail to reach an agreement to raise the nation’s $14.3 trillion debt limit.

Shares also declined after Goldman Sachs Group Inc. economists led by Jan Hatzius, based in Germany, cut their forecasts for real U.S. economic growth to 1.5 percent in the second quarter and 2.5 percent in the third quarter, from 2 percent and 3.25 percent respectively.

Stress Tests

European shares declined yesterday on concern the region’s banks may have to raise as much as 80 billion euros ($113 billion) of additional capital as stress tests failed to allay investor concern about a Greek default and governments’ ability to bail out their lenders.

The European Banking Authority said after the close of trading on July 15 that eight of the 90 banks had failed the stress tests. Regulators didn’t include a Greek default in the tests even though credit default swaps indicate investors see an almost 90 percent chance of one.

Crude oil for August delivery dropped １.4 percent to settle at $95.93 a barrel in New York yesterday. Oil futures have risen 26 percent in the past year.

The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 1.9 percent this year through yesterday, compared with a gain of 3.8 percent by the S&P 500 and a drop of 5 percent by the Stoxx Europe 600 Index in the same period. Stocks in the Asian benchmark are valued at 13.5 times estimated earnings on average, compared with 13.1 times for the S&P 500 and 10.5 times for the Stoxx 600.