By Rex Crum, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Google Inc. gained ground
Wednesday after the tech giant kicked off its annual developers
conference, and Zulily Inc. surged following a rating upgrade to
lead a broad slate of gains for the tech sector.
Google (GOOGL) rose 2.3% to close at $585.93 a share after the
company held the keynote presentation at its I/O developers
conference in San Francisco. Among the highlights were the debut of
smartwatches from LG and Samsung that run on Google's Android
operating system, and Android TV, a software platform that can be
used to watch and organize TV programs and streaming-video apps
from the Internet.
Google said the first set-top boxes to support Android TV will
be available in the fall.
Zulily (ZU) climbed more than 9% to close at $39.88 a share
after Goldman Sachs analyst Debra Schwartz raised her rating on the
online clothing retailer to buy from neutral. Schwartz also raised
her price target on Zulily's stock to $50 a share from $47. "We see
a good entry point as the company expands its merchandising,
fulfillment, and marketing initiatives which we expect to drive
higher-than-expected customer growth into 2015."
Among other leading tech stocks, gains came from Apple Inc.
(AAPL), Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), Facebook Inc. (FB), Netflix Inc.
(NFLX) and Intel Corp. (INTC)
More gains came from Facebook Inc. (FB), Broadcom Corp. (BRCM)
and Pandora Media Inc. (P).
Investors await the pricing of digital camera company GoPro
Inc., which was scheduled to set the price of its IPO prior to
trading as a public company on Thursday.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index (RIXF) shook off its early
weaknesses to rise 29 points and close at 4,379, while the
Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX) also eked out a small
gain.
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