Well, this is ironic: Microsoft has been found guilty of violating intellectual property rights in a nation where 82 percent of all software is pirated, a nation that is home to a counterfeiting syndicate that in 2007 was busted for manufacturing and distributing more than $2 billion worth of counterfeit Microsoft software.
As its recent buying binge–three acquisitions in October, alone–suggests, Cisco’s business is in decent shape these days. Reporting first-quarter results after market close today, the company handily beat Wall Street estimates.
What do you know: China Unicom just coughed up some first weekend sales numbers for the iPhone and…well, they’re not much to look at, despite what I said earlier. The carrier sold just 5,000.
Cisco’s fall acquisition binge continues unabated. Late Monday, the company announced plans to buy the set-top box business of China’s DVN Holdings for up to $44.5 million. This after spending $3 billion on videoconferencing system maker Tandberg, wireless infrastructure outfit Starent Networks and software-as-a-service security vendor ScanSafe–all in quick succession.
Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo says the demand for mobile devices improved in many markets during the third quarter–but you wouldn’t know it to look at the company’s earnings. This morning, Nokia posted an unexpected 559 million euro ($836 million) loss for the period, its first in a decade. Worse, its smart-phone market share declined to 35 percent from 41 percent in the previous quarter.
Netflix is headed to the iPhone–at some yet-to-be-determined point in the future. Asked by Reuters if he’d ever consider a partnership with Apple, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said he would, but only after the company had secured its foothold on videogame consoles and elsewhere.
Google claims that its Book Search settlement will “bring back to life millions of lost books in a way that serves the interest of all.” And if that truly is its goal, the company is going to have to put its own Brobdingnagian self interests second to those of others–if only for a little while. To wit, Google’s announcement Monday of a number of concessions to the European Union, which seems a bit dubious of the whole thing.
If Apple hasn’t already signed a deal to bring the iPhone to China, it’s getting damn close. Sources tell Reuters that China Unicom may announce the rumored agreement as soon as tomorrow.
If Intel’s latest earnings are truly an indication of how the tech industry is holding up in the econalypse, then the tech industry isn’t doing too badly (though, obviously, it has seen better days). After market close Tuesday, the chip behemoth posted second-quarter results far in excess of expectations.
What part of “No” does EMC not understand? On Monday the company once again said its bid for data storage equipment maker Data Domain is “superior” to a competing offer from NetApp. This, despite the fact that Data Domain earlier in the day issued a statement recommending that shareholders reject EMC’s $30-a-share cash bid.
Apple has $29 billion in cash, no debt, a 36 percent gross margin, and it’s on the cusp of another iPhone ugrade cycle. Little wonder, then, that analysts are raising their target prices on the company’s stock. Among those doing so today: Morgan Stanley’s Kathryn Huberty, who says “Apple is emerging as the clear leader in the battle over the mobile Internet.”
Apple and Research in Motion may disagree on many things, but they’re of the same mind when it comes to the the netbook phenomenon: It will be short-lived. Asked about Apple’s interest in the category during a late-April earnings call, COO Tim Cook said the company has none. Turns out, Research in Motion co-CEO Jim Balsillie feels pretty much the same way.
About the best thing to be said for Sony’s grotesque financial results is that they came in smaller than expected. The company’s 98.9 billion yen ($1 billion) loss for the fiscal year ended March–its first net loss in 14 years–wasn’t nearly as bad as the 150.0 billion yen ($1.57 billion) figure it had predicted in January or even close to the 173.8 billion yen ($1.8 billion) analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had been forecasting.
John Paczkowski has been poking fun at the tech industry and the personalities that drive it since 1997. From 1999 to 2007, he wrote the award-winning tech news Web log Good Morning Silicon Valley for the San Jose Mercury News, Silicon Valley's daily newspaper. Read more »
Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.
12:58 AM: Breakfast: Two schools of fish from Tokyo Bay. Calories: 782,000. How I was feeling when I ate this: confused, irradiated, hating my size.
11:37 AM: Exercise: “Taxi Stomp” (alternating legs, for 30 blocks). Calories burned: 148,900,183.
1983. The Beatles announce their first tour in thirteen years, but likewise announce that Michael Jackson will be going on tour with them as a one gigantic mega-concert event.
Best video mashup ever.
A Facebook Memorial
Wow.
Worth it for the Rickrolling photo alone.
Excellent.
Flughumor!
… you vacuous, toffee-nosed, malodorous perverts
Stephen Fry and zoologist Mark Carwardine meet the kakapo — a fat, flightless and very randy rare parrot.
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