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The True Costs (and Future) of webOS

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The True Costs (and Future) of webOS

The real news in the HP Q4 2011 results is not whether the company made an overall profit (even if it did). It is how much HP spent on the Palm and webOS businesses-- a sum totalling well over $2 billion.

First off, one has to recall HP spent $1.2BN to buy Palm in the first place back in 2010, before releasing a couple of webOS-powered smartphones and the stillborn TouchPad tablet. Two other numbers emerge from the Q4 2011 results-- $885 million in "impairment of goodwill and purchased intangible Continue reading...

Is Microsoft Standing on Feet of Clay?

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Is Microsoft Standing on Feet of Clay?

Microsoft is a colossus, with sales reaching over $60 billion a year (and growing by 10% Y-o-Y), annual profits totaling $20BN and owning nearly $60BN in cash. But is it really about to collapse due to standing on feet of clay?

This is the belief Silicon Valley big VC firm partners, executives and startup gurus speaking to Business Insider share. How would such a scenario-- a nightmare for Steve Ballmer and co.-- play out?

First off, Apple manages to beat all other vendors to become global PC vendor by H2 2012, as Canalys predicts (keep in mind Canalys forecasts also count tablet numbers). As consumers (and employees) get more and more intimate with Apple hardware and software, enterprise IT departments will also start switching to Apples-- as they already do in the mobile sphere, switching from Blackberries to iPhones and the iPad. RIM tried to enter the enterprise tablet market with the PlayBook, but with very little success.

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Tegra 3 Gets Four Cores, Official Launch

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Tegra 3 Gets Four Cores, Official Launch

The long-awaited Nvidia quad-core mobile device processor gets is official-- the Tegra 3, previously known as "Project Kal-El," promising improvements in both performance and power consumption.

Nvidia claims the Tegra 3 provides up to x3 the graphic performance and 61% less power consumption over the Tegra 2, via 4-core 1.3GHz ARM Cortex A9 CPU, 12-core GPU and a 5th low-power "companion core" running low-intensity processes such as audio streaming, some video playback and standby modes.

The company Continue reading...

Garage Sale No More: HP Keeps PC Division

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Garage Sale No More: HP Keeps PC Division

HP decides on a fate for the HP Personal Systems Group-- the unit will remain part of the company after all.

The spin-off option will never happen either, as HP (and new CEO Meg Whitman) realises the value of remaining in the PC business.

The HP PSG was put on sale last August as one of the last decisions by non-hardware loving ex-CEO Léo Apotheker, who wanted to turn HP into an IBM-alike, selling hardware and software to enterprise clients.

Even when going through such uncertain times, the HP Continue reading...

What's Really Happening at Acer?

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What's Really Happening at Acer?

Global Acer revenues slide further down-- reaching $3.8BN and crashing by -30% Y-o-Y in Q3 2011 according to its latest financial results, with total quarterly losses totalling -$36M.

Meanwhile consolidated revenues for the first 3 quarters of 2011 decline by -28% to reach $347.2BN.

These are not good times for Acer-- once the biggest PC vendor in EMEA according to Gartner. The analyst now says Acer crashed by -39.3% in the EMEA Q3 2011, holding 13.6% market share (down from 21.7% in Q3 2010) Continue reading...

Google Unwraps Ice Cream Sandwich with Samsung

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Google Unwraps Ice Cream Sandwich with Samsung

Google officially unveils Android 4.0 (aka Ice Cream Sandwich) at a Hong Kong Samsung event, where Samsung announces the first smartphone running on the OS-- the Galaxy Nexus.

Ice Cream Sandwich offers a gelataria of improvements on previous Android iterations-- unifying the Google platform as it merges the smartphone (Android 2.3, aka Gingerbread) and tablet (Android 3.0 aka Honeycomb) versions of the OS.

The UI gets a complete makeover, thanks to tweaks ranging from a new font ("Roboto") adorning Continue reading...

What’s Up in UPS?

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What’s Up in UPS?

What’s new in UPS, you ask? OK, you didn't ask because you don’t think anything really new is going on. Isn’t it a mature market with a few behemoths locking up the business?

Yes... and no. It is a mature market but Geneva-based AST Power Quality Solutions believes it can target the exposed underbelly of the old UPS beasts. The very fact that UPS is mature means the market leaders have over-extended their product lines, added more complicated features to units to justify their price points, and evolved clunky ordering and logistics structures. All for single digit profit margins. It’s the maturity that has created their vulnerabilities, argues AST-PQS.

Founded in 2009 and out with their A Series UPS line in Europe in September 2010, AST Power Quality Solutions is an independent joint-venture business extension to ASTModular SA, a provider of modular data centres and headquartered in Barcelona.

AST-PQS goal is to build a complete set of all-inclusive power quality solutions (aka UPS) for the professional (B2B) 1-phase markets. The USP of their UPS (OK, I’ve been waiting years to work in that clever phraseology of acronyms) is to simplify the typical confusingly-broad product offering by including all the most important features, yet matching the price points of “less advanced” products currently available.

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Great Garage Sale on HP Drawing Board?

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Great Garage Sale on HP Drawing Board?

The Wall Street Journal reports HP may not carry out the PC part of Great Garage Sale after all, as post-Apotheker CEO Meg Whitman is currently busy "crunching the numbers of the proposal by her predecessor."

Whitman wants to make the decision regarding the HP PC division's fate by the end of October.

Apotheker wanted to turn HP into something like IBM, selling hardware and software to an enterprise client base. IBM sold off its PC business to Lenovo back in 2005.

The PC business totals $40 billion Continue reading...

What's the Price of Failure? At HP, it's $7.2 Million...

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What's the Price of Failure? At HP, it's $7.2 Million...

Massive severance packages and golden parachutes are everything but news, but it's always worth pointing them out. Like in the case ex-HP CEO Leo Apotheker, who leaves the company with a very tidy sum-- a $7.2 million, to be precise.

In additional, he also receives a $2.4 million bonus and $3.7M in stock, as the regulatory filing from the US Securities and Exchange Commission shows. And HP will even pay the lawyers negotiating the package!

One would think Apotheker led HP to a prosperous new golden Continue reading...

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