Video #1:
In this clip we hit up the GDGT Launch Meetup party to find out what the coolest tech and gadget gifts are for 2009, and chat briefly with company founders Peter Rojas and Ryan Block.
Video #2:
In this clip we get a peek at the latest in the Blackberry Curve family with a look at the new 8520 smartphone. I also asked Blackberry about the Apple iPhone rivalry is affecting them, though it’s worth noting Blackberry’s sales since the iPhone launched have soared exponentially.
Video #3:
In this clip we check out the 2009 GDGT Launch Meetup to get up to date on the latest tech gadgets including head-mounted HD camera (Contour HD), printers and portable TV.
Video #4:
In this clip we talk with a Playstation fanatic for his top 5 games and Al De Leon from Sony Playstation to find out whats in store for the PSP in 2010.
This weekend, we uploaded a hilarious video from 1993 on Internet. Today, we travel back in time and look at cell phones:
From MSNBC:
Now that Apple has once again passed Google in market value, can the consumer-electronics maker maintain its lead?
While Apple’s capitalization has risen above that of Google for short bursts in the past, it has remained higher since July 22. As of Aug. 11, Apple was worth $145.87 billion, compared with Google’s $143.40 billion. This could be a momentary shift in Wall Street’s whims — like when Cisco Systems briefly surpassed Microsoft to become the world’s most valuable company in 2000.
More likely, Apple has more solidly unseated Google as tech’s No. 2 powerhouse and is now on track to one day challenge Microsoft for the crown. While both Apple and Google are likely to remain highly valuable in the coming years, there’s reason to believe that Apple may outshine Google in the eyes of investors.
A couple of pieces I wrote ages ago:
- Google is 21st Century’s Monopoly
- Will Google Surpass MSFT’s Value by 2010?
- Will Google Become World’s First Trillion Dollar Market Cap Company?
Maybe I should look into Apple’s odds?
If Michael Arrington and his gang of crazies managed to actually build this darn thing, then yes, this puts Tech Crunch into a whole other sphere of accomplishments.
To put this into context, back in 2008, they put out the call.
It’s one thing to build a successful rag that covers other companies and bears influence (as is: it’s tough enough), but to build an actual product from clunky materials and make them come together into something resembling this:
… let alone working, would be quite the feat.
Image courtesy of the hacks at Gizmodo. And yes, we mean hacks in a nice way, as in “man, that Michael Jordan is suck a hack!”
Is is just me or is the supposedly-immune technology sector next to ask for a bailout?
It sounds crazy, but I think that the meltdown we’re saying can easily exasperate the issues that were due to hit technology:
- After all, we all love open source software, for example, but all of it surely bit into sales. Since you came across AVG, when was the last time you paid McAfee for anti-virus? Or better yet, while my old company had to fork over tens/hundreds of thousands for a CMS, my new one managed to get its hands on a wide array of free open source ones.
- Can too much Moore’s Law be a bad thing? As consumers, obviously not… but over time, this hits margins. A powerful Dell laptop now costs about $500. How sustainable a model is that?
- Hardware and servers in general have become quite cheap that maintaining a high-paying workforce seemed unsustainable for some time to come.
Right now, the mere notion that Silicon Valley would ever ask the government for economic assistance seems crazy, but crazier things have happened. Such as what?
Well, despite the fact that US consumers decided to forego paying US car companies as consumers, the government will step in and force them to pay them indirectly as taxpayers. That is definitely crazy.
Imagine opening a door and finding yourself in a hallway, everyone is running from left to right. What do you do? Do you follow the masses or do you run the opposite way?
Well, from 2006-present, when companies overinvested, overhired, overfunded and overdid everything right and left, we remained conservative. Trust me, if I could have overdone anything, I probably would have, too. But we didn’t, and while every company is laying off 33% of staff, we actually find ourselves in the odd situation of expanding our company.
Whether you are buying equipment or hiring talent, this is an employer’s / buyer’s market… When buying equipment, companies have the choice to:
a) buy them outright
b) lease them with the option to replace them at Fair Market Value in 2 or 3 years
c) lease them with the option to buy them for $1 in 2 or 3 years
I figure in this climate, it’s best to hold on to cash so I am leaning towards financing (b or c). I came across this,
from PC World:
An FMV lease is generally best if you’re pretty sure you’ll upgrade to a newer notebook when your lease expires. If you’ll want to hang onto the notebook, then you should consider a $1 buyout lease. Keep in mind, though, that monthly payments on FMV leases are usually lower than $1 buyout leases.
So I’m torn. We’re looking at buying new Macs for editors to edit videos. And the shelf life of those bad buys - when pushed to the limit for video editing - are at most 2 years. But while the payments for the $1 buyout are a bit higher, I like the ideas of having a few extra Macs in a few years that we can usefor other purposes.
If anyone can chime in, it would be appreciated. Leave a comment or email me at ash@watchmojo.com.
Apocalypse now, analyst style, from Trip Chowdhry of Global Equities Research, via Eric Savitz. Not all that crazy, frankly. I am not software or hardware expert, but on the VC-backed consumer media web stuff, I agree with most of the boldfaced (emphasis mine):
- Almost every Silicon Valley company is facing deteriorating business conditions and will cut their workforce by 3%-10% by year end.
- Project cancellations are accelerating in almost every vertical, including financial services, retail, transportation and public sector.
- “Many startups are starting to fold.” He contends that “almost every” VC funded open-source company is struggling and will run out of funds within the next 6 months. He also says that “many VC funded Web 2.0 companies are shutting down…the Web 2.0 fad is now coming to an end.” He has a similarly dark view on the prospects for software as a service start-ups.
- He thinks the death of many start-ups will be trouble for Google (GOOG), which he says gets 7% of AdWords related revenue from start-up companies.
- He also sees a coming glut of used hardware arriving on the market early next year, selling at 20%-25% of original prices, and depressing the market for computing and networking gear. He thinks that IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Cisco and Juniper in particular are vulnerable to this phenomenon, and could soon find themselves competing with their own used hardware.
- “Every enterprise software company,” including Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, CA, BMC and Sybase are negotiating lower prices on maintenance contracts.
- Indian outsourcing companies, including Infosys, Satyam, Cognizant and Wipro are seeing project pipelines “drying up.” He contends “there is not enough work to keep employees busy.”
- He says Sohu, Baidu, Netease and Sina are struggling to maintain top-line growth, as multinationals cut back their online marketing campaigns in China.
- Web browsers are growing in importance; he thinks Oracle and IBM will offer their own browsers within 12 months.
- Motorola could get a life line in the form of equity investments from Microsoft and possibly Google, in return for supporting the Windows Mobile and Android mobile phone platforms.
- First-generation SAAS companies - NetSuite, Kenexa, RightNow, Salesforce.com, Rackspace, SuccessFactors, DemandTec - “continue to struggle and probably will not see any recovery in their business, irrespective of the economy.”
- Salesforce.com’s business “continues to deteriorate, the best is over, the worse is still to come.” He writes that one of his contacts describes the company as “a modern day Visi-Calc.”
- Cisco is feeling pressure from Microsoft and Arista Networks; he expects layoffs at Cisco of 5%-10% by year end.
- VMware, he says, is seeing business deteriorate. He expects 10% layoffs by year end.
- Apple, he says, is going to start selling iPhones via Costco at $149 starting in January.
Quick: close the window before your colleague jumps out!
Everyone was clamoring today about how Apple surpassed Google in market cap today.
In all fairness, indeed, when measured by market capitalization (shares outstanding x share price), that is true.
But while Google has $12.7B in cash on its balance sheet, Apple has a whopping $20.7B. In fact, in 2009, it’s expected that Apple will have $30B in cash, and by 2010 might even surpass MSFT’s cash hoard.
What does this mean? Well, not much, other than the fact that when measured by enterprise value (market cap less cash plus debt), Apple trails Google $135.79B to $145.31B.
Over time, I don’t doubt that Apple can continue to see both its market cap and enterprise value grow, and eventually surpass Google’s. Google remains a one-trick pony (search/AdSense) whereas Apple now has computers, music players and phones to boost its growth rate… no wonder Eric Schmidt et al. are so hellbent on video and wireless.
Time looks at Google, Facebook and Apple as likely winners of the Web wars.
Google, Facebook and Apple do make me think of the 3 Cs:
- Google = commerce
- Facebook = community
- Apple = content.
Interesting that none of the three create any of the underlying C, they just enable it. That being said, I don’t buy any of these “the future of this” or “how this will kill that” pieces, nor do I buy many of these “X company is the future of so-and-so”.
Google’s place in business is cemented: it’s catapulted itself to IBM and MSFT status and while it may or may or not change, it won’t go anywhere.
Apple today is kicking ass and won’t be disappearing, but just a decade ago it was going nowhere.
Facebook is a great story but has yet to prove itself. It can become Friendster, quickly, and last time I checked, MySpace remains much bigger…
But the bigger reason why I take these articles with a grain of salt is two-fold:
- didn’t an analyst from Sanford Bernstein argue just last week that - on the strength of their respective 20-30% revenue growth - Amazon and Google would own the future of the Web?
- isn’t the future of the Web a video-based one? Sure, Google has video mojo thanks to their YouTube acquisition. But Facebook? Not really. Apple can’t really claim leadership - let alone leadership - either.
This makes me wonder: if video is the future of the Web, who will win between the technology players versus the content players. Hmm… let me think about that, a post is coming soon.
Back in 1997, Michael Dell was asked what he would do if he were running Apple. He answered:
And at the Gartner Symposium and ITxpo97 here today, the CEO of competitor Dell Computer added his voice to the chorus when asked what could be done to fix the Mac maker. His solution was a drastic one.
“What would I do? I’d shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders,” Michael Dell said before a crowd of several thousand IT executives.
Dell’s comments follow Steve Jobs’s keynote address at the Seybold trade show last week in San Francisco, where the Apple cofounder seemed to win over attendees with his explanation of why he had made certain key decisions, killing the clone market and aligning more closely with Microsoft. The Seybold crowd–as well as some Apple employees–also seemed to be buoyed by the increasing role Jobs has taken on at the company as board member and interim CEO.
But others, like Dell, appear to think that Jobs’s expanded role isn’t helping. There is some concern that Apple will have a hard time recruiting a top-notch CEO because of Jobs’s presence.
Eleven years later, you can pretty much swap Apple with Dell and Michael Dell with Steve Jobs. But the point is: Dell probably should not have said that, and I guess, the lesson is, it’s a good thing Fake Steve Jobs and not the actual Steve Jobs is saying that Dell is dead.
Dell has a strong brand and remains a powerful company. It certainly is not dead, but I think if Michael Dell wants to correct the problems, he might want to transport himself back to 1997 and practice what he preached.
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