Amazon and Microsoft are in pole position. The COVID-19 pandemic is making both temporary and permanent changes to the way the economy works but picking the beneficiaries is much more difficult than it would seem. The net result of everyone staying at home has been skyrocketing internet usage which is beginning to put a strain on the core network which...
SoftBank is likely to have to sell more assets. SoftBank is in an increasingly tight spot as many of its portfolio companies are in trouble and need cash injections right at the exact time when SoftBank needs to conserve cash the most. WeWork – Any more work? WeWork is in real trouble and SoftBank’s withdrawal from the share purchase worsens...
2020 likely to be a very difficult year. Huawei has done an excellent job of weathering the storm in 2019 but the tidal wave in 2020 is likely to overwhelm any growth prospects that the company might have otherwise had. Huawei has released its 2019 annual report where the cover very appropriately depicts a lighthouse withstanding a severe battering from...
Risk that many partners don’t come back at all. Meituan-Dianping reported good Q4 19 results that no one really cared about with all attention being placed upon how this company has fared during the crisis and what shape the recovery will take. Q4 19 Revenues / Adj. Net Income were RMB28.2bn / RMB2.3bn well ahead of forecasts of RMB26.5bn /...
The sharing economy is in meltdown. I think that it is extremely unlikely that SoftBank will become insolvent but a continued decline in confidence in its business model and potential further failures within its portfolio could trigger a serious liquidity crisis. The bankruptcy of OneWeb combined with the news that WeWork burned through $1.4bn in cash in Q4 2019 adds...
P40: Another triumph that won’t sell. Huawei has launched its latest flagship, the P40 which has all the bells and whistles but without Google Mobile Services, no-one outside of China is going to buy it. The P40, P40 Pro, P40 Pro+ have some very cool features including: First, quad curve display: This is effectively a display with no bezels...
Upgrade demand could help 5G. Despite British Telecom’s denials and the efforts of the broadband providers in the USA, it is clear that the Internet is creaking under the strain of the great home working and e-learning experiment opening further the way for 5G’s best use case by far. British Telecom has denied that its network is under pressure and...
It is raining money that does not exist. The scale of the insanity sweeping the market became clear yesterday as dire predictions for digital advertising were made and yet both Google and Facebook rallied strongly (7% and 9% respectively) While Facebook is seeing a huge spike in usage of its Digital Life services in the hardest-hit countries, its customers are...
SoftBank is in urgent need of cash. Now is the worst time to try and sell anything and this move by SoftBank shows just how desperately it needs cash to prop up both its balance sheet and investor confidence in the company as a going concern. SoftBank has announced a JPY4.5tn (US$41bn) asset sale program of which JPY2tn ($18bn) will...
Richard is founder, owner of research company, Radio Free Mobile. He has 16 years of experience working in sell side equity research. During his 11 year tenure at Nomura Securities, he focused on the equity coverage of the Global Technology sector.
Airbnb – Hardest times.
An equity raise will be brutal. I have very little doubt that Airbnb will survive this crisis but there is very little visibility in terms of how much value the market will put on its operations the next time it has a market event. Airbnb is in a very tough spot as not only it is a travel company, but...