Tencent battens down the hatches for the quarters ahead With the Chinese government showing no signs of letting the video game industry out of its current bind, Tencent is slashing costs and focusing on other areas to lessen the impact of the what is now an inevitable fall in gaming revenue. The video games industry relies on a constant stream...
Samsung reinvents the Nokia Communicator but sadly, doubles down on Bixby. Samsung has shown (see here) the form factor within which it thinks that a folding screen will be most applicable, and in doing so has reinvented the enterprise-focused iconic Nokia Communicator (see here). Most importantly, Samsung confirmed that the screen would be going into mass production in the coming...
AI so dumb, it accepts ads from ISIS. Despite its rhetoric regarding its progress in the fight against fake news, even the most obviously fake placements still seem to be getting through, highlighting once again that at the root of almost all its problems lies its weakness in AI. Tests carried out by Vice News (see here) and Business Insider...
Even the best can’t touch laptops The tablet market is dying and its failure to take over the laptop market means that it is likely to continue being squeezed and not even the new iPad Pro will be able to save it. The new reviews on the new iPad Pro are in and while they are, as expected, universally positive,...
If you fold it, will they come? With most major announcements now out of the way before CES 2019, the folding screen is positioning itself to be the biggest theme at CES in January 2019, potentially kickstarting the next product cycle. Full-face screens are now pretty much the norm meaning that there is very little if any differentiation to be...
Apple signals the way ahead is less predictable. Apple reported excellent FQ4 18 results but guided weakly for FQ1 19 which combined with Apple putting an end to disclosing unit figures, caused general disappointment causing the shares to fall 6.5% in after-hours trading. FQ4 18 revenues / EPS were $62.9bn / $2.91 compared to consensus at $61.4bn / $2.78. Apple...
Apple benefits but Android suffers. The result of huge increases in device prices is now being felt as data from the US indicates that iPhone users, in particular, are holding onto their phones for longer. For Apple, this is a worthwhile trade as the increase in price that it has been able to push through is greater than the negative...
Reasonable numbers but tough outlook. Facebook Facebook reported reasonable results but I still don’t think that the market has fully appreciated the difficulty that the company is going to experience in the medium-term which keeps me cautious. Q3 18 revenues / EPS were $13.7bn / $1.76 compared to consensus at $13.7bn / $1.46. The better than expected profitability caused a...
Red flags everywhere The saga of Faraday Future continues with further evidence of terrible financial management which serves to underpin my view that while Jia Yueting has control, the venture is doomed. The latest twist in the story is a statement from Evergrande Health (see here) that alleges that Jia Yueting has manipulated his majority board seat position in the...
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.
Cable TV – Sword of Damocles pt. IX
Devices to hasten the demise Never one to miss a trick, both Amazon (see here) and TiVo (see here) are now offering set-top boxes that make combining streaming and OTA TV as easy and as fun as possible. This combined with a further loss of 1.1m cable TV subscribers in Q3 18 (MoffatNathanson) and rapid consolidation is a further sign...