Xiaomi and Microsoft – The Office

Reply to this post           This deal is really about Office in China. Microsoft and Xiaomi have struck a deal where Xiaomi will take ownership of 1,500 of Microsoft’s patents and Xiaomi will pre-install Office on all of its handsets. I suspect that these patents are almost exclusively wireless patents which, with Microsoft’s precipitous decline in...

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Lenovo Q4 15A – Weather-beaten

Reply to this post           Lenovo should be able to weather a stormy 2016 Lenovo reported a difficult quarter as weakness in the PC market and market share losses in mobile took a heavy toll on financial performance. Q4 15A revenues / net income were $9.1bn / $180m compared to consensus at $10.6bn / $204m but...

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Facebook & Microsoft – Hand in glove.

Reply to this post           I think Facebook could buy some or all of Microsoft’s consumer assets. Microsoft and Facebook are jointly building an undersea cable highlighting the increasing computability between these two companies. The MAREA cable will be 6,600km long extending from Virginia Beach, USA to Bilbao, Spain and will be capable of carrying 160Tbps....

Oracle vs. Google – The merry-go-round pt. II.

Reply to this post           It might have been better for Google if it had lost. The jury has found that Google’s use of Oracle’s APIs fitted the definition of fair use meaning that it will not have to pay Oracle anything for copyright infringement. Oracle will now appeal but in order to get this verdict...

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Microsoft – Mission Impossible pt. II.

Reply to this post           The digital consumer ecosystem is looking increasingly impossible. Microsoft is taking the knife to phones again which casts further doubts over its commitment to the digital consumer ecosystem. Another 1,850 positions are to go of which 1,350 are in Finland which will result in a $950m charge of which $200m is...

Xiaomi – Broken engagement.

Reply to this post           Flat revenue is the least of Xiaomi’s problems. Xiaomi has finally admitted that it ran out of growth in 2015, but unsurprisingly was very tight lipped about the much larger problems it faces in 2016. Revenues in 2015 increased 5% to RMB78bn ($12.5bn) which, with 70.7m units shipped, gives an ASP...

Project Ara – The Holy Grail Pt II.

Reply to this post           Different game but the rules stay the same. Google has scaled back the ambitious objectives of Project Ara (see here) to something more realistic, but to succeed it will still have to obey the four rules of the road (see here). Prior to its reorganisation, Project Ara aimed to provide a...

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Facebook & HTC – Collateral Damage.

Reply to this post           It makes no sense for Facebook to deliberately lock HTC out. Facebook has updated the firmware for the Oculus Rift that has prevented the HTC Vive from running the Oculus Rift apps. The new firmware now performs a platform integrity check to ensure that the Oculus Rift hardware is present before...

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Tencent Q1 16A – Search for happiness.

Reply to this post           Tencent needs to do a little better to keep everyone happy. Tencent reported very healthy Q1 16A results as business continued to benefit from user growth in China that is now substantially outstripping a stagnant device market. Q1 16A revenues / adj-EPS were RMB32.0bn / RMB1.06 nicely ahead of consensus at...

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Google I/O – Brains not brawn.

Reply to this post           Google touts its brains but once again ignores the elephant. Google launched some interesting innovations at its developer conference, but once again declined to address the elephantine problems that it has with software fragmentation and software distribution. Many of the announcements were merely bringing Google into line with competition, but what...