Home is the right strategy for Facebook to extend its reach. Facebook Home is a software skin that takes over the home screen of an Android device putting Facebook functionality front and centre of everything that the user does. The experience is very communication centric with updates and messages popping up from friends in a...
Tonight’s announcement risks being a big anti-climax. The last time Facebook made a “big announcement” the result was the spectacularly unambitious Facebook Graph Search. What could have been a big move to diversify away from social networking and take on the giants of the internet is nothing more than a better way to use what...
Samsung and Google will end up in a struggle for the user. So far Samsung and Google have been on good terms given the symbiotic nature of their relationship. The Android software has enabled Samsung to tick the software box and to make excellent margins on its hardware designs and innovations. In return, Samsung handsets...
(RFM will return on Wednesday April 3rd) Windows RT in its current form looks doomed. When Samsung pulls its RT products, everyone will and I have also seen many product roadmaps shut down all together. I have discussed the problem in detail in a previous post but in a nutshell, Windows RT fails because although...
Intel’s aspirations in TV are about supplying chips. Intel appears to be closing in on acquiring TV shows and movies to offer to consumers as a pay-tv service. Time Warner, NBC Universal and Viacom are all in discussions with Intel and success would give Intel critical mass to start offering a service. This is going...
Digital Life has an increasingly Orwellian future. The big ecosystem creators are slowly but inexorably nudging users towards their ecosystems. It is very subtle, it is very slow but the signs are there that the long term of ambition of Google, Twitter, FaceBook, Microsoft, Apple and so on is to keep their users to themselves...
The China ecosystem is coming. Android is currently exploding in China but there are plenty of signs that this is temporary. Under Google’s definition, anything that does not meet its specification cannot be called Android and this where the vast majority of the cheap Android devices find themselves. While the market is growing like crazy,...
Exporting services from Japan is a license to lose money. NHN Corp, South Korea’s biggest internet company, is making a bid to expand outside its own turf with its Line, its chat application. This application has been developed by NHN Japan, the Japanese internet company it acquired in 2006, but the focus is to take...
Microsoft has loads of money but no clue how to use it. Paying developers to write applications is a well-known tactic for those trying to prop up an ecosystem that is not faring as well as it should. Microsoft has backtracked on a long held policy and is now offering developers $100 per application for...
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.
Dell– Not so sweet
There is no upside in Dell without risk. The “go-shop” period has produced two additional bids, but investors are going to be disappointed with the prices that have been offered. At the 12th hour, both Carl Icahn and Blackstone have put in bids of $15 per share and “more than $14.25” respectively. These bids are...