Magic Leap makes its pitch to stay in the game. Magic Leap has allowed reviewers to get an early look at its new device which is smaller, more powerful but still very far from anything that a consumer would pay for. This is why Magic Leap followed everyone else in focusing on the enterprise because productivity is far more important...
The regulatory shadow mostly passes. China has moved to end the uncertainty that has been plaguing its technology sector with a statement that promises an end to the crackdown and recognises the VIE structure used for overseas listings for the first time. However, I think that this statement is selective and that for some sectors and companies there will be...
Spending splurge in full swing. Intel has announced that it will spend at least $33bn on leading-edge capacity in Europe in yet another sign that we are in the upward leg of one of the biggest cycles seen for many years. Intel will spend around $20bn for a leading-edge fab in Magdeburg in Germany, $13bn on expanding capacity in Ireland...
The appeal of RISC-V has peaked. SiFive, the RISC-V chip designer is selling its OpenFive services business including some of its designs to Alphawave IP in what I think is a good example of perfect timing as interest in RISC-V has just peaked. RISC-V is an open-source semiconductor architecture that competes directly with Arm and allows users to build chips...
Crushed by both USA and China. The Chinese technology sector is being crushed by both the American and Chinese regulators which may leave some like Didi, with nowhere to go. This has been triggered by the latest calamity at Didi which is trying to delist from the USA and relist in Hong Kong but instead of welcoming the prodigal son...
Rivian makes excuses for its inexperience. Rivian reported bad Q4 21 results and went on to halve its production targets and blame it on the war in Ukraine which is a classic example of how difficult it really is to manufacture vehicles at scale even when they are in high demand. This is one of the key risks that I...
Buybacks only work when the shares are cancelled. Amazon has launched an initiative to bolster its share price, but value is only returned to shareholders when shares that are repurchased are cancelled which I suspect is not going to be the case here. For many of the large technology companies, a large component of their attractiveness to employees is the...
Apple smacks Intel, AMD and Nvidia across the chops. Apple held its “peek performance” event where the star of the show was a Mac Mini on steroids with a hefty price tag. There is not a replacement for the Mac Pro as Apple stated that there is still one more to come. Once again, Apple leaves Intel, AMD and to...
After 20 years, corporate governance is once again a problem. 18 years ago, Ericsson’s corporate governance went from awful to not great but now with its latest blunder, the pressure is on to fix what it should have fixed back in 2004. Activist investor Cevian Capital has accumulated a large position in Ericsson and, smelling blood in the water, is...
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.
GM / Cruise – Cruise control
Accounting gives GM an instant paper profit. General Motors is buying SoftBank out of its stake in Cruise in what will end as a good investment for SoftBank, but I still think that the valuations in this sector remain much too high. In 2018 SoftBank closed a two-tranche deal with Cruise where it purchased 11% for $900m and would then...