Upcoming Upscale PC Sales Uptick? Q&A with Jon Peddie

Many have apparently given up on the near-term future of PC sales. Not so Jon Peddie head of Jon Peddie Research. Having been looking at graphics, multimedia, and technology entertainment for a good 30 years, and working with others who also have decades of experience in various markets, they're well plugged in. What the firm has been hearing of late suggests that even vendors are hopeful for the higher ends of the PC markets, and so it issued a report on the subject. We called to get some details

• Mar 5, 2009

Intel, Qualcomm, Nvidia On Collision Course

Competition is far from over in the chip sector, as illustrated by the recent flurry of moves by semiconductor manufacturers. Intel's decision to outsource some chip manufacturing to Chinese foundry TSMC may seem curious given the current economic downturn, but TSMC fabs are set up to produce chi...

• Mar 4, 2009

Vendors Gear Up For More Risky Business

A combination of new federal dollars flowing into the economy and the financial straits in which states find themselves is driving the market for governance, risk and compliance (GRC) software. The heady days (for GRC vendors) of Sarbanes-Oxley are pretty much over, because most public companies ...

• Mar 4, 2009

Google Exec Bonuses After Slashed Employee Holiday Bonuses

According to a regulatory filing, Google's top executives received million dollar bonuses for helping the company see at least some earnings growth in the financial black hole known as 2008. But let's not forget that holiday bonuses went out the window at the company not three months ago. From one point of view, at least, the savings more than paid for the executive perk.

• Mar 4, 2009

Is Google Burning Its Brand? [UPDATED]

Google's motto may be "Don't do evil," but a recent attempt to defund a non-profit critic, suggests that "See no evil" and "Hear no evil" might be appropriate as well. Add other actions that have raised the eyebrows of critics, and experts think that the company is tarnishing its brand.

• Mar 4, 2009

Informatica: The Hunter And The Hunted

On the heels of Informatica's acquisition of Applimation, I asked Adam Wilson, Informatica's vice president of product management and marketing, what he's learned about the art of integrating technology from newly acquired companies. Informatica describes itself as a vendor of "enterprise data in...

• Mar 4, 2009

Think Tanks Grease The Skids

Policy papers rarely break new ground, but they often help policy-makers justify their actions. The technology trade group IEEE just published one of those, 'Ten Ideas for Policymakers to Drive Digital Progress," that reads very much like a wish list the Obama Administration might have drawn up. ...

• Mar 4, 2009

Spanion Declares Bankruptcy - What's the Impact?

It was only last month that I had the Q&A with Jim Handy about the memory industry shake-up. The shocks are still continuing, as Spansion filed for bankruptcy. This follows the resignation of the CEO in the wake of the company trying to restructure its balance sheet and Spansion Japan having already filed for bankruptcy. So what happens now?

• Mar 2, 2009

House Bill To Spur New Gold Rush?

Democratic lawmakers say there's gold in them thar hills. Or in them thar mountains of electronic waste from PCs, cell phones and other pieces of obsolete IT hardware. Paradoxically, it might be the hardware manufacturers themselves--Dell, Lenovo, Toshiba, Apple and Nokia, to name a few--who migh...

• Mar 2, 2009

Tech Law: Spansion Files, Microsoft Sues, AT&T Gets Pass, More

Flash memory vendor Spanion files for bankruptcy; the U.S. Supreme Court turns down an FTC request to reinstate an antitrust suit against Rambus and overturns an antitrust ruling against AT&T over DSL pricing; the EU won't allow Intel to defend itself in oral arguments in antitrust charges because the company missed the deadlines; Intel tries to get Psion's netbook trademark overturned, Microsoft sues TomTom for patent infringement and puts a chill down the back of Linux vendors; and plaintiff lawyers try to reinstitute the class action status of the Vista Capable suit.

• Mar 2, 2009

Is VMware The New Salesforce.com?

Salesforce.com is more than simply the market leader for software-as-a-service (SaaS). While others (notably NetSuite) came to market sooner, Salesforce.com was the first company to successfully sell the idea of hosting software in its own data centers and delivering it as a service via the Internet...

• Feb 27, 2009

Yoo Hoo, Yahoo. Bartz Reorg Leaves Mission Unclear

CNET got a hold of the Yahoo reorganization memo that CEO Carol Bartz issued yesterday. But by focusing on organizational issues, is she overlooking some of the even more fundamental issues that the company must face?

• Feb 27, 2009

IBM, Microsoft Top Tech Brands; Apple, Google Behind

CoreBrand, which has been measuring corporate brand and financial performance for years, pulled together for us the top ten technology brands. Whether measured as perception of brand strength or as the contribution that brand makes to market cap, you may find some of the results surprising.

• Feb 26, 2009

Ballmer Still Has It Yin For Yang

Steve Ballmer just can't quit bashing Yahoo co-founder and ex-CEO Jerry Yang. During Microsoft's annual mid-year analyst meeting held this morning, the Microsoft CEO quipped, "I don't want to be known as the Jerry Yang of this episode." The episode in question is Microsoft throwing good money aft...

• Feb 24, 2009

Dinosaurs Like Cisco Need "Mammals" In The Data Center

Cisco, EMC and Dell have done such a good job of filling data centers with their servers and storage devices that in order to keep growing in new markets, they've either got to disrupt their own installed bases or expand into adjacent ones. For the time being at least, these dinosaurs have chosen th...

• Feb 24, 2009

Show More