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	<title>All About Gadget &#187; business</title>
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		<title>Leadership and Vision</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/leadership-and-vision/</link>
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		<pubDate>Sun, 18 Sep 2011 03:36:34 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>admin</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[Google Tech Talk September 11, 2009 ABSTRACT Presented by Jerry Porras. Jerry Porrass research interests are the characteristics of visionary companies in both the United States and Europe; the dynamics of planned organizational change process; organizational vision and its influence on the long-term behavior organizations; and leadership. Jerry I. Porras is the Lane Professor of [...]]]></description>
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		<title>AT&amp;T gearing up for rare antitrust fight with DOJ 
    (AP)</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/att-gearing-up-for-rare-antitrust-fight-with-doj-ap/</link>
		<comments>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/att-gearing-up-for-rare-antitrust-fight-with-doj-ap/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 01 Sep 2011 06:24:32 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Brad Selers</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[ SAN FRANCISCO &#8211; The Justice Department's rejection of AT&#038;T's proposed purchase of T-Mobile USA will test new federal guidelines on challenging mergers and the companies' resolve in forming the nation's largest wireless carrier. A courtroom battle is likely and could wring out information that the companies would prefer to keep private. Still, AT&#038;T Inc. has a big incentive to fight: If the deal is called off, the company has to pay a $3 billion breakup fee and surrender some of its unused spectrum for wireless communications. AT&#038;T is promising to fight the Justice Department's decision. The department filed a lawsuit Wednesday to block the $39 billion deal, saying it would reduce competition and lead to price increases for customers. If AT&#038;T follows through on that, it could produce the biggest antitrust showdown since business software maker Oracle Corp. squared off with the federal government seven years ago. That dispute, triggered by the government's decision to block Oracle's proposed purchase of rival PeopleSoft Inc., exposed several well-kept corporate secrets and required Oracle CEO Larry Ellison to testify before a packed courtroom. In the end, Oracle pulled off something few companies have done in the past 30 years: It persuaded a federal judge that the Justice Department didn't have grounds to block its PeopleSoft deal. Oracle closed its $11.1 billion takeover four months after getting the favorable court ruling. Usually, not even the most powerful companies bother to fight government regulators in an antitrust dispute. Google Inc., for example, backed off in 2008 when the Justice Department threatened to sue to block a proposed Internet search partnership with Yahoo Inc. Microsoft Corp., the world's largest software maker, pulled out of a deal to buy Intuit Corp. in 1995 after the Justice Department objected. The Justice Department filed 138 antitrust cases in federal courts from 1999 to 2008 and lost just four of them, according to the latest breakdown from the agency. One reason that the Justice Department has such a good track record is because it rarely challenges a deal unless it's very confident it can win, said Joseph Bauer, a University of Notre Dame law professor and antitrust expert. Knowing AT&#038;T would probably go to court, the Justice Department may have wanted to signal that it intends to get tougher on corporate marriages between rivals in markets with few other competitors. A union between AT&#038;T and T-Mobile USA would leave Verizon and Sprint as the only other major cellphone carriers in the U.S. T-Mobile, a subsidiary of German telecom company Deutsche Telekom AG, is currently the No. 4 wireless carrier, while AT&#038;T is second. Combined, AT&#038;T would be the largest. In a sign of its confidence, the Justice Department decided to strike down the deal even though it could have taken about three more months to study the pros and cons. The timing stunned AT&#038;T, which said it didn't get any advance warning. "It was an aggressive and impressive move by the DOJ to take the battle right at AT&#038;T," said Daniel Wall, a San Francisco attorney who represented Oracle in its 2004 fight to win the right to buy PeopleSoft. "It sent a statement that the DOJ intends to fight this one all the way to the finish line." Wall said AT&#038;T may have a tougher time proving its case than Oracle did against the Justice Department. In the PeopleSoft deal, Wall said, antitrust enforcers seemed to be manipulating the definition of the business software market. "This time, it looks to me that they have a pretty solid market definition," Wall said. "They don't appear to be playing games." University of Iowa law professor Herbert Hovenkamp said the Justice Department is being guided by a set of new guidelines, issued late last year, which make it clearer when mergers should be challenged on antitrust grounds. "I don't think they are overreaching here," Hovenkamp said. "If there is a broader message here, it's that the government intends to enforce these new guidelines." Besides being forced to divulge potentially damaging information, AT&#038;T will face other risks if it doesn't settle with the Justice Department. Going to trial will take months, or even years, leaving the company in a legal limbo that could depress its stock price and cause customers and key employees to defect. There's another risk to going to trial: as they try to prove their case, antitrust lawyers sometimes obtain confidential e-mails that contain embarrassing snippets and present other evidence that can make companies look bad. Those are some of the reasons why AT&#038;T mayl try to reach some kind of settlement with the government. If AT&#038;T persists, antitrust experts said that it's better off going up against the Justice Department than the Federal Trade Commission, which also handles antitrust reviews. That's mainly because lawsuits with the Justice Department are contested in federal courts. By contrast, the threshold for the FTC to block deals is generally lower, and the ensuing legal skirmishes occur in administrative law proceedings that drag on longer. "The merging parties usually have a better shot when they are going up against the DOJ than the FTC," said D. Daniel Sokol, a University of Florida professor specializing in antitrust law. Follow Yahoo! News on Twitter , become a fan on Facebook ]]></description>
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		<title>One of the business sites of Internet search engine Google Inc ...</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/one-of-the-business-sites-of-internet-search-engine-google-inc/</link>
		<comments>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/one-of-the-business-sites-of-internet-search-engine-google-inc/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 29 Aug 2011 10:50:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Brad Selers</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[ (Reuters) - One of the business sites of Internet search engine Google Inc is shown on a computer screen in Encinitas, California in this April 13, 2010 file photo. REUTERS/Mike Blake ]]></description>
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		<title>Analysis: HP - Dial &quot;M&quot; for mayhem</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/analysis-hp-dial-m-for-mayhem/</link>
		<comments>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/analysis-hp-dial-m-for-mayhem/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 21 Aug 2011 21:46:31 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Peter Drew</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[ HP CEO Leo Apotheker speaks to the press after delivering the keynote address at the HP Summit in San Francisco, California March 14, 2011. Credit: Reuters/Stephen Lam By Poornima Gupta SAN FRANCISCO &#124; Sun Aug 21, 2011 4:23pm EDT SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Leo Apotheker's credibility as a CEO is falling along with Hewlett-Packard's stock price. Apotheker, who gained a reputation for sharp business acumen when he headed up SAP, thoroughly flummoxed HP shareholders last week with what some analysts have called a "value destroying" $11.7 billion deal to buy British software maker Autonomy and for sticking a for-sale sign on HP's PC division -- thus scaring off clients for the year or so it will take to decide on the division's future. In a resounding rejection of Apotheker's grand vision, shareholders sent HP shares down almost 20 percent on Friday, wiping out $16 billion of value in the worst single-day fall since the Black Monday stock market crash of October 1987. Since Apotheker joined HP early last November, the company has lost almost 44 percent of its value, and he has lost a significant amount of investor support. "We wonder whether activist investors will -- and should -- begin to exert pressure on the board," said Toni Sacconaghi, an analyst with Sanford Bernstein. "If HP's results don't improve, the company will ultimately restructure its portfolio and/or replace its leadership." Pat Becker Jr., fund manager at Portland, Oregon-based Becker Capital Management Inc, which owns HP shares, noted that Apotheker has continually failed to instill confidence in his conference calls with investors. "Every time he has gotten on the call, the stock has gone down substantially," Becker said. On a conference call last Thursday following the announcements on Autonomy and the PC division, Apotheker failed to fully address key questions from analysts, including why HP was paying a large premium for Autonomy. When asked about the vision for HP's PC unit, he said the decision could range from an outright sale to a spinoff to a "potential "nontransaction." "That call -- was that an 'A' performance by a CEO on that acquisition?" asked Becker, whose firm holds HP shares. An HP spokeswoman said the "strategic transformation" is intended to position the company for a new future and drive long-term shareholder value. While investors applaud Apotheker's long-term plan to get out of HP's commoditized PC business, and the Palm WebOS tablet and smartphone business -- considered a capital sinkhole -- that goes with it, the $11.7 billion bill for Autonomy and haphazard articulation of the spin-off strategy left many shaking their heads. HP's purchase price is a stunningly rich 10 times sales of Autonomy, a cloud search specialist whose revenues are equal to only about 1 percent of HP's. HP's Personal Systems Group, which includes the PC business and the now-defunct TouchPad tablet -- faces an uncertain future, which may undermine the business and benefit Dell, whose shares ended up nearly 2 percent on Friday in a broadly weak market. Even more worrying, HP's new strategic road map marked an about-face on several crucial fronts, signaling a lack of direction. Executives as recently as May had touted how WebOS would be on every HP product from printers to PCs. In March, they had played up the advantages of serving both consumers and enterprise. In addition, Apotheker has been forced to slash HP's sales estimates three times since he took over last November. IN BIG BLUE'S FOOTSTEPS It is not the first time HP seems behind the curve. it agreed to buy Compaq in 2001 in what turned out to be a rocky merger. IBM, on the other hand, transformed itself by selling its PC arm to China's Lenovo in late 2004 and establishing its dominance in enterprise IT. HP appears to be trying to replicate Big Blue's success. Some analysts and fund managers hold out hope that the company is at least now on the right track and can still catch up by making smart acquisitions. "Just because they didn't make the move earlier doesn't mean they still can't skate to the where the puck is going," said Tony Ursillo, an analyst with Loomis Sayles Value Fund. But he added, "HP has overpaid for every acquisition it has made" in the past year. One thing that could take the sting out of the steep price tag for Autonomy is the sale of HP's PC division, which industry experts estimate could fetch as much as $10 billion. And Apotheker did make at least one correct decision by retiring the TouchPad. Sacconaghi estimates the business lost about $250 million last quarter, or 9 cents a share. INTERNAL DISARRAY But the events of last Thursday have done little to build confidence in Apotheker. The afternoon of high drama kicked off with a series of rapid-fire announcements: disclosure of acquisition talks with Autonomy; confirmation a deal had been done; announcement that HP was killing its TouchPad and other WebOS devices. HP also disclosed its results an hour earlier than scheduled, marking the second straight quarter that the company had to release earnings ahead of schedule. And in another small sign of disarray, TouchPad ads featuring "Glee" star Lea Michele continued to run on CNBC on Friday. While HP's dire competitive position was in the making well before Apotheker's arrival, shareholders do not view the CEO's track record as impressive. "I was skeptical coming in about whether he had the right background for the job," Ursillo said. "So far the results are not encouraging." (Reporting by Poornima Gupta; Editing by Peter Lauria , Edwin Chan and Leslie Adler) ]]></description>
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		<title>Verizon strike to end but talks to continue</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/verizon-strike-to-end-but-talks-to-continue/</link>
		<comments>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/verizon-strike-to-end-but-talks-to-continue/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 20 Aug 2011 23:49:29 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Brad Selers</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[ 1 of 2. A striking Verizon worker walks the picket line in front of a Verizon wireless store in New York August 15, 2011. Credit: Reuters/Brendan McDermid By Sinead Carew NEW YORK &#124; Sat Aug 20, 2011 5:08pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - About 45,000 Verizon Communications employees are set to end a two-week strike and return to work by Tuesday after the telephone company and unions said they reached an agreement to resume bargaining. Almost half of the workers in Verizon's wireline business went on strike on August 7 after talks for a new labor pact failed when their contract expired. Under the latest agreement, reached early on Saturday morning, Verizon promised to extend the terms of the old contract indefinitely while it continues bargaining for a new one with unions representing technicians and customer service workers. Workers will start to head back to work for late shifts on Monday night and the rest of the striking workers will show up to their jobs on Tuesday, one of the unions said. Neither side would provide details about how the agreement was reached, but both sides continued to nip at each other. Tens of thousands of Verizon managers were asked to work 12 hours a day for six days a week and many worked more than that to cover for the strikers, said Verizon spokesman Richard Young. Verizon said its management team's work helped "convince the unions to begin bargaining with us in good faith." "The fortitude and efforts of our managers have proven to be our strongest point of leverage in bargaining," Marc Reed, Verizon's executive vice president of human resources, said in a statement. The Communications Workers of America said it was "outraged" by the company's comments, and demanded a retraction. "It is both inaccurate and insulting," the CWA said in a statement. "We agreed with management not to claim victory in changing the process, reinstituting the contract or shaping our goals. We will be prepared to fight and fight hard whenever necessary if Verizon believes it can resume negotiations on that basis." The agreement to continue talks follows an announcement by the company last week that healthcare benefits would expire on August 31 for workers who were still on strike at the time. This would have affected 35,000 workers represented by the Communications Workers of America, and another 10,000 members of The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers in nine states and the District of Columbia. BITTER DISPUTE The decision to end the strike came after the unions and the company were able to agree on a structure and focus for bargaining on key issues such as jobs, employment security and financial issues such as healthcare contributions and pensions, according to CWA President Larry Cohen. Cohen told Reuters that the issues on the table are complicated and will "take some time" to work out but he said the union was looking forward to the joint process. "We would both say that this focus is much better than it was two weeks ago," Cohen said. The striking workers are in Verizon's wireline business which provides telephone, Internet and television services. Verizon is looking to cut costs in this business, which has been declining for years as consumers have been hanging up home phones in favor of cellphones and Internet services. But the unions had argued that Verizon was looking for too many concessions in areas such as healthcare contributions, pensions and work rules. Verizon said it had made headway with negotiating a "number of local and regional" issues with the unions. The dispute quickly turned bitter as Verizon complained of network sabotage on the second day of the strike while the unions said picketers were injured by vehicles driven by Verizon managers covering for the strikers. Both sides also swapped complaints at the National Labor Relations Board. Cohen said the problems facing the strikers went beyond Verizon and its workers. He argued that there should be some kind of national framework for workers healthcare and bargaining rights. "I don't really blame Verizon leadership for this problem," he said. "It's the nation." (Additional reporting by Mark Weinraub in Chicago; editing by Vicki Allen and Sandra Maler ) ]]></description>
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		<title>Hewlett-Packard overhaul exposes underdog status (AP)</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/hewlett-packard-overhaul-exposes-underdog-status-ap/</link>
		<comments>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/hewlett-packard-overhaul-exposes-underdog-status-ap/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 20 Aug 2011 01:57:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Brad Selers</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[ SAN FRANCISCO &#8211; Hewlett-Packard, one of the world's largest technology companies, finds itself the underdog as it ditches most of its consumer businesses to become more like the well-oiled, corporate-focused machines of rivals IBM and Oracle. HP will no longer make smartphones and tablet computers and wants to leave the PC business after spending a decade assembling itself into a technology conglomerate by buying such companies as computer maker Compaq Computer for $19 billion in 2002 and smartphone pioneer Palm for $1.8 billion last year. HP's stock plunged 20 percent on Friday, a day after the restructuring announcement. That's a strong signal that investors are doubtful about HP's ability to thrive without businesses that have helped set it apart from rivals. Even though the PC division that HP wants to sell or spin off is the company's least profitable, it accounts for nearly a third of revenue. Rumors have been circulating for months that HP might try to exit the PC business, which is under pressure from tablet computers and smartphones &#8212; the ones made by Apple, not HP. Analysts generally agree that HP would be better off in shedding a thinly profitable business that faces fierce competition. However, their anxiety spiked because of how HP went about it. Some analysts worry that CEO Leo Apotheker may have done irreversible damage to the PC business by throwing its future into question. He said HP is merely considering possibilities for the business and may not shed it at all after 12 to 18 months of exploration. That uncertainty could lead to an exodus of customers, which would lower the price that HP could fetch for the division if it's able to sell it. Or it could damage its value so much that HP isn't able to unload it and is stuck with a business in decline. Even if HP does shed its PC unit, it's left with businesses that are already under pressure. In many cases, those businesses are playing catch-up to IBM, Oracle and Cisco Systems Inc., which is going through its own restructuring. HP would be left with only one major business in which it is the clear leader &#8212; printers and printer ink, a longtime cash cow. It would also still sell servers, but it is running even with IBM in that area. In other, more lucrative areas, HP is far behind. IBM is the market leader in technical services. Cisco is the leader in computer networking equipment. IBM, Oracle and Apotheker's former employer, SAP AG, rule in business software. Losing the PC business would leave a giant hole. In the past nine months, for instance, it supplied nearly $30 billion of HP's revenue of $95 billion. And that doesn't include ancillary sales, such as selling a printer to a company that has already bought a PC. HP will likely lose some leverage in those relationships, and other divisions could suffer as a result. Tablets and smartphones were a much smaller factor. HP doesn't break out that category and had included it in a catch-all category of corporate investments, which supplied just $416 million in revenue since the fiscal year started in November. But the businesses were clearly in trouble. That division lost nearly twice that amount during the same period. Jayson Noland, an analyst with Robert W. Baird &#038; Co., said the restructuring plan raises questions about HP's viability. He has downgraded HP stock to "neutral," after HP's latest quarterly results showed falling profit margins in its services and printer and ink businesses. Those are HP's most profitable divisions and would take on an even more prominent role after the restructuring. Noland said HP no longer would be a "safe haven" when the economy is rough. The transformation plan, he said, is expensive, protracted and risky. In announcing the sweeping changes, HP is trying to emulate IBM. IBM rescued itself from the brink of collapse in the 1990s by ditching its consumer businesses and focusing on services and software. But following that model puts HP at a disadvantage, because IBM has had nearly a decade to perfect it. IBM's head start confers many advantages, especially stronger investor support for the market leader. IBM enjoys a market value of about $190 billion as of Friday, nearly four times as large as HP's $50 billion. And IBM has had years to invest in areas that HP is just now exploring. More than 90 percent of IBM's income comes from services and software, areas in which it has spent billions of dollars on research and acquisitions. By contrast, just over 40 percent of HP's income is from those businesses. HP is still largely dependent on legacy businesses, particularly printer ink, PCs and servers. Services became HP's most profitable division with its $14 billion acquisition of Electronic Data Systems in 2008. But that business has suffered, and Apotheker has blamed years of neglect by his predecessor, Mark Hurd, who resigned under pressure a year ago in a scandal over ties with a former contractor. And IBM is far ahead here. Its revenue from services and software is twice as big as HP's. IBM has been down this road before. IBM's decision to sell its PC business in 2005 was one of the last steps of its transformation, but IBM's PC business was substantially smaller then than HP's. IBM had just 5 percent of the worldwide PC market at the time. By contrast, HP commands nearly 20 percent of the worldwide PC market today, making it the world's top computer maker. And its PC business makes money, unlike IBM's at the time. The fact that HP's PC business is thinly profitable will limit how much HP can fetch for it. Brian White, an analyst with Ticonderoga Securities, warned investors that even if HP sold it for $12.5 billion, it would only add 6 cents per share to annual income. "A possible PC divestiture won't cure the near-term challenges," he said. Apotheker, in an interview with The Associated Press, was reluctant to discuss how IBM played into his decisions. But he said that the differences between the companies' PC businesses would allow HP to extract a higher price. IBM, which is based in Armonk, N.Y., got $1.75 billion from Chinese computer maker Lenovo Group Ltd. for its PC operations. "When IBM spun out their PC business, they spun out a money-losing business," Apotheker said. "We are very proud to have a money-making, market-leading business with the best margins in the business. We are going at this from a position of strength." The transformation Apotheker envisions would strip HP of valuable levers that have set the company apart. The consumer businesses have helped insulate HP from swings in how businesses and governments buy information technology. A downbeat report from PC maker Dell Inc. this week, and HP's cut to its full-year revenue guidance on Thursday, reinforced fears that companies and government agencies have dialed back their spending on technology. To some analysts, the restructuring has a make-or-break quality. Investor sentiment is likely to turn on the fate of the PC business. How it's handled could have ramifications for Apotheker's job security as well. He is in his 10th month on the job. By announcing the deliberations "without a clear plan or buyer in place, the company effectively set the clock ticking on the profitable PC business's viability &#8212; and value," analysts from IDC wrote in a research note. In 18 months, that business "may be unrecognizable." Shares of HP, which is based in Palo Alto, Calif., fell $5.91, or 20 percent, to close Friday at $23.60. Follow Yahoo! News on Twitter , become a fan on Facebook ]]></description>
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		<title>HP may drop PCs, to buy Autonomy for $11.7 billion</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/hp-may-drop-pcs-to-buy-autonomy-for-11-7-billion/</link>
		<comments>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/hp-may-drop-pcs-to-buy-autonomy-for-11-7-billion/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 19 Aug 2011 03:39:03 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Peter Drew</dc:creator>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.allaboutgadget.com/hp-may-drop-pcs-to-buy-autonomy-for-11-7-billion/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[ Related Video HP makes dramatic choices 4:55pm EDT 1 of 2. HP CEO Leo Apotheker speaks to the press after delivering the keynote address at the HP Summit in San Francisco, California March 14, 2011. Credit: Reuters/Stephen Lam By Poornima Gupta and Paritosh Pansal SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK &#124; Thu Aug 18, 2011 9:47pm EDT SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Hewlett-Packard Co may spin off the world's largest PC business, part of a wrenching series of moves away from the consumer market, including killing its new tablet and buying British software company Autonomy Corp for as much as $11.7 billion. The moves underscore the problems plaguing personal computers and devices, HP's core business, and a decade-long search for direction by the original Silicon Valley garage startup, whose "HP Way" was once a model for businesses. The iconic company associated with the birth of Silicon Valley also plans to kill WebOS-based phones and the TouchPad tablet, which was launched in June but has failed to excite consumers. HP's third-largest acquisition ever and its potential departure from the PC arena sets in motion a transformation that recalls International Business Machine Corp's overhaul of the last decade. The barrage of news, which forced HP to announce third-quarter earnings an hour early on Thursday, masked a sharp reduction in HP's estimates for full-year revenue and earnings that sent its shares down 6.1 percent to a 52-week low. They slid another 10 percent to $26.61 in after-hours trading. HP Chief Executive Leo Apotheker is responding to mounting pressure to fire up growth just as global economic and tech-spending outlooks darken. Like other PC makers, it is struggling to come up with an answer to Apple Inc's iPhones and iPads, which are gobbling up PC market share. "HP is at a critical point in its existence and these changes are fundamental to the success we all want," Apotheker told analysts on a conference call. The announcement is the second this week to show how quickly technology companies are transforming as they jockey for position to cope with radical changes in consumer demand. Google Inc announced on Monday it was buying mobile handset maker Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion, launching the Internet search and mobile software company into manufacturing for the first time. HP "is saying 'I want to be more like IBM.' They divested their PC business and they got more involved in software," said FBN Securities analyst Shelby Seyrafi. "The PC industry is a very challenged one because of the slow growth in that sector. For those companies like HP which don't have a strong tablet offering, they are victims of the encroachment of Apple's iPads and tablets on their notebook business. So they're vulnerable to losing share." The acquisition of cloud search-software specialist Autonomy, which analysts say may draw rival bids, marks its boldest foray into the software and technology services after Apotheker came on board with a mandate to drive innovation. A PC spinoff marks a historic shift for a company that Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard built into a sprawling $120 billion empire from a $538 garage operation in 1939. "HP is recognizing what the world has recognized, which is hardware in terms of consumers is not a huge growth business anymore," said Michael Yoshikami, chief executive of YCMNET Advisors, a minor shareholder in HP. "It's not where the money is. It's in keeping with the new CEO's perspective that they want to be more in services and more business oriented." LEO MAKES BOLD MOVE Speculation has swirled for months that HP was no longer keen on keeping a PC business struggling with low growth and single-digit margins. Sources told Reuters in June that private equity firms from Blackstone Group and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts to TPG Capital would like HP to break up and sell them some of its units, arguing that the world's No. 1 PC maker and tech powerhouse is stretched too thin. Spinning off the PC division, run by personal systems group chief Todd Bradley, would mark one of the biggest makeovers for the company since 1999, when it spun off its measurement and components businesses to form Agilent Technologies. The moves would turn a company that in some ways tried to mimic Apple into a devout follower of IBM, dropping a tablet with innovative software, checking out of the PC business and embracing the software and services Big Blue today embraces. HP has twisted and turned before, including controversial former CEO Carly Fiorina's acquisition of PC maker Compaq in 2001, which a spinoff would undo. "If HP spins off their PC business ..., maybe they will call it Compaq?" Dell Inc CEO tweeted after the news emerged. Some alternatives HP is exploring include hiving off its PC business into a separate company through a spin-off or other transaction that would likely be tax-free to U.S. shareholders. HP expects the process to be completed within 12-18 months. Apotheker, however, made it clear that its printing unit -- also the target of spinoff speculation -- was very strategic to the company. Apotheker, a former chief of European software giant SAP AG, had been expected to drive an expansion of the company's relatively small but very profitable software division -- including through major acquisitions. Cambridge, England-based Autonomy counts Procter &#038; Gamble Co among a long list of major corporate customers that use its software to search and organize unstructured data like emails. It said the offer values its fully diluted share capital at as much as 7.09 billion pounds ($11.7 billion), were a clutch of convertible bonds to be exercised. Under the agreement, Barclays Capital will provide debt financing to help bankroll HP's acquisition. The British firm's CFO, Sushovan Hussain, is on a visit to California, a source told Reuters. "HP would be buying this as part of a refocus of the business on software," said Tim Daniels, technology, media and telecoms strategist at Olivetree Securities. "Clients now don't have a problem accumulating data, the problem is the structuring of it. Eighty percent of the data on the Web now is unstructured: video, pictures, emails, etc." KILLING THE TOUCHPAD? HP's Personal Systems Group also includes smartphones, tablets and the WebOS operating system, pulling in about $41 billion in revenue but only about 13 percent of profit. HP's decision to discontinue the TouchPad -- which hit the store shelves in July with much costly fanfare -- follows poor demand. It was discounted by $100 a month after it was launched in a market dominated by the iPad. WebOS came with the $1.2 billion acquisition of Palm last year. "There were also a lot of missteps, such as launching it a month before it was ready and pricing it the same as the iPad 2," said Current Analysis' Avi Greengart. "It was a great operating system. Everybody was pulling for it but a lot of people weren't buying it." Going forward, HP expects further pressure on its revenue and cut its full-year forecast for the third straight quarter. HP now expects full-year revenue of $127.2 billion to $127.6 billion, down from a previous estimate of $129 billion to $130 billion. It also cut its earnings per share estimate to a range of $3.59 to $3.70, down from its previous estimate of at least $4.27 per share. Barclays Capital and Perella Weinberg are advising HP, while Qatalyst Partners, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, UBS and JPMorgan Chase are advising Autonomy. HP also named John Visentin as executive vice president of its services group. Ann Livermore, former HP Enterprise unit chief who was managing the services unit on an interim basis, will move over to the company's board. (Additional reporting by Megan Davies and Sinead Carew in New York, Bill Rigby in Seattle, Alexei Oreskovic in San Francisco, Victoria Rowley, Georgina Prodhan and Paul Sandle in London; Writing by Edwin Chan ; Editing by Richard Chang and Carol Bishopric) ]]></description>
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		<title>In nod to IBM, HP overhaul minimizes consumers (AP)</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/in-nod-to-ibm-hp-overhaul-minimizes-consumers-ap/</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 19 Aug 2011 03:38:59 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>admin</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[ SAN FRANCISCO &#8211; Hewlett-Packard Co. is surrendering in smartphones and tablet computers and has put its personal computer division up for sale, as new CEO Leo Apotheker tries to transform the Silicon Valley stalwart into a twin of East Coast archrival IBM Corp. The restructuring announced Thursday contains an unmistakable message: HP has failed to cater to both consumers and corporations. As a result, it needs to exit most of its consumer businesses, just as IBM did six years ago. The overhaul will have three parts: &#8226; HP will stop making tablet computers and smartphones by October. &#8226; It will try to spin off or sell its PC business, the world's largest. By the end of next year, HP computers could be sold under another company's name. &#8226; The company plans to buy business software maker Autonomy Corp. for about $10 billion in one of the biggest takeovers in HP's 72-year history. HP, the largest technology company in the world by revenue, will continue to sell servers and other equipment to business customers, just as IBM now does. Those businesses currently don't generate as much revenue for HP as PCs, but they have higher profit margins. Apotheker would not say whether any jobs will be cut. HP plans to take a charge of about $1 billion for restructuring and related costs, some of which could go for severance payments. HP employs more than 300,000 people worldwide. The changes are motivated by a shift toward an IBM-style business model, which is focused on selling to corporations and governments. But the influence of Steve Jobs and Apple Inc. shouldn't be underestimated. Apple is the hottest consumer electronics company on the planet with its highly popular iPhones and iPads. "Apple singlehandedly knocked HP out of the PC, smartphone and tablet business," Gleacher &#038; Co. analyst Brian Marshall said in an interview. Rather than remain locked in a futile fight with a company that seems to have found the magic touch on making hit consumer products, HP decided to whittle its competition to the other business technology specialists &#8212; namely, IBM, Oracle Corp. and Cisco Systems Inc., Marshall said. The focus makes sense considering that Apotheker spent most of his career at German business software maker SAP AG, another company that catered to the technology needs of companies and government agencies. "This is his bread and butter," Marshall said. "Now he has to deliver." Investors appeared underwhelmed and sent HP's stock down $1.88, or 6 percent, to $29.51 during the regular trading session Thursday, after news of the changes leaked and HP disclosed them along with a quarterly forecast that was lower than expected. After the market closed, the stock fell another 10 percent to $26.61. It was a day the broader market declined, with the Standard &#038; Poor's 500 index falling 4.5 percent. Apotheker is seeking radical changes to help erase the stain of scandal and leave his imprint on a massive company he inherited last year. His predecessor, Mark Hurd, resigned under pressure a year ago, after an investigation found expense reports that were allegedly falsified to conceal a relationship with an HP marketing contractor. In trying to ditch most of HP's consumer businesses, Apotheker is reversing a decade-long binge on computer hardware. The area where HP has been most visibly lacking is mobile devices. HP has been hopelessly outmatched in smartphones and tablets despite its $1.8 billion acquisition last year of Palm Inc., whose webOS software was the crown jewel of the deal. The software powered the fledgling TouchPad tablet and HP-powered smartphones that are being discontinued in Thursday's announcement. The software was well-reviewed, but iPhones and iPads and smartphones running Google Inc.'s Android operating system have dominated the fastest-growing parts of the consumer technology market. HP was left in the margins. WebOS smartphones had a worldwide market share of less than 1 percent, according to Gartner. HP will try to find ways to keep webOS alive, which could include using it in other devices such as PCs and printers or licensing it to handset makers, Apotheker said in an interview. He said he was disappointed with the designs of HP's mobile devices and believed the business would have required too much money to turn around. "We have better opportunities to invest our capital," he said. HP executives likely decided that "they were too late to the tablet market to make a dent," said Forrester Research analyst Charles Golvin. "They recognized they did not have a high probability of success." HP conceivably could try to license webOS for use in cars and consumer electronics devices made by other companies, Golvin said. But even that is challenging because Google is targeting many of the same markets with its Android system, which is free. "This begs the question of how much longer it will be before the other shoe drops and they close the Palm business entirely," Golvin said. The diminishing of the Palm business will be striking to many technologists. Jon Rubinstein, the former CEO of Palm, said in December that Palm sold itself because executives realized the business could be small and successful, but couldn't sustain itself on its own in the long run. Rubinstein, who was an Apple executive before leading Palm, said HP seemed to be the best choice because, given its size, it could help Palm bring its products to more people. In PCs, HP is acknowledging that it needs to reverse course on a path begun two CEOs ago, under Carly Fiorina. She pushed through the controversial decision to spend $19 billion for Compaq Computer. That set the stage for HP's ascent to become the world's top PC maker. PCs are HP's biggest revenue generator, but the business is also HP's least profitable, a result of falling prices for computers and brutal competition. HP's effort to jettison its PC business is another concession to Apple's increasing dominance of consumer electronics, said Shaw Wu, an analyst with Ticonderoga Securities. The PC division also had become a drag on HP's stock even though it still accounts for about 15 percent of the company's earnings, Wu said. "Apple is a such a fierce competitor that HP probably realized it was going to have to cut its losses," Wu said. "And it makes sense to cut your losses sooner than later." The decision also makes HP's trajectory look similar to rival IBM's. A key player in building the PC market in the 1980s, IBM sold its PC business in 2005 to focus on software and services, which don't cost as much in labor and components as building computer hardware. The acquisition of Autonomy mirrors a key element of IBM's transformation from stodgy mainframe seller into a software and services powerhouse, which has made IBM the envy of many large technology companies. HP's net income increased in the fiscal third quarter, which ended July 31, but its lower-than-expected outlook for the current period weighed on the stock. The company also cut its full-year revenue outlook. ___ AP Technology Writers Michael Liedtke and Rachel Metz in San Francisco and Barbara Ortutay in New York contributed to this report. Follow Yahoo! News on Twitter , become a fan on Facebook ]]></description>
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		<title>NCR&#039;s Scalable Deposit Module (SDM) is the only ATM technology ...</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/ncrs-scalable-deposit-module-sdm-is-the-only-atm-technology/</link>
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		<pubDate>Mon, 15 Aug 2011 08:30:15 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Brad Selers</dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[ (AP) - NCR's Scalable Deposit Module (SDM) is the only ATM technology on the market that allows consumers to deposit both cash and checks simultaneously in any orientation through a single slot. This new technology, designed for NCR SelfServ ATMs, delivers a consumer deposit experience that is twice as fast as other ATMs. (Photo: Business Wire) ]]></description>
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		<title>Electronic Arts upbeat about holiday season sales</title>
		<link>http://www.allaboutgadget.com/electronic-arts-upbeat-about-holiday-season-sales/</link>
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		<pubDate>Mon, 15 Aug 2011 08:30:11 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Brad Selers</dc:creator>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.allaboutgadget.com/electronic-arts-upbeat-about-holiday-season-sales/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[ Visitors walk past the exhibition stand of Electronic Arts (EA) at the Gamescom 2010 fair in Cologne August 18, 2010. Credit: Reuters/Ina Fassbender By Michelle Martin FRANKFURT &#124; Mon Aug 15, 2011 1:02am EDT FRANKFURT Aug 15 (Reuters) - Video games publisher Electronic Arts (EA) is upbeat about Christmas holiday sales as it expects to release top titles and prepares its most high profile launch ever: "Star Wars: The Old Republic". "We think it should be a very attractive season for Electronic Arts as we have quite a few blockbusters in the pipeline," Jens Uwe Intat, the head of sales and distribution for Europe, told Reuters ahead of Gamescom, Europe's biggest video games trade fair. The company, which develops games for the consoles of Sony Corp, Nintendo and Microsoft, also said it was optimistic about the launch of the widely anticipated online game "Star Wars: The Old Republic," The launch date for the new game has not yet been named, but Intat said he hoped it would be announced before the holiday season. "We have lots of people who have been subscribing to newsletters and webpages so we are actually feeling very bullish about the game," Intat said. He added that the company was "still in the process of fine-tuning" services for the game. EA hopes the online game will rival Activision Blizzard "World of Warcraft", which has more than 12 million subscribers. EA is said to be spending more than $100 million to develop "Star Wars". Other big games in EA's Christmas line-up include the shooter game "Battlefield 3", racing game "Need for Speed" and "Sims Pet". The company's soccer game, "FIFA", which is due to launch at the end of September, has already taken record-breaking pre-orders, Intat said. PLAY BEFORE YOU PAY Another strand of EA's strategy is to focus on Facebook games, which are free to play. The games make money from players who buy so-called microtransactions in games such as costumes or tools which enhance game experience, Intat said. This business model, which is a departure from how video games have traditionally made money, is in the spotlight as social gamemaker Zynga has filed with US regulators for an initial public offering on the stock market worth up to $1 billion. Advertising in the free-to-play games has the potential to be a revenue-driver in the future, Intat said, adding that "more and more consumer goods companies understand that and embrace that type of advertising opportunity". The company is striving to improve on its current position in the social gaming space by introducing some of its franchises like "The Sims Social" on Facebook. EA acquired Playfish, a leading maker of social network games, in November 2009 in a bid to make headway with its diversification strategy and in August it closed the acquisition of PopCap games, the maker of "Bejeweled." [nN1E76B1O4] (Additional reporting by Liana B. Baker ; editing by Patrick Graham) ]]></description>
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