When a company like Apple launches a sexy new product (iPad), one can react (Amazon) or get caught flat-footed (Adobe). It’s easy to look at today’s market situation and say who’s winning or losing. The more interesting conversation is to determine what someone can do to compete or take advantage of this changed topography. That’s [...]
Archive | Tech & Trends
Smartphones as Appliances
The growth of the mobile data marketplace is one of the bright spots for business in the current recession. Mobile carriers report increasing demand for data services, and Apple and Research in Motion both reported strong earnings aided by sales of their smartphone products.
Understanding Twitters Growth
One of the hottest recent stories in the tech industry has been the rapid rise of the messaging service Twitter. Starting from a small base of enthusiast users, the service has rapidly risen to prominence in the media, with extensive coverage of its adoption by celebrities. In the last month, Google counted about 65,000 news stories mentioning Twitter, and the web tracking service Alexa reported a remarkable 400% increase in traffic to Twitter.com in the last four months. In April 2009, Alexa reported that daily visits to twitter.com surpassed those to cnn.com:
What Apple Knows That Facebook Doesn’t
Too often, we don’t recognize the power of platforms – even in Silicon Valley. The piece below by Umair Haque, draws an interesting difference between the way Apple and Facebook are both conducting their businesses. Some would argue against viewing Apple as ‘open,’ given the proprietary nature of the iPod and iTunes. Either way, it’s [...]
Ars Technica: Pew Internet Report – Only half of US Netizens use search engine daily
Ars Technica assistant editor Jacqui Cheng wakes us up to the fact that many Americans may be on the Internet, but they’re not surfing with the style we use in Silicon Valley. That smacking sound you just heard? It’s the entire Googleplex smacking their lips at the growth opportunity. Jacqui’s key sentence is this: “There’s [...]
Can the iPhone be Apple’s next big thing?
Apple’s excellent April financial report — revenue up 43% and year over year and profits up 36% — masked the disturbing news that Apple’s iPod business has basically stopped growing. iPod units were up only one percent year over year. Most of Apple’s growth came from the Macintosh business.
Although Macs are on a roll at the moment, it’s risky for Apple to rely only on the relatively mature personal computer market for all of its growth. With the iPod now saturating, Apple needs its new iPhone business to provide a second growth engine.
Ballmer to Yang: I Just Can’t Quit You
Two NYT journalists see Microsoft ‘needing a franchise’ as the software giant puts the moves on Yahoo all over again. Two weeks after walking away from takeover talks with Yahoo, Microsoft made clear on Sunday that it still needed to create an Internet powerhouse that could rival Google — and that its interest in Yahoo [...]
The iPhone Work
Today was a good day. Fortune, WSJ, others covered us. Good day.
Apple iPhone: Successes/Challenges
The Apple iPhone is easily the most publicized new mobile device in recent memory. But despite all the discussion about the product, there’s relatively little hard information available to the public on its impact. How is it being used? What effect is it having on customers and on the technology industry?
To help answer those questions, Rubicon Consulting conducted a detailed survey of 460 randomly-selected iPhone users in the US. This report summarizes the findings from the survey, and what they mean for users and other companies.
What was Ford’s Alan Mulally thinking?
Unless you are selling talking beer openers or donuts, comparing your product to Homer Simpson defies conventional wisdom. When your product is a slow-selling car, your actions are certain to leave people saying, “D’oh!”
Yet, this is exactly what Ford Motor CEO Alan Mulally did recently. He wasn’t subtle, in a public speech he projected an image of Homer over a picture of Ford’s Taurus sedan while being critical of the design and talking up future models as much better. We can be pretty sure that this will not rally sales of the Taurus over the coming months, so has Mulally gone mad or is he actually smart?