IPTV Customers Found Satisfied With Their Service

February 19, 2009

U.S. consumers getting television over the Internet from Verizon and AT&T report being very satisfied with their service, according to a study conducted by Strategy Analytics.

More Than 80%Of FiOs and U-Verse customers report being very or extremely satisfied

More Than 80%Of FiOs and U-Verse customers report being very or extremely satisfied

The survey, completed in late 2008, highlights the competition developing in the American television delivery market as cable companies face challenges to their long-held monopolies. Both Verizon and AT&T have extended fiber-optic networks into local neighborhoods and provided high-speed broadband connections along with scores of digital television channels.

Strategy Analytics said it contacted 845 digital television subscribers, including some who received service from cable companies Comcast, Cox and Time Warner Cable and others who were customers of DirecTV and Dish.

More than 80 percent of subscribers to Verizon’s FiOS and AT&T’s U-Verse said they were extremely or very satisfied with their provider.

Digital television appears to be the greatest lure of the “triple play” offerings telecos developed to bundle TV, phone service and Internet connections, Strategy Analytics said.

Cable subscribers were the least happy with their service, with Time Warner customers most likely to switch.

Today’s television market place is becoming more complicated as consumers increasingly look to the Internet for content and avoid paying a cable or telecom provider.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

IBM Pushes Ahead With Broadband Over Power Lines

February 19, 2009

IBM said it has begun using electrical wires to deliver broadband access to about 200,000 homeowners in rural Alabama, Indiana, Michigan and Virginia.

Effort targets rural electrical co-ops

Effort targets rural electrical co-ops

Big Blue, which is working with the power line Internet service provider International Broadband Electric Communications, said it hopes to expand the program to more of the 45 percent of Americans who don’t have broadband today.

IBEC has received low-interest loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development Program. IBM will provide technical expertise, project management services and training for installation crews.

According to a press release, here is how it works: “Broadband over power line technology modifies radio signals to transmit voice and Internet data over electric utility power lines. All a consumer needs is a modem that plugs into existing electrical outlets in their home or business.”

IBM and IBEC have targeted member-owned electric utility co-ops for the construction of their Internet over power line networks. IBM did not say what speeds its expects to achieve.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

Boxee Looses Hulu Video Content; Final Blow?

February 19, 2009
Tomorrow, on Friday, Boxee will have to remove access to Hulu's video content

Tomorrow, on Friday, Boxee will have to remove access to Hulu's video content

This week, Hollywood showed that it has full control of its content, on the Web or anywhere else; and the unfortunate victim of Big Media’s decision to show off its muscles is a tiny company called Boxee.

Tomorrow, the maker of the media center application will remove from its software, any access from Hulu’s TV shows and movies. Hulu‘s web site is a joint venture of NBC Universal and News Corp.

This is a significant blow for the New York-based startup – which software is currently in alpha – and relies on Hulu for most of its traffic and users.

“Since our early days in private alpha, Hulu was the most requested site by our users,” admitted Boxee CEO, Avner Ronen in a recent blog post.

So, is it the end of Boxee? I think so and I invite anyone from Boxee reading this post to prove me wrong.

But apart from Hulu’s video content, I didn’t find Apple’s movie trailers, CNN’s video snapshots or access to music or photos to be appealing enough to go through the pain of installing Boxee on my Mac and connect it to my HDTV to watch it. Right?

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Posted by TechPulse 360

Search Market Bounces Back In January As Google Loses Share

February 19, 2009

Americans conducted 13.5 billion online searches in January, up 7 percent from December.

The growth in this core, online market place improved from a depressed pace at the end of 2008. Growth was 3 percent in December and, in November, the volume of searches in the U.S. actually fell 3 percent, in part because the month had one less day than October.

ComScore said the market shifted little from December and not in Google’s favor. Google lost 0.5 points of market share and ended the month with 63 percent of the market.

Yahoo gained the same amount of share and held 21 percent of the market in January. Microsoft gained 0.2 points of share to 8.5 percent and Ask Networks lost ground to fall behind AOL in the rankings.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

Analyst: Sales Of Apple Macintosh To Decline In 2009

February 19, 2009
Apple suffered a steep decline in sales of Macintosh computers in retail

Apple suffered in January its first monthly decline in three years of Macintosh sales at U.S. retail stores

The recession is finally catching up with Apple, which so far refused to lower its prices despite the sudden drop of consumer spending.

According to market-research firm NPD, unit sales of Apple computers through U.S. retail channels fell 6 per cent in January, while Windows PC unit sales were up 16.6 per cent, compare to the same period last year.

In dollar value, the drop of Mac sales was much steeper, at 11 per cent.

However, all Macs are not treated equal. Mac notebook growth was 9.4 per cent, compared with 26.6 per cent for Windows portables, while Mac desktops drop 31.5 per cent and -6.5 per cent for Windows laptops.

Did Apple lost its Mojo?

Apple’s market share, measured in dollars, is now 13.7 per cent of the U.S. PC market, down from 16.4 per cent in January 2008; and far behind H-P’s, now at 40.1 per cent, up from 39.2% a year earlier.

And this time, declining iPod sales will not be able to offset Apple’s lower Macintosh sales. Indeed, NPD reports that iPod unit sales were also down 14% year-over-year in January.

Looking ahead, NPD expects 2009 sales of Macintosh to decline year-over-year; for the first time since 2003!

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Posted by TechPulse 360

Sprint Nextel Lost $2.8 Billion, Shed 4.5 Million Subscribers In 2008

February 19, 2009
Sprint's $20 billion debt could endanger the company's survival

Sprint's $21.6 billion debt is a concern for the company's long term survival

It’s getting much worse for Sprint before it could get a little better.

For the first time since its acquisition of Nextel in 2005, the number of Sprint subscribers fell below the 50 million mark to 49.3 million; after losing an additional 1.3 million last quarter, including 1.1 million “postpaid” customers who pay a monthly bill and are considered the most valuable.

At the end of the fourth quarter, Sprint served 36.7 million post-paid subscribers, 3.6 million prepaid subscribers and 9.0 million wholesale and affiliate subscribers, which includes Amazon’s Kindle customers.

Sprint has a massive debt load

For the full year 2008, Sprint Nextel lost nearly $3 billion on declining revenues of $35 billion. By comparison, the Kansas company generated $40.1 billion in revenues and lost $29.3 billion – including a $29 billion write-down of its Nextel acquisition – in the same period a year ago.

Nextel’s total value has been entirely wrote off Sprint’s books; another impressive destruction of value. Cisco’s CEO, John Chambers, is again correct in saying that huge acquisitions just do not work.

More worrisome in this credit crunched economy is Sprint’s heavy debt load totaling $21.6 billion, and making Sprint the financially weaker wireless carrier of the U.S. “big four” (AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile).

Is a bankruptcy or sale looming ahead? That’s definitely not a case to be discarded, unless of course if Palm’s Pre can generate the same kind of profits for Sprint than Apple’s iPhone did for AT&T and its other wireless partners.

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Posted by TechPulse 360

H-P Gets Hit Hard By Downturn; Revenue To Decline This Year

February 18, 2009

Hewlett-Packard was able to sidestep the worst of the economic downturn in November when it reported fourth-quarter results.

This was in part because its quarter closed in October, well before the financial markets imploded.

We dont want to bank on the economy getting better, says Mark Hurd

We don't want to bank on the economy getting better, says Mark Hurd

The invisibility cloak no longer works. The company reported first-quarter results on Wednesday with a sharp change of fortune. Sales of personal computers, printers, servers and software fell sharply, with PC revenue tumbling 19 percent.

Even sales of critical printing supplies (they supply a big share of H-P’s profits) sank 7 percent.

“The slowdown in IT spending was global,” CEO Mark Hurd said on a conference call with analysts. “We don’t want to bank on the fact the economy is going to get better.”

That pessimism led the Silicon Valley tech giant to predict revenue will fall 2 to 5 percent this year as customers delay purchasing equipment and re-evaluate their budgets.

The weakness was particularly noticeable in the emerging markets of China, India, Brazil and Russia, where quarterly revenue was down 22 percent.

Overall, the quarter saw notebook sales drop 13 percent and sales of low-cost servers running chips from Intel and Advanced Micro Devices plunge 22 percent.

So when will the key supplies segment turn around? There is a correlation between GDP growth and printing volume, said Hurd.

When unemployment is high, less printing takes place, he said. “(It) won’t turn around until the economy starts to turn around,” added CFO Cathie Lesjak.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

H-P PC Sales Fall: Is The Mirage Over?

February 18, 2009

Despite financial incentives – like a 0% financing to small and medium businesses to buy notebooks – H-P’s PC division recorded a steep decline last quarter, in both sales and profits.

Revenues for the Palo Alto, Calif.-company’s Personal Systems Group (PSG) declined 19 per cent to $8.8 billion, with unit shipments down 4 per cent.

Notebook revenue for the quarter was down 13 per cent, while Desktop revenue declined 25 per cent.

Commercial client revenue was down 19 per cent, while consumer client revenue decreased 18 per cent.

Operating profit was $435 million, down from $628 million, in the prior-year period.

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Posted by TechPulse 360

Shipments Of H-P Printers Drop More Than 33%

February 18, 2009
Higher priced supplies helped H-P improve the printing group's margins

Higher priced ink cartridges and supplies helped H-P improve its printing group's margins

Once H-P’s high flying unit, the Imaging and Printing Group (IPG) is being hit hard by the recession, with printer unit shipments down 33 per cent.

IPG’s overall revenues declined 19 per cent to $6.0 billion, while operating profits are stable at $1.1 billion, thanks to a price increase of ink and other printing supplies, resulting in a revenue decline of just 7 per cent.

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Posted by TechPulse 360

IT Services Lift H-P Earnings; But Predicts Overall Revenues To Decline 5% For 2009

February 18, 2009
H-P's EDS acquisition boosted the company's first quarter profit

H-P's EDS acquisition boosted the company's first quarter profits

H-P keeps growing despite recession, and its quite remarkable for a $100+ billion company.

The Palo Alto, Calif.-company announced today financial results for its first fiscal quarter ending in January, with net revenue of $28.8 billion, up 1 per cent from a year earlier and up 4 per cent when adjusted for the effects of currency.

Operating profits were down only 5 per cent to $2.5 billion thanks to a record operating profit of $1.1 billion posted by H-P’s services division, up from $499 million the prior-year period. Services revenues increased 116 per cent to $8.7 billion due primarily to the EDS acquisition.

H-P estimates revenues for the current quarter to decline approximately two to three per cent from the prior-year period and full year revenues to decline approximately two to five per cent.

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Posted by TechPulse 360

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