In Cisco deal, Tandberg does just fine
On the face of it, Cisco’s bid to purchase Norwegian videoconferencing rival Tandberg for $2.98 billion looks like a crushing victory for Cisco. After all, CEO John Chambers has been a tireless advocate for Cisco’s version of the technology, using it to slash his travel budget and pitch a new way to work – and he’s nabbing Tandberg for a mere 11% premium over Wednesday closing stock price. (Tandberg trades on the Oslo Stock Exchange.)
Surely Tandberg must have seen the growing threat from Cisco (CSCO), and wilted under pressure?
Not exactly. Read the fine print, and this looks like a good deal for Tandberg for three reasons. More
Video: Watch Apple's WWDC 2009 keynote
For those who couldn't make it to San Francisco Monday — or who couldn't get into the event (it sold out in record time) — Apple (AAPL) has posted a 2-hour streaming video of the entire keynote. Click here to watch it.
If you want to learn more about the iPhone 3G S without watching the video, the same link offers a 13-minute guided tour that can be played on a computer or an iPod. It also offers links to videos about Snow Leopard and the new MacBook Pros.
See also:
Apple posts video of iPhone 3.0 preview
For those who couldn't make it to Cupertino, Calif., Tuesday, Apple (AAPL) has posted a Quicktime video of its iPhone OS 3.0 special event.
Click here or on the image at right to view it.
These recordings are always useful to pick up nuances and details — including, in this case, a live duet on leaf trombones and a terrifying three-person shoot-out — that don't make it into the live blogs and press reports.
But this one is especially interesting because it's the first of these Cupertino special events that was not moderated by CEO Steve Jobs, currently on medical leave.
This time, Greg Joswiak, VP of iPhone and iPod product marketing, handled the introduction and wrap-up, and Scott Forstall, senior VP of iPhone software, did the bulk of the presentation.
So how did the new team do? Let us know what you think.
See also:
Video: Steve Jobs at "Let's Rock"
For those who couldn't make it to San Francisco to catch Steve Jobs' appearance Tuesday at the Yerba Buena Center for the Performing Arts, Apple (AAPL) has posted the video here.
Among the highlights:
- "The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated"
- Updated iTunes numbers: 8.5 million songs, 125,000 podcasts, 30,000 TV shows, 2,600 movies, 65 million credit card accounts
- NBC is back, HDTV content for $2.99
- Demos of iTunes 8.0, Genius feature
- iPod classic: 120GB for $249
- New iPod nano: 8GB for $149, 16GB for $199, eight colors, new ad, "shake to shuffle"
- iPod touch price cuts: 8GB for $229, 16GB for $299, 32GB for $399
- App Store stats: 3,000 apps, 100 million downloaded in 60 days
- Phil Schiller demos Spore Origins, Gameloft, Need for Speed: Undercover
- iPod touch TV ad: "The funnest iPod ever"
- iPhone 2.1 software update coming Friday: "It fixes lots of bugs."
- Guest performance: Jack Johnson
Video: High fives and hype at Boston's new Apple Store
There was no lack of enthusiasm — or videography — at Thursday's opening of the company's new flagship store in Boston. Thousands of fans turned up and at least a dozen videos have already been edited and posted on YouTube; three representative clips are pasted below the fold.
Anyone who hasn't been to one of these events might find these images shocking.
It's one thing to stand in line for hours and share in the growing excitement and anticipation. It's another to watch it cold, from the outside. There's a lot of stage-managed hysteria here, whipped up by blue- and orange-shirted Apple staffers working from a script. It's like a college-town pep rally with just a whiff of Nuremberg.
But what the hell. The fanboys like it, and it sells computers. A lot companies would kill for the kind of loyalty Apple (AAPL) can command.
Videos below, as promised:
Pseudo GPS coming to iPhone
What's next for the Apple (AAPL) iPhone? A flurry of new features — starting with a "locate me" pseudeo-GPS function on Google Maps — according to leaks that have been making the rounds of the Apple blogs.
The scoop goes to GearLive.com, which for the past two days has been exploring what appears to be a pre-release version of firmware update 1.1.3. The improvements (documented with screenshots) that it has discovered so far include:
- Edit Home Screen – Rearrange icons on your home screen
- Drag icons around with your finger
- Locate Me integration with Google Maps (apparently by triangulating cellphone towers)
- Send SMS to multiple people
- Add Safari Bookmarks to your Home Screen (example)
Responding to commentary that questioned the veracity of their claims, GearLive's Andru Edwards and Nate True have posted an eight-minute video walkthrough of the new features that seems to have made believers of the skeptics. YouTube has removed its mirror version, but you can see the original here.
It's not clear how the pre-release software made it out of Cupertino's secretive skunkworks two weeks before Steve Jobs' Macworld keynote. Ars Technica reports that it may have been leaked by someone at Apple as a Christmas present to an iPhone hacker to aid in jailbreaking efforts. As with the last update, version 1.1.3 disables unlocked iPhones and breaks third party applications that run on jailbroken phones.
Video: Apple employees pumped up for holiday sales
This promises to be a huge Christmas for Apple (AAPL) — what with new iPods, a new Mac OS, and the new iPhone — and the 200 or so Apple Stores will play a key part in moving the merchandise.
These retail outlets are cash machines. More than 100 million people moved through the stores in the fiscal year that ended in September, generating about $4.2 billion of the company's $24 billion annual revenue.
The stores are also showcases, both for the company's products — jewel-like devices that need to be seen and played with to be appreciated — and for its legendary commitment to service and support. The staff are unfailingly courteous and helpful, enthusiastic evangelists for the cause.
Sometimes, they're a bit too enthusiastic. Witness the video below shot by a British user who braved freezing temperatures to attend the opening of the company's new Exeter store last week. Matt Aiken, who has a blog called Lost in Tech, describes the scene:
about 15 minutes before the store opened the staff began to hype up the crowd running up and down like loonatics, shouting and whooping. All a bit to much for some of the more reserved people in the queue, the guy next to me threatened to pull a moonie if they didn’t shut up! The opening was done in a similar fashion – watch the youtube video I made below sorry it’s a bit jerky.
ADDENDUM: Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster and his staff spent six hours Thanksgiving weekend monitoring the traffic at "normal" sized American Apple Stores in the East and Midwest. Quantifying the "gravitational pull" the stores have on nearby customers, they report that "27% of people walking within 25ft of an Apple store entrance actually entered the store." Muster concludes:
We note Apple stores are typically located in central, high traffic areas of a mall. Only a fraction of shoppers actually purchased anything from the Apple stores. The important point is this gravitational pull highlights that consumers' future buying intentions could be shifting to Apple from PCs. If materialized, this shift should benefit Apple in 2008 and 2009.
For more detail from Piper Jaffray's report, see AppleInsider here.
NBC's Zucker: Apple Turned Dollars into Pennies
It's been two months since Apple (AAPL) and NBC Universal (GE) broke up over video pricing on iTunes, but the wounds don't seem to have healed — at least for Jeff Zucker.
Variety reports today that NBC's CEO let loose on Apple in a breakfast interview with The New Yorker's Ken Auletta at Syracuse University. Zucker claims that NBC — Apple's single largest video partner — made only $15 million in iTunes sales in the past year. That's about 1/3 of what outsiders had estimated and far less than the entertainment giant is used to pulling in from hit properties like The Office and 30 Rock.
"We don’t want to replace the dollars we were making in the analog world with pennies on the digital side," he said, according to Variety.
But in describing the negotiations that led to an impasse in August, Zucker repeated claims that Apple has already contradicted, specifically:
- that NBC Universal represented 40% of Apple's iTunes video content (Apple claimed in a press release it was only 30%)
- that its demands were modest: to raise the price of one show — any show — from $1.99 per episode to $2.99 (Apple claimed NBC wanted to hike the per-episode cost to $4.99)
Zucker also suggested that NBC was asking for something Steve Jobs is unlikely to give any media partner: a cut of his iPod sales.
"Apple sold millions of dollars worth of hardware off the back of our content and made a lot of money," Zucker said. "They did not want to share in what they were making off the hardware or allow us to adjust pricing." (link)
NBC's iTunes contract with Apple expires in December and from the tenor of Zucker's remarks, renewal doesn't seem likely. “We know that Apple has destroyed the music business – in terms of pricing – and if we don’t take control, they’ll do the same thing on the video side,” he told the breakfast audience, according to FT.com.
NBC and News Corp., meanwhile, are set to launch Hulu.com, their bid to offer studio-produced video on the Web that's supported, like broadcast TV, with advertising. Hulu is handing out beta subscriptions here, if you want to give it a try.
See What iTunes Looks Like Without NBC and Apple to NBC: Drop Dead
