Author: Eva Glass

Eva Glass first rose to prominence in The INQUIRER. She continues to work behind the scenes to dig out the best stories.

Microsoft hit by $900 million Surface RT write-down

Posted on July 19, 2013 by - News, Products

surface-rtMicrosoft announced its fiscal Q4 results last night and unsurprisingly the results missed expectations by a wide margin. The PC market remains slow, hence Redmond’s numbers can’t be good. The company reported revenue of $19.9 billion and earnings of $4.97 billion.

However, Microsoft’s attempt to tap the tablet market seems to have failed quite spectacularly. Redmond announced an embarrassing $900 million inventory write-down for Surface RT tablets. So, instead of helping the company out, the Surface burned a massive hole in its pocket.

Last week Microsoft slashed the Surface RT price by $150 in an apparent effort to clear inventory. The company is already working on the next generation of Surface RT products and it apparently includes two different form factors. The problem is that nobody else appears to be working on RT devices – in fact vendors seem to be running away from it like a particularly nasty flu bug.

The only companies who still seem to be supporting Windows RT are Qualcomm and Nvidia, which comes as no surprise since they are supposed to build the chips for next generation Surface devices. In a recent interview with Computerworld, Nvidia vice president of computing products Rene Haas said the chipmaker is still committed to Surface RT and Windows RT. He said he is excited by the “new price point” which might inspire new sales.

However, analysts are having none of it.

J. Gold Associates analyst Jack Gold said that Nvidia is simply marketing its product. “They don’t want to spook the market and say RT sucks and won’t sell,” he said. Analyst and ex-AMD and Compaq employee Pat Moorhead thinks Microsoft won’t ditch the platform anytime soon – even if it means that it will be the only OEM using it.

However, even Microsoft can’t afford such write-downs every couple of quarters and something has to change soon, or it will have another Zune on its hands.

Intel in Atomic damage control mode

Posted on July 18, 2013 by - News, Opinions

Intel-logoIntel reported its second-quarter earnings on Wednesday and the general consensus is that the numbers were weaker than expected. Net income was down 29 percent, while sales of PC chips, which make up about two thirds of Chipzilla’s revenue, were down 7.5 percent. Sales fell five percent to $12.8 billion, missing analysts’ forecasts by $100 million. 

The writing is on the wall for Windows RT

Posted on July 18, 2013 by - News, Products

surface-rtOver the last week or so we witnessed a flurry of Windows RT news, some positive, some very negative indeed. Late last week Microsoft decided to slash the prices of the Surface RT by as much as $150 in an effort to make the uncompetitive tablet a bit more appealing to the average consumer on the prowl for a cheap media tablet.

In June, Microsoft announced that it would release Outlook 2013 for Windows RT tablets, which is clearly an attempt to gain a bit more traction in the enterprise segment. The decision not to include Outlook in Windows RT at launch was baffling, and still is. The first reviews of Outlook 2013 for RT are in and they are positive, but it really should have been included months ago. With the upcoming 8.1 update, it should land on all RT devices, provided there are still RT devices by the time it appears.

This is no laughing matter, the lack of actual Windows RT products is becoming a serious concern. For example, Lenovo has just dropped the Yoga 11 convertible from its web shop. Dell and Asus have also slashed the prices of their RT tablets. Some players like HP ignored Windows RT altogether, while some gave it a go and dropped it, like Samsung. What’s more, all vendors are focusing on proper Windows 8 tablets instead, based on x86 chips.

In fact, the only hardware maker that still seems to be taking Windows RT seriously is Microsoft itself. The Surface RT price cut is a way of clearing inventory and making room for the next generation Surface RT, or a couple of them. At this point it seems that Microsoft is working on two different designs. One is reportedly based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 SoC, while the other one will be powered by Nvidia’s Tegra 4. Rumours of a smaller Surface RT have been floating around for months and there is a good chance Microsoft will roll out a 7- to 8-inch design along with a new full-size 10.6-incher.

Unfortunately it seems to be too late. Future Windows RT tablets, including the Surface RT in both rumoured flavours, will now have to compete with tablets based on Intel’s new Bay Trail chips. This was not the case last year, when the Surface RT was opposed solely by ARM based Androids and iPads. Now it will face tough in-house competition in the form of Windows 8.1 tablets powered by Intel’s x86 Atoms. What’s more, Bay Trail is shaping up to be a beast. It is said to be faster than the Snapdragon 800 and it doesn’t need much power, either.

With new x86 SoCs from Intel and AMD coming online, it is hard to see why Microsoft would want to stick with a specialized tablet OS, designed for ARM. The next generation of Windows 8.x tablets is expected to end up a lot cheaper than the first generation, leaving very little wiggle room for Windows RT. Small wonder then that many brands aren’t getting on board, since they seem to believe Windows RT will be dead as disco within a generation or two.

It seems that the only practical way to keep Windows RT alive in the long run is to stick it on dirt cheap tablets designed to take on bargain Androids in the 7- to 8-inch range. This probably won’t work, as Windows RT is rather bloated and it’s far too expensive to make sense on such cheap devices, unless Microsoft agrees to practically give it away for free. Since we are talking about Microsoft, this will happen when hell freezes over. In theory at least, Microsoft could keep Windows RT alive, but we’re really not sure it should.

Seagate thinks SSDs and HDDs can coexist

Posted on July 17, 2013 by - News, Products

hdd-hugeNow that it has started peddling solid-state drives of its own, Seagate seems to think there is plenty of room for SSDs and HDDs to coexist, with hybrid drives serving like a buffer of sorts.

In other words, hybrid drives will be the equivalent of Belgium or Bosnia, which means they don’t exactly have a bright future in the long run. Sooner or later SSDs will come knocking at their door.

In an interview with the Korea Herald, Seagate VP Banseng Teh said the future of storage lies not in hard drives or unit sales, but in storage capacity. Commenting on reports that Samsung might ditch its desktop PC business, Teh said such a turn of events wouldn’t have much of an impact on Seagate. It is worth noting that Samsung has denied that it is pulling out of desktops.

“The volume of what we ship to desktop makers including Samsung is admittedly retreating, but this trend does not affect us because it is not about the units we ship, but the capacity,” Teh said.
Teh believes that annual storage shipments will grow 20 fold by capacity by 2020, which sounds quite optimistic. Desktops might not be the driving force behind hard drive sales, but other form factors and new devices should take their place.

Hard drives will not only get bigger, they will get smarter, too. Teh believes that over 85 percent of hard drives will eventually incorporate hybrid technology. In addition, SSD penetration in notebooks should hit 33 percent by 2016, with a CAGR of 162.4 percent between 2011 and 2016.

However, SSD remain prohibitively expensive and they won’t replace mechanical drives anytime soon. That is why Seagate and other hard drive makers are focusing on hybrid drives in the interim.

“Besides being impractical, a sudden surge in investment would likely plunge the semiconductor industry into a massive slump,” Teh said. “Our goal and strategy is to provide the broadest range of options for our customers, be it SSDs, hybrid or hard disk drives, based on their computing needs.”

European car sales plummet to 20-year low

Posted on July 17, 2013 by - News

beemerEuropean car sales have gone off a cliff yet again. Reuters is reporting that the first half of 2013 was the worst for carmakers in two decades and it seems to be getting worse, as sales in June dropped 6.3 percent. 

With record unemployment in Europe and youth unemployment over 50 percent in some EU countries, the figures are hardly surprising.

The industry is also facing a host of other problems  and overcapacity is one of them. Fiat and Peugeot seem to have gotten the worst of it, dropping 13.6 and 10.9 in June respectively. 

It’s hardly surprising, as both outfits are running on fumes and selling outdated hatchbacks – both the 308 and Bravo are long overdue for replacement, along with the venerable Punto. The plucky Peugeot 208 is off to a good start, though.

Ford was an exception with a 6.9 percent rise in sales and the Volkswagen Group is still hanging in there, thanks to a fresh range of hatchbacks based on the new MQB platform. However, Audi was down 8.9 percent.

Car registrations in EU and EFTA countries fell 6.7 percent last month to 6,436,743, the lowest monthly total since 1993. IHS Automotive believes the market has bottomed out, but it’s still too early for anything resembling a recovery. In a recent interview BMW CEO Norbert Reithofer said things probably wouldn’t get better until at least the middle of 2014.

Even the mighty German market, which bucked the negative trend in recent years, shrank 4.7 percent in June. Sales in France and Italy dropped 8.4 and 5.5 percent respectively and we don’t even want to mention Spain and Greece.

However, Britain soldiers on with the sixteenth straight month of gains. Sales in June were up 13.4 percent, which is rather surprising.

Online sales growth hits new high

Posted on July 17, 2013 by - News

visa-epayThe online retail market in the UK is still going strong and according to IMRG Capgemini’s latest figures it is growing at the fastest rate in two years. IMRG Capgemini’s e-Retail Sales Index found that June sales rose 20 percent year-on-year. Furthermore monthly sales in June were better than in May for the first time in five years.

IMRG CIO Tina Spooner said the market has beaten expectations this year, with 16 percent growth in the first half of the year, beating the outfit’s earlier forecast of 12 percent. Mobile transactions are also doing well, up 136 percent year-on-year in June.

“Mobile commerce continues to power on in 2013. More specifically, the mobile conversion rate has increased from 1.27% in June 2012 to 2.03% in June 2013 which is a very positive signal that mobile commerce is achieving serious traction in the UK market,” said Oliver Ripley, mobile product manager at eCommera.

Ripley pointed out that modern retailers are investing more in mobile commerce storefronts, both through browsers and bespoke apps. The shopping experience is getting better for mobile users, with improved payment services and user interface improvements.

Ripley also noted that consumers are becoming more used to mobile transactions and this is especially true of younger consumers.

Chris Webster, VP, Head of Retail Consulting and Technology at Capgemini said the uplift experienced this month will provide retailers with a note of cheer.

“With the Index recording its biggest year-on-year growth since June 2011 and Q2 being 17% up on Q2 2012. This is in stark contrast to the continued decline in store footfall reported by the BRC over the first half of the year and amplifies the increase of online at the expense of store sales,” he said. “In addition, Britons remain price-conscious, but have responded well to good deals found online and it’s good to see consumer confidence returning.”

Good weather boosts June footfall, high street gets the best of it

Posted on July 16, 2013 by - News

highstreet South endRetail footfall in June was up 0.1 percent year-on-year, reversing the negative trend in May, which saw a 0.7 drop. Good weather seems to be the main factor, as high street footfall was up 1.4 percent while out of town footfall was up 0.6 percent.

However, according to the British Retail Consortium, footfall in shopping centres dropped three percent following a previous drop of 1.7 percent in May. Looking at the first half of the year, the trend is largely positive, as footfall fell 1.5 percent compared to 2.9 percent during the first six months of 2012.

Greater London did particularly well, with a 2.4 percent spike, followed by Wales with a 2.3 percent increase. Scotland and the West Midlands were up by 1.2 and 1.3 percent respectively. However, footfall in the East Midlands was down 1.9 percent.

“The improvement in the weather may well have contributed to this,” said BRC director general Helen Dickinson. “Our recent retail sales figures showed a strong performance from fashion and footwear and it is likely that shoppers took advantage of the start of the sunshine in June to visit their local high street and buy items for their summer wardrobes.”

However, Springboard pointed out that good performance of high streets also has a lot to do with the fact that they underwent a bigger decline in footfall in previous year, which means they are starting from a lower base.

Morrisons’ boss calls for online sales tax

Posted on July 15, 2013 by - News

 morrisons-dalton-philipsMorrisons chief executive Dalton Philips believes the Government should impose a new online sales tax to level the playing field with its rivals and e-commerce outfits. Philips told The Daily Telegraph that the tax imbalance between internet and high street retailers is illogical and it is taking its toll on Britain’s town centres.

Interestingly, Morrisons is moving into the online space right now, but it still feels it should pay its fair share. Last week Philips said Morrisons lost £700 million of sales last year because it lacked an e-commerce platform. Shoppers simply chose the convenience offered by online groceries instead. In response, Morrisons is entering the e-commerce space with Ocado and it believes the new platform should be able to break even in just four years.

But Morrisons’ online push isn’t about to change Philips’ mind.

“As a country, we need to look at how we’re going to tax retailers in general wherever they operate, because we’ve all got to contribute to society, but one can’t be disadvantaged over the other,” he said. “I’m not into intervention for intervention’s sake but you’ve got to have a level playing field. As more and more sales migrate online, it seems to me intuitive that you would tax the online channels as well.”

Philips added that there was simply no logic to the tax system anymore, as the rates keep going up, while at the same time town centres become ghost towns, as brick and mortar outfits find themselves fighting against the odds to stay competitive.

More often than not, they fail.

Asus sharpens channel with hot monitor

Posted on July 15, 2013 by - News, Products

asus-4k-monitorAsus is about to introduce the world’s first consumer 4K monitor with a not so consumerish price tag. The Asus PQ321Q is a 31.5-inch behemoth priced at $3,499 at major US e-tailers and the official availability date is July 16.

Although the price won’t go down well with the average consumer, or quite a few professionals for that matter, the spec sheet is very impressive indeed. It boasts a 3840×2160 Indium Gallium Zinc Oxide panel with a ppi count of 140 pixels. At 35mm it’s very thin, too. It consumes up to 93W of energy, but in standby mode it goes down to 6W or 1W depending on the setting.

The viewing angles are 176 degrees, brightness stands at 350cd/m2 and the gray-to-gray response time is 8ms. Of course, the monitor can also be used as a TV hybrid, although the lack of 4K content and relatively small size would make such an exercise quite pointless.

Asus is already working on an ever bigger version of the monitor, with a 39-inch panel.

Mind you, although the price may seem rather outlandish, it is actually not as bad as it seems. A few years ago the first 1080p or WUXGA panels cost even more at launch, but within a few years prices dropped north of $1,000, rendering them affordable for many businesses and enthusiasts.

4K might reinvigorate the anaemic desktop PC market, but we’ll have to wait for at least a couple of years to see the first truly affordable consumer devices.

Mobile payments explosion might be a damp squib

Posted on July 12, 2013 by - News

google-walletFor months now we’ve been reading very optimistic reports on the future of mobile payments and m-commerce, but one outfit is apparently looking beyond the hype. Research firm eMarketer has slashed its growth estimate for proximity mobile payments in half.

Last October eMarketer forecasted that mobile payments would hit $2.13 billion this year, but in its latest note it puts the figure at $1 billion. Although the number of mobile transactions has more than tripled over the past two years, growth is apparently slowing down, plagued by a multitude of issues.

The firm pointed out that delays and adoption issues are hampering growth. The fact that there are already several competing platforms isn’t helping, either. However, it is still looking good in the long run. By 2016 mobile transactions should hit 2016, roughly a year behind the previous eMarketer schedule. Just a year later, in 2017, mobile payments should hit $58 billion.

Aside from the usual hardware teething problems, mobile payment outfits need to address security concerns and streamline the process itself. At the moment, the user experience still involves too much friction, according to PayPal CTO James Barrese. The ultimate goal is to come up with a one-touch payment scheme that would be a lot simpler and quicker than the good old card swipe. That probably won’t come about soon, and maintaining a level of security deemed acceptable by consumers might be very challenging.

In addition, the fact that there are several players vying for their slice of the pie, using their own systems and infrastructure, means that there is plenty of room for consolidation, reckons Venture Beat. However, big players aren’t very open to consolidation, or even cooperation, hence it is very unlikely that a single platform can break out of the pack and transform itself into an industry standard.

Chromebooks defy slow PC market with strong growth

Posted on July 12, 2013 by - News, Products

chromebookDemand for traditional desktops and laptops has been waning for years and the last two quarters saw the biggest slump in PC shipments in decades, but Google’s Chromebooks have bucked the trend.

Envisioned as cheap alternatives to Windows based laptops and netbooks, Chromebooks are cheap and cheerful, usually priced between $199 and $299. Although the market is still on a tablet binge, consumers seem to be quite interested in Chromebooks as well.

NPD estimates that Chromebooks have already managed to seize 20 to 25 percent of the sub-$300 laptop market in the Land of the Free. Overall, Chromebooks had a 4 to 5 percent market share in the first quarter, up from one to two percent a year ago.

That is a pretty impressive share for a category of products that practically didn’t exist a year ago and even today many consumers have no idea what a Chromebook actually is. NPD analyst Stephen Baker told Bloomberg that he was initially sceptical, but he now believes Chrombooks have managed to find a niche in the marketplace.

“The entire computing ecosystem is undergoing some radical change, and I think Google has its part in that change,” he said.

The untimely demise of the netbook also played a role in the Chromebook surge. Although netbooks weren’t that big among average consumers, they were essentially a good way of getting very cheap yet fully functional computers to schools and other institutions on a budget.

Chromebooks are just more of the same, but their success beckons the question – couldn’t have Intel and Microsoft played their netbook cards a bit better five years ago? After all, Google seems to be proving that there is still enough room for dirt cheap laptops, in spite of the tablet juggernaut. It seems Intel made a terrible strategic miscalculation with Atom cores.

Five years ago Chipzilla didn’t want to peddle high-volume low-margin chips, yet now it is struggling to come up with competitive mobile SoCs, which are basically an evolution of the original Atom concept. Maintaining higher margins and appeasing the Street with good quarterly results seems to have been more important than a comprehensive long-term mobile strategy.

Microsoft to slash Surface RT prices in US

Posted on July 12, 2013 by - News, Products

surface-rtMicrosoft is apparently about to slash the price of its Surface RT 32GB tablet by $150. The price cut should help the troubled tablet quite a bit, as it was originally priced at $499, which made it rather uncompetitive given its underwhelming spec.

Now though major retailers in the US are listing the Surface RT 32GB for just $349, reports Engadget. The new price sounds like a pretty good deal, although it is still no bargain. With such a sensible price tag, the Surface RT might have been a success, but the cut seems to be coming too late. Although Microsoft has not released any official sales figures, analysts believe it only manages to ship a couple of hundred thousand units per month.

Furthermore, the Surface RT is already ripe for an upgrade. It is based on Nvidia’s Tegra 3 and it has a 10.6-inch screen with 1366×768 resolution, which makes it look rather obsolete compared to iPads and high-end Android tablets.

Microsoft is expected to introduce an all new Surface RT in a few months, but before it does the current model should get a significant OS update, along with Outlook and it seems – a new, sane price tag.

Warehouse space in demand

Posted on July 11, 2013 by - News

castlewarehouseAlthough growth remains slow, demand for new warehouses and distribution facilities in London and other economic hubs remains surprisingly strong.

According to Colliers International, demand is being fueled by anxiety on the part of some institutional investors, who are worried about the future of multifamily markets.

In addition to London, space in other centers with access to good infrastructure, ports and inland distribution centers is also at a premium. Munich is big, thanks to the strong performance of German car makers.

Erik Barnekow, head of EMEA Industrial and Logistics at Colliers said Hong Kong and Sydney are nearing full capacity. Seoul is also big, but it is experiencing uneven industrial demand. Demand is expected to stay strong through the end of the year, with a special emphasis on build-to-suit facilities.

Colliers points out that the recovery of the European logistics market remains patchy, reflecting a lack of momentum in the retail trade.

Although demand in London is strong, the number of modern facilities is limited and there aren’t many new investments. The report found that modern shed space in Greater London is now “severely limited” with only very modest levels of new supply anticipated over the next 18 months.

The Heathrow zone has seen practically no new speculative development over the past four years, which is a direct consequence of the volatile economic climate. It is no better in South, East or West London and there is very little grade A stock available.

However, a few new build-to-suites were constructed over the last 12 months, but vacancy levels are low and there is still a huge shortage of new space coming to market.

Nvidia takes on AMD with game bundle

Posted on July 10, 2013 by - News

nvidia-gangnam-style-330pxNvidia has announced a game bundle for the summer season, in cooperation with Ubisoft. The Splinter Cell Blacklist promotion is clearly aimed to counter AMD’s highly successful Never Settle Reloaded bundle, but in reality both bundles are an indication that AMD and Nvidia really don’t have any truly new GPUs to offer this year.

Nvidia’s bundle will include the latest Ubisoft Splinter Cell game, Splinter Cell Blacklist, and it all cards above the GTX 660 will be eligible, including all GTX 700 series cards. Interestingly, the ultra high end GTX 690 and GTX Titan are not included in the programme, which might mean that Nvidia has something even better lined up for its flagship products, or that it feels that they don’t need any freebies to sell well.

Although the promo is kicking off now, SC Blacklist won’t launch until late August, but Nvidia will have plenty of download codes ready and waiting. The promotion is expected to last until the winter game season when it will probably be replaced by a new bundle.

In any case 2013 is shaping up to be a rough year for the PC gaming market. New consoles are on the way, while at the same time GPU makers really don’t have much to offer in terms of new hardware.

Microsoft washes hands to seal XP’s fate

Posted on July 10, 2013 by - News

win8errorMicrosoft is slowly preparing for the inevitable demise of Windows XP.

Redmond will discontinue support for the venerable operating system next April and its warnings to partners are becoming a bit more vocal.

In an effort to ease the transition, Microsoft has already announced a range of programmes and initiatives to gently force customers to upgrade their XP boxes. But it is a daunting task – over the next 270 days Microsoft partners will have to upgrade an estimated 586,000 PCs per day and roughly a year from now we could see a spike in IT department suicides.

Microsoft plans to spend $40 million in fiscal 2014 to speed up its Windows Accelerate Programme, which doesn’t really sound like much from our perspective. In addition Redmond will extend its Get to Modern programme aimed at SMBs. Since it is believed that SMBs are still the biggest XP users, they will need the most help to get everything sorted and they don’t have that many resources to go around.

HP has also joined the fun, with an offer of specially priced HP ElitePad tablets with Windows 8, ZDnet reports.

Another related programme is TouchWins. Although it is not directly designed to speed up XP transition, it does offer incentives to makers of touch-enabled Windows 8 devices.