Google sparks e-books fight with Kindle
January 14, 2010
Source:  REUTERS

FRANKFURT: Google plans to launch an online store to deliver electronic books to any device with a Web browser, threatening to upset a burgeoning market for dedicated e-readers dominated by Amazon's Kindle. 

The Web search giant said on Thursday it would launch Google Editions in the first half of next year, initially offering about half a million e-books in partnership with publishers with whom it already cooperates, where they have digital rights. 

Readers will be able to buy e-books either from Google directly or from other online stores such as Amazon.com or Barnesandnoble.com. Google will host the e-books and make them searchable. 

"We're not focused on a dedicated e-reader or device of any kind," Tom Turvey, Google's director of strategic partnerships, told journalists at the Frankfurt Book Fair. 

The announcement comes a week after Amazon said it would introduce the Kindle into 100 countries outside the United States, pushing its leading position in a small but fast-growing market in which its competitors include Sony's Reader. 

Technology research firm Forrester expects about 3 million e-readers to be sold in the United States this year, from a previous base of about 1 million, helped by lower prices, more content and better distribution. 

Top U.S. bookseller Barnes & Noble has been reported to be planning an entry into the e-reader market to complement a large online bookstore it launched in July. 

Amazon shares fell 2 percent in early trading in New York, while the Nasdaq slipped 0.4 percent. Barnes & Noble fell 1.2 percent, and Google was down 0.6 percent. 

Forrester media analyst Sarah Rotman Epps said Google would not necessarily steal market share from Amazon, although it would strengthen the position of others who support open standards usable across a range of devices, such as Sony's. 

"Certainly it presents collective competition to Amazon, but for many consumers the word 'e-reader' is synonymous with the Kindle," she said. 

Microsoft had also been rumored to be planning a reading device, but Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said last week it had no need, since it already supplied the software that runs the most popular device for electronic reading, the PC. 

Google Editions will allow Google to make money for the first time out of one of its book ventures -- which also include a controversial project to scan and index tens of millions of books through partnerships with libraries. 

Google will share revenue with publishers, and also with online retailers in cases where readers buy Google-hosted books through a retailer's site. It already partners with publishers to make their physical books searchable and available for sale. 

Turvey said Google would give publishers 63 percent of revenues and keep 37 percent for itself where it sold e-books directly to consumers. 

In cases where e-books were bought through other online retailers, publishers would get 45 percent and most of the remaining 55 percent would go to the retailer, with a small share for Google, he said 

Top 10 valuable companies on basis of M-Cap
January 14, 2010
SOURCE : REUTERS

SEATTLE: MUMBAI: The ongoing tariff war seems to be doing more damage than good to the valuations of telecom scrips. In what seems to be a reflection of shifting investor priorities, IT major Infosys has emerged as a more valuable firm than India’s biggest mobile operator - Bharti Airtel - on the basis of Wednesday’s market capitalisation. 

At the end of Wednesday’s trading session, the M-cap of Infosys was Rs 1.29 lakh crore ($28 billion), a tad higher than Bharti’s M-cap of Rs 1.28 lakh crore ($27.9 billion). With this, Infosys has replaced Bharti to become the seventh-most valuable company in the Indian stock market. 

While the current tariff war among mobile operators has cast a shadow on the sector’s valuation, the possibility of a rebound in global demand has supported valuations of top IT companies. READ FULL STORY or click NEXT to see top 10 valuable companies  

Dell CEO expects IT spending bounce
January 14, 2010
SOURCE: REUTERS

SANTA CLARA, California: Dell Inc Chief Executive Michael Dell said the business climate was improving and repeated his expectation for a 
"powerful" hardware refresh cycle beginning next year. 

While noting that there are still obstacles to the recovery, Dell sounded optimistic about the upcoming year as the tech sector makes its way out of a crushing recession that has severely impacted end-demand. 

"It's getting a bit better incrementally ..., but I think there are still challenges out there," Dell told business executives on Tuesday at a forum in Santa Clara, in the heart of Silicon Valley. "The U.S. is doing a bit better than Europe; Europe's probably six to nine months behind the U.S." 

Dell expects companies to begin upgrading aging equipment starting in early 2010 and said the server refresh cycle was already underway and stronger than expected, thanks to Intel's new Nehalem processor. 

Roughly 80 percent of Dell's business comes from sales to businesses, institutions, government and education customers. The downturn in spending by those commercial customers has hit the world's No. 2 PC maker harder than it has competitors with more balanced portfolios, such as Hewlett-Packard. 

And nearly 60 percent of Dell's revenue comes from PCs. Dell's shipments fell 17 percent in the second quarter, according to industry tracker IDC. Its market share stood at 13.7 percent. 

Dell trails HP in global PC rankings and is being pressured from below by fast-rising Acer Inc, which has made huge market share gains, in part due to netbook sales. 

QUEST FOR MARGINS 

Dell and other technology companies have been looking to move further into the IT services business, with its higher margins and recurring revenue streams, and diversify away from lower-margin hardware. 

The company has agreed to buy services provider Perot Systems for $3.9 billion in what would be the company's largest acquisition ever. Dell said the move was part of its play to build a different kind of services business. 

"Perot Systems is of a sufficient size that gives us a certain scale, but it's also not too big," he said. 

Dell is now planning to launch a smartphone with Google's Android mobile software on carrier AT&T's network, a source familiar with that has said. But when asked about how he views the mobile space, Dell said he had made no announcements, but company was looking at it closely. 

"I do think there is definitely a phenomenon going on with the Internet in your pocket, and there are new platforms that are emerging," he said. " ... I think you'll see us begin to show up gradually."