2008 seems like a year in which several major companies are positioned for turnarounds. Whether or not they would be successful is another matter, but there is enough discontinuity in each of their markets, that turnarounds could happen. Here are some to watch:
Yesterday, Apple released its earnings for its first quarter of fiscal 2008 that ended December 29, 2007. Revenue was $9.6 billion, up 35% y-o-y and 54% sequentially driven by the strong sales of Macs, iPhones, and iPods. Net income was $1.58 billion, or $1.76 per diluted share, up 58% y-o-y. Gross margin was 34.7%, up [...]
Takkle is a social network for high school sports, where students, athletes, coaches, and fans share their passion. Takkle has a strategic alliance with Sports Illustrated. Takkle allows students to create their profiles and upload their stats, photos and videos for college recruiters. In November 2007 Takkle raised $7 million in venture funding led by [...]
The story of Sridhar Vembu’s innovative bootstrapping. A story all entrepreneurs should understand.
Meg Whitman is finally leaving eBay. My Forbes column, eBay’s Bounce-Back Opportunity, discusses what the successor needs to pay attention to, whether it is John Donahoe or otherwise. We have also discussed eBay’s strategy at length in Web 3.0 and eBay and eBay vs Amazon. Today, the determining factor in the eBay vs Amazon debate [...]
“Are you kidding? No way!” In 2008, the IT and IT enabled services (ITES/BPO) industries are supposed to be the major drivers of India’s economic growth. According to Nasscom, the two industries combined will employ 4 million people and account for 7% of GDP and 33% of foreign exchange inflow. The death of this industry [...]
My GigaOm column, Yahoo Please Put Up A Fight discusses all those things we have been talking about for a while here. The problem with Yahoo at the moment is a complete lack of vision about how the web needs to evolve. The MyYahoo user experience, for all its promises, has remained a marginal “starting [...]
In 2007, Cisco benefited strongly from the trends of online video and network convergence with its home video (Scientific Atlanta) and Telepresence ventures. Net sales were $34.9 billion (up 23%) in fiscal 2007 and it added $9.6 billion in the first quarter (up 17% y-o-y and 2% q-o-q). It will be announcing its second quarter [...]
