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Technology Stocks
Better Monetization Eases Market Concerns Over Facebook
Facebook may have recorded the largest Internet player IPO ever. But since going public, the company’s market value has slipped considerably. Facebook has lost more than $40 billion in market value since the IPO as analysts have been worried about its ability to keep up monetization, especially on the mobile front. But the recent quarterly results managed to quell a few market concerns.
Google Aiming to Be a Major Player in the Still-Developing Tablet Market
Analysts estimate that the Internet giant Google (NASDAQ:GOOG), accounts for more than 66% of the search engine market share. But the growing importance of mobile devices is hurting Google’s search revenues. Not only do mobiles offer a smaller screen for displaying ads, but the click-through rate on mobile devices is also less. Ads generated on smartphones cost about 40% less than those on computers and about 25% less than on those generated on tablets. Delivering the same monetization rates on mobile devices is proving to be difficult, even for leaders like Google. No wonder Google is looking beyond search.
Microsoft Sees Revenue Declines But Gears Up for Windows 8
According to research by IHS, PC sales will fall 1.2% to 348.7 million units this year. This is first time since 2001 that PC sales are projected to decline over the year. This decline attributed to poor economic conditions and the increased adoption of mobile devices like the iPad.
RIM Looks Grim
According to market research, in August of this year BlackBerry manufacturer RIM’s market share of the U.S. smartphone market fell from 11.4% a year ago to 8.3%. RIM may have managed to retain the third position in the market and is far ahead of Microsoft’s 3.6% market share. But it still has a big gap to overcome if it plans to contend with the second largest player in the market. Google’s Android phones commanded 52.6% of the U.S. smartphone market, and Apple saw its share grow from 31.9% to 34.3% in August. RIM may be counting on the BlackBerry 10 to pull it out of the rut. However, given the current gap in market share, that would be quite a challenge.
The Market Likes Workday
Last week, SaaS-based enterprise services provider Workday (NYSE:WDAY) finally went public. According to Fortune/CNN Money, its IPO was among “the largest venture-backed IPO since Facebook.” It sold 22.8 million shares at $28 each, raising $637 million through the IPO.
A Peek Into Newly Public Qualys
A Gartner report, Market Trends: Cloud-Based Security Services Market, Worldwide, 2012, estimates that the cloud-based security market will be worth $4.2 billion by 2016. Researcher IDC is more optimistic: One of its reports on cloud security–based solutions estimates a compounded growth rate of 16% over the period 2011 to 2015, projecting that the market will grow from $5.1 billion in 2011 to $9.3 billion in 2015.
Jumptap on Amazon’s Radar
Research firm eMarketer estimates that $2.6 billion, or just 2% of all U.S. marketing budgets this year, will be spent on mobile advertising. But it’s clear that importance of mobile advertising is growing. StatCounter estimates that smartphone and tablet users now account for more than 10% of Internet traffic in the country. Recently the IAB Mobile Marketing Center of Excellence released mobile advertising report for the past year. According to their research, global mobile advertising was worth $5.3 billion last year, with 26% of the market belonging to Europe and 31% to North America. Asia Pacific markets contributed the largest share – 36% of the market. The emerging markets of Latin America and Middle East & Africa together accounted for nearly 7% of the global market.
E2open Will Find the Public Market Tough
According to Forrester’s research, the cloud computing market will be worth $241 billion by the year 2020. Forrester projects the market to be worth $55 billion by 2014. Driven by such growth potential, E2open, one of the leading providers of cloud-based, on-demand software solutions for supply chain management, went public.