Blog articles from 01/2009

On January 27, 2009, Cisco announced that it was acquiring a company that provides middleware to bridge between the IT and building management systems. Cisco says that the acquisition of Richards-Zeta Building Intelligence can allow IT systems - including servers, phones, Telepresence, digital signage, and networking equipment - to be managed in much the same way as security, HVAC, and other building management systems. CNET reported yesterday that this acquisition plays into...

T-Mobile USA announced that Google Android-based G1 smartphone is now available in all markets nationwide. Previously, it was only sold in T-Mobile’s 3G service markets. Although the carrier has not publicly discussed the G1’s sales figure, Morgan Stanley projected around 300,000 unit G1 sales in 4Q08 for the carrier. Contrasting this number, Taiwan’s HTC (G1’s maker) in early January said that G1’s 2008 shipments reached the company’s one million goal as first reported by...

Verizon announced solid earnings this morning much to the relief of the analyst community. Wireless came in as the strongest segment as was expected. Wireless revenues for Q4-08 were $12.8B up 12.3% (YoY) compared to the wireline segment which contributed $11.9B to the top line down 2.7%(YoY). Verizon added ~1.2 million post paid wireless subs last quarter compared to ~2 million the quarter before. The only concerning factor was the slight increase in the churn rate which was recorded...

New report reveals monitoring makes up 75% of home security revenues -- Monitoring revenues are still the financial bedrock of the U.S. security industry, constituting 75% of all revenue, according to Home Systems: Home Security Update, which reports monitoring will cushion this market during the recession. This new report from Parks Associates finds the number of monitored security households intending to cancel their service is only 4-8% higher than normal due to the...

Associates is supporting the 6th Annual World Health Care Congress event in Washington D.C. from April 14-16, 2009. The World Health Care Congress is the most prestigious meeting of chief and senior executives from all sectors of health care. The 2009 conference will convene over 2,000 CEOs, senior executives and government officials from the nation's largest employers, hospitals, health systems, health plans, pharmaceutical and biotech companies, and leading government...

Verizon has released the Hub, which looks to be an enhancement to the 'Verizon One Communications Center' and a good example of fixed-mobile communications convergence in the telco space. The Wall Street Journal provided a write-up on this today. The new home phone, called the Hub, aims to retain existing landline customers and attract other carriers' customers, the company said. The phone will deliver streaming video services and work with Verizon Wireless text messaging and...

When people ask me about which particular segments of the digital lifestyle market will continue to grow despite our current economic conditions, one area that I continually point out are the digital home tech support services. These can include the retail-based services (best known by Geek Squad), the remote PC support space, warranty services, home network management software, security services (Symantec, McAfee, Radialpoint, F-Secure, etc.), remote management and residential gateway...

The WSJ featured an article today announcing the formation of “ The Pool .” Lead by Publicis Groupe’s Starcom MediaVest and VivaKi, The Pool is a consortium of six major media companies including Microsoft, Yahoo!, CBS Interactive, and Hulu.com as well as several marketers. The Pool was assembled with hopes to increase online video ad revenue by developing effective ad format standards and identifying which online video ad formats are most preferred by online viewers....