Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Sprint’s Likely Buyer May Be CenturyLink

Sprint Nextel Corp. might end up being acquired if AT&T successfully acquires T-Mobile USA, and the most likely buyer is CenturyLink, the biggest company in telecommunications without a wireless unit, analysts speculate.

CenturyLink, based in Monroe, Louisiana, is the most logical acquirer because it has the financial resources, it’s shown an appetite for big deals and it needs a wireless business, say analysts including Chris Larsen of Piper Jaffray Cos.

Kansas City, Mo. Also Gets i-Gbps from Google

Google has said it will extend its symmetrical 1-Gbps fiber to the home network across the river from Kansas City,Kan. to Kansas City, Mo. as well.

"Trust" Now a Big Issue for Media, Business and Government

U.S citizens now trust business and government less in 2011 than they did in 2010. About six percent fewer U.S. respondents say they "can trust government to do what is right." At 40 percent of respondents, U.S. levels of trust in government are nearly identical to view of Russians about their own government. About 39 percent of Russian respondents think they can trust government to do what is right.



About 46 percent of U.S. respondents say they can "trust business to do what is right."



Media fares even worse than business or government, though. Just 27 percent of U.S. respondents say they "trust media to do what is right." Media scores dropped 11 percent since 2010.



read more here

Reputation Management in a Social World

It is by now commonplace that online reputation can be affected quickly and widely on social media. For many brands, that means activities to manage, shape or respond to these threats to a firm's reputation now are necessary.

78% of IT Professionals Use Personal Devices for Work

A survey of 100 information technology professionals indicates just how much intermingling of "business issued" and "personal" devices now happens at enterprises.

The respondents indicate that 78 percent use personal devices for business-related purposes or use corporate devices to connect to personal applications. It is possible that those ratios do not apply equally to most enterprise employees, since the respondents are among the "most technical" employees at an enterprise.

And though most are worried about the impact such personal devices pose for enterprise security policies, fully 35 percent of the IT professionals say they also violating their corporate policies at least occasionally.

Where Voice is Headed

Here's a pictogram by Dean Bubley and Martin Geddes that illustrates where they think "voice" is headed.

A couple of key points are that voice shifts from being a fixed network service to being primarily a wireless service; shifts from being a stand-alone "service" to an attribute of some other application or experience; and that it increasingly is delivered "over the top" as an application, not as a provisioned service.

None of those key observations would be unexpected, or necessarily good news for today's telecom providers. "Voice" in the future will be a feature or attribute, not necessarily a service sold by a telco as a specific service.

Monday, May 16, 2011

SAP Focuses on Mobile Apps

Germany's SAP AG sees the business-software industry's future in mobile apps. The corollary is that SAP sees cloud-based software as the future.

Bill McDermott and Jim Hagemann Snabe, who took over as co-chief executives in February 2010 following revenue and profit shortfalls, have sold investors on a plan to make SAP a growth company again in part by bringing the consumer mobile-app craze to the enterprise.

By combining its business-software assets with Sybase, which it acquired last year, SAP hopes to build a mobile powerhouse, offering its customers mobile versions of SAP's business software and the ability to easily build and securely manage their own mobile apps.

Directv-Dish Merger Fails

Directv’’s termination of its deal to merge with EchoStar, apparently because EchoStar bondholders did not approve, means EchoStar continue...