rajsekar

Joost: Sometimes Too Much Money Is a Curse, Not a Blessing

Ed and Om Malik missed an important failure in this autopsy report. One of the main reasons (atleast # 1) for Joost's collapse is the lack of focus from Mike Volpi. Mike has been called a rock star by media and analysts because of his management and digestion of many small startups into Cisco. There again the vision and focus came from John Chambers and not Volpi. Volpi could successfully operate within Cisco's walled garden and create wonders, but he failed once he was left to himself. That's not creativity or having focus. There are many such loose cannons loitering Sand Hills Road looking for openings to create a Google or Sun (oops bad choice). The best analysis will be to compare Joost and Hulu. A focussed and smart CEO can do wonders for a startup company. Joost should have hired a Chief who knew the technology foremost and the ability to execute the plan. Mike Volpi lacked both traits and here we are with an autopsy report.

TiVo Is Still Grossly Undervalued

IP Rocks-I don't totally agree with your view. It's right on TiVo's part to sue Echostar for patent infringement and get some kind of royalty for DVRs that they have sold since then. But the bigger issue for TiVo is revenue growth. How do you achieve that with the present model of assemblying hardware and subscribing customers? The economics of DVR has come down to $5 rental for a HD Recorder. Why would anyone pay $15 or so to TiVo for a separate DVR. I was a TiVo user and loved the box and UI, but had to abandon the service when I switched my provider to satellite for economic reasons. I have since gone back to cable and use a generic DVR which satisfies my needs and makes a smaller hole in my wallet. There are millions of users who are in my position and have turned down expensive services like TiVo. TiVo's increasing churn rate is a reflection of this trend. Show me some revenue growth and I can bet on the stock price. There are fundamental flaws with TiVo's business model and they have to be changed.

TiVo Is Still Grossly Undervalued

Nuke, DVR's have become a mainstay for Cable and Satellite TV users. The so called TiVo patent claims are so narrow that other DVR software like Microsoft Media Center, Moxi and Linux based PVR are using features like pausing and reverse live TV feed besides recording. They don't infringe TiVo's patents. TiVo can manage to stop Echostar and that's it. It will take years and lot of money to go after other DVR vendors and cable companies to prove that they violated TiVo's patents. TiVo should have been dead long time ago and this company on basic life support is waiting for someone to buy. You should better read the claims in the Patent ligitation and understand the core technology that is described. I don't see any future for TiVo.

Not Everyone in China Wants to Buy an iPhone

This sales number was expected but Apple and many analysts thought that China was a different market. Their assessment has been off track. The same problem happened during India launch and similar projections were given by analysts. iPhone is a complete flop in India and China will follow suit. Expect the same low numbers from South Korea launch. Apple cannot replicate its success outside US for many reasons. Everyone says that China has a 700 million mobile phone base and just a small fraction of those users buying iPhones will be sufficient to boost Apple's market share. That's not going to happen. For all the great things written about iPhone, analysts should know that US sales rose after Apple slashed handset price to $199. Apple will see increased sales when AT&T introduces buy 1, get 1 iPhone free for $99. It's not too late for this sales to be announced.

Five Reasons Apple’s iPhone Will Succeed in China

China is not going to be any different territory for Apple. Good Luck

Is Microsoft's Bing Losing Its Bling?

Can someone remove this spammer MadHedge? What an idiot. This guy is pasting the same comments on all MSFT related articles.

Windows 7 Launch Should Give Microsoft a Boost

Why would you give Windows 7 a big thumps up when it's an extension of Vista? Many vendors like Dell and Lenovo are smarter to launch their new laptops on XP rather than Win7. All analysts are expecting a big turnaround for Microsoft with Win7 release, especially with corporate IT. Anyone who has been testing or using Win7, including me, didn't find any big difference with Win7 performance or features. Users who knew to work around Vista annoyances still applied the same changes to Win7. Win7 is technically a Service Pack 3 for Vista and nothing more. MSFT will not see much sales bounce with Win7 because corporate users are pretty happy with WinXP and may decide to stay put. The bigger question is upgrading to Win7 from XP which is a convoluted process. Poor ignorant home users will shell out $100 to buy a Service Pack for their Vista OS. For XP users, upgrading to Win7 is a nightmare situation.

Will Windows 7 Resurrect IT Spending?

Why would you give Windows 7 a big thumps up when it's an extension of Vista? Many vendors like Dell and Lenovo are smarter to launch their new laptops on XP rather than Win7. All analysts are expecting a big turnaround for Microsoft with Win7 release, especially corporate IT. Anyone who has been testing or using Win7, including me, didn't find any big difference with Win7 performance or features. Users who knew to work around Vista annoyances still applied the same changes to Win7. Win7 is technically a Service Pack 3 for Vista and nothing more. MSFT will not see much sales bounce with Win7 because corporate users are pretty happy with WinXP. Poor ignorant home users will shell out $100 to buy a Service Pack for their Vista OS. Same applies to home users who purchased Snow Leopard OS, which is a service pack for Leopard MacOS.

Toyota Reviews U.S. Ops; Not Profitable Here

Richard - Your analysis is missing some key decisions that Watanabe took during 2004-05 period when Toyota was busy trying to outsell GM and Ford. As I have been commenting, San Antonio plant is Toyota's nail in the coffin. Toyota is currently having overcapacity in all their US plants, especially Indiana and San Antonio. The new Texas plant was a wrong move to assemble Tundras when Indiana plant had spare capacity to handle this. Watanabe was over confident that Tundra can woo F150 and Silverado owners. The next big hype is Prius and this hybrid dominance will be challenged by all electric plug-in cars coming from Nissan, Subaru and Chevy Volt. Consumers will flock to an all electric car, rather than buying a hybrid. For the same price of a Prius, you can buy Nissan's EV car which doesn't use gasoline. So the new Mississippi plant is another blunder. I am not certain if NUMMI closure will help Toyota, since Corolla and Tacoma are assembled in Canada and Mexico, where production costs are lower than Bay area. Moroever the US auto market and sales are contracting like never before and days of 9 million cars are gone. The fight for US auto is going to be brutal and Toyota will be left with excess manufacturing capacity and too many gas guzzlers. Well Watanabe wanted Toyota to beat GM, but he never expected that one day Toyota will become GM.

T. Boone Pickens' Epic Wind Fail

Will any sane individual, leave alone billionaire, spend two billions to buy wind turbines for an unplanned wind farm? Leave aside all calculations and numbers favoring wind and natural gas. Boone Pickens has a basic credibility problem. Anyone trusting this guy with his Pickens Plan will lose his shirt? US needs to take a hard look at current energy hogs (cars and coal fired power plants) and make tough decisions. There is a platonic shift taking place in auto sector and all automakers who have setup manufacturing in US is going to end up with excess capacity. Our oil consumption can lower only by producing less number of cars. This number will have to settle below 5 million units. There is nothing that guys like Pickens can do about it

The Pickens Plan: Where Are We One Year Later?

Leave aside all calculations and numbers favoring wind and natural gas. Boone Pickens has a basic credibility problem. Anyone trusting this guy with his Pickens Plan will lose his shirt? US needs to take a hard look at current energy hogs (cars and coal fired power plants) and make tough decisions. There is a platonic shift taking place in auto sector and all automakers who have setup manufacturing in US is going to end up with excess capacity. Our oil consumption can lower only by producing less number of cars. This number will have to settle below 5 million units. There is nothing that guys like Pickens can do about it.

Boone Pickens Retreats on Wind Power

Pickens has a basic credibility issue. Why is Congress listening to Pickens and his plans? It's a well known fact that US is dependent on foreign oil for many years now and Pickens thinks that Congress realized it just last year. Picken's lean towards Natural Gas is surprising and I don't think our automotive or industrial sector is geared towards using Compressed Natural Gas (CNG). Countries like India, China and Singapore have invested money to run fleet vehicles using CNG, while US is lagging behind on usage of CNG. Storage of natural gas is a tricky issue unlike oil. Pickens is dead wrong on his plan. I wouldn't trust anything that Pickens talks. I wish some billionaire swift boats Pickens for his Natural Gas strategy and flip-flopping. Boone's wind plan is "Gone with the Wind". So what's next up in Boone's sleeve?

Boone Pickens' BP Capital: Rebuilding in 2009

Thanks to Ferdinand to point out Boone Picken's true color. The fact that Pickens was part of Swift Boat Veterans campaign speaks volume about this guy and his mental caliber. Let's leave aside all this wealth, hedge funds and other charity work. Boone spent millions to disgrace a war veteran when the person was running for the highest office in the country. How can anyone trust what Boone says? During the past one year Boone has been making noise about America's energy independence through his Picken's Plan. The Pickens plan is full of holes and why are public and Congress entertaining such guys with these half-baked plans. Anyone with true conscience will stay away from such funds and his empty plans.

TiVo Is Still Grossly Undervalued

Nuke/ Jim - Let me give my view point on your $50 price target and "TiVo death watch" bashing. I can say that $15-18 price target is a realistic one for TiVo, if anyone can answer my lingering questions:

1. Why didn't TiVo pursue Rupert Mudoch when he decided to use NDS DVRs instead of TiVo?
2. Why is TiVo not suing Comcast when they are currently distributing Motorola DVR with Comcast logo? Moreover TiVo is working with Comcast and a New England roll-out is already in place.
3. Why is TiVo losing customers and their rising churn-rate every quarter?
4. Can TiVo come out strongly and say that Microsoft, Moxi, MythTV, SageTV, Cisco/SA, NDS, Comcast, Motorola are infringing TiVo's patents and claim royalty?

I owned TiVo shares when they filed the first Echostar patent litigation and for last three years there have been no movement in their share price. The shares have been swinging between $10 and $4.50 since 2006. If TiVo claims that it's a game changer in the media industry, then the stock price and number of customers don't reflect that status. If you are willing to bet your dollars on Echostar ruling, then I am not buying this stock.

Look at the media business wherein big game changers like Google and Apple are battling to retain their uniqueness to customers. When touch based iPhone was introduced in July 2007, Apple fans were drooling in front of posh stores in Palo Alto and New York. The clowns paid $499 to buy an iPhone. Just two years down the road, I can walk into my favorite Walmart and buy a cheap iPhone. Apple can no longer claim any Wow with iPhone. Palm is the latest Wow in the industry. Similarly TiVo was a Wow eight years ago and they have lost the crown. It's too late to predict that TiVo can gain market share and get millions of patent infrigement dollars from other PVR vendors. Also TiVo should have been ruthless like Jacob's father-son duo (Qualcomm founders) to milk wireless carriers over CDMA patents. In the end, Broadcom beat them to death over CDMA patent infringement. Bad Karma, Jacob's.

TiVo Is Still Grossly Undervalued

Hello Jim3, sounds like you are a TiVo rep or their founder, Jim Barton. I have analyzed all the patents and their respective independent claims that Jim Barton has authored. I have also used other PVR software - Media Center, Moxi and MythTV. The 389 patent claims are very narrow and I can't argue the infringement in this forum. If TiVo has enough cash let them go after all PVR vendors to prove that their technology infringes 389 patent.