by Andrew LaVallee, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
Dell’s fiscal third-quarter earnings fell 54 percent to $337 million, while revenue declined 15 percent to $12.9 billion.
The personal-computer maker saw revenue in its small and medium business unit slip 19 percent from the year-earlier period, while its consumer business was down 10 percent. In a statement, Michael Dell, its chief executive, said that the launch of Microsoft’s Windows 7 has been “very well received” by consumers and businesses, and that the company will see those results more in the fourth quarter.
by Justin Scheck and Nick Wingfield, Reporters, The Wall Street Journal
Cash-strapped consumers have been slow to buy personal computers in the recession. But with the launch of Microsoft Corp.’s new Windows 7 operating system Thursday, PC makers are aiming to reverse that trend–and then some.
Many big tech hardware makers are expanding into services. Hewlett-Packard last year bought Electronic Data Systems; Dell agreed last month to buy Perot Systems; and Xerox cut a deal for Affiliated Computer Services, also last month.
by Keith Johnson, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
And then there were five–defections from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce over its climate-change policy, that is.
Apple today resigned its membership in the Chamber “effective immediately.” That’s a harsher tone than the other departures–three utilities said they’d let their membership lapse at the end of the year, and Nike simply quite the Chamber’s board of directors.
The tech world came to a halt briefly on Wednesday as people watched, blogged, and tweeted Apple CEO Steve Jobs’s appearance at an event unveiling a new line of iPods. Out of the spotlight another computer maker, Dell, made a product announcement of its own. Sort of.
VMworld, the annual conference hosted by software maker VMware, is fast becoming one of the hot tech conferences, in large part because VMware’s technology has become an important selling point for tech-equipment makers like Dell and Cisco Systems. There are likely to be dozens of new product announcements made at the conference, which kicks off Monday.
by Justin Scheck, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
The tech services business has been hot for the last year or so, since H-P bought IT outsourcing giant EDS in May for more than $13 billion. H-P and IBM, the market leader in services, are now going head to head for big outsourcing deals.
by Andrew LaVallee, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
Apple is now calling its MacBook laptops “the world’s greenest lineup of notebooks” instead of “the world’s greenest family of notebooks” in response to a recommendation by the Better Business Bureau’s advertising division.
The division came to the recommendation after rival computer maker Dell challenged Apple’s MacBook marketing, which refers, among other things, to the devices’ energy usage, packaging and recyclable components.
by Justin Scheck, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
Until three weeks ago, few people outside corporate data centers knew much about deduplication technology, which makes data storage more efficient by culling repetitive documents. That changed when data storage companies NetApp and EMC got into a bidding war last month for a leading provider of the heretofore obscure software.
by Justin Scheck, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
There’s still no mobile phone from Dell, despite plenty of chatter about that possibility over the last 18 months. But it’s gotten easier to buy from the company using a mobile phone.
Dell recently, and quietly, went live with a new version of its Web site that works better with mobile phones.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
There has been speculation for months now that Dell at some point will make a big acquisition. Most of the thinking has been about diversification moves. But Bernstein Research analyst Toni Sacconaghi proposes an idea that would boost Dell’s stake in the PC business: consider buying Acer.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Unable to get the attention of the wireless carriers, Dell has decided to enter the mobile phone market by selling its wares direct through retailers, according to Collins Stewart analyst Ashok Kumar. The analyst writes that the carriers have decided to pass on Dell’s handset, “citing a non-compelling product with a roadmap that lags competition.”
Dell isn’t dead yet. And in fact, Craig-Hallum analyst Christian Schwab this morning goes so far as to suggest the stock offers investors a potential double. Asserting in a research note this morning that the company can still “get its groove back,” Schwab this morning launched coverage of the stock with a Buy rating and a $19 price target.
Dell CEO Michael Dell has done little to dispel rumors that his company is working on a mobile computing device. In fact, he all but confirmed them while traveling in Japan on March 24 when he said: “It is true that we are exploring smaller-screen devices.” What form those devices will take remains a matter of heated debate.
This is a section of the All Things Digital Web site featuring posts from around the Web, from other Dow Jones properties and also original pieces we solicit. The section is now explicitly labeled that it comes "from other Web sites."
We are fully aware of the controversies around how linking and aggregating is done on the Web and we, in no way, are attempting to "scrape" original content created by others. Instead, regarding third-party posts, we are trying to point readers of this site to other posts from around the Web that we admire and are trying to do so in the quickest manner possible.
The Internet is full of terrific content that is not ours and we want to help our readers find it by making editorial suggestions--Look, Mom, no algorithm!--of posts we think are worth their time.
That is why we have made even more changes to Voices to ensure we do this in the most transparent and timely way. While we don't expect that everyone will agree with our policies, we have made changes that reflect our intent in pointing to content outside our site.
Because the site is wholly owned by Dow Jones, publisher of The Wall Street Journal, we aim to adhere to the journalistic standards of the best of the mainstream media. But, because it is run autonomously as a small online startup, we aim to exhibit the fresh thinking and nimbleness of the best of the new media. We want to be first, and sassy, but also well sourced and accurate. We will offer lots of opinion and analysis, but plenty of fact as well.
