Supplier Report: 2/28/2015

Sony World Photography Competition Shortlist

Sony World Photography Competition Shortlist

IBM

  • IBM Pumps $4 Billion Into Cloud and Mobile Initiatives (thank you Kevin, huge story with hundreds of similar posts this week)…

    Among its new priorities, IBM has put particular emphasis on online, or cloud, services. It has said it invested $1.2 billion in data centers to augment those it acquired with SoftLayer Technologies in 2013. It also invested $1 billion to accelerate commercialization of its Watson data-analytics technology.

    http://www.wsj.com/articles/ibm-pumps-4-billion-into-strategic-imperatives-1424959681

  • WebSphere (IBM) offers 31% better performance over WebLogic (Oracle)

    Enterprise IT vendor IBM today said its WebSphere Application Server 8.5.5.4 running on dual Intel Xeon Processor E5-2600 v3 demonstrated 31 percent better performance on per core basis against 18800.76 SPECjEnterprise20101 EjOPS result from Oracle using WebLogic 12.1.3 Server running on Oracle Server X5-2 with dual Intel Xeon Processor E5-2600 v3.

    http://www.infotechlead.com/networking/ibm-websphere-server-offers-31-best-performance-against-oracle-weblogic-28413

  • Jim Cramer: Don’t write off IBM, but I like SalesForce better

    TheStreet’s Jim Cramer says you can’t write off IBM because they’ve managed to reinvent themselves so many times. On Thursday the company announced it will spend $4 billion in 2015 on analytics, mobility, cloud computing and security. Cramer says IBM CEO Ginni Rometty is laying out a vision about the idea of social, mobile, media, and cloud computing becoming a larger part of the company. Right now it’s about 27 percent of the company and they want to take it to 40. But Cramer says if you take it to 40 it can’t be because the rest of IBM is doing so poorly. He says IBM is looking increasingly like an Accenture with a social/mobile component. Warren Buffett is a fan of IBM and while Cramer says he wouldn’t write IBM off, he certainly likes Salesforce a lot more than IBM

    http://www.thestreet.com/video/13060589/jim-cramer-i-dont-want-to-write-off-ibm-but-i-like-salesforce-better.html

  • IBM has out “mega-deal’ed” HP

    In December IBM announced a $1bn (£644m) deal with German airline Lufthansa, a win with global comms company WPP for $1.25bn (£800m), and said it had scored undisclosed deals thought to be worth more than £500m with media org Thomson Reuters and Dutch bank ABN AMRO.

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/02/26/hp_can_eat_ibms_dust_says_anlalyst_report/

  • IBM Advances SoftLayer for Hybrid Cloud Growth

    Connected to the initial $1.2 billion investment in cloud services that IBM announced in 2014, the new computing capacity broadens the company’s cloud footprint in both Australia and Canada, bringing the SoftLayer portfolio to local doorsteps. The new cloud centers are each the second of their kind to be opened in their respective countries, giving customers the option for in-country data redundancy.

    http://www.eweek.com/cloud/ibm-advances-softlayer-for-hybrid-cloud-growth.html

Oracle

HP

  • The Battle of Two Tech Giants (HP vs. IBM)

    So where is the sunlight? The willingness of HP to act. Splitting your company into two pieces is a massive task. Recall what the EU wanted to do to Microsoft, and how that company reacted. But there are green shoots: The company’s guidance is weak, but we are still operating in a pre-split era, so operational performance isn’t the best barometer. Instead, the company has plenty of cash, and is making big moves: HP is said to be eyeing Aruba Networks as an acquisition and is shifting around its cloud leadership quickly after installing a new leader.

    http://techcrunch.com/2015/02/26/who-wins-the-battle-of-the-disrupted-tech-giants-hp-or-ibm/

  • HP scores large deal (billions) with Deutsche Bank

    The 10 year deal, which mainly covers Deutsche Bank’s wholesale banking, will see HP provide dedicated data centre services with the aim of reducing infrastructure costs for the bank.

    http://www.sharedserviceslink.com/news/deutsche-bank-and-hp-announce-multi-billion-dollar-agreement

  • HP Separation to Cost $1.3 Billion in 2015

    “Recall that we are separating into two Fortune 50 companies, I mean it’s sort of hard to imagine that there are two Fortune 50 companies embedded in HP,” Whitman said. “That has included an entire organizational design and selection process the IT strategy carve out financials and many other activities.”

    http://www.datamation.com/data-center/hp-separation-to-cost-1.3-billion-in-2015.html

  • HP reportedly mulling purchase of Aruba Networks

    The move would give HP, which already offers its own “converged campus networking” gear, a bigger footprint in wireless mobile, a hot market, that could grow even hotter as more businesses and consumers use Wi-Fi to take some of the pressure off overloaded cellular networks. This acquisition would be reminiscent of Cisco’s purchase of Meraki a little over two years ago for $1.2 billion.

    https://gigaom.com/2015/02/25/hp-reportedly-mulling-purchase-of-aruba-networks/

Other

  • Splunk’s Value Is in the Clouds; Investors Should Take Profits Now

    Cloud and big-data markets are driving profits higher for many software companies, but data analytics specialist Splunk (SPLK – Get Report) has struggled to grow its bottom line. While its revenue is growing at impressive rates, Splunk’s valuation remains a concern. And investors would be wise to take some of their profits off the table ahead of the company’s fourth-quarter results Thursday.

    http://www.thestreet.com/story/13056850/1/splunks-value-is-in-the-clouds-investors-should-take-profits-now.html

  • Gartner BI Magic Quadrant 2015 Spots Market Turmoil

    “Business-centric platforms such as Tableau Software, Qlik, and other emerging vendors have a more narrow set of capabilities, but are used more broadly for a range of BI and analytics functions — including reporting, for which they are not optimal… — primarily because they are easy to use and deploy,” Gartner writes in its report. In contrast, companies using more conventional, IT-centric platforms (such as Cognos or BusinessObjects) that have a broad range of BI capabilities say they apply them to narrow use-cases.

    http://www.informationweek.com/big-data/big-data-analytics/gartner-bi-magic-quadrant-2015-spots-market-turmoil/d/d-id/1319214

Supplier Report: 2/21/2015

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IBM

Oracle

  • Large Outflow of Money Witnessed in Oracle Corporation

    Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) managed to eke out gains of 0.02% in intraday trade. The share price increased by 0.01 points to $44.11. Till last observation, the net money flow was highly discomforting at a negative $(-12.61) million. The total inflow of $52.08 million in upticks was completely overshadowed by an outflow of $64.69 million in downticks, giving the up/down ratio a value of 0.81. The shares have seen a change of 0.41% in the past week.A block trade occurred in the counter in which the composite value of the upticks was $13.61 million and the composite value in downticks was $29.61 million. The resultant up/down ratio for the block exchange was 0.46. The block trade had a negative money flow of $(-16.01) million.

    http://stafforddaily.com/large-outflow-of-money-witnessed-in-oracle-corporation-2/347374/

  • More on Oracle’s pricing wars:

    The X5 is priced at a mere $562,000, reports Forbes. This would present a 40% discount to similar offerings by VCE, which is backed by Cisco and EMC. Cisco, Oracle, and EMC are among the biggest players in the server market, according to IDC. VCE dominates Infrastructure services segment with a 24% market share, generates $1.3 billion in revenue, and is also the biggest player in the general purpose segment of the server market. Oracle’s edge comes from its strength in software with a 50% chunk of the Platform segment that helped it generate as much as $1 billion revenue in 2QFY14.

    http://www.bidnessetc.com/34982-oracle-corporation-brings-aggressive-pricing-to-server-wars/

HP

Other

  • Philly 311 built on SalesForce technology:

    And that front-office focus is crucial, he added. “For the last 40 years we’ve seen massive investments in [information technology] that, frankly, have not paid off, which were all in the back office,” said Kundra, former chief information officer of the United States. “Now what you’re seeing in terms of the cities is that they’re making these investments in the front office and addressing the problems that citizens actually have.”

    http://gcn.com/articles/2015/02/20/philly-311.aspx

  • Enterprise and wearables:

    F&S puts the market for wearables in Asia Pacific as being worth $US8.5 billion and expects it to grow to $US37 billion over the next five years, a CAGR of around 34 percent. It expects uptake of wearables in enterprises to be much faster, with “volume shipments poised to grow at a CAGR of around 75 percent in the period 2014-2018.”

    http://www.whatech.com/managed-it-services/news/42329-hit446-enterprises-beware-or-be-aware-of-wearables

  • Yahoo is using Splunk for their Hadoop needs:

    Splunk Enterprise and Hunk help us gain insights into all of our data, whether it is streaming in real time or historical data at rest,” said Ian Flint, monitoring architect, Yahoo. “Hunk gives Yahoo deep visibility into our massive Hadoop data stores to help us continuously optimize operational performance. Insights we gain from Hunk help us save millions of dollars per year in hardware provisioning. Splunk Enterprise helps us to maximize revenue by giving product and business teams better insight into our customers, the user experience and any looming issues.”

    http://insidebigdata.com/2015/02/20/yahoo-selects-splunks-hunk-hadoop-analytics/

Supplier Report: 2/14/2015

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IBM

  •  IBM establishes “One Channel” team…

    The team is designed to align channel operations from across the company in an effort to provide a broader, more competitive partner experience, according to Big Blue, while also increasing IBM’s focus on the recruitment of new partners, developers and independent software vendors.

    http://www.channelweb.co.uk/crn-uk/news/2395350/ibm-unveils-one-channel-team

  • IBM Cloud Chief: “We are in a marathon”

    But LeBlanc believes he’s got a good story to tell. IBM has set up “40 different data centers in 15 different countries,” he said, with an eye toward being in the right place in accord with customers’ needs.

    http://venturebeat.com/2015/02/13/ibm-cloud-chief-were-in-a-marathon/

  • IBM finds security flaw in dating apps…
    Something to consider as the internet of things tracks more of our personal health data…

    The study revealed a fearful fact for the businesses too. According to the study, employees of almost 50% companies use the dating apps which were found vulnerable. This makes the corporate data endangered too.

    http://techfrag.com/2015/02/13/ibms-research-cautions-mobile-dating-app-users/

  • IBM & Apple partnership to expand…

    The first apps to be released solved specific problems in specific industries. In tech talk, they were for vertical industries. Each of the apps had a catch name. There was one for flight planning for airlines named Passenger+, and insurance company customer service app was named Retention. Now, the two have begun work on their horizontal apps, says a spokesperson for IBM. One of those apps supply-chain, which helps to match how much product, is expected to be sold with how many materials need to be ordered.

    http://www.dailymailtimes.com/apple-and-ibm-partnership-to-expand/443/

  • Another brutal article on IBM current performance:

    Here’s the outcome of all this in a nutshell: recently, IBM failed to win a $600 million contract with the CIA to handle all of that agency’s cloud computing, even though its offer was actually 30 percent less costly than Amazon’s winning bid. Let that sink in: book-seller Amazon beat IBM for a major technological, government job. IBM is a giant with enormous background in mainframe computing and government contracts. Here’s what’s most frightening. IBM’s bid was rejected on “technical grounds.”

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-a-georgescu/ibm-a-lesson-for-american_b_6659702.html

  • IBM drops patent bomb on Priceline.com

    The patents span 10 years, starting in 1999. They cover a setting up a user account with single-sign-on in a federate computing environment; a way to present applications as an interactive service; a method for presenting advertising as an interactive service; and a way to preserve state information between a client and server.

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/02/10/ibm_sues_priceline/

Oracle

HP

  •  HP acquires Voltage Security with a view to data encryption

    Voltage provides solutions focused around data encryption and tokenization, and its services are intended to bolster HP’s existing Atalla cloud encryption and data security product.

    http://thestack.com/hp-volta-acquisition-130215

Other:

Supplier Report: 2/7/2014

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IBM

Oracle

  • Mark Hurd on Oracle’s transition to the cloud

    Hurd continued, “We are one of the few, few cloud companies that frankly we are not only getting bigger, but our growth rate is actually accelerating at the same time and I think that’s because of all the things I described: better training, better sales, more sales people, lots of great products in R&D, some good acquisitions and altogether its combined to this set of results.”

    http://www.benzinga.com/media/cnbc/15/01/5192062/oracle-ceo-on-transition-into-cloud-acquisition-of-datalogix-and-micros-sys

  • Why did Oracle spend $1.2B on DataLogix?

    There are a certainly good reasons that pushed Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) to spend that huge amount of money to bring Datalogix under its control. Spending on advertising is increasing, and advertisers continue to look for better ways to target ads for better returns. Data analysis is important for advertisers as it provides greater insight about audiences for powerful ad targeting.

    http://investcorrectly.com/20150206/oracle-corporation-orcl-pay-1-2b-datalogix/

HP

Other

Supplier Report: 1/30/2015

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IBM
Even though IBM has refuted reports of a massive layoff, reports continue to come in.  Something to keep an eye on.

[Note: The blogger who broke the story still maintains that major reductions (10k) have started]

Oracle

  • Is Ellison overpaid?
    Another scenario of investor shenanigans…

    Jackson said that in their view, even if PGGM and Railways Pension do not own a massive stake in Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) between the both of them, they are representing the majority of shareholders in the company which may have these issues with the way the software company is run. She said that they could have partnered with other substantial shareholders, but PGGM and Railways Pension are the groups which have been consistently been bringing up these issues in the past years.

    http://www.insidermonkey.com/blog/is-oracle-corporation-orcls-ellison-overpaid-catherine-jackson-thinks-so-338531/

  • Oracle stock remains strong:

    Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) dropped slightly amid mild profit booking and the last known price was $43.9 per share. The price decreased by -0.29 points or -0.66% which made the investors to buy on weakness. For the latest trading session, the net money flow was recorded at $19.39 million. The total upticks were valued at $78.32 million and the total downticks aggregated to $58.93 million, thereby putting the up/down ratio at 1.33, implying that stock remains inherently strong. The counter has seen a change in the share price of -0.66% on a weekly basis.In a big block trade which occurred today, the total uptick value was $27.18 million and the total downtick value was $13.89, resulting in an up/down ratio of 1.96. The net money flow for the block trade was calculated to be $13.3 million.

    http://stafforddaily.com/oracle-corporation-witness-large-inflow-of-money/322095/

HP

Other