Archive for November, 2011

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Local PC makers to benefit from IT intervention fund

November 30th, 2011
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The Nigerian local personal computer (PC) assemblers are expected to benefit from IT intervention from currently being pushed by the Nigerian Computer Society, (NCS).

It would be recalled that the four local PCs approved years back by the Federal government d are not limited to Beta Computers, Brian Integrated Systems, Zinox and Omateck computers.

Although the actual amount of fund being sought by the NCS from the First Bank for the initiative was not disclosed as at press time, the President of NCS, Mr. Demola Aladekomo who s during a courtesy visit to First Bank Corporate Head Office last week said that the IT intervention fund if fully implemented would among other things create at least 1 million IT related jobs within the next five years.

He told the First Bank management that a well articulated and financially supported policy on assembly and manufacturing of hardware with incentives not just for local consumption but also for export, accelerated development of capacity for software design and publishing and partnerships with governments to develop business processing, large scale modern call centres, knowledge/Incubation parks can create not just millions of jobs for Nigerians but contribution to the nation’s GDP that may rival oil as had happened in other countries.

Aladekomo who said that the fund would put more people to work than a combination of three or four different sectors of the economy combined could do noted that the intervention fund is also targeted towards supporting their members involved with PC manufacturing for public PC acquisition programs.

“Specifically, we seek to work with you to create an intervention fund targeted LPO financing, capacity development and the other programs mentioned above. If you approve of this initiative, we shall work with you to put in place the modalities of execution and ensuring its success.” he said.

What is required, according to him is leadership and partnership with NCS in this critical area that may spell doom for our country if not urgently tackled.

Employment

He said that, “We make bold to say that if fully utilised, the IT industry could put more people to work than a combination of three or four different sectors of the economy combined could do.

“NCS intends working with the Federal Government towards creating, conservatively, One Million IT related jobs within the next Five years. Key areas of focus towards achieving this goal are: Business Process Automation, Call Centre Operation, Health Care Delivery, Emergency and Disaster Response Systems, Software Development, Incubation and Knowledge Park development to mention a few.

According to him, the IT intervention fund is an initiative of NCS driven by national development challenges and socio-economic developmental priorities.

“It is proposed by NCS to accelerate IT development in Nigeria in view of the increasing relevance of IT in facilitating sustainable development and overall prosperity which aligns with the goals of the Ministry of Communication Technology.

“In particular the focus is on employment generation. NCS intends working with the Federal Government towards creating, conservatively, One Million IT related jobs within the next Five years.

“Again the details and modalities will depend on further discussions with the bank and other stakeholders” he explained. If fully implemented, he said that obviously employment generation from the initiative would boost the economy.

” Due to the strategic nature of IT in driving development it will put people to work in a massive manner. It will therefore improve the security situation and reduce the ills and evils associated with large scale unemployment.

“This is the major area where NCS will like to partner with First Bank. Specifically, we seek to work with you to create an Intervention Fund targeted towards supporting our members involved with PC manufacturing for public PC acquisition programs, LPO financing, capacity development and the other programs mentioned above. If you approve of this initiative, we shall work with you to put in place the modalities of execution and ensuring its success” he explained.

CBN cashless program

He said that the NCS recognised and commended the recent E_Payment Cashless program of CBN, adding that the project would generate 50,000 IT related jobs within the next six months alone. “We expect this program to generate another 250,000 IT related jobs by the end of 2012.

It is not nuclear science, when we say One Million IT related jobs can be created within five years if a third of it is already being created just by the right policies within months.

Challenges

To actualise the proposed IT intervention fund, he said that what is required is leadership and partnership with NCS in this critical area.

“NCS looks forward to leadership buy in from the financial services to make this effort successful. It is a forward looking initiative for job creation and sustainable development. NCS however requires the partnership of financial services stakeholders and regulators. There is a need to approach the fund from a developmental mindset.

“In view of the need to address pressing developmental challenges, seize amazing opportunities for growth in the digital enabled world and enhance the future prospects of the Nigerian economy, the financial sector needs to support IT industry efforts of this nature

Source:http://www.vanguardngr.com/2011/11/local-pc-makers-to-benefit-from-it-intervention-fund/

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Highest Operating Margin in the Computer Hardware Industry Detected for Apple (AAPL, SSYS, HPQ)

November 30th, 2011
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Below are the three companies in the Computer Hardware industry with the highest operating margin. A healthy operating margin is required for a company to pay for its fixed costs and generate cash.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) is highest with an operating margin of 30.8%. Apple Inc. designs, manufactures, and markets personal computers and related personal computing and mobile communication devices along with a variety of related software, services, peripherals, and networking solutions. The Company sells its products worldwide through its online stores, its retail stores, its direct sales force, third-party wholesalers, and resellers.

Apple has overhead space with shares priced $377.16, or 25.9% below the average consensus analyst price target of $508.73. The stock should hit resistance at its 50-day moving average (MA) of $393.64, as well as support at its 200-day MA of $363.96.

Following is Stratasys (NASDAQ:SSYS) with an operating margin of 19.8%. Thus far today, Stratasys has traded 28,000 shares, vs. average volume of 203,000 shares per day. The stock has underperformed the Dow (-0.0% to the Dow’s 0.6%) and underperformed the S&P 500 (-0.0% to the S&P’s 0.7%) during today’s trading.

Finishing up the top three is Hewlett-Packard (NYSE:HPQ), with an operating margin of 8.6%.

Hewlett-Packard share prices have moved between a 52-week high of $49.39 and a 52-week low of $21.50 and are now trading 26% above that low price at $27.12 per share. In the last five trading sessions, the 50-day moving average (MA) has climbed 0.4% while the 200-day MA has slid 0.7%.

Source:http://www.fnno.com/story/fast-lane/331-highest-operating-margin-computer-hardware-industry-detected-apple-aapl-ssys-hpq-fast-lane-0

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EMC Corporation (EMC): Today’s Featured Computer Hardware Loser

November 30th, 2011
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EMC Corporation (EMC) pushed the Computer Hardware industry lower today making it today’s featured Computer Hardware loser. The industry as a whole closed the day down 0.5%. By the end of trading, EMC Corporation fell 15 cents (-0.7%) to $22.39 on heavy volume. Throughout the day, 37.3 million shares of EMC Corporation exchanged hands as compared to its average daily volume of 21.7 million shares. The stock ranged in price between $22.31-$22.75 after having opened the day at $22.67 as compared to the previous trading day’s close of $22.54. Other company’s within the Computer Hardware industry that declined today were: Mitek Systems Inc (MITK), down 7.2%, Echelon Corporation (ELON), down 6.9%, Identive Group Inc (INVE), down 5.8%, and Xata Corporation (XATA), down 5.7%.

EMC Corporation develops, delivers, and supports the information and virtual infrastructure technologies and solutions. EMC Corporation has a market cap of $44.63 billion and is part of the technology sector. The company has a P/E ratio of 21.7, equal to the average computer hardware industry P/E ratio and above the S&P 500 P/E ratio of 17.7. Shares are down 1.6% year to date as of the close of trading on Monday.

TheStreet Ratings rates EMC as a buy. The company’s strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its impressive record of earnings per share growth, robust revenue growth, expanding profit margins, good cash flow from operations and largely solid financial position with reasonable debt levels by most measures. Although the company may harbor some minor weaknesses, we feel they are unlikely to have a significant impact on results.

Source:http://www.thestreet.com/story/11326505/1/emc-corporation-emc-todays-featured-computer-hardware-loser.html

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Seagate Technology PLC (STX): Today’s Featured Computer Hardware Winner

November 30th, 2011
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Seagate Technology (STX) pushed the Computer Hardware industry higher today making it today’s featured computer hardware winner. The industry as a whole closed the day down 0.5%. By the end of trading, Seagate Technology rose 59 cents (3.7%) to $16.58 on average volume. Throughout the day, 11.8 million shares of Seagate Technology exchanged hands as compared to its average daily volume of 10.1 million shares. The stock ranged in a price between $16.45-$17.20 after having opened the day at $17.06 as compared to the previous trading day’s close of $15.99. Other companies within the Computer Hardware industry that increased today were: Hutchinson Technology (HTCH), up 15.7%, OCZ Technology Group Inc (OCZ), up 13.9%, Lantronix Inc (LTRX), up 4%, and Western Digital Corporation (WDC), up 3.6%.

Seagate Technology Public Limited Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells hard disk drives for enterprise, client compute, and client non-compute market applications worldwide. Seagate Technology has a market cap of $6.37 billion and is part of the technology sector. The company has a P/E ratio of 13.8, equal to the average computer hardware industry P/E ratio and below the S&P 500 P/E ratio of 17.7. Shares are up 6.4% year to date as of the close of trading on Monday.

TheStreet Ratings rates Seagate Technology as a hold. The company’s strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its solid stock price performance, revenue growth and growth in earnings per share. However, as a counter to these strengths, we also find weaknesses including deteriorating net income, poor profit margins and weak operating cash flow.

Source:http://www.thestreet.com/story/11326488/1/seagate-technology-plc-stx-todays-featured-computer-hardware-winner.html

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Tablets to get faster with PCI Express 4.0

November 30th, 2011
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A speedy successor to PCI data transfer protocols used in PCs and interconnects like Intel’s Thunderbolt is being designed with tablets in mind, a standards-setting organization said on Tuesday.

The PCI-Express 4.0 bus will also go into PCs, servers and embedded devices and provide more bandwidth for high-speed data transfers than its predecessors, which could boost overall tablet and PC performance, said Al Yanes, president and chairman of the PCI Special Interest Group, which develops the PCI standard. The organization on Tuesday wrapped up a feasibility study that sets the stage for the final specification to be released by 2014 or 2015.

The PCI-Express protocol is used in PCs to shuttle data at high speeds between internal components. A version of the PCI-Express is also supported on Thunderbolt, an interconnect technology co-developed by Intel and Apple.

The protocol, also called PCIe 4.0, will transfer data at up to 16 gigatransfers per second over copper wire. That is twice the speed of PCIe 3.0, which was finalized in late 2010 and is just reaching products. Intel is bringing on-chip support for PCIe 3.0 with its upcoming Ivy Bridge desktop and laptop processors, which will be released in the first half next year.

“The PCIe 4.0 specification will address the many applications pushing for increased bandwidth at a low cost including server, workstation, desktop PC, notebook PC, tablets, embedded systems, peripheral devices, high-performance computing markets and more,” Yanes said.

There are implementations of the older PCI buses in tablets, but they do not run demanding workloads, said Dean McCarron, principal analyst at Mercury Research. But the tablet market is evolving fast, and there will be a bigger need for a faster bus like PCI-Express 4.0 to play high-definition games and video, he said.

“Performance requirements always increase. This is not for a product for tomorrow, but for a product down the road,” McCarron said. “Look at phones, they started with LCDs or LEDs, but now they are pushing high-definition.”

PCI-SIG is trying to cut down on power consumption by chopping the number of data-transfer lanes and reducing on-board hardware, McCarron said. That also helps reduce the cost of making a tablet.

Beyond an internal bus, PCI-SIG is also mulling plans to create a thin interconnect to link mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets to external peripherals, though plans have not yet been fully detailed. The peripheral would rival existing interconnects like USB, Thunderbolt and FireWire.

PCIe 4.0 is more about performance than power savings, and addresses the need to bring faster communication interfaces to take advantage of technologies such as 100-gigabit Ethernet and solid-state drives, said Nathan Brookwood, principal analyst of Insight 64.

The first products with PCIe 4.0 will be on computers where performance is never enough, such as servers and gaming desktops and laptops, Brookwood said. Putting PCIe 4.0 into tablets could be a long-term plan, and could relate to a time when tablets start blending in with low-end notebooks.

The final PCIe 4.0 specifications are expected to be released in the 2014 to 2015 time-frame, Yanes said. He said that PCI technologies are typically implemented in products within a year after a specification release, but that actual product release dates depended on device makers. The PCI-SIG currently has more than 800 members.

Source:http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9222253/Tablets_to_get_faster_with_PCI_Express_4.0?taxonomyId=12&pageNumber=1

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Why Apple is Already the #1 PC Manufacturer

November 30th, 2011
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If — and for some, this is a big if — the iPad is a PC, then Apple is about to overtake HP as the world’s leading manufacturer of PCs, reports industry research firm Canalys. But the the truth is that Apple has already taken this title.

First, let’s address the issue of whether or not a tablet is a personal computer. (Just spelling out “personal computer” makes the whole debate seem absurd.) iPads are more powerful than laptops were even a few years ago. Sure, they’re running ARM chips, but now that ARM chips are running, oh I don’t know, servers, it hardly seems to matter what hardware you’ve got under the hood as long as it gets the job done.

More importantly, once you attach a keyboard to an iPad, the “this isn’t a PC” line doesn’t pass the sniff test. As I can attest from hundreds of hours of personal experience, an iPad nestled in a Zagg keyboard case running web apps in Safari is indistinguishable from a laptop, and certainly more versatile than Google’s Chromebook.

Granted, it’s annoying that some of the handiest keyboard controls (for tab and application switching, for example) don’t work. Which just illustrates the point that it hardly matters whether or not the iPad is a particularly good PC. In confusing “this is a PC” with “this is a laptop replacement,” technology pundits continue to miss the forest for the trees, which is that what people want out of a PC turns out to not really be what companies thought they wanted.

There’s no reason an iPad couldn’t multitask to a greater extent than it currently does. If it wanted to, Apple could enable greater keyboard control and faster application switching.

Some apps, like Blogsy, already allow a degree of multitasking most people think would be impossible on an iPad. (For one, Blogsy allows you to browse the web and image libraries while writing posts in a split screen mode, effectively allowing you to have an HTML editor, web browser and image editor all open at the same time.)

Which brings us full circle on the status of Apple as PC manufacturer. The iPad is hardly a post-PC device — that’s marketing speak. It’s a PC in a form factor that’s the natural evolution of the ongoing press for ever smaller and lighter devices. If you hack it, you can do just about anything you like with it.

The real question is not, “is the iPad a PC?” The real question is, “at what point do we start defining devices like the iPhone 4S, which has the same CPU as the iPad and the same screen resolution, as PCs?” (Not to mention devices like the Motorola Atrix / “lapdock” combo.)

In which case, Apple is, bar none, the world’s largest PC manufacturer.

Source:http://www.technologyreview.in/blog/mimssbits/27375/

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Game-Changing mobile computer from Micronet creates even more opportunities for Telematics and Mobile Applications companies

November 30th, 2011
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Micronet, worldwide specialist in mobile computing terminals has launched a rugged, all-in-one mobile computer that combines the benefits of a fixed in-vehicle terminal with the mobility and flexibility of a handheld device. The new CE-500 range breaks new ground in offering a single solution that supports all the needs of the latest generation of telematics and mobile applications.

Micronet’s new mobile computing innovation is sold through telematics service providers and independent software vendors. By connecting to existing telematics black boxes, the CE-500 uses the GPS, GSM and GPRS built into telematics units that may already be installed, avoiding the need for an additional simcard or second airtime bill. For telematics service providers, this extends the possibilities of their existing hardware, enabling them to offer fully integrated and even richer end-to-end solutions.

Based on the Windows CE 6.0 embedded platform, the CE-500 series features a choice of 7” or 4.3” LED backlit colour touchscreens, facilitating easy and intuitive operation by drivers of HGVs, Vans or Cars. In addition, it offers a host of integrated communication options including a quad band GPRS modem, GSM voice support via the internal microphone and speaker, GPS, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth. This allows a single CE-500 device to replace the cost of purchasing/installing several separate pieces of equipment.

Customers can choose between a fixed and portable solution. With the portable option, the CE-500 series can instantly be taken out of it’s cradle, becoming a fully-featured rugged mobile device (IP54), supporting powerful field service, delivery and mobile workforce management applications. This means the ability to use software applications inside or outside of the vehicle. Most significantly, in portable mode the CE-500 can utilise the comms in the vehicle’s telematics black box when re-docked. In addition, the touchscreen allows for full signature capture for proof of service or delivery.

According to Micronet Europe’s Managing Director Martin Port, this new mobile computing innovation is a real-game changer for the telematics and mobile applications industry:

“With the CE-500, we’ve created a product that we’re able to offer in conjunction with our partners at an incredible breakthrough price. For a long time, companies have been put off by consumer devices that don’t stand the test of time and the often prohibitive cost of industrial grade mobile computers. Now companies have the choice of something that gives them all the power and enterprise capability at a price that makes complete commercial sense. In addition, Micronet has over 25 years of experience in this area, and has over 300,000 mobile computers deployed worldwide.”

Micronet provides a comprehensive Development Toolkit (DTK), enabling service providers, independent software vendors (ISVs) and system integrators to develop and port their own applications onto the devices. The company also offers professional services and support, assisting with application design, programming and system integration tasks.

Source:http://www.prweb.com/releases/micronet/mobilecomputer/prweb8994603.htm

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