Weekly Digest
Weekly Digest Issue No. 514
06-05-2010
by Deirdre McArdle
Tablet market wide open for Apple | Smartphones drive mobile market growth
New jobs a welcome sign
This week proved to be another fruitful few days on the jobs front with recruitment announcements coming from companies based across the country. First up, Carlow-based protection services firm Netwatch opened its new corporate headquarters and command centre last Friday. The new facility follows an investment of EUR5 million by Netwatch, which will see the firm create 50 new jobs within the next 18 months. The jobs will focus on the areas of operations and research and development. Netwatch offers remote monitoring services for consumers and enterprises.
Also on Friday, green data centre Cork Internet Exchange announced it had doubled its capacity. The expansion comes as the firm sees huge growth in demand for its services as a result of rising interest in cloud computing and IT outsourcing, and will see Cork Internet Exchange create 10 new high-skilled software and networking jobs.
Also on Friday, ePassport firm HID Global announced its intention to create 42 new jobs in its R&D and manufacturing base in Connemara. Last year HID Global consolidated its eGovernment passport inlay production to its campus in Connemara. All eGovernment product research, development and manufacturing is now housed at this base where it employs 233 staff. Minister for Social and Family Affairs, Eamon O Cuiv, said the work conducted by HID Global (Ireland) is a "great practical example of what we mean when we talk about the Smart Economy".
UPC kicks it up a gear
UPC Ireland had a busy week, finalising an acquisition, re-branding and rolling out a new broadband product. First up, the cable operator said it had finalised its acquisition of collapsed internet and cable TV provider Broadworks, which was wound up on 22 March. UPC is now in a position to offer its services to Broadworks' 6,500 customers, most of which are in the greater Dublin area.
Also this week UPC announced it is dropping the NTL and Chorus names as part of a major re-branding exercise. The operator plans to spend EUR3 million over the next three months on a high-profile media campaign to publicise its re-branding. TV presenter Craig Doyle will be the face of the campaign.
The firm also unveiled plans to upgrade its fibre-power broadband speeds to 100Mbps from August. UPC said it is launching the 100Mbps service as a result of increasing demand from its customers for higher speeds; it claims over half of its customers currently run its 15Mbps and 30Mbps services. UPC claims its 100Mb service will allow users to download an entire music album in just 5 seconds, a TV show from iTunes in 30 seconds, a high quality movie in less than 2 minutes and a high definition movie in around 6 minutes. "This [100 Mbps service] will be available to all the homes we have cabled within the next 18 months," said Robert Dunn, UPC Ireland chief executive. Dunn declined to reveal the pricing structure for the service.
Tablet market wide open for Apple
It was a mixed week for the revived tablet computer market. Last Friday Apple, whose iPad essentially re-ignited the market, announced it had sold its one millionth iPad. "One million iPads in 28 days --that's less than half of the 74 days it took to achieve this milestone with iPhone," said Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who noted that "demand continues to exceed supply". The device is proving wildly popular in the US with Apple saying that iPad users have already downloaded more than 12 million apps and over 1.5 million e-books for the iPad. The news came as Apple released the 3G version of the device. Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, estimated that Apple sold 300,000 iPad 3Gs over the weekend, including pre-orders and online sales.
Meanwhile, it's looking increasingly unlikely that the iPad will be facing a serious rival in the near term. Microsoft this week shelved a development project for a two-screen, tablet-style device that could be used to read e-books. Microsoft spokesman Frank Shaw said the project, code-named Courier " will be evaluated for use in future offerings, but we have no plans to build such a device at this time." Shaw declined to say why Microsoft decided not to pursue the project.
On the same day Hewlett-Packard announced that it had killed its Slate tablet computer plans. The Slate was to be based on Microsoft's Windows 7 operating system and was expected to be released this year. However, HP has now said that Windows 7 isn't a suitable tablet OS, and it has terminated its plans. The Slate was widely pegged as a credible competitor to Apple's iPad, which for now looks like it may well have the run of the market.
Smartphones drive mobile market growth
The global mobile phone market grew by 21.7 percent in the first quarter, shipping 294.9 million units, compared to 242.4 million in the same period in 2009, according to IDC. Growth was driven by the global economic recovery and also a strong surge in demand for smartphones. In fact, the growing demand for smartphones propelled Research In Motion (RIM), BlackBerry maker, into the top five vendor list for the first time ever, with growth of 45.2 percent. RIM kicked out troubled mobile maker Motorola and jointly claimed fourth spot along with Sony Ericsson, which had a disappointing quarter with shipments dropping by 27.6 percent. Nokia maintained the top position with a moderate quarter, shipping 107.8 million units, representing growth of 15.7 percent. LG also had an average quarter, reporting shipment growth of 19.9 percent.
Samsung Electronics turned in an impressive performance to solidify its second place. It shipped 64.3 million units, up 40.1 percent on the year-ago quarter. It now holds 21.8 percent of the mobile phone market, up from 18.9 percent last year. Financially, Samsung also had a sterling quarter. It posted a first-quarter profit of KRW4 trillion (USD3.6 billion), its biggest quarterly profit ever. That compares with a year-ago profit of KRW580 billion. Revenue in the latest quarter was KRW34.6 trillion, up 21 percent from KRW28.7 trillion a year ago.
And despite dropping out of the top 5 vendor list Motorola's mobile phone unit got back on track to return to profitability in the fourth quarter of this year, thanks to strong first-quarter sales of Google Android-powered smartphones. During the quarter, Motorola shipped 8.5 million handsets, including 2.3 million smartphones. For the quarter Motorola's mobile phone division reported a reduced operating loss of USD192 million, compared with a loss of USD545 million a year earlier, on sales down 9 percent to USD1.6 billion.
Caped Koala Studios has built a virtual world for kids, combining education and social networking 