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Staff Writers Acer has signed up a major hardware supply deal with QBE Insurance covering notebooks, desktops, servers, Tablets, LCD’s and handhelds.
The deal which covers all the insurer’s hardware requirements, right down to the Wyse terminals, came down to Acer’s ability to customise the offering and
Wrapping a rubber bumper round an external drive casing adds more than protection, it adds style.
The drives, capable of withstanding a fall from table height, are designed by Scotish celebrity designer Neil Poulton and come in any colour you like (as long as its orange that you like).
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“When I was a kid I was crazy about a Sci-Fi show on TV called “Captain Scarlet.” Captain Scarlet was a puppet. But Captain Scarlet was indestructible. He drove the SPV (Spectrum Pursuit Vehicle) a futuristic 10 wheel-drive, high-speed tank that rolled over everything, each of its wheels cushioned by an independent axle and suspension system. The SPV was characterized by its front bumper, which wrapped around the car’s nose like the toe of a classic 70s basketball shoe. The bumper was made of solid white rubber and was heavily grooved to look like segments of an orange. The SPV was tough. It was rugged. It, like its pilot, was indestructible,” explains Poulton.
The LaCie Rugged Hard Drive features a triple interface which is designed to protect data against everyday bumps and bruises. Powered by a FireWire or USB connection the drive is capable of transfer speeds up to 800Mbits/s and has the advantage of not requiring a dedicated power source.
Inside the drive is mounted on four independent suspensions, but on the outside the unit is surrounded with a drop resistant rubber bumper, has a warnished, scratch-protected aluminium shell and sports three prices from $399 for an 80GB 5400rpm drive up to $689 for a 100GB 7200rpm. A 120GB 5400rpm option is priced at $649.
LaCie says the maximum safe ‘drop-height’ is 90cm when the drive is not operating and warns users should no drop it while it is in use.
In another product announcement LaCie has also called on Poulton to design the casing of what it describes as its most powerful portable hard drive ever.
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The Little Big Disk has a capacity of 320GB, a triple interface (2x FireWire 800, 1x FireWire 400, 1x Hi-Speed USB 2.0) like its Rugged sibling and is said to be the fastest handheld device available with RAID 0 speed of up to 80MB/s via FireWire 800.
Targetted at the style-conscious content/design markets, Olivier Mirloup, LaCie Senior Product Manager says the “LaCie Little Big Disk is the perfect companion to Apple PowerBooks, especially suited for audio/video editors who need a compact but speedy editing workstation on the road.” Not available until second quarter pricing runs from $699 for a 160GB version to $1499 for the 320GB model.
The commission checks will be flowing at Dimension Data this week as the integrator announces another $40 million contract, this time with Centrelink.
Just last week the company announced a $40 million contract to provide network management services for the South Australian Government, now the Federal Government is kicking in with another $40m.
The contract will see Dimension Data contract to provide “equipment, maintenance and related professional services” for a network overhaul dubbed the Data Network Redesign Project. The sales team involved may have to hang around to get their commission cheques though as the contract has a five year lifespan.
The overhaul will see DiData deploy a secure, IP converged network form core routing and switching to encryption and public key infrastructure (PKI).
“Dimension Data has had a long and productive association with Centrelink, initially working with the agency, then known as the Department of Social Security, on its first major network upgrade in 1993. A number of our current team members worked on the design of this original network – a factor which has maintained our reputation for technical excellence within Centrelink,” said Steve Nola, Australian CEO, Dimension Data.
“This is a significant win for Dimension Data in
Centrelink’s IT environment supports 25,000 employees using 35,000 screens across more than 1,000 service delivery points, including 316 Customer Service Centres, seven Remote Area Service Centres, 360 Centrelink agents, 178 access points and 26 call centres – the largest single-purpose call centre network in Australia, receiving more than 32.6 million calls per year.
The Competitive Carriers’ Coalition came down hard on Telstra’s proposal for operational separation and says its move to introduce a national price of $30 for ULL represent twin attacks.
Telstra contacted its wholesale customers late last week to advise them of the new pricing regime before a review of the ULL pricing has been completed.
“Telstra has thumbed its nose at that process by writing to its wholesale customers today to tell them that it will introduce a national price of $30,” says the CCC.
A price of $30 for ULL would particularly affect broadband customers points out the CCC and would result in all Telstra wholesale partners to raise their fees by as much as $10 or more a month.
The new pricing, if it holds, could put Telstra in the enviable position as being the only provider in the market able to offer a full retail
broadband service for less than $30.
“The ACCC has indicated that Telstra is already charging too much for ULL. To increase prices further can only be seen as an act of supreme arrogance by a powerful monopolist,” CCC executive director David Forman said.
Forman didn’t stop there though; Telstra’s draft operational separation plan is “a disgrace” he claims in an official statement.
“Telstra has simply done a cut and paste on the direction it received from the Minister outlining what it must do and said trust us, we will fill in
the detail later,” Forman said. “This plan should be rejected outright and Telstra should be told to start from scratch.”
“If the legislation or Ministerial directive are not strong enough to control this behaviour, then they should be amended so Telstra is brought
under control,” said Forman.
While publicly listed Harvey Norman franchisor business relies considerably on revenues from its subordinate franchisee sales, the operation also owns a significant property portfolio and a number of direct stores.
And it all seems to be going better than expected. With the franchise operations taken into account, the company currently has 213 stores across the globe and plans to maintain its aggressive roll-out of new Harvey Norman, Domayne and Joyce Mayne stores across Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Ireland and Slovenia.
Counting all the stores together with the exception of Rebel Sports and the
Like for like sales which does not account for revenues coming from new stores increased by 6.5 per cent. During the six months to 31 December 2005, eleven new complexes opened in
Profit for the six months beat market expectations with a net profit after tax and minority interests, calculated in accordance with AIFRS, increased from $111.28 million for the six months ended 31 December 2004, to $131.86 million for the six months ended 31 December 2005, an increase of 18.49 per cent according to the company.
This well and truly beat reported analyst forecasts averaging around $102 million.
Franchise fees, rent and interest received from franchisees increased by $27.75 million, an increase of 8.6 per cent over the previous corresponding period.
Flushed with cash the Directors have recommended an interim fully franked dividend of 4.0c per share be paid on 8 May 2006 to shareholders registered at 5.00 pm, 19 April 2006.
While furniture remained a strong seller it is consumer electronics and computers that are the driving force behind the company’s continued growth Chairman Gerry Harvey said the company had seen no signs of a consumer slowdown except for weaknesses in some segments caused by high petrol prices. Demand for plasma and LCD televisions, personal computers, DVD recorders and portable media players continued to deliver improved revenue and overall market share, he said.
Of particular interest is the company’s test case for a converged AV/IT style store which it opened at Sydney’s Castle Hill in October last year.
Nortel Networks has moved to settle two class action shareholder suits which arose following the accounting scandal the company suffered in 2004.
The company was forced to re-state its earnings figures for the previous three and a half years and the subsequent plummet in the company’s share price angered shareholders who rightly felt they had not been kept informed.
Now the company wants to move on and although the settlement, believed to be the fifth largest of its kind ever, will severely impact the company’s financial position it will allow it to get on with business.
“Our intent is to achieve a fair resolution of these lawsuits and avoid a prolonged, uncertain and costly litigation process,” said Harry Pearce, chairman of the Board of Directors, Nortel. “A final settlement would remove a significant impediment to Nortel’s future success and allow Mike Zafirovski and the Nortel team to move forward.”
The proposed settlement is also conditioned on Nortel and the lead plaintiffs reaching agreement on corporate governance related matters and the resolution of insurance related issues.
Under the terms of the settlement Nortel would make a payment of US$575 million in cash, issue 628,667,750 of its common shares (representing 14.5% of its current equity), and contribute one-half of any recovery in the existing litigation by Nortel against the Company’s former executives who were fired over the scandal in early 2004.
The equity component of the settlement will result in a non-cash charge based on the fair value of the common shares issuable. Based on a closing price of US$3.02 as of February 7, 2006, this charge would be approximately US$1.898 billion and will impact Nortel’s financial statements over a period of time.
On an after-tax basis, and based on the February 7, 2006 share valuation, the Company expects to record a total charge of US$2.473 billion, or US$.57 per share. The Company expects it would fund its cash contribution to the settlement fund out of its then available cash balances.
The proposed settlement would contain no admission of wrongdoing by the Company or any of the other defendants and is still subject to final negotiations.
Armed with a 32 bit ARM-7 microprocessor Verbatim’s new Pro line of Store ‘n’ Go line of USB flash drives are pitched at IT Pros, content developers and demanding users.
Mobile phone group, Orange, is set to massively increase the amount of data you can store on a mobile phone SIM card.
Later this year the company plans to launch a card capable of storing 512MB, 8,000 times more than is possible on today’s SIMs.
The additional storage capabilities on such ‘Mega-SIMs’ could help phone companies turn regular phones in multimedia warehouses.
A 512-megabyte MegaSIM could store up to 130 songs, three movies or 80 games, compared with existing 64 kilobyte cards which could at best store a phone book and some text messages.
The cards are the result of a collaboration with M-systems, Oberthur Card Systems and LG Electronics.
The new SIM cards could potentially impact on the market for additional storage cards fitted into external slots on multimedia handheld devices.
Hosting and managed service provider WebCentral announced its half yearly results today and its managed services and SaaS offerings are producing stella results.
The company’s rich media content management business, FTR (For The Record), which supplies court recording type services largely to the US market, didn’t look as healthy as it did the prior half which was buoyed by a $7 million contract from the US Social Security Administration. However, the FTR has some contracts in place, which are not yet reportable says the company and which the Group says will assure futer results.
Overall the Group’s revenue increased 4 per cent to $29.8m and net profit after tax of $1.3m for the half year to 31 December 2005. This compares with revenue of $28.7m in the previous corresponding period and net profit of $1.7m.
In particular, the Group’s web and application hosting business achieved good growth for the half
reporting an 11 per cent increase in revenue to $22.9m and a 15 per cent increase in earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) to $2.5m from $2.2m in the previous corresponding period.
Taking a closer look at the figures, the managed hosting business achieved a 31 per cent increase with the company signing “a number of new, long term managed services contracts with corporate clients including a major sporting body, a mobile phone selection service, a global videoconferencing company and a national art union”.
The real winner for the future could be Software as a Service (SaaS) which reported a telling 72 per cent increase in revenues growing from $1.1m in the previous corresponding period to $1.9m by the end of last year.
The company says the ASP model has “experienced a dynamic resurgence in the past 18 months, boosted by the growing range of quality business applications available via the internet as well as improved access to affordable broadband.
The ASP division accounts for more than 20 per cent of the company’s data usage and it reports that actual customer numbers have grown significantly in the past six months.
The Managed Exchange premium email offering grew by 112 per cent in the past 12 months and the company now manages almost 8,500 mailboxes.
Shares in Google fell almost 20 per cent overnight as the search gorilla’s earnings results fell foul of analyst’s expectations.
It is the first time since the company’s IPO that it has missed the Wall Street earnings targets taking the lustre off a share that has more than quadrupled investors money. A massive rise of 82 per cent in net income and 86 per cent in sales was not enough to allay analyst’s fears that the stock is over-valued.
The resulting fall in valuation is in excess of US$15 billion from its market capitalisation of US$128 billion.
The company blamed a higher than expected tax bill resulting from higher costs of overseas operations on the short fall. At the tax rate initially forecast by Google, adjusted earnings would have been US$1.81 per share, versus the consensus of US$1.77.
Revenue, excluding traffic acquisition costs of US$629 million, was US$1.29 billion, nearly double the US$642 million in revenue net of such costs it reported in the year-earlier fourth quarter. But the stock is priced “for perfection” offered one analysts and anything short of perfection was duly punished.
In an analyst conference call, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said the company plans significant investment this year, most of that on infrastructure (and real estate). “We are going to invest for the long term and make some really big bets,” he said without offering more detail.
The company made a one-off US$90 million donation to the Google Foundation and the results included a US$58 million charge in stock compensation.
Net income for the fourth quarter rose to US$372.2 million, or US$1.22 per diluted share, from the year earlier quarter’s US$204.1 million, or US$0.71 cents a share.