Dell blames ‘uncertain adoption’ of Windows 8 for some of its financial woes
Dell blamed Microsoft's Windows 8 as one of several causes for its grim financial future, according to a filing with securities regulators.
"The difficult environment faced by the Company as a result of its underperformance relative to a number of its competitors [includes] ... the uncertain adoption of the Windows 8 operating system," Dell said in a lengthy proxy statement filed Friday with the U.S Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The proxy statement laid out Dell's case for shareholders accepting a $24.4 billion offer, led by its founder and CEO, Michael Dell, to take the PC maker private. Michael Dell has joined with private-equity firm Silver Lake Partners to buy the company, with Silver Lake in turn tapping Microsoft for a $2 billion contribution. Read more...
Apple will be the top chip buyer in 2012, says research firm
Apple will be the world's largest chip buyer this year because of the surge in demand for the company's products, enabling it to command lower prices and quicker delivery, IHS iSuppli said in research released on Wednesday.
The company's spending on chips will grow as competitors scale back or slow down spending on chips used in products such as computers, smartphones, tablets, and other electronics, the research firm said.
Apple will spend an estimated $28 billion on semiconductors this year, according to the numbers from iSuppli. That is much larger than second-place Samsung, which is expected to spend $14.9 billion, growing by 0.3 percent from last year.
There has been growing demand for Apple's iPad, iPhone, and Mac computer products. Earlier this week, Apple said it sold 17 million iPads during the most recent fiscal quarter, growing by 84 percent from the same period a year ago. Apple's iPhone sales went up by 28 percent year-over-year to 26 million, while Mac sales went up 2 percent. Read more...
Use Internet Explorer 9? You need this update, stat
Just over 8.5% of TNW readers, which amounts to a whole pile of traffic, use Internet Explorer on their normal computers (non-mobile), so this post is for them. If you use Internet Explorer (and we presume that that means you are on version 9, the good one), you need to make sure that you have the April ‘Cumulative Security Update’ for the browser.
It patches some five previously reported issues, making it an essential grab if Internet Explorer is your daily drive. Depending on how you have your Windows Update settings tuned, you might be snagging it automatically, but if not, details can be found right here. Read more...
Google exec attacks ‘hostile’ patent campaign against Android
Google's chief legal officer Wednesday issued a stinging rebuke of what he called "bogus patent" attacks on the Android operating system by major competitors like Apple, Oracle and Microsoft.
"Android's success has yielded ... a hostile, organized campaign against Android by Microsoft, Oracle, Apple and other companies, waged through bogus patents," wrote David Drummond, Google's chief legal officer, in a blog post on the company's Web site.
Drummond bristled about moves by major firms to "band together" to acquire patents held by struggling firms, citing a successful $4.5 billion bid by Microsoft, Apple and others in June to acquire 600 patents from Nortel.
He suggested Microsoft and Apple may contend that Android infringes on these "dubious" patents, forcing Google to pay damages or license fees that would raise the costs of smartphones. Read more...