Samsung seen as player in RIM’s future — again
Samsung is considering buying Research in Motion or licensing RIM's BlackBerry 10 operating system, Jefferies analyst Peter Misek wrote in a note to investors this week.
"Among other options, we believe Samsung is considering ramping up its internal OS development efforts, licensing BB10 or buying RIM," Misek wrote. "We think any acquisition is unlikely until after BB10 launches." That launch is set for January 2013.
Misek's comment sparked news reports and comments from other analysts, including some who don't think Samsung will benefit much from a RIM acquisition.
"I think a Samsung acquisition of RIM is unlikely because the restructuring would be more complicated than Samsung's just sticking with what they have and pulling business away from RIM," said Ken Dulaney, an analyst at Gartner who has followed RIM for decades. Read more...
Morgan Stanley may refund some Facebook investors
Morgan Stanley, the lead investment bank in Facebook's troubled initial public offering, will compensate retail investors who overpaid when they bought Facebook's stock in Friday's IPO, according to a source familiar with the matter.
The person said the firm is reviewing orders its retail clients placed for Facebook stock, and will make price adjustments if the clients paid too much. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
The person did not say what amount constituted overpaying for Facebook's stock. Read more...
Apple welcomes Chomp to the company, notifies SEC and investors of share plan
Apple has alerted the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and investors of its recent acquisition of app search and discovery company Chomp, submitting a regulatory filing with the commission that lays out the share plan for the company.
The company has filed a Form S-8 with the SEC, which must be submitted when it issues stock or stock options to employees, registering 3,207 shares to Chomp as part of its equity incentive plan. The proposed maximum offering price per share stands at $29.02, resulting in a proposed maximum aggregate offering price of $93,067.14. Read more...
Kindle sales soar but Amazon mum on actual numbers
Amazon said flooding in Thailand and economic problems in Europe weighed on its financial results for the fourth quarter but it also said it was pleased with the results, which disappointed investors.
Some observers were likely also disappointed that Amazon didn't disclose unit sales figures for its popular Kindle e-readers. It said only that during the last nine weeks of 2011, Kindle unit sales, including the Fire tablet, increased 177 percent compared to the same period in 2010.
Some analysts believe Amazon makes very little money on the sale of Kindles, hoping to make money instead on e-book sales. Read more...
Symantec looking to buy
Symantec Corp's chief executive is looking to do acquisitions and next week may let investors know just how hungry the security and storage software company will be this year.
Enrique Salem, CEO of the world's No. 5 software maker, has not done a large acquisition since he announced plans a year ago to buy VeriSign Inc's widely used technology for securing payments over the Internet in a transaction worth $1.3 billion.
At the Reuters Global Technology Summit in New York on Tuesday, he said he has not ruled out doing another deal of that size, though his preference is to do smaller, "tuck-in" acquisitions. Acquisition targets that Symantec is focusing on include storage or security companies that provide mobility, cloud computing and virtualization. Read more...