Saturday, January 29, 2011

Nokia smartphone market share shrinks to 31 percent

from Engadget:

>>Nokia's reporting its converged mobile devices (smartphones, to you and us) reached volumes of 28.3 million during Q4 2010, which is a neat bump from 20.8 million at the same time last year and 26.5 million in the previous quarter. However, in the context of the broader smartphone marketplace, that figure now amounts to only a 31 percent share, according to Nokia's own estimates, which is a major dip relative to its 40 percent slice in Q4 2009 and 38 percent in Q3 2010.

Accuray Turns to Black, Backs View

from Yahoo:

>>Revenues dipped 5% year over year to $54.2 million, but were ahead of the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $49 million. Products and services revenues fell 3.6% and 8.9% year over year, respectively, to roughly $34.4 million and $18.8 million.

Accuray installed 6 new CyberKnife robotic radiosurgery systems in the quarter versus 11 systems a year-ago, taking the aggregate global installed base to 222 units. The company booked 19 orders for CyberKnife compared to 18 orders in the prior-year quarter. Total order backlog at the end of the quarter was $410 million, up 26% year over year.

Piper Jaffray - Accuray

from Seeking Alpha:

>>In the report, Piper Jaffray states, "ARAY has now successfully escaped its troubled past that included material backlog revisions and deferred revenue recognition controversies. Given the solid new order growth, sales growth and unexpectedly strong gross margin and earnings outperformance we believe the stock no longer deserves to trade at a discounted valuation relative to other small cap medical technology companies. Our revised price target of $10 is now based on 1.7x our FY12 EV/REV estimate, which is in-line with the current median multiple for our small cap medical technology comp group. We remain strong buyers of the stock at current levels."

Shares of Accuray were trading at $7.97 at the time of posting, up 16.18% from Thursday's market close.

LEASE. BUILD. COMPARE. The Data Center TCO Calculator

Making a multi-million dollar investment without knowing the total cost?

Equinix and Advocate Networks have partnered to create a Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Calculator to serve the needs of technology buyers who are focused on data center acquisition and growth strategies.

Date and time: Tuesday, February 15, 2011 7:00 am
Pacific Standard Time (San Francisco, GMT-08:00)
Change time zone
Tuesday, February 15, 2011 3:00 pm
Western European Time (London, GMT)
Tuesday, February 15, 2011 4:00 pm
Europe Time (Berlin, GMT+01:00)
Tuesday, February 15, 2011 10:00 am
Eastern Standard Time (New York, GMT-05:00)
Program:
Innovation Exchange Webinar Series
Panelist(s) Info:
Scott Fogle CEO of Advocate Networks, Brian Lillie CIO Equinix and Greg Adgatae General Manager for Enterprise and Federal Segments at Equinix
Duration: 45 minutes
Description:
Equinix and Advocate Networks have partnered to create a TCO Calculator to serve the needs of technology buyers who are focused on data center acquisition and growth strategies. This calculator leverages the transparent, neutral and customer focused expense management expertise of Advocate Networks combined with the industry leading knowledge and quality of Equinix in the data center business.

Piper Jaffray increased its Accuray price target to $10 from $8

from Benzinga:

>>Piper Jaffray has raised the price target on Accuray Incorporated from $8 to $10 and maintains its Overweight rating.


Friday, January 28, 2011

Noise Filter: European Data Center Firm InterXion’s IPO

from www.thewhir.com (thanks for the quote):

>>There was quite a bit of coverage in the buildup to the initial public offering of European Data Center provider InterXion’s (www.interxion.com) initial public offering. The company’s stock was set to start trading as INXN Friday on the New York Stock Exchange.

...

Seeking Alpha posted quite an exhaustive two-part examination of the company earlier in the week, written by Paolo Gorgo.

The first part examines the offering itself, and the competitive landscape for colocation in Europe, for the benefit of potential investors in North America.

“Interxion’s operations are all based in Europe and have been, so far, reported in the euro currency. Interxion’s proposed IPO on the NYSE will represent a unique opportunity for U.S. investors to access a leader in the fast growing European multi-tenant network neutral data center market, but may also raise questions about the company’s strategy in the North American market.”

The second part delves in greater detail into the company’s financials.

“It is interesting to note that about fifty-three percent of Interxion’s Monthly Recurring Revenue for the nine months ended September 30, 2010 was generated by contracts with terms of one year or less remaining. However, the company has, so far, experienced a very low churn of less than 2% per quarter, similar to its peers (Average Monthly Churn rate was 0.6% in the nine months ended September 30, 2010).”

INXN opened trading Friday up at $14.55.

InterXion shares rise in debut

from Reuters:

>>Shares up as much as 18.5 percent

"It'll be interesting over the next two or three years to see if InterXion makes a bigger play in the United States," said Todd Weller, Internet infrastructure analyst at Stifel Nicolaus & Co.

"They will have to prove they can compete," he said.

In the U.S. market, InterXion is facing competition from heavyweight incumbents such as Equinix Inc (EQIX.O), which last spring bought out Switch & Data, which had served as InterXion's access to the U.S. market through a business partnership.

Late last year, InterXion entered into another transatlantic agreement, partnering with privately held data center host Telx.

"We can read into these partnerships that it's a really important market for InterXion," Weller said, suggesting the European firm could expand by either building data centers in the United States or acquiring established U.S. peers.

InterXion's U.S. listing comes four months after people familiar with the matter said InterXion-owner Baker Capital had hired Morgan Stanley (MS.N) to explore a sale of the company.

However, some of the people said at the time that Baker's high price expectations -- equivalent to more than 10 times earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization -- could deter bidders.

...

Its top-of-range pricing on Thursday helped lift shares of its UK competitor, data center operator Telecity Group Plc (TCY.L), which rose as much as 6 percent to a six-week high on Friday.

strong sales of cutting-edge smartphones

Samsung's performance in the fourth quarter continued to be driven by memory semiconductors and strong sales of its cutting-edge smartphones.

Strong Smartphone Growth Powers Mobile Business

Samsung's telecommunications businesses – Mobile Communications and Telecommunications Systems – registered a record quarterly operating profit of 1.44 trillion won for the period, up 38 percent year-on-year. Fourth quarter revenue reached 12.11 trillion won, compared with 10.17 trillion won for same period of 2009. By finishing the year strongly, Samsung achieved full year 2010 operating profit of 4.30 trillion won on sales of 41.20 trillion won for its telecommunications businesses.

Driven by strong year-end demand for the company's flagship smartphones, Samsung's mobile device sales reached 80.7 million units for the quarter, up 17 percent year-on-year. This brought total sales for the year to 280 million units, registering growth of 23 percent and outperforming the overall market.

Following its introduction in June, Samsung's flagship Galaxy S smartphone has achieved worldwide sales of 10 million units, while the Galaxy Tab - an Android-powered tablet device - attracted strong year-end demand. In emerging markets, Samsung's diverse product mix of mass-market smartphones and touch-screen feature phones also registered solid sales growth.

While mobile device sales are expected to contract slightly in the first quarter of 2011 due to weak seasonal demand, Samsung forecast high single-digit sales growth for the year overall, driven by the fast-expanding smartphone and tablet segments. Samsung announced it will introduce the successor to its Galaxy S smartphone during the first half of 2011, featuring a dual-core processor and Super AMOLED Plus display to further enrich user experience. With its growing lineup, the company is targeting smartphone sales of 60 million units for the year, double that of 2010. In the tablet market, Samsung will complement its Galaxy Tab with a range of devices to optimally meet various user needs.

PR

multiple expansion

from Reuters:

>>"We believe the transaction could result in multiple expansion for other datacenter and/or hosting companies, such as Equinix Inc (EQIX.O) and Savvis Inc (SVVS.O)," Piper Jaffray said in a note to clients.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Korea's 9th CK at Seoul National University

from the IV MB, by yyy60:

>>** Google translation is terrible. All I can understand is they are going to introduce CK at Seoul National University, probably in Samsung Medical Center in Seoul.

http://media.daum.net/cplist/view.html?cateid=100000&cpid=45&newsid=20110126103405899&p=kukminilbo

** translated from Korean **

Big 4 hospital 7,000,000,000 great Cyberknife introduction

2011.01.26

Ah San, Severance decision, Seoul National University, the Cyberknife where Samsung plan

[cookie healthy] Seoul Ah San hospital and the Severance hospital are robot radiation operation system (Accuray) introduces. The Seoul National University hospital and Samsung Seoul as well introduction became known that
is in the process of propelling. With the corresponding 6,500,000 dollar is an expensive equipment which reaches to about 7,200,000,000 won as Hanhwa.

Cyberknife end like that is a knife but is an operation which is not hemorrhage. The brain, the vertebra and the prostate, provides the non-getting wet cure which substitutes the cancerous characteristic which occurs from the pancreas etc. body all region and a non-cancerous characteristic tumor operation. Specially 3 nothings which are not integrity, hemorrhage and ache () expense is a surgery cure.

Piper Jaffray Remains Buyers Of Accuray Inc. Ahead of Q2 Results

from Benzinga:

>>Piper Jaffray remains buyers of Accuray Inc. ahead of the company's FQ2 results scheduled to be released on Thursday evening. Piper believes there are a number of reasons to be optimistic about ARAY's future at present, including an improving US capital spending backdrop, potential upside from recent strategic alliances, expanded regulatory approval in critical markets and maturing clinical data to support gradual long-term penetration in key applications like lung and prostate.

Piper remains comfortable with its FQ2 estimates which call for revenues of $48.4 MM, slightly shy of consensus at $49.7 MM. It is forecasting gross margin expansion of approximately 270 bps YoY to 48.0% with profitability improvements anticipated in both the company's product and services operating segments. Piper's earnings estimate of -$0.04 is below consensus at -$0.01, though it believes upside to the number is possible.

Inside Interxion's IPO

you may read the articles at Seeking Alpha:

>>On January 12, 2011, European colocation and data center specialist Interxion announced plans to launch an initial public offering of its shares on The New York Stock Exchange, where it expects to start trading under the ticker symbol “INXN”. The IPO is scheduled for Friday, January 28.

FIX Flyer Selects Equinix to Offer Unparralleled Choice and Flexibility for Clients

Leading Service Providers and Software Vendors Use FIX Flyer and Equinix to Deliver Differentiated Trading Solutions

NEW YORK, NY — January 26, 2011 — FIX Flyer, a world leader in trading infrastructure solutions, today announced that it now offers a hosted solution inside Equinix (Nasdaq: EQIX), a provider of global data center services. FIX Flyer, inside Equinix International Business Exchangeª (IBX¨) centers, helps customers manage and optimize their connectivity as part of an overall private cloud strategy.

The FIX Flyer solution on Equinix&squot;s global platform is used by a set of world–class technology service providers and independent software vendors (ISVs) to enable unprecedented choice, flexibility and interoperability. It also provides them with the agility to extend their existing trading infrastructure to an enterprise–ready trading connectivity service.

FIX Flyer automatically manages and optimizes the distribution of FIX (Financial Information Exchange) connectivity, independent of its geographic location. By teaming with Equinix, ISVs and developers can further monetize the value of their connectivity and trade processing, and help customers access on–demand FIX resources where and when they need it – at any time, across the globe. In particular, mid–sized brokerages leverage the combination of FIX Flyer on Platform Equinix to manage all of their trade connectivity to their institutional clients, eliminating the hassle and expense of using third party VPN providers.

A number of leading service providers — including Market Street Advisors and FolioDynamix — have turned to FIX Flyer and Equinix to deliver services to their customers. These independently branded connectivity services utilize Flyer’s Managed FIX technology and a key set of enterprise–ready features – including FIX connectivity management, FIX certification, self–service monitoring via Daytona, IP security, as well as the option to deploy selective translation and tag filtering on demand. As a result, these service providers give their customers the ability to manage their trade processing securely and cost–effectively in a cloud environment. All of these service providers leverage the Managed FIX API as the presentation layer for their trading applications.

Brian Ross, CEO of FIX Flyer, commented: "The ability to manage, certify and secure FIX connectivity becomes challenging as it continues to grow at historical rates. Customers adopt our Managed FIX to better service their connectivity needs and help reduce this complexity. FIX Flyer has dramatically decreased overall costs for our clients by reducing their data center footprint and consolidating application infrastructure on to Managed FIX, while providing a dynamic solution that supports ultra high reliability and flexibility."

Equinix provides a single, globally distributed platform of facilities across geographies to optimize trading applications. FIX Flyer leveraged the Equinix global footprint to develop a unique and cost–efficient offering to manage clients’ FIX connectivity that achieves stringent SLA objectives. The network community provides other Equinix customers with access to some of the latest technology for connecting to other hosting centers, including access to technical resources for testing, configuration and support.

Bevin Crodian, CEO of Market Street Advisors, noted: "Managing connectivity to sponsors from a capacity and cost perspective is a significant challenge for many asset managers today. We partnered with FIX Flyer integrated within Equinix facilities to create a solution that combines scalability and unparalleled flexibility, efficiently delivering connectivity anywhere in the world through a standard interface."

Aaron Schumm, SVP, Product FolioDynamix, added: "FolioDynamix, a full service Wealth Management solutions provider, selected Managed FIX and Equinix as the foundation of the FolioDynamix service offering launched in 2009. The FIX Flyer and Equinix solutions provide the platform that allows us to empower our customers with flexible control over their connectivity and a single system for managing geographically dispersed connectivity anywhere."

John Knuff, general manager of financial services for Equinix, said: "With the rollout of the Managed FIX offering in 2009, FIX Flyer became one of the first service providers worldwide to offer a FIX service inside Equinix data centers. Flyer’s approach to FIX management and connectivity complements Equinix’s global reach and helps us better serve our customers around the world."

"We selected FIX Flyer in order to connect to the world’s markets," added John Calicchio, Head of Trading & Operations at Euro Pacific Capital. "The infrastructure they use gives us a completely hassle free platform so we can confidently conduct our business."

Growth in automating all aspects of trading for small–to–medium asset managers to enterprises is driving the move to FlyerÕs Managed FIX. The timing of this growth, coupled with the advancements in FIX connectivity technology, is allowing leading edge service providers to leverage FIX Flyer inside Equinix data centers and thus removes many of the barriers associated with existing FIX technologies.

LG's mobile communications business

from finance.yahoo.com:

>>Mobile phone handset sales rose 8 percent to 30.6 million devices in the fourth quarter from the third, but declined 10 percent from the year before.

Colocube Expands Footprint in Atlanta Opening 2nd Datacenter for Enterprise Cloud Services to Support Market Demand

Atlanta, GA (PRWEB) January 26, 2011

Colocube, a leader in high performance enterprise hosting, announced today that it has expanded its footprint by opening an additional data center in Atlanta in the new Equinix facility at 180 Peachtree Street in downtown Atlanta.

Colocube remains a key player in the managed services and IT infrastructure market with a comprehensive portfolio of premium products and services, wide footprint and a diverse customer base. Leveraging its datacenters globally, the company offers enterprise–class platforms and services to deploy cloud, computing, network, storage, IP services and IT infrastructure solutions.

The company continues to broaden its datacenter space to handle increased demand in the Enterprise Cloud and Private Cloud markets. “We have experienced explosive growth in cloud services as enterprises have realized benefits with cloud-based infrastructures, and we are expanding our footprint in Atlanta to support that demand”, stated Fred Tanzella, CEO of Colocube. “Providing managed private cloud and enterprise cloud services that are both hypervisor neutral and carrier-neutral as a op-ex service verses a cap-ex spend has been appealing to CIOs and CFOs. Our cloud services offer the highest levels of security with monitoring from multiple third-party Internet security firms which resonates with CIO’s that have been concerned with security in the cloud.“

Colocube’s new facility will complement its existing floor at the renowned carrier hotel at 56 Marietta Telx serving the Southeast and is SAS70 Type II certified. The new facility is located in the state-of-the-art Equinix IBX (Internet Business Exchange) facility in downtown Atlanta. Equinix provides the physical security and infrastructure redundancy that has made Equinix the global leader in the data center space. Colocube will leverage the Platform Equinix ecosystem as well as support Colocube’s expanding global customer base.

About Colocube
Colocube is a global provider of managed cloud, managed hosting, and high-density computing services for mission critical applications that allow enterprises to scale operations while reducing costs and IT infrastructure support. At Colocube, we are focused on providing dense solutions that reduce our customer’s required footprint, which translates into direct savings for our customers.
Colocube is one of the most respected high performance hosting companies in the industry serving a global customer base. Colocube has partnered with premier companies that are leaders in their respective industries to provide best in class service to our customers. Visit Colocube at http://www.colocube.com

Digital Realty's Lease-Signing Trend Is Your Friend

Whole article at Seeking Alpha:

>>Digital Realty Trust (DLR), a real estate investment trust (REIT) engaged in the ownership and management of technology-related real estate (data centers), recently announced record lease signings for 2010.

Nokia N8

From Seeking Alpha:

>>Nokia launched its new N8 smartphone featuring the Symbian 3 operating system in 2010. A Morgan Stanley survey suggested that Nokia could sell 2.5 million N8 smartphones during Q4 2010, and 9 million in 2011.[1] However, according to more recent research by Finnish research company Inderes, it now appears that Nokia finished Q4 2010 well ahead of the initial estimates for N8 sales – Inderes estimates the company sold between 3.5 million and 4 million of the smartphones.[2]

  1. Barrons, citing Morgan Stanley survey, November 2010.
  2. GSMArena, citing Inderes as the source, January 2011.

Galaxy S hopping

from www.koreaherald.com:

>>South Korea's largest mobile carrier SK Telecom Co. said Monday that it will release a smartphone that can also serve as a set-top box, playing content on personal computers, tablet PCs and TVs.

The smartphone named "Galaxy S hopping," made by Samsung Electronics Co., will hit shelves in the local market this week, SK Telecom said in a statement.

The new phone represents the company's efforts to tap into the growing demand for the seamless exchange of content on different devices, including smartphones, personal computers, tablet PCs and TVs.

Connecting the new smartphone to the TV will turn the phone into a set-top box, which allows streaming content saved on the phone to be displayed on larger TV screens, SK Telecom said. As they leave the living room, consumers can pick up the movie where they left off on smartphones or other devices, SK Telecom said.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Immersion: Activist Funds vs. Long-Term Potential

full article @ Seeking Alpha:

>>Time to survey recent developments at Immersion Corporation (IMMR) since our last update.

On December 29 Ramius, an activist fund, nominated three directors for election to Immersion’s board. Two existing directors, John Hodgman and Emily Liggett, are serving for a term expiring in 2011. Back in December 2009, Ramius had questioned the company’s decision to reduce the size of the board so that only one director was up for election, an issue also raised at the 2010 annual meeting. In the event only two directors are put up for election by the Company at the 2011 annual meeting, as it seems, Ramius stated it will withdraw one of its nominees.

Equinix gaining momentum with telcos

from Tier 1 Research daily newsletter:

>>Views from PTC: Equinix gaining momentum with telcos

T1R attended this week's Pacific Telecommunications Council conference in Hawaii, well attended by many carrier executives, a few datacenter CEOs and other sunbathers. Traditionally, this conference has been representative of the carrier side of telcos; slow to innovate and repetitive of topics from the past decade.

Monday, January 24, 2011

FiberMedia Hires Equinix's John Panzica

from http://advancedtrading.com:

>>In an interview with Advanced Trading, Panzica said he decided to make the career move to get back to more of an entrepreneurial company, noting that FiberMedia is akin to the Switch & Data smaller company model. Of the six data centers operated by FiberMedia, five sit in the New York/NJ marketplace and Secaucus is the headquarters and flagship data center, which is a fully redundant facility. In addition to the redundancy, another advantage is that FiberMedia’s Secaucus facility sits in the geographic corridor between Nasdaq’s data center in Carteret, N.J. and NYSE Euronext’s data center in Mahwah, N.J.

Evercore Partners raises Equinix to overweight

from www.finanznachrichten.de:

>>Evercore partners raises Equinix Inc to overweight ratin.

* Evercore partners raises Equinix Inc price target to $100 from $95

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Equinix goes for some cool running

from www.businesstimes.com.sg:

>>Recycled Newater will be used to cool the new data centre it is building, reports RAJU CHELLAM

THE world's largest carrier-neutral data centre company, Equinix Inc, will use recycled Newater to cool the new 'green' data centre (DC) that it is building in Singapore.

As reported earlier, the company is investing US$43 million in the facility that will see the addition of 850 new cabinet equivalents when ready by June 2011.

'Apart from using chilled water to cool the DC itself, we will be using energy-saving blue LED lights all across the DC, as well as motion sensors to control the lighting automatically,' Clement Goh, managing director of Equinix Singapore, told BizIT in an interview.

'The National Environment Agency has agreed to supply us Newater, perhaps the first instance of Newater being used to cool a DC.'