Communications and Technology Blog - Tehrani.com - Apple Archives

Will iRadio Kill Pandora?

2013-06-07T21:24:25Z

34% of Internet radio users surveyed would switch to Apple’s iRadio and some believe this is a major problem for Pandora. I remember when Google was going public, similar research showed users would also switch to a better search engine given the opportunity. The challenge is many people are set in their ways and inertia keeps them from switching.

What Apple needs to do is make the radio integration so solid that you have no choice but to try it and perhaps like it better than the service you currently use.

As a fan of EDM I can tell you Pandora has been terrible these last few years with a library which is woefully out of date. Slacker was terrible at EDM but over the last few years their combination of artists and songs has become amazingly good.

Songza too has been amazing and another Internet radio player which I believe should be used by every serious music listener.

This leaves us with another favorite - Sirius XM… Their BPM, Electronic Area and Tiesto stations are quite solid and perhaps some of the best Internet radio experiences available for EDM lovers.

Pandora Playing Barcelona Nights Radio

Of course there are other genres – I am also a fan of Ottmar Liebert and have a Pandora station with my favorite song from this artist – Barcelona Nights. The station basically plays good but the same music every time with very little variation for a few hours and then starts playing music which is fairly unrelated and poor.

The point is Pandora could certainly improve its algorithms for music selection. Slacker is my favorite Internet radio service because it not only seems to have very good choices of artists and songs but also allows radio stations to be stored for times when you have limited battery, poor service or don’t want to eat data minutes up.

Apple has Genius which obviously will be leveraged heavily when creating custom stations. To date I haven’t been a fan of Genius – it doesn’t seem to match the music I like at all. Perhaps it works better for others and for Cupertino’s sake it better if they want to be a threat in this crowded space.

One wonders however what the benefit is to Apple having a radio service as many users buy music on iTunes they discover on these radio services anyway. Moreover, the business doesn’t seem to be profitable enough to invest in for the company. The logic could be that by providing the service as well, they can ensure users buy the music from them and aren’t pushed to buy music from a rival service like Amazon. In fact if Amazon purchase one or more of these Internet radio services they could cajole users to do just that.

In closing, iRadio won’t kill Pandora but the company could kill itself if it doesn’t keep up with superior music matching services which are proliferating.

A Billion WebRTC Endpoints Force Voice and Data Players to Adapt or Die

2013-06-05T21:52:30Z

From an evolutionary standpoint regardless of whether we talk about nature or business, adaptation is a key to success in changing environments. During the industrial revolution in London a species of moth with a white color blended in with the bark of the local trees until soot from the nearby factories turned the trees black. Some darker moths were now camouflaged in the dark trees and eventually the species adapted and became black. When air quality improved, the moths over successive generations changed color again.

Although this may not be the most flattering segue, WebRTC is spreading like the soot from factories in London – it’s now available on one-billion endpoints… It’s beyond the point of no return and tech and telecom companies which don’t adapt will get eaten, just like a white moth on a black tree.

It’s worth pointing out there are some potential question marks regarding implementation of this new standard which encompasses peer-to-peer audio, video and data sharing. For example, when will Microsoft and Apple decide to support or ignore this standard.

It seems inconceivable however that either company could ignore WebRTC because quite frankly the ecosystem of companies developing new applications which leverage this new standard is staggering. In fact our upcoming WebRTC World Conference in Atlanta later this month had to expand its exhibit area twice to handle all the companies that wanted to participate.

These and many other entrants and existing organizations will be offering compelling services to the market and in order for companies to take advantage of them, they will have to leverage devices which run Chrome or Firefox as these are currently the browsers supporting the new standard. This will eventually force Redmond and Cupertino to come around and support WebRTC in my opinion.

But I digress – there are a few points regarding this disruptive technology which we should all consider. The first is how Unified Communications or UC vendors will handle this transition. Steve Anderson writes an intriguing piece about the matter on the WebRTC World website and it’s worth a read. Rory Lindstone writes another piece about how gateway vendors such as Voxeo, Huawei and Mavenir are helping bridge the old and new worlds of telecom meaning you won’t have to retire your existing solutions to take advantage of WebRTC.

Doug Mohney also writes on WebRTC World and describes some of the differences between RCS and WebRTC – he explains the latter is on a fast track when compared to the former. He has a good point – I heard about RCS quite often since the last few SuperComm shows which haven’t existed for years and still, RCS seems to be getting rolled out very slowly.

The point is, WebRTC is changing everything again. The same way IP led us to IP communications with new possibilities and entrants in the market, WebRTC will see hundreds if not thousands of new companies releasing products and services and many new entrants will displace older ones.

The adaptable startups and existing companies will make it through this transition and perhaps become tomorrow’s Skype, Facebook or Twitter. You may not realize it but Skype was released six years after the VoIP market was conceived! In other words when it comes to disruption it is difficult to predict who the next winners and losers will be but what you can generally predict is the more adaptable the company to new technology, the better it will do.

Oh and if you made it this far, I have a present for you… Here is a special code you can use for 50% off at WebRTC Conference & Expo. It’s only for friends of Rich Tehrani – if you enter it manually it is: WRTCRich and it will save you $397.50.

I hope to see you at the show.

Your iPhone Could Get Hacked Through the Charger

2013-06-04T19:13:59Z

As scary as it sounds – that iOS device which you thought was safe from hackers because Apple controls the App Store could get infected through a malicious charger. This is a major concern for IT departments who didn’t previously worry about Apple devices which were not jailbroken. It is now impossible to know which Apple devices have been infected meaning all of them are suspect.

An article on TMCnet by Steve Anderson explains that a group of researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology discovered the exploit which can be duplicated via a device called a Mactans charger. The device is built via a BeagleBoard which is a TI-based single board computer and costs around $45.

The biggest fear you should have is that a malicious individual will install one of these on the cardio equipment of a gym which has an embedded 30-pin or Lighting adapter. Another obvious area is an airport lounge or coffee shop.

Anderson continues:

The researchers in question went on to contact Apple about the Mactans' capabilities, though as yet have not received a response. But the Mactans itself can, reportedly, leave its malware behind in just under one minute of continuous exposure, and once it's in, it can be extremely difficult to dislodge. According to the researchers, the malware can be hidden in much the same way that Apple hides its own built-in hardware, making removal a difficult proposition.

Efforts from Apple came quickly in terms of blocking the ability to jailbreak an iOS device by using a USB port, and given the kind of damage that Mactans can do, Apple will likely be moving all the more quickly to find patches to block Mactans' capabilities. But with large numbers of people using Apple devices—especially iOS devices—it may well be that the metaphorical genie is out of the equally metaphorical bottle.

As mobile devices proliferate and the PC market decreases in importance, there an increased desire by hackers to keep up with the most popular devices. For IT departments everywhere this means they need to watch their BYOD device policy and ensure they are ready for the malicious attacks which could be produced as a result of unsuspecting users downloading a malicious program which affects the network and steals precious corporate data.

To learn more about the state of secure mobility and how your company can keep itself protected in the age of BYOD, attend the Secure Mobility Conference July 23^rd, 2013 in NYC.

How Apple Lost Control of its Branding

2013-05-03T21:16:37Z

The one thing Apple does better than any other tech company is name products and technologies in an easy-to-understand manner. iPhone, iTunes, iPod, you get the idea. Sure there are some exceptions like adding an "S" after some of the iPhone iterations that doesn't seem to make much sense but perhaps the worse offense is the branding of the 3rd generation iPad. Instead of calling it the iPad 3 it was called "The New iPad."

The point is, the name was stupid. It was certainly different and caught us off-guard but sometimes thinking different is thinking incorrectly. The issue is exemplified by an email from Rakuten (formerly Buy.com) which refers to the iPads as 3rd and 4th generation instead of the proper name Apple picked for these devices.

Even now, Apple refers to the latest iPad as the iPad with "Retina Display." Do you really think this is easy to remember? If you go through the trouble of coming up with a name like Lightning for your power adapter, why do expect your customers to remember that their iPad is the one with "Retina Display."

I am imagining a soccer parent at Starbucks being asked - "Which iPad is that?" I'm not sure - the latest one I think.

The reason this is a missed opportunity has to do with the comparison to the iPhone product line. Oh, you have an iPhone 5? I have an iPhone 3... I guess I need to upgrade.

And what happens with the next iPad - will it be the iPad with Retina+? Will it be the iPad 4S? Or how about calling it The New iPad again??

When you have a good thing - like naming conventions which work, why do you need to screw around with it? Anyone have an answer? Because if you do, it will explain why Apple made the decision to lose control of its branding. The question is, will the company learn from its mistake?

AT&T: From Dumb Pipe to Security and Home Automation

2013-04-26T21:49:39Z

There has been talk within the telecom industry for many years regarding whether communications service providers would eventually just become providers of dumb pipes or provide added value they can charge for. The move to IMS in-part was supposed to allow these companies to add more apps and services to their offerings, allowing them to generate more revenue.

When Apple opened up its iPhone platform, hundreds of thousands of apps began to do many of the things telcos would have liked to provide. Moreover, many functions which telcos used to charge for like SMS were given away for free from the likes of WhatsApp and Facebook.

A natural place for these companies to look for growth is an adjacent industry – one which could not easily be disrupted by an app or a technology shift.

This explains AT&T’s move into the home security market with its Digital Life solutions which also tackle the task of home automation. TMC reported on this news in the past but the big roll out was today in Atlanta, Austin, Texas, Boulder, Colo., Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, Philadelphia, Riverside, Calif., San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis and select areas of the New York and New Jersey metropolitan area. The company plans to introduce Digital Life in up to 50 markets by the end of 2013.

“We know how important security is to our customers, and this was our top priority when we set out to build Digital Life,” said Kevin Petersen, senior vice president, AT&T Digital Life. “People rely on their mobile devices more than ever, so Digital Life offers an easy and convenient way to secure their homes, protect their families and simplify their lives from virtually anywhere.”

The system is designed to be user-friendly and control cameras, door locks, lights, thermostats, small appliances and provide the capability of setting alerts or programs which manage your home.

Customers can choose from two base plans: Simple Security, which is their basic home security package; or Smart Security which includes enhanced security features and the option to add home automation.

Simple Security - Includes 24/7 home monitoring, 24-hour battery backup, a wireless keypad, keychain remote, recessed sensors and an indoor siren for $29.99 a month plus $149.99 for equipment and installation.
Smart Security - Includes the benefits of Simple Security plus a choice of three of the following features: motion sensor, carbon monoxide sensor, glass break sensor, smoke sensor or takeover kit. Smart Security begins at $39.99 a month plus $249.99 for equipment and installation.

Customers who select Smart Security can add these automation packages:

Camera Package - View live video from inside and outside of the home for an additional $9.99 a month plus equipment and installation.
Energy Package - Control appliances, lighting and thermostats for convenience and energy efficiency for an additional $4.99 a month plus equipment and installation.
Door Package - Allow a pet sitter or repairman into your home remotely with automated door locks, or check to see whether your garage door is open or closed for an additional $4.99 a month plus equipment and installation.
Water Detection Package - Detect water leaks before damage occurs for an additional $4.99 a month plus equipment and installation.
Water Control Package - Detect leaks and shut off water at the main water source for an additional $9.99 a month plus equipment and installation.

According to wireless analyst Jeff Kagan, "This is the kind of new and innovative service we can expect from the wireless industry going forward. This is an exciting opportunity for AT&T, and a competitive threat to the traditional home security and automation business. I think we can expect to see much more innovation in this space thanks to this move from AT&T. This service connects every part of a consumer's home to the AT&T Mobility wireless network. Home automation and security is the next generation of services we will see AT&T offer across the country."

ADT is the leading player in the market with nearly 16,000 employees and over six million small business and residential customers. They will have to contend with a new and very large competitor in AT&T.

I reached out to Sarah Cohn, Director, Media Relations about the company’s thoughts on the new competition and she said, “With nearly 140 years of experience, our customers have told us that what matters most to them is the quality and reliability of our home automation and security solutions. Telecom and cable companies have been in the security space before, and we welcome their re-entry because we believe it will not only raise awareness of smart home technology, but also expand the category, ultimately helping to attract new customers to ADT Pulse.”

Of course AT&T has the ability to not only offer home automation but can further bundle television, wireless and broadband service into an attractive package which may cut into ADT’s margins if they choose to compete for market share. Consider this the new quadruple or quintuple play. Moreover, AT&T has retail stores which means this real estate has just become more valuable as some customers will certainly be swayed to purchase from the company which allows them to speak to a salesperson about their home security system in their local shopping center or mall. In fact, home automation can be a complex concept to many - seeing solutions in action at a store is likely the best way to sell such solutions.

There is always the chance that AT&T’s marketing clout will grow the market and as a result, the entire home security and automation sector will see a boost. Either way, for AT&T, the move to offer television and now security and home automation shows that communications service providers do have numerous options when it comes to extending their revenue base beyond just dumb pipes.

On Screen Size, Apple is From Mars, Samsung from Venus

2013-04-24T15:57:29Z

For many years now I have waxed poetic about the need for Apple to create a large screen phone. With the latest iteration of the iPhone, the “5” they decided to elongate the device but not make it wider. To me, this mistake is the worst that Apple has made since ignoring the market for seven-inch tablets and then playing catch-up with the iPad mini.

At first, when asked about larger screen phones, Apple said that they didn’t fit in the hand. Of course this was a shock to many people who not only were able to fit larger phones in their hands but to those of us who saw the ad for the iPad mini where the company showed it FITTING IN A HAND.

Now the story from Apple has changed – Apple’s Tim Cook said yesterday that large screen phones require trade-offs. Specifically he said:

My view continues to be that iPhone 5 has the absolute best display in the industry. And we always strive to create the very best display for our customers. And some customers value large screen size, others value also other factors such as resolution, color quality, white balance, brightness, reflectivity, screen longevity, power consumption, portability, compatibility with apps and many things.

Our competitors had made some significant trade-offs in many of these areas in order to ship a larger display, we would not ship a larger display iPhone while these trade-offs exist.

Some of these points actually do make sense and I speculated as such last September but perhaps the most important aspect of a portable device like a smartphone is its battery life and no one gets a whole day of use from an iPhone 5 if they actually use it for much of the day.

In other words, Apple already made a major trade-off sacrificing a full day of battery life to keep the iPhone 5 thin and light.

And every day Apple Store employees get hammered with the question, “When will Apple come out with a larger screen phone.” How do I know? Because I ask them, and this is what they tell me.

The biggest weakness Apple has right now is a device which fits between the size of the iPhone 5 and the iPad Mini. What smartphones does Samsung sell which are bigger than the four-inch iPhone 5? The list is extensive. The Galaxy S3 is 4.8 inches in size, the S5 is five inches in size. The Galaxy Note 2 is 5.5 inches. Want a tablet from Samsung, you can choose from the following sizes: 7”, 7.7”, 8.0”, 10.1” and 11.6”. Apple has merely two tablet sizes. Let’s stipulate for the moment that the iPad and Mini give enough options to consumers looking for a large and small tablet… Even so, we have to agree that Apple needs at least one wider smartphone.

I have consistently warned Apple of the multiple device threat starting on July 8^th, 2010. I saw Apple’s Achilles’ heel as being its limited product line competing with myriad screen sizes from a plethora of competitors. I saw how the PC market overtook Apple in the eighties due to improvements in price/performance from a multiple vendors and I realized screen size was the equivalent differentiator in the mobile space.

Yet Apple has changed its story on the topic – first telling us that larger phones don’t fit in the hand (how do they look at themselves with a straight face?) and now that they have trade-offs. The trouble is, these product trade-offs are causing customers to walk across the Verizon store from the Apple section into Samsung’s arms.

I have tremendous respect for Apple but when millions of customers vote with their wallets and tell you they prefer a larger phone – even with trade-offs, you have to listen to them. Or am I wrong? Let me know.

For more – see the post which shows how hand sizes vary widely and making a statement that “our phone fists in the hand” doesn’t take into account how much hand sizes vary.

With Tablets and Smartphones Eating the PC, What Can Microsoft Do?

2013-04-11T21:48:24Z

These are very dark days for people who work for many divisions of Microsoft as tablets and smartphones have absolutely decimated the PC market as evidenced by a decline of 14% in sales of PCs last quarter. This news comes on the heels of the Windows 8 launch, the new OS which fuses the best of the tablet and Windows experience in one platform. The only problem is the new OS with all its marketing and slick new form factors isn’t cutting it, as consumers gravitate towards smaller screen devices.

Expect many calls for Steve Ballmer to be fired and when you consider how many markets Redmond has squandered since 2000 you could make a solid case for pushing him out. Tablets, music, cloud and smartphones are just a few. 11 months ago, one reporter had the foresight to say he should have been fired already.

It’s worth noting that Samsung has been one of the few companies besides Apple to capitalize on tablets and smartphones and other companies in this space which enjoyed leadership positions such as Blackberry, Nokia and HTC are also struggling.

Redmond will definitely see sales from corporate customers who upgrade PCs from XP and other operating systems to Windows 8 and of course its developer, server and Exchange lines of business are in no jeopardy at the moment.

Still, you have to wonder why the company isn’t leading the market in app sales on Android and iOS. It is common knowledge that users want Office on their iPads for example… What is the delay? The latest rumors say the market needs to wait a full 18 months from now to see its debut! The company makes games as well so why not try to dominate mobile devices with your game development?

The additional challenge here is Microsoft already tried to fight Apple with the unveiling of Windows 8 and it seems this isn’t a successful strategy. In fact, this polarizing OS seems to be pushing people to tablets and smartphones.

This strategic shift in the market requires Microsoft to refocus like it did when it missed the internet in the nineties – but this time, Google and Apple have precious few vulnerabilities to go after.

When Borland owned the desktop database market and could charge $650 for its software some decades ago, Microsoft stunned the world by rolling out its Access competitor for only $99. When Netscape owned the desktop browser market and charged for its software, Microsoft rolled out Internet Explorer for free.

This time, pricing isn’t going to help the world’s still-dominant OS provider attract massive amounts of new customers. Innovation is about the only thing left to try and they are losing the innovation battle to Android and iOS. The scary thing is Adobe Flash for the moment is still a major reason to us PC products but once HTML5 gets established, PC sales could slow even more.

Microsoft needs to do something to change this momentum and it needs to do it fast as not only are customers signaling discontent but financial analysts and investors are joining in.

Learn more about HTML5 at the ultimate HTML5 developer conference DevCon5, July 24-25, 2013 in NYC.

IDC: PC Sales Decline Substantially

2013-04-10T21:29:10Z

According to IDC, PC sales are in a tailspin with 76.3 million units sold in the first quarter of 2013. This number represents a decline of 13.9% compared to the forecast decline of 7.7%. These are the worst numbers since IDC started tracking in 1994 and it is the fourth quarter of year-on-year shipment declines.

iCharts

Microsoft recently saw the prices of many of its Windows 8 machines slashed only months after they became available… This report sheds some light on the situation. In my post on the matter I said:

It seems Microsoft is getting known for making an OS you HAVE to buy while Apple makes an OS you WANT to buy.

Windows 8 needs better marketing, an update or perhaps something else to get people to accept it. These numbers should keep a slew of execs in the traditional PC market awake for many nights.

HP, Dell, Acer, Toshiba and Apple all saw their PC sales decline while Lenovo grew 10% in the US but remained flat worldwide. ASUS saw some growth in the US and substantial declines elsewhere.

What this tells us is we are indeed in a post-PC era and as smartphones become more usable and tablets approximate the functions of a PC, consumers are not upgrading their old computers as quickly or buying new ones at all.

Unless Microsoft can generate some PC market excitement, the ramifications for suppliers, IT departments and developers are obvious... The PC market as we once knew it is declining more quickly than anticipated as consumers gravitate towards Android and iOS. These groups need to ensure their strategies are in-line with the current trends.

Windows 8 Relegated to Budget Status?

2013-04-04T18:01:23Z

Microsoft seems to make an OS you HAVE to buy while Apple makes an OS you WANT to buy

The Microsoft Store has good news for people waiting to pick up a new Windows 8 machine… Lower prices on relatively new hardware. Interestingly, only a few specific models saw their prices decreased. Some believe it has to do with specific models which didn’t sell well while others think the challenge is Windows 8 itself. Certainly PC manufacturers haven’t been shy in telling the world that Windows 8 is unsatisfactory so one imagines the problem here is a lack of purchaser enthusiasm for the new OS.

Before I go on, it’s worth mentioning the savings on at least one machine is a solid 30% - specifically the Toshiba Satellite U95T-S2130 convertible Ultrabook is now priced at $799 – from $1,149. The ASUS TAICH 21-UH51 dropped merely $100 from $1,299 to $1,199 – this Ultrabook/tablet hybrid with its dual-screen design is likely too expensive to drop further in price.

It’s worth pointing out this news is a serious sign of weakness for Microsoft who is losing marketshare in the tablet and smartphone space and for now mindshare in the PC category.

Then again, for Microsoft and its partners, bare bones margins have been the norm while Apple was always able to charge a premium for their products.

It seems Microsoft is getting known for making an OS you HAVE to buy while Apple makes an OS you WANT to buy.

The irony is that from a hardware standpoint the difference between Apple’s products and the latest crop of hardware running Redmond’s software is very small. This may tell us the problem with consumer and business adoption of these new machines definitely has to do with Windows 8. Interestingly I am beginning to get backlash from pro-Microsoft readers whenever I mention something negative about Windows 8. This is new for me. It’s something I am familiar with hearing this sort of feedback from Apple loyalists, not Microsoft. This may tell us that Windows 8 is just a polarizing OS which may require time for the masses to accept.

With these new “budget” price points however, people on the fence may be tempted to give the new OS a spin.

Apple Email Swings Back at Galaxy S4

2013-03-16T21:11:09Z

For Apple, this past week has got to have been the biggest nightmare the company has faced in well over a decade. Cupertino went from being on top of the world in the eighties to crashing in the nineties to soaring over the past decade as the company became synonymous with the mobile revolution. Samsung has been improving its Galaxy S line and the latest iteration, the S4 actually had as much hoopla around its introduction as an Apple event.

Finally there is a mobile competitor to Apple which can generate as much buzz around a product launch.

In response, Apple sent an e-mail to its database touting the benefits of the iPhone 5 starting with winning the J.D. Power award for customer satisfaction eight years in a row. From there the email goes into detail about perhaps the biggest external difference between it and the new Samsung Galaxy S4... It reminds the reader of the iPhone 5's sleek aluminum enclosure which is more like a fine watch than a smartphone. My colleague Tony Rizzo certainly would agree - he is no fan of the Samsung plastic case. The Korean company for its part is quick to point out the technological achievement it has attained with this new phone - implying its more important to worry about what's inside than outside. A side benefit of course is you can change the battery.

The next point the e-mail makes is the Retina Display as it explains the iPhone "ushered in the era of super-high-resolution displays." While this is true, the Galaxy S4 has thee same resolution as an HDTV - it seems like we need to call a truce to the pixel wars as we are beyond the limit of what our eyes can discern.

The next benefit the email touts is the iPhone 5 has great battery life without a great big battery. It seems this statement is only accurate if you don't use the phone that often. This is the equivalent of a car company touting a three-ton truck with a V-12 6.0 liter engine as being a fuel-efficient vehicle.

The rest of the email talks about the camera, processor, 4G-LTE support, Siri, iOS and iCloud but it seems to smack of desperation. The iPhone 5 is a great phone - Apple has screwed up by not making it larger - we are also sick of complaining about this. It's it is a solid device which has a huge PR problem primarily becasue Samsung is on a roll coming out with great devices in a variety of sizes. Although many in the press such as Rizzo aren't impressed by the Galaxy S4, the average person on the street is talking about this new phone that can sense your finger hovering over it and can respond to the position of your face.

Apple has a problem on its hands and needs to pick up the pace of innovation while understanding the market may want a phone form factor it didn't invent.

The email points to a web page with similar information titled There's iPhone And then there's everything else if you are interested in reading it for yourself.

Research Shows More Innovation under a Joint Chairman/CEO

2013-03-15T14:12:10Z

Many of us know people who struck it rich in an IPO and then decided to retire or take time off. If a percentage of people in a company decide to leave the organization when it decides to go public, it is logical to conclude that innovation at the organization will begin to slow.

A new study by Stanford’s Shai Bernstein involved extensive analysis of patents from nearly 2,000 companies and discovered the patents at public firms were more incremental than those at private firms. In order to determine the value of a patent she analyzed the amount of times a patent application was cited in other applications. The idea being that breakthrough patents are cited more often and are of greater quality.

If you are wondering just how much less innovative public companies are than their private counterparts the answer may surprise you – there was a 40% decline in patent citations five years after a company went public.

Other than brain drain, reasons for a loss of innovation likely have to do with companies becoming more cautious when dealing with public markets which expect an easily digestible story and consistent earnings improvements.

This thought is backed up by the research as companies with separate board chairs and chief executives had less innovation and inventors were also more likely to leave such organizations.

Other reasons for less innovation could be people become comfortable at a certain point – a corporate culture can go from being “hungry” to “satisfied” when there is enough money available. The saying “fat cats don’t hunt” is fairly accurate and the proof may be that inventors who stayed at companies experienced a 48% decline in the quality of their patents according to Bernstein’s research.

What we don’t know from the research however is whether the more innovative companies are more competitive, make more sales and/or make more profit. It’s one thing to have a great patent – yet another to make a product and even more of a challenge to have it be something the market wants.

If we assume innovation is roughly equal to profitability level, this research may change the way companies are organized over time. I recently explored how Steve Jobs transformed our views on management as he became an often-cited reason for supporting the founder over an outside management team. Now however we may need to also rethink how boards are organized and whether it is a good idea to have the CEO be the chairman of the board as well.

Before we jump to any conclusions its worth pointing out PWC research shows 43% of the S&P 500 boards separate the roles and half the companies with a combined role have discussed the possibility of splitting the roles at the next CEO succession.

Whether this research becomes fodder for boardroom discussions is unknown at this time but we think it is worthy of consideration.

Microsoft, Facebook, Apple and Google: France's War With US Tech Firms

2013-03-13T17:45:27Z

Ten years ago the people of France had to deal with a major challenge – English tech words were beginning to become more popular than baguettes. As a result, the country’s Culture Ministry banned the term e-mail and replaced it with the term Courriel. A decade later, the country decreed the word hashtag shouldn’t be used but instead they suggested 'mot-dièse' which we believe may be French for “too much time on our hands due to overly generous government handouts.”

The country’s battle against tech terms coming from the US is dwarfed only by the country’s attack on US tech corporations. Most recently, Apple was fined 10,000 euros for having its workers work past 9:00 p.m. in retail stores. The French ban working between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. unless it is required. Now the country is after Skype – France isn’t happy the free service hasn’t registered as a telecoms operator.

Last week I pointed out the irony in the delayed EU fine of Microsoft after it didn’t give users an option to install competitive browsers. The point is by the time the company got fined, it had lost a good deal of marketshare because the internet itself allowed the competition to bypass the installed browser default which Microsoft provided in its OS.

Facebook too has had to deal with EU regulators on privacy issues – in 2011 the EU started to look at how the service tagged photos using facial recognition and over a year later the social networking giant removed all the facial recognition data from the EU.

This is by no means an exhaustive list of French and EU conflicts with tech companies – many know Google has had a number of back-and-forth legal challenges relating to advertising and newspapers.

It’s worth pointing out in many of these cases I am sure the companies in question were on the wrong side of the law and did need to be slapped on the wrist in court, through fines, etc to bring them in line.

It is however worth considering the German and French governments came together in 2008 to build a competitor to Google called Quaero. The plan was scrapped after the Germans pulled out but the project was slated to be massive – up to $2.6B was to be spent on it over five years.

This isn’t to say the US government hasn’t at times made life difficult for tech companies. The FTC for example just decided that social media like Facebook and Twitter need to have the same consumer protection disclaimers as other forms of advertising. While this makes sense from a fairness perspective, how you put a disclaimer and a message in 140 characters has yet to be determined.

You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to see a pattern emerging here. First the French go after the terms, then the business models and finally the companies themselves.

Google, YouTube, Apple and Beats: Music Options Galore

2013-03-06T11:07:36Z

There is good and bad news for Pandora today. The streaming radio leader has for the first time found itself in a position to compete for radio advertisers on an equal footing thanks to its inclusion in an influential ratings network run by Strata Marketing. The potential in the streaming radio market has brought new competition.

It's worth noting the news recently broke that Apple has held talks with Beats Electronics LLC about collaboration and/or investment in a music service called Daisy – apparently these talks go back a decade but Steve Jobs wasn’t ready to act when they began. Although Apple hasn’t been announced as an investor in the deal, Daisy has just secured $50M from a group including Warner Music owner Len Blavatnik, Fort Worth billionaire Lee M. Bass, and Australian financier James Packer.

Although the service may not be called Daisy when it launches officially it does seem to be based on technology developed by a company Dr. Dre purchased called MOG.

To make matters more interesting, it seems YouTube also will have a streaming service which of course will compete with Google Play (which is celebrating its first birthday with its new name). Does Google need two music services? Some speculate the reason has to do with coercing music owners to keep the free versions of their music on the world’s most popular video sharing service.

What does all this mean? Simply that the internet is going to continue to put massive pressure on terrestrial radio and the amount of choice in the market will in-turn benefit consumers tremendously. In order for these companies to compete they will have to innovate as margins are already razor-thin. Advertisers will have more choice than ever and the market is likely to become somewhat more fragmented.

Apple’s role in streaming music will be interesting to watch as just about everyone else has now launched at least on music service. Remember they picked up streaming service LaLa in 2009 for $80M meaning they are theoretically planning an entry into the space. Can they differentiate theirs somehow by embedding it into iOS more seamlessly than the other market choices? Think about what they've done with their mapping service which is the default when you ask Siri for directions. This sort of integration may make sense but it seems really late for Cupertino to act without being considered a major copycat at this point.

Apple's Magic Dependent on iWatch Success?

2013-03-05T14:40:51Z

At this point we are all aware Apple has a new watch in the works and it is even thought to be released later this year. Pundits have even determined this product could be vastly more profitable for Cupertino than even the much-anticipated Apple TV. They call it a $6B opportunity!

One wonders however how different this product will be from the iPhone. If you think about it, the iPhone transformed the company’s mobile product line and potential. The iPod used to look like a music player but today is an iPhone without the phone. The larger iPad originally was 4 iPhones working as one. The iPad Mini is just a smaller iPad. The point here is much of the Apple innovation centers around one innovative device – everything else seems to just be an extension.

We all know about the Apple “magic” or the ability to design products we didn’t know we wanted but when we see them, we can’t figure out how we ever lived without them. Rob Enderle writes a compelling piece about the situation on TMC’s Wearable Tech World site where he explains the iPhone and iPad should have been duds based on other similar products which preceded them.

I too have commented about how the Nokia N800 tablet which was a better device than the original iPhone never gained traction in the market.

Enderle points to the iWatch as the next big test for the company. We know there are a ton of techie watches in the market - does the company still have what it takes to make a new product launch such as the iWatch go mainstream? He doesn’t think so but he says he hopes he is wrong.

Here is something worth pondering before the launch of such a device. The smartphone made watches less relevant – especially for the younger generation. Will the company who helped kill a generational desire to own time-keeping devices on their wrists get these same people to reverse course and try slapping a piece of electronic jewelry on an area which has never seen a tan line? Time will tell if Apple still has the magic we once associated with Steve Jobs.

Smith Micro Extends MDM Standard to Chipset Level

2013-02-28T14:45:02Z

Smith Micro's main message at Mobile World Congress 2013 was that wirelss broadband connectivity is going to become easier. Carla Fitzgerald, VP Marketing Wireless & Mobility explained how the company has worked with chipset vendors to get its QuickLink MBIM Middleware installed at the chip level in various computer systems.

She said, "Connectivity originally started as an application where the user was once forced to be an IT administrator." She continued, "But now with standards like MBIM and Smith Micro working with chipset vendors, connectivity will be automatic regardless of operating system."

The benfits for users will be the ability to have backward and forward compatability across not only operating system versions but operating systems as well meaning you could take a USB stick modem and seamlessly have it work regardless of your system. Currently the middleware supports just about anything you would want to use such as Windows 7, Vista, XP, Mac OSX and Linux.

There are obvious benefits for carriers as well since this advanacement "lubricates" the system meaning it should be simpler for users to connect to networks regardless of the device they purchase.