Strategy in TECH...
Imagine this, you leave work early to grab a quick bite of lunch and get home before your sister, niece, and nephew arrive for a family visit. At lunch, you get a notification from your Ring Doorbell app and see that they’ve arrived early. No problem, thanks to Ring, you can let them in and head out to meet them there.
But is it really your family? Or is it a hacker who has figured out how to hack your Ring Doorbell and is now in your home, emptying it of all of its valuables?
We learned today that Bowers and Wilkins (B&W) is close to launching a new series of products that appear to be under the “Formation” brand or series name. This news broke when MacRumors, a fan blog for aficionados of Apples McIntosh products, noticed a listing on Apple’s online list of sanctioned HomeKit and AirPlay accessories. They dug deeper…
Eyebrows raised everywhere when privacy-concerned industry watchers discovered that Google had put a microphone in their Nest Secure home alarm system, but failed to disclose that fact. Google says is was simply an “error.” But was it?
The latest data from market research firm Strategy Analytics shows that Amazon is still the king of the smart speaker market – selling more smart speakers than anyone else. But the data also showed something else rather surprising – Google has substantially closed the gap between it and Amazon, coming within about 5.5% of Amazon’s market share numbers in the all-important fourth quarter selling season.
Josh.ai announced this morning that it has partnered with Savant to bring their more intuitive voice command system to one of the leading control systems in custom integration. While there are many advantages to this partnership, a big one is bringing the seamless integration of voice commands to Savant’s renowned user-centric ‘scene’ feature.
In what is becoming a bit of a familiar refrain in tech these days, including our report just yesterday on Control4’s results, Sonos reported record results for their fiscal first quarter on Wednesday. The company beat analysts’ expectations for revenues ($496 million vs. $491M expected) and for earnings ($0.55/share versus $0.41 expected). And yet, their stock tanked fully 17% after the announcement. Not only that, but as of 11:00AM today, Sonos stock is down another more than 13%.
The headline caught my attention immediately – “Exclusive: Foxconn reconsidering plans to make LCD panels at Wisconsin plant.” This story, from the highly respected Reuters News Agency, follows a series of articles on Foxconn’s growing business struggles in the wake of a decline in sales to Apple. But it immediately raised a red flag with me…
I arrived at my destination, Amtrak’s South Station in Boston, right on time. As I approached the doors to exit the station, my eyes suddenly focused on a shocking scene. Not only was there a torrential downpour – that was not a surprise, it had been raining as I departed New Jersey early that morning as well – but added to that downpour were gale force winds. It was like something out of a cheesy Hollywood disaster movie. I saw debris flying by horizontally, people struggling with popped-inside-out umbrellas as they attempted to fight the winds and stinging rain to remain on their feet.
Just then, my cell phone rang. It was an irrepressably jovial Charlie Porritt, CEO of Russound, telling me cheerfully he was only a couple of blocks away and would be there to pick me up in a couple of minutes. I pushed the disconnect button and said out loud to no one in particular – “I’m not going out there!”
We have followed Foxconn for years now, first picking up on them in 2012 when news had emerged that a significant Apple supplier was having problems with employees committing suicide – eventually forcing the company to install ‘suicide nets’ on their taller factories and offices to help thwart further suicide attempts. Foxconn has continued on to become one of Apple, Inc.’s largest iPhone supplier of parts and assembly.
CES 2019 is over the hump, closing tomorrow. But the top tech stories are pretty big and pretty clearly defined – and will be quite exciting, when they appear…someday. The top tech stories include – LG’s rollable, bendable OLED displays, Artificial Intelligence (AI), 5G – the next generation wireless tech, 8K TVs, autonomous vehicles – both car and motorcycle, and Apple & Siri strike back.
